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Olympics: Ivanka Trump to attend closing ceremony

Ivanka Trump is expected to travel to South Korea for the closing ceremony of the 2018 Winter Olympics.

The White House confirmed to BBC News that the first daughter will lead the US delegation in Pyeongchang.

She will also reportedly attend several of the sporting events leading up to the closing ceremony.

Meanwhile, Vice-President Mike Pence said he would not rule out talks with North Korea officials when he attends the Winter Olympics this week.

“I have not requested a meeting, but we’ll see what happens,” he told reporters in Alaska on Monday during a stopover on his way to Japan and South Korea.

Ms Trump tweeted her excitement last month about the Olympic games, which begin in Pyeongchang, South Korea on 8 February.

She was asked to attend the ceremony by her father, President Donald Trump, and the Olympics Committee, according to a White House official.

Ms Trump worked with the International Olympic Committee to bring the 2028 Summer Games to the city of Los Angeles, the official added.

Mr Pence will lead the US delegation to the opening ceremony, and will join the top US general in South Korea as well as other military and diplomatic officials.

The vice-president said though “all options are on the table” regarding North Korea and its nuclear ambitions, part of the goal of his trip was to “tell the truth about North Korea at every stop”.

US Vice-President Mike Pence — Image captionMr Pence has signalled he was open to talks with North Korea

“We’re traveling to the Olympics to make sure that North Korea doesn’t use the powerful symbolism and the backdrop of the Winter Olympics to paper over the truth about their regime,” he said.

He added that it was a “a regime that oppresses its own people, a regime that threatens nations around the world, a regime that continues its headlong rush to develop nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles”.

His comments come a day after he announced he would bring to the games the

Mr Pence said he would bring Otto Warmbier’s father to remind the world of North Korea’s human rights abuses.

The Winter Olympics take place as tensions have eased between North and South Korea. The two nations are expected to march under one flag at the opening ceremony and agreed to field a joint team in women’s ice hockey.

Olympic officials are also scrambling to contain the spread of a norovirus after 41 members of security staff reported having symptoms of vomiting and diarrhoea.

Norovirus hits Olympics security staff

Some 1,200 of the guards have been withdrawn from Olympic sites.

Syria war: UN calls for truce as government pounds rebel enclave

Rescuers carry a badly injured man in a stretcher after a reported air strike on the town of Kafr Batna, in the Eastern Ghouta area outside Damascus (6 February 2018) — Image captionKafr Batna was one of a number of towns in the Eastern Ghouta reportedly hit on Tuesday

The UN has appealed for an immediate ceasefire in Syria, as the government intensified its bombardment of a besieged rebel enclave near Damascus.

UN officials said they needed at least a month to deliver aid to conflict zones and evacuate the critically ill.

Their call came as air strikes reportedly killed more than 40 people in the rebel-held Eastern Ghouta area.

UN war crimes experts also said they were investigating reports of bombs containing chlorine being used there.

Medics, opposition activists and Western powers say government forces have used the toxic chemical in six attacks in the past 30 days in the Eastern Ghouta and the town of Saraqeb, in the rebel-held north-western province of Idlib.

The government has dismissed the reports as “lies”, but the head of the UN’s International Commission of Inquiry on Syria called them “alarming”.

Map showing control of the Eastern Ghouta (18 December 2017)

Paulo Pinheiro also said the “scale and ferocity” of the government’s attacks on the Eastern Ghouta, where 400,000 people have been trapped since 2013, and Idlib had “increased dramatically” in the past 48 hours.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), a UK-based monitoring group, said at least 30 people were killed in strikes in the Eastern Ghouta on Monday.

Another 47 died in fresh attacks on Tuesday, it added, including suspected ground-to-ground missile strikes on the towns of Douma and Harasta. It warned that 19 people were also still stuck under the rubble in several areas.

The Syria Civil Defence, whose rescue workers are commonly known as the White Helmets, earlier put the death toll at about 30.

Media captionEastern Ghouta is the ‘epicentre of suffering’ in Syria

“Today there is no safe area at all,” Siraj Mahmoud, the head of the organisation in Damascus Countryside province, told Reuters news agency. “Right now, we have people under rubble. The targeting is ongoing, warplanes on residential neighbourhoods.”

The SOHR and state media also said that shells fired by rebels in the Eastern Ghouta had killed three people in government-held parts of Damascus.

The UN’s humanitarian co-ordinator for Syria and other UN representatives warned in a joint statement that the situation in the enclave and other conflict areas was “extreme”, and urged all parties to agree to a cessation of hostilities.

“If there was a sufficiently long pause in hostilities, medical evacuations and humanitarian convoys could resume in East Ghouta, saving the lives of hundreds who need urgent medical attention, including many critically ill children,” they said.

Another six people were reportedly killed in government air strikes on Idlib.

On Sunday night, 17 people from Saraqeb presented symptoms consistent with exposure to chlorine gas, including breathing difficulties, according to the Union of Medical Care and Relief Organizations (UOSSM).

Activists said the town was struck by two barrel bombs dropped by helicopters.

Syrians reportedly suffering from breathing difficulties following a Syrian government air strikes on the town of Saraqeb rest at a field hospital (4 February 2018) — Image captionPeople presented symptoms consistent with exposure to chlorine in Saraqeb on Sunday night

UOSSM also reported that hospitals in Maarat al-Numan, Kafranbel and Tal Mardikh had been targeted in air strikes since Sunday and taken out of service.

Government forces, which are backed by Russia and Iran, launched an offensive to retake Idlib in late October. But they stepped up their attacks on the province over the weekend after al-Qaeda-linked jihadists shot down a Russian Su-25 warplane, in an incident in which the pilot was killed.

The UN officials said civilians in Idlib were being forced to move repeatedly to escape fighting, and warned that the province – home to 1.16 million displaced people – might not be able to withstand the consequences of continued conflict.

Louboutin faces setback in EU legal battle over red soles

Louboutin shoes of Vlaams Belang senator Anke Van Dermeersch are pictured on 27 September 2013 — Image captionThe scarlet sole is traditionally associated to Louboutin shoes

French fashion designer Christian Louboutin has been producing his famous scarlet-soled shoes for more than a quarter of a century.

Since the defining day when he reached for an assistant’s “Chinese Red” nail polish to add a finishing flourish to his Pensée high heels, he has fought to protect his signature style.

The latest development in that battle comes from the European Court of Justice (ECJ).

Senior judges have been discussing whether his trademark in Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg – the Benelux countries – holds water.

The case goes back to 2012 when the Dutch shoe retailer Van Haren brought out its Fifth Avenue by Halle Berry line. It included high-heeled shoes with red soles.

Christian Louboutin put his foot down, saying it infringed his brand’s Benelux trademark. The District Court in The Hague agreed and granted a temporary injunction against Van Haren.

The Dutch company – having been ordered to stop producing its black and blue shoes with red soles – appealed against that decision and in 2014 the case was referred to the ECJ for “clarification”.

Van Haren argues the trademark is invalid because EU law does not allow trademarks that consist solely of “the shape that gives substantial value to the goods”.

Christian Louboutin heels are seen on display on 17 August 2007 — Image captionThe advisory is not the end of the case over the red soles yet

Louboutin’s mark covers “the colour red (Pantone 18 1663TP) applied to the sole of a shoe”.

What has been at issue is whether or not “shape” includes colour. If it does, the mark can be ruled invalid.

On Tuesday, ECJ’s Advocate General Maciej Szpunar gave his view that it did.

He added that any decision on the trademark’s validity should not take into account the “attractiveness of the goods flowing from the reputation of the mark or its proprietor”.

Christian Louboutin speaks at a forum on 10 November 2011 — Image captionChristian Louboutin has tried to make a direct link between the red soles and his shoes

It is not the end of the story, although it is a blow to Louboutin’s case. The court still has to come to a definitive decision, which may or may not follow Mr Szpunar’s opinion.

Christian Louboutin has said “the shiny red colour of the soles has no function other than to identify to the public that they are mine”.

He is not the first brand leader to cry blue murder after feeling their signature colours were in danger of being appropriated by someone else.

In 2016 the UK High Court upheld an earlier decision that Cadbury’s trademark for its purple packaging was invalid. It was after Nestlé appealed against a ruling that fellow competitors to the UK chocolate maker could not use “Pantone 2865C”.

The trademark covered the use of the colour “applied to the whole visible surface, or being the predominant colour applied to the whole visible surface, of the packaging of the goods”.

The courts were happy so far as “the whole visible surface” was concerned, but found “the predominant colour” to be too vague. It therefore rendered the whole trademark unusable.

The owners of EasyJet became caught up in a chromatic contretemps when they announced plans to enter the mobile phone market in 2004. It is perhaps not surprising that opposition to EasyMobile’s marketing plans came from Orange.

The telecoms giant claimed the presence of two mobile companies on the market both sporting tangerine would be confusing.

Composite picture with Easy Jet and Orange logos — Image captionToo much tangerine? Orange opposed EasyJet’s marketing plans for a new telecoms firm

In 2014, BP lost a fight to trademark the use of the colour green on petrol forecourts in Australia. It failed to convince the intellectual property watchdog that the firm was inextricably linked in the mind of the average motorist with a particular shade of green (Pantone 348C, if you must know).

Examples from the United States perhaps give the best impression that you can – more or less – own a colour. The jewellery brand Tiffany and delivery company UPS have both secured high levels of protection for their chosen hues: robin’s egg blue and Pullman brown, respectively.

It is worth noting that Christian Louboutin holds a valid trademark for red-soled shoes in the US (provided the rest of the shoe is not also red). Nevertheless, that has not been enough to protect him in the European courts.

As long as there is this variation between jurisdictions, colour trademarking is likely to remain a grey area.

Quentin Tarantino: Uma Thurman car crash was a ‘horrendous mistake’

Quentin Tarantino and Uma Thurman — Image captionThe pair have been friends for over 20 years

Quentin Tarantino has said allowing Uma Thurman to drive a car that crashed on the set of 2003 film Kill Bill is “one of the biggest regrets of my life”.

He said he drove the car in one direction to test it, but then asked Thurman to drive it the other way.

He said he didn’t realise there was a twist in the road coming back. Thurman posted footage of her crash on Monday.

The director said failing to test the route one more time was “one of my most horrendous mistakes”.

Thurman suffered neck and knee injuries in the accident.

In a New York Times interview published over the weekend, Thurman said she had worries about the state of the car, but that Tarantino had persuaded her to go ahead with the scene.

In an interview with Deadline Hollywood, the director said he heard “Uma was trepidatious about doing the driving shot” but added: “None of us ever considered it a stunt. It was just driving. Maybe we should have but we didn’t.”

He said he drove down the road to check it was OK and thought, “this is going to be okay. This is a straight shot… no hidden S-curves”..

He added: “I was very happy, thinking, she can totally do this, it won’t be a problem.

“I came in there all happy telling her she could totally do it, it was a straight line, you will have no problem. Uma’s response was ‘OK’. Because she believed me. Because she trusted me… I told her it would be safe. And it wasn’t. I was wrong.

“I didn’t force her into the car. She got into the car because she trusted me. And she believed me.”

He said they decided Thurman should drive the car down the same road in the opposite direction because the light would be better as it was getting towards the end of the day.

“I thought, a straight road is a straight road and I didn’t think I needed to run the road again to make sure there wasn’t any difference, going in the opposite direction.

“Again, that is one of the biggest regrets of my life. As a director, you learn things and sometimes you learn them through horrendous mistakes. That was one of my most horrendous mistakes, that I didn’t take the time to run the road, one more time, just to see what I would see.”

Uma Thurman — Image captionKill Bill Volume One was released in 2003

He said it was “just horrible” when he saw her crash.

“It was heartbreaking. Beyond one of the biggest regrets of my career, it was one of the biggest regrets of my life.

“It affected me and Uma for the next two or three years. It wasn’t like we didn’t talk. But a trust was broken.”

Writing on Instagram, Thurman said she was proud of Tarantino for finding the footage for her.

“Quentin Tarantino was deeply regretful and remains remorseful about this sorry event, and gave me the footage years later so I could expose it and let it see the light of day, regardless of it most likely being an event for which justice will never be possible,” she said.

“He also did so with full knowledge it could cause him personal harm, and I am proud of him for doing the right thing and for his courage.”

Uma Thurman and Michael Madsen — Image captionMichael Madsen played one of the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad

In the interview, Tarantino also responded to other claims in the New York Times – namely that the director spat in Thurman’s face in the Kill Bill scene where Michael Madsen is seen on screen doing so, and choked her with a chain in the scene where a teenager named Gogo is seen doing it in the film.

The director said: “I love Michael, he’s a terrific actor, but I didn’t trust him with this kind of intricate work, of nailing this. So the idea is, I’m doing it, I’m taking responsibility. Also, I’m the director, so I can kind of art direct this spit.”

Regarding the choking scene, Tarantino said it was the actress’s suggestion “to just wrap the thing around her neck, and choke her. Not forever, not for a long time”.

He added: “I would ask a guy the same thing. In fact, I would probably be more insistent with a guy.”

Responding to the New York Times article, he added: “Uma was in turmoil about the uprising against me this whole weekend… she never meant this to roll over to me.

“We’re both one of the closest people in each other’s lives.”

London mayor plans neighbourhood on Elizabeth Line site

The mayor of London has announced plans to transform a tunnelling site into a new neighbourhood with 1,500 homes.

Sadiq Khan said Transport for London (TfL) was seeking to develop the 12.3-acre Limmo Peninsula in Newham, east London.

The site is currently being used to build the new Elizabeth Line, which is due to open in December.

Six hundred of the 1,500 planned homes will be “genuinely affordable”, the mayor said.

“The Limmo Peninsula has the capacity to be transformed into a booming new east London neighbourhood,” Mr Khan said.

“It is part of my strategy to free up public land and to use it to build homes that our great city so desperately needs.

“It is no secret that it will take many years to fix London’s housing crisis, and we ultimately need government support – but schemes such as this prove that we can make a real difference now by delivering high-quality neighbourhoods with a large proportion of genuinely affordable homes.”

The mayor is in the process of trying to find a partner to develop the Limmo Peninsula, which is TfL’s largest land site.

Melanie Leech, chief executive, British Property Federation, said: “Unlocking new sites for housing is vital in meeting London’s desperate need for more homes.

“In London, working with TfL and capitalising on sites such as this to add to housing supply is critical, particularly when the mayor has an ambitious target of 65,000 new homes each year.”

Katie Price urging MPs to tackle online abuse

Katie Price is to appear in Parliament later to call on MPs to make online abuse a criminal offence.

The reality TV star and model also wants to see the creation of a register of offenders.

Her 15-year-old son Harvey – who is partially blind, autistic and has Prader-Willi syndrome – has been targeted on social media.

MPs launched an inquiry into online abuse after a petition started by Ms Price was backed by 200,000 people.

It is possible to prosecute people who send abusive or threatening messages on social media under existing laws.

But campaigners say these laws were created before the internet was invented and need to be updated.

Ms Price, who is appearing before the Commons Petitions Committee, says she wants to introduce legislation called Harvey’s Law to give people extra protection.

She said of her son’s experiences: “Harvey was getting racial abuse, they were mocking him … putting him on t-shirts, and he’s got complex special needs – I’ve got five children but they always pick on him.”

“He cannot speak for himself but I can,” she told the OP’S NEWS Daily Politics.

“I have two had people arrested by the police – they took it as far as they could but they could not charge them with anything because there is absolutely nothing in place.

“So I thought, I am going to do something about this.”

She said freedom of speech was important but there had to be a line and it was not just people with disabilities who needed protection, “it could be anyone”.

“I am going to fight as much as I can to get online abuse a criminal offence,” she said and added that she was counting on MPs to “put a case together, and believe in me, and take it to the next step so it is a discussion in government”.

‘Death threats’

The Petitions Committee is looking at the impact of online abuse – particularly on people with disabilities – responsibility for protection, whether technology companies are doing enough.

It is also examining whether the law needs to be changed, how to define online abuse and what support is given to victims.

The government’s minister for women, Victoria Atkins, said she had become disillusioned with social media.

“I’ve come off Twitter because I was so fed up of it. I was fed up with the death threats and the nastiness, from people who often live many many miles away from my constituency,” she told BBC Radio 5 live’s told Emma Barnett.

It comes as Prime Minister Theresa May prepares to announce proposed new laws to stop people being intimidated in public life.

In a speech marking the centenary of women getting the vote, she will make an appeal for “tolerance and respect” and say it is unacceptable for anyone to face threats over their political views.

The PM will add that she is considering a new offence to protect politicians and their families.

Brits rescued from flooded river ‘containing crocodiles’

A campervan half-submerged in a river near a sign warning of crocodiles — Image captionThree British men spent the night on top of their campervan

Three British tourists in Australia have been rescued after rising floodwaters stranded them on the roof of their van.

Unaware of the flood risk, the men, all in their early 20s, set up camp next to a river in Queensland, known locally for its saltwater crocodiles.

Water levels rose during the night, forcing the men on to their vehicle roof where they waited until morning.

Emergency services said the men had done the “right thing” by staying put.

The alarm was raised on Tuesday at 6:00 local time (19:00 GMT Monday) after the trio were seen on top of their half-submerged vehicle with 100m of water between them and dry land.

Saltwater crocodiles, which can reach up to 23ft (7m) in length, are known to live in the area.

“The worst case scenario would have been if they thought ‘let’s give it a go and swim’ which would have been a potential life or death situation,” said Queensland Fire and Emergency Services officer Guy Bulmer, who was first on the scene.

“You don’t know what’s in the water. Crocs, logs, debris.”

Earlier in the day, other visitors to the area, about 15 miles south of Cairns, had been warned of the flooding risks.

However, they had left by the time the British tourists arrived.

Media captionDo you have what it takes to be a ‘croc-wrangler’?

“During the night and the course of the evening they noticed water entering the campervan and there was a croc sign quite close by,” said Mr Bulmer.

“The signs are not there for general information. It’s quite specific – there are crocodiles there.

‘Potential for death’

“They went to the roof of the van and it’s not until they were seen this morning that someone saw them there – they had no shirts on either.”

It took emergency services 45 minutes to rescue the men, using a rubber dingy and lookouts for crocodiles.

“We had people on watch assisted by the police in case any crocs did turn up,” Mr Bulmer said.

“They look like logs so they are hard to spot, but they are quite shy and we were making a lot of noise.

“I wouldn’t have been surprised if they were around though.

“You’ve also got debris in the water, it’s extremely dirty, so there is plenty of potential for injury and death.”

Mr Bulmer added: “After we got [the men] back to dry land they were certainly grateful.

“They had a cold and wet night. They got warmed up and it was happy days because no-one got hurt.”

A British woman was less fortunate in November when was bitten on the leg by a crocodile in Cape Tribulation, Queensland.

The same month, a crocodile was also thought to be responsible for the death of a local man, after human remains and clothes were discovered near a creek bank in the north of the state,

Cambridge University admits ‘significant’ sexual misconduct problem

Aerial view of Cambridge — Image captionCambridge University students and staff reported abuse over a nine-month period using an online form

Cambridge University has admitted it has a “significant problem involving sexual misconduct” after receiving 173 anonymous reports.

Both students and staff reported abuse over a nine-month period using an online form started in May 2017.

Of those, 119 are students complaining about other students, but two have complained about staff and some staff have also complained about colleagues.

The university said it showed students had the “confidence” to report issues.

It launched the online form encouraging students and staff to report anonymously any harassment, hate crime or sexual misconduct concerns.

Breaking the Silence campaign advert — Image captionThe university launched an awareness-raising campaign called Breaking the Silence in October

While other universities have similar strategies, Cambridge University’s pro-vice-chancellor for education, Graham Virgo, said it was “the first to publish such a high number of reports”, as The Guardian first reported.

Writing in The Conversation, an academic news website, he said: “We expected high numbers, and view it as a metric of success.

“It appears victims have confidence in our promise that these figures will be used to judge the nature and scale of sexual misconduct affecting students and staff, and to act on it accordingly.”

The university’s campaigns showed that it has “a large number of Cambridge voices who have reported the issues they’ve faced”, Prof Virgo added.

Image captionProf Graham Virgo said the figures showed a “significant problem” within the university

In September, the university advertised for a sexual assault and harassment adviser at a salary of up to £37,000 to “bolster advice and support available to students”.

It also launched an awareness-raising campaign called Breaking the Silence in October.

Before its Breaking the Silence campaign, 52% of those reporting recent incidents thought nothing would be done if they made a complaint. Following the launch, that has dropped to 30%, Prof Virgo said.

In the past five years, there had been fewer than six reports made formally to the university each term.

Prof Virgo added: “It supports our belief that we have a significant problem involving sexual misconduct – what we now need to ensure is that those who have been affected receive the support and guidance they need.”

Hunt orders review of disciplining doctors after Bawa-Garba case

Jeremy Hunt has ordered an urgent review of medical malpractice cases following concerns over a recent manslaughter case involving a doctor.

Dr Hadiza Bawa-Garba was struck off the medical register after she was found guilty of mistakes in the care of a six-year-old boy who died of sepsis.

The health secretary says clarity is needed about drawing the line between gross negligence and ordinary errors.

Doctors should learn from not fear mistakes, he says.

The Bawa-Garba case has rocked the medical profession.

Medics rally behind struck off doctor

Doctor struck off over six-year-old’s death

More than 800 medics have signed an open letter in support of Dr Bawa-Garba, saying focusing on one person ignored the part low staffing levels played in the tragedy and striking her off would discourage medics from being open when reviewing mistakes.

Dr Bawa-Garba was originally suspended from the medical register for 12 months last June by a tribunal, but she has now been removed from the medical register following a High Court appeal by regulator the General Medical Council.

The GMC said the the original decision was “not sufficient to protect the public”.

Jack Adcock — Image captionJack died at Leicester Royal Infirmary in 2011 when undiagnosed sepsis led to cardiac arrest

Health and Social Care Secretary Jeremy Hunt said: “The only way we can reduce mistakes in the NHS is to learn from every single one, and the tragic case of Dr Bawa-Garba raises many important questions about how the health system supports staff to be open and transparent when things go wrong.”

The government’s rapid review will be led by Prof Sir Norman Williams, former President of the Royal College of Surgeons, and will report back by the end of April 2018.

It will look at:

Any lessons that need to be learned by the General Medical Council and other professional regulators
How learning, openness and transparency can be protected so that mistakes are learned from and not covered up
Providing clarity to doctors about where they stand with respect to criminal liability and professional misconduct

Tragic case

When six-year-old Jack Adcock, from Glen Parva, Leicestershire, was admitted to the hospital in February 2011, his sepsis went undiagnosed and led to him suffering a cardiac arrest.

The courts heard Dr Bawa-Garba, a paediatrician, committed a “catalogue” of errors, including missing signs of his infection and mistakenly thinking Jack was under a do-not-resuscitate order.

At the time of the ruling, Jack’s mother, Nicola, said: “We are absolutely elated with the decision. It’s what we wanted.

“I know we’ll never get Jack back but we have got justice for our little boy.”

The Medical Protection Society, which represented Dr Bawa-Garba, said at the time: “A conviction should not automatically mean that a doctor who has fully remediated and demonstrated insight into their clinical failings is erased.”

An online appeal set up by concerned doctors has raised more than £320,000 to help pay the legal costs of Dr Bawa-Garba.

Charlie Massey, chief executive of the General Medical Council, welcomed the announcement of the government’s rapid review.

People smuggling raids: 21 arrests made across England

Raids have taken place across England in an operation to tackle people smuggling involving suspected Kurdish gangsters.

The National Crime Agency (NCA) said 350 officers were involved in the raids in Middlesbrough, Hartlepool, Stockton, Newcastle, Hastings and London.

Officers raided about 20 addresses and made 21 arrests in the major operation.

The gang is suspected of charging up to £10,000 per head to smuggle migrants in the back of lorries across the Channel.

As well as residential properties, a number of car washes believed to be linked to money laundering activities were also raided.

The NCA said most of the trafficked immigrants are Iraqi Kurds and mostly men, but some families have also been brought into Britain.

Deputy director Tom Dowdall said: “We believe we have identified and disrupted a significant network which is suspected of smuggling hundreds of migrants into the UK and planned to carry on going.”

Police arrested a 42-year-old from a terraced house in Devonshire Road, Linthorpe, Middlesbrough, who was one of 16 people arrested in the Cleveland Police area.

A further two people were arrested in London, as well as two in Sussex and one in the Northumbria area.

The NCA’s senior investigating officer Mark Spoors said the suspects were arrested on suspicion of immigration offences and linked to money laundering.

“The crime group have used complicit lorry drivers running from France into the UK,” he added.

Mr Spoors said the operation had been a success as all the targets had been arrested.

The operation followed a year-long investigation with links to the French, Belgian and Dutch authorities, the NCA said.

It said it was one of the biggest operations it had carried out since it started five years ago.

Officers at a briefing at Cleveland Police’s HQ in Middlesbrough were told some of those targeted were suspected of being involved in bringing migrants into the UK in lorries for money.

They were told two men in the Linthorpe area of Middlesbrough were thought to be ringleaders.