By JILL LAWLESS

LONDON (AP) — British governments past and present face allegations of avoiding scrutiny and undermining democracy after the revelation that thousands of Afghans have been resettled in the U.K under a program that was hidden from the media, the public and lawmakers in Parliament.

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Key information was also kept from the Afghans themselves, who had assisted U.K. forces and whose personal details had been disclosed in a huge data leak. Many plan to sue the British government for putting them in danger from the Taliban. Some are left in Afghanistan as the current British government says the resettlement program will end.

Here’s what happened in an extraordinary chain of events.

An email error with huge consequences

The saga was triggered by the chaotic Western exit from Afghanistan in August 2021 as the Taliban, ousted from power 20 years earlier, swept across the country, seized Kabul and reimposed their strict version of Islamic law.

Afghans who had worked with Western forces — as fixers, translators and in other roles — or who had served in the internationally backed Afghan army were at risk of retribution. Britain set up a program, known as the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy, or ARAP, to bring some to the U.K.

In February 2022, a defense official emailed a spreadsheet containing the personal information of nearly 19,000 ARAP applicants to someone outside the Ministry of Defense. The government says the individual thought they were sending a list of about 150 names, not the whole set.

The British government only became aware of the leak when a portion of the data was posted on Facebook 18 months later by someone who threatened to publish the whole list.

The government sought secrecy

The leak sparked alarm among British officials who feared as many as 100,000 people were in danger when family numbers of the named individuals were added. The then-Conservative government sought a court order barring publication of the list.

Britain’s Defence Secretary John Healey attends Britain’s Prime Minister’s press conference during the NATO summit in The Hague, Netherlands, Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (Ben Stansall/Pool Photo via AP)

A judge granted a sweeping order known as a super injunction, which barred anyone from revealing not only information about the leak but the existence of the injunction itself.

Super injunctions are relatively rare and their use is controversial. Most of the handful of cases in which they have come to light involved celebrities trying to prevent disclosures about their private lives. This is the first known case of a super injunction being granted to the government.

Former Defense Secretary Ben Wallace said Wednesday that he sought the legal order to gain “time and space to deal with this leak, find out whether the Taliban had it” and protect those at risk.

Wallace said he asked for an ordinary injunction — not a super injunction — for a period of four months. The gag order remained in place for almost two years.

A secret program sparked a legal battle

The government began bringing to Britain the Afghans on the leaked list who were judged to be most at risk. To date, some 4,500 people — 900 applicants and approximately 3,600 family members — have been brought to Britain under the program. About 6,900 people are expected to be relocated by the time it closes, at a cost of 850 million pounds ($1.1 billion).

In all, about 36,000 Afghans have been resettled in the U.K. since 2021.

Meanwhile, several news organizations had learned of the leaked list but were barred from publishing stories about it. They challenged the super injunction in court, and a judge ordered it lifted in May 2024 — but it remained in place after the government appealed.

The government finally came clean

Britain held an election in July 2024 that brought the center-left Labour Party to power. Prime Minister Keir Starmer and his Cabinet learned of the injunction soon after taking office and grappled with how to proceed.

In January, the government ordered a review by a former senior civil servant. They found little evidence that the leaked data would expose Afghans to a greater risk of retribution from the Taliban. The review said the Taliban had other sources of information on those who had worked with the previous Afghan government and international forces and is more concerned with current threats to its authority.

Given those findings, the government dropped its support for the super injunction. The injunction was lifted in court Tuesday, and minutes later Defense Secretary John Healey stood in the House of Commons to make the saga public for the first time.

Many questions remain unanswered

Healey said the secret settlement route was being closed, but acknowledged Wednesday that “the story is just beginning,” and many questions remain unanswered.

Immigration critics including Reform UK leader Nigel Farage are demanding to know what screening was done on the people who came under the secret program.

Lawyers for Afghans on the leaked list want to know why the information was kept from them. Adnan Malik, head of data privacy at U.K. legal firm Barings Law, said he was assembling a class-action lawsuit by hundreds of former translators, soldiers and others.

FILE – Demonstrators hold placards, during a protest in Parliament Square, London, Aug. 18, 2021. (AP Photo/Alberto Pezzali, file)

Lawmakers and free speech advocates say the use of a super injunction is deeply worrying. They ask how Parliament and the media can hold the government to account if there is such stringent secrecy.

Judge Martin Chamberlain, who ruled that the injunction should be lifted, said Tuesday at the High Court that the super injunction “had the effect of completely shutting down the ordinary mechanisms of accountability.”

Healey acknowledged that “you cannot have democracy with super injunctions in place,” and said the government had acted as quickly and safely as it could.

“Accountability starts now,” he told the BBC.

By DAVE COLLINS

The largest piece of Mars ever found on Earth was sold for just over $5 million at an auction of rare geological and archaeological objects in New York on Wednesday, while a juvenile dinosaur skeleton went for more than $30 million.

The 54-pound rock named NWA 16788 was discovered in the Sahara Desert in Niger by a meteorite hunter in November 2023, after having been blown off the surface of Mars by a massive asteroid strike and traveling 140 million miles to Earth, according to Sotheby’s. The estimated sale price before the auction was $2 million to $4 million.

The identity of the buyer was not immediately disclosed. The final bid was $4.3 million. Adding various fees and costs, the official bid price was about $5.3 million.

A Martian meteorite, weighing 54.388 lbs. (24.67 kg), said to be the largest piece of Mars on Earth, estimated at $2 – 4 million, is displayed at Sotheby’s, in New York, Wednesday, July 9, 2025, part of their Geek Week auction, July 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

Two advance bids of $1.9 million and $2 million were submitted. The live bidding went slower than for many other objects that were sold, with the auctioneer trying to coax more offers and decreasing the $200,000 to $300,000 bid intervals to $100,000 after the proposals hit $4 million.

The red, brown and gray meteorite is about 70% larger than the next largest piece of Mars found on Earth and represents nearly 7% of all the Martian material currently on this planet, Sotheby’s says. It measures nearly 15 inches by 11 inches by 6 inches.

It was also a rare find. There are only 400 Martian meteorites out of the more than 77,000 officially recognized meteorites found on Earth, the auction house says.

“This Martian meteorite is the largest piece of Mars we have ever found by a long shot,” Cassandra Hatton, vice chairman for science and natural history at Sotheby’s, said in an interview before the auction. “So it’s more than double the size of what we previously thought was the largest piece of Mars.”

It’s not clear exactly when the meteorite was blasted off the surface of Mars, but testing showed it probably happened in recent years, Sotheby’s says.

Hatton said a specialized lab examined a small piece of the red planet remnant and confirmed it was from Mars. It was compared with the distinct chemical composition of Martian meteorites discovered during the Viking space probe that landed on Mars in 1976, she said.

The examination found that it is an “olivine-microgabbroic shergottite,” a type of Martian rock formed from the slow cooling of Martian magma. It has a course-grained texture and contains the minerals pyroxene and olivine, Sotheby’s says.

It also has a glassy surface, likely due to the high heat that burned it when it fell through Earth’s atmosphere, Hatton said. “So that was their first clue that this wasn’t just some big rock on the ground,” she said.

The meteorite previously was on exhibit at the Italian Space Agency in Rome. Sotheby’s did not disclose the owner.

A mounted Juvenile Ceratosaurus skeleton, of the Late Jurassic, Kimmeridgian Stage, approximately 154-149 million years ago, estimated at $4 – 6 million, is displayed at Sotheby’s, in New York, Wednesday, July 9, 2025, part of their Geek Week auction, July 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

Bidding for the juvenile Ceratosaurus nasicornis dinosaur skeleton started with a high advance bid of $6 million, then escalated with offers $500,000 higher than the last and later $1 million higher than the last before ending at $26 million. The official sale price was $30.5 million with fees and costs. The original estimate was $4 million to $6 million.

Parts of the skeleton were found in 1996 near Laramie, Wyoming, at Bone Cabin Quarry, a gold mine for dinosaur bones. It’s more than 6 feet tall and nearly 11 feet long.

Specialists assembled nearly 140 fossil bones with some sculpted materials to recreate the skeleton and mounted it so it’s ready to exhibit, Sotheby’s says.

The skeleton is believed to be from the late Jurassic period, about 150 million years ago, Sotheby’s says.

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Ceratosaurus dinosaurs were bipeds with short arms that appear similar to the Tyrannosaurus rex, but smaller. Ceratosaurus dinosaurs could grow up to 25 feet long, while the Tyrannosaurs rex could be 40 feet long.

The skeleton was acquired last year by Fossilogic, a Utah-based fossil preparation and mounting company.

Wednesday’s auction was part of Sotheby’s Geek Week 2025 and featured 122 items, including other meteorites, fossils and gem-quality minerals.

By SEUNG MIN KIM

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he was “highly unlikely” to fire Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, a public statement made less than 24 hours after suggesting in a private meeting that he was leaning in favor of dismissing the head of the nation’s central bank.

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Trump confirmed that in a White House meeting Tuesday night with about a dozen House Republicans he had discussed the “concept” of dismissing Powell, long a target because of his refusal to lower interest rates as Trump wants.

“Almost every one of them said I should,” Trump said about the lawmakers who had come to talk to him about crypto legislation.

He indicated he was leaning in that direction, according to a White House official. During that session, Trump waved a letter about firing Powell, but a person familiar with the matter said it was essentially a prop drafted by someone else and that the Republican president has not drafted such a letter.

Neither source was authorized to publicly discuss the private meeting and they spoke only on condition on anonymity.

Trump made his comment about being “highly unlikely” to dismiss Powell — ”unless he has to leave for fraud” — during an Oval Office meeting with Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, the crown prince of Bahrain.

In recent days, White House and administration officials have accused Powell of mismanaging a $2.5 billion renovation project at the Fed, adding to months of efforts by Trump try to rid himself of the politically independent central banker.

U.S. stocks were shaky as Trump spoke about Powell on Wednesday. The S&P 500’s modest gain in the morning became a drop of 0.7% after initial reports that the president may fire the Fed chair. Stocks then trimmed their losses after Trump’s later comment.

Treasury yields also swiveled in the bond market but remained mostly calm.

Those at the White House meeting were among the more far-right lawmakers, including members of the House Freedom Cause whose views are not always shared by other Republicans. In the Senate, Republicans have taken a more guarded approach. Some have backed Powell’s performance at the Fed as they await an inspector general’s review of the construction project.

In a speech Wednesday, Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., said if Powell is dismissed, “you are going to see a pretty immediate response”

“If anybody thinks it would be a good idea for the Fed to become another agency in the government subject to the president, they’re making a huge mistake,” said Tillis, who has announced that he is not running for reelection.

Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., said this week that Powell “has done a decent job.”

“I don’t think he’s been perfect,” he said, adding that there have been times they disagreed, but “I do believe that the chairman is calling them like he sees them.”

Republicans on the House Financial Services Committee had been scheduled to meet with Powell on Wednesday evening in a gathering set months ago, but it was abruptly canceled due to votes in the House, according to a committee aide granted anonymity to discuss a private meeting.

AP Business Writer Stan Choe in New York, AP Congressional Correspondent Lisa Mascaro and Associated Press writer Stephen Groves contributed to this report.

By KEVIN FREKING

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump’s request to cancel about $9 billion in foreign aid and public broadcasting spending is nearing passage in the Senate, an action that would have a tiny impact on the nation’s rising debt but could have major ramifications for future spending fights in Congress.

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Spending bills generally need bipartisan support to advance in the Senate. But the legislation before the Senate gives Republicans the opportunity to undo some of the previously approved spending without Democratic support as they follow through on Trump’s efforts to target the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and roll back help for nations suffering from conflict, drought and disease.

The Trump administration is promising more rescission packages to come if the first effort is successful. Democrats say doing so jeopardizes a process that requires lawmakers from both parties to work together to fund the nation’s priorities.

The move to cut a sliver of previously approved spending comes after Republicans muscled Trump’s big tax and spending cut bill to approval in both chambers without any Democratic support. The Congressional Budget Office has projected that measure will increase future federal deficits by about $3.3 trillion over the coming decade.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said Republicans were using the president’s rescissions request to target “wasteful spending.”

“It’s a small but important step for fiscal sanity that we all should be able to agree is long overdue,” Thune said as the Senate opened on Wednesday.

Lawmakers clash over cuts to public radio and TV stations

In opposing the bill, Democrats said Congress was ceding its spending powers to the executive branch with little idea of how the White House Office of Management and Budget would apply the cuts. Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York called the legislation a “terrible bill that guts local news, defunds rural radio stations and makes America less safe on the world stage.”

The legislation would claw back nearly $1.1 billion from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which represents the full amount it’s due to receive during the next two budget years.

The White House says the public media system is politically biased and an unnecessary expense.

The corporation distributes more than 70% of the money to more than 1,500 locally operated public television and radio stations, with much of the remainder assigned to National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting Service to support national programming.

Some Republicans had expressed worries about how local radio and televisions stations would be able to survive without federal assistance. Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., said he secured a deal from the White House that some funding administered by the Department of the Interior would be repurposed to subsidize Native American public radio stations in more than a dozen states.

Democrats are not assured by the side agreements. Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., said in some rural areas of his state pubic radio is the most reliable ways to get news and emergency alerts during wildfire season.

“These cuts will lead to rural public radio stations laying off staff, reducing programming, or even shutting down entirely,” Kelly said.

Kate Riley, president and CEO of America’s Public Television Stations, a network of locally owned and operated stations, said the side deal was “at best a short-term, half-measure that will still result in cuts and reduced service at the stations it purports to save, while leaving behind all other stations, including many that serve Native populations.”

“Simply providing a one-time payment to Tribal stations will not ensure they can continue their current service or even survive,” Riley said.

Slashing billions of dollars from foreign aid

The legislation would also claw back about $8 billion in foreign aid spending. Among the cuts are $800 million for a program that provides emergency shelter, water and sanitation and family reunification for those forced to flee their own country and $496 million to provide humanitarian assistance such as food, water and health care for countries hit by natural disasters and conflicts. There’s also a $4.15 billion cut for programs that aim to boost the economies and democratic institutions in developing and strategically important countries.

Republicans said they winnowed down the president’s request by taking out his proposed $400 million cut to a program known as PEPFAR. That change increased the prospects for the bill’s passage. The politically popular program is credited with saving millions of lives since its creation under then-President George W. Bush, a Republican, to combat HIV/AIDS.

Democrats said the changes Republicans made to save PEPFAR funding were not enough. They said that the Trump administration’s animus toward foreign aid programs would hurt America’s standing in the world and create a vacuum for China to fill.

Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, said the amount of money it takes to save a starving child or prevent the transmission of disease is miniscule, even as the investments secure cooperation with the U.S. on other issues.

But the cuts being made to foreign aid programs through Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency were having life-and-death consequences around the world, he said.

“People are dying right now, not in spite of us but because of us,” Schatz said. “We are causing death.”

Republicans are facing a Friday deadline

Republicans providing just enough votes to take up the bill, with Vice President JD Vance breaking a 50-50 tie on Tuesday night. Three Republicans joined with Democrats in voting against advancing the measure. That sets up on Wednesday what’s known as a vote-a-rama, in which lawmakers will vote on scores of proposed amendments to the bill. Once the amendment process is over, the Senate will vote on final passage.

The House has already shown its support for the president’s request with a mostly party line 214-212 vote, but since the Senate is amending the bill, it will have to go back to the House for another vote.

The bill must be signed into law by midnight Friday for the proposed rescissions to kick in. If Congress doesn’t act by then, the spending stands.