A photo of the Prince of Wales with another generation – this time of puppies – has been posted on social media by Kensington Palace to mark his 43rd birthday.

The picture, taken by the Princess of Wales, shows Prince William with their family’s Cocker spaniel, Orla, and three of her four recently-arrived puppies.

The message for Prince William was signed online “with love”, with the initials of Catherine and their children, George, Charlotte, Louis, and “the puppies”, plus a paw print emoji.

The picture was taken in Windsor earlier this month.

There was also a message online for Prince William from the official account of the Royal Family, saying “Happy Birthday to The Prince of Wales!”, plus some celebratory emojis.

An accompanying picture, of the prince sitting on a stone wall, was taken while he visited farmers and food producers on the Duchy of Cornwall – a parcel of land William now owns – in May.

Orla was given to the royal couple by Catherine’s brother, James Middleton, in 2020, shortly after the death of their previous dog Lupo.

The dog – seen walking behind William in the picture – gave birth to four puppies in May.

Spaniels are well known for their affectionate behaviour and the picture shows the puppies clambering around the prince.

In the puppy picture, the prince looks relaxed in a pair of jeans and trainers – an informal moment after recent showcase occasions, including Trooping the Colour and the Order of the Garter procession.

He also visited a project linked to his Earthshot environmental prize which creates a type of sustainable dye that can reduce the fashion industry’s use of harmful chemicals – so colours can really be green.

Catherine did not appear at Royal Ascot earlier this week, with royal aides saying she had to find a balance in how she returned to public events. In January, the princess revealed she was in remission after her cancer diagnosis last year.

On Friday, she sent out a message about her support for children’s hospices – saying they helped families who were “heartbroken, fearful of the future and often desperately isolated”.

And now her photo has marked her husband’s birthday.

While Prince William was born in mid-summer on the longest day of the year, his father King Charles has been praising those in Antarctica experiencing the shortest day of the year.

He recorded a special message for the BBC’s Antarctic Midwinter Broadcast, which sends a morale-raising message to scientists working in remote research stations in the depths of their winter.

The King praised the work of researchers tracking climate change.

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Terrance “T.A.” Dixon, Fat Joe’s former hype man, has filed an incendiary lawsuit in federal court against the rapper. Filed on Thursday, the lawsuit alleges that Fat Joe, whose real name is Joseph Antonio Cartagena, engaged in “coercive labor exploitation, financial fraud, sexual manipulation, violent intimidation, and psychological coercion.” Dixon asserts that the rapper and his associates deliberately suppressed and erased his contributions to Fat Joe’s success and brand.

Filed in U.S. District Court Southern District of New York, the filing details many disturbing claims about Fat Joe’s sexual relations that it contains a trigger warning on the first page of the 157-page document. Allegedly, Fat Joe engaged in sex with minors on numerous occasions.

According to Dixon, Fat Joe forced him into “humiliating situations, including sex acts performed under duress and surveillance, accompanied by threats of abandonment in foreign countries.” Dixon believes he was coerced into “more than 4,000 sexual acts to maintain his standing within the Enterprise.”

“Defendant was in love with Minor Doe 3,” Dixon claims. “He even contemplated leaving his wife. The Defendant paid all Minor Doe 3’s bills and even took her overseas to his tour stops. He brought her to Florida and would put her up in a condo he rented a few blocks from his house with his wife,” the lawsuit asserts. “In a recorded conversation, Minor Doe 3 and her 15-year-old cousin describe in detail to Plaintiff how ‘inappropriate’ it was for Defendant, who was in his late 30s at the time, to be fawning over children.”

Notably, Dixon is represented by Tyrone Blackburn, who is also the lead counsel in the federal case against Sean “Diddy” Combs. He is seeking up to $20 million in damages.

Fat Joe’s attorney, Joe Tacopina—who has defended many high-profile clients, including Donald Trump and A$AP Rocky—responded to the lawsuit with a statement to Variety. “The lawsuit filed by Tyrone Blackburn and Terrance Dixon is a blatant act of retaliation—a desperate attempt to deflect attention from the civil suit we filed first, which exposed their coordinated scheme to extort [Fat Joe] through lies, threats, and manufactured allegations.”

“Law enforcement is aware of the extortionate demand at the heart of this scheme,” Tacopina’s statement continues. “The allegations against Mr. Cartagena are complete fabrications—lies intended to damage his reputation and force a settlement through public pressure. Mr. Cartagena will not be intimidated. We have taken legal action to expose this fraudulent campaign and hold everyone involved accountable.”

The new filing also names Pete “Pistol Pete” Torres and Richard “Rich Player” Jospitre, listed as key associates in Fat Joe’s “criminal enterprise,” with claims of violations of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act and the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO). Further, the suit names Jay-Z’s Roc Nation with allegations that the company, which represents Fat Joe, knowingly participated in “concealing, transferring, and manipulating” Dixon’s creative rights and royalty interests.

Defendants allegedly “engaged in deliberate tax fraud schemes” in an effort to conceal their extensive wage theft, artificially inflate Dixon’s tax liabilities, and more. The filing also cites a whistleblower accountant who is said to have come forward last year, as well as recorded phone calls that “helped paint the picture” of the full scope of allegations.

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At least 30 US military planes have been moved from bases in America to Europe over the past three days, flight tracking data reviewed by BBC Verify has shown.

The planes in question are all US military tanker aircraft used to re-fuel fighter jets and bombers. According to Flightradar24, at least seven of these – all KC-135s – stopped off in US airbases in Spain, Scotland and England.

The flights come as Israel and Iran continue to exchange strikes, after Israel launched an operation on Friday that it said was to destroy Tehran’s nuclear programme.

It is unclear whether the US movements are directly connected to the conflict, but one expert told BBC Verify that the tanker aircraft flights were “highly unusual”.

Justin Bronk, a senior analyst with the Royal United Services Institute (Rusi) think tank, said that the deployments were “highly suggestive” that the US was putting in place contingency plans to “support intensive combat operations” in the region in the coming weeks.

The seven jets tracked by BBC Verify have since travelled on and according to flight tracking data could be seen flying east of Sicily as of Tuesday afternoon. Six had no stated destination – one landed on the Greek island of Crete.

But the former head of Irish Defence Forces, Vice-Admiral Mark Mellett, said that the movements could be part of a broader policy of “strategic ambiguity” that could be attempting to influence Iran to make concessions in talks over its nuclear programme.

Israel initially launched an attack on Iranian nuclear infrastructure on Friday, just a day after President Donald Trump’s deadline to Iran to strike a deal on suspending its nuclear programme expired.

The jet movements come amid reports that the US has also moved an aircraft carrier – the USS Nimitz, from the South China Sea towards the Middle East. The Reuters news agency reported that a planned event involving the ship in Vietnam was cancelled after what the US embassy in Hanoi called an “emergent operational requirement”.

MarineTraffic, a ship-tracking website, showed that the USS Nimitz’s last location was in the Malacca Strait heading towards Singapore early on Tuesday. The Nimitz carries a contingent of fighter jets and is escorted by several guided missile destroyers.

The US has also moved F-16, F-22 and F-35 fighter jets to bases in the Middle East, three defence officials told Reuters on Tuesday. The tanker planes moved to Europe over the past several days can be used to re-fuel these jets.

Earlier on Tuesday, Vice-President JD Vance suggested that the US could intervene to support Israel’s campaign, writing on social media that Trump “may decide he needs to take further action” to end Iran’s nuclear programme.

Tehran is believed to run two principal underground enrichment sites. Natanz has already been hit by Israel, and Fordo is buried deep within a mountain complex near the city of Qom.

To penetrate the facility, the US would likely have to use GBU-57A/B Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP) munitions, two senior Western military officers told BBC Verify. MOPs are huge, 30,000lb (13,600kg) bombs also known as “bunker busters”.

The bomb is the only conventional weapon of its kind that is thought to be capable of breaching up to 200ft (60m) of concrete. Only the B-2 stealth bomber can carry the munitions.

Recently, the US has had a squadron of B-2 bombers at its base on the island of Diego Garcia. While the island is some 2,400 miles from Iran’s southern coastline, their location on Diego Garcia would put them well within striking of range of Iran.

“You would be able to maintain a sustained operation from [Diego Garcia] far more efficiently,” Air Marshall Greg Bagwell – a former RAF deputy operations chief – told BBC Verify. “You could literally have them round the clock operating.”

Satellite images first showed B-2 bombers had been stationed on Diego Garcia at the end of March, but the most recent imagery from the island no longer shows the bombers present.

2:04How one US weapon could change the course of the Israel-Iran conflict

Vice-Admiral Mellet said he would expect to see the bombers on the island ahead of any operation targeting Iran and called their absence “a missing piece of the jigsaw”.

Air Marshall Bagwell agreed. But he noted that B-2s have been known to operate for 24 hours at a time and could launch from the continental US if the White House decided to launch a strike.

“They’ve taken away any means for Iran to now defend itself, which obviously leaves any military or even the nuclear targets pretty much at the mercy of whatever Israel wants to do to it.”

Additional reporting by Merlyn Thomas.

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