it is surrounded by electric fences. normally there are guards in watchtowers who are there, armed, ready to react every 2a hours. this happened on new year s day. it has happened in the same area in the last year, so there are questions about the security and surveillance of the border area in this east coast part of south korea. what appears to have happened is an alert was raised about 6:a0am on new year s day and then a search was made for about three orfour hours. they did not find the individual and that individual has then made it into north korea. one of the things we do know, and certainly one of my sources is telling me, is it is a civilian but we don t know if it is a south korean citizen or whether or not it was a north korean defector who was here in the south, who may have wanted to try and go back north. coronavirus is continuing to cause major disruption for travellers worldwide.
a crucial court hearing in new york on tuesday. he also rejected arguments by the prince s lawyer, andrew brettler, that the lawsuit should be dismissed because miss giuffre, a us citizen, no longer lives in the us. this comes after ghislaine maxwell was convicted this week of recruiting and trafficking young girls to be sexually abused by her boyfriend, the late american financier jeffrey epstein, between 1994 and 2004. on tuesday, judge kaplan will hear oral arguments to decide whether virginia giuffre s lawsuit against prince andrew will proceed. aruna iyengar, bbc news. the south korean military says it has carried out a search operation after a south korean man crossed the border into north korea. the circumstances of the apparent defection are unclear, but a military source said the unnamed man crossed from the demilitarised zone into the north on saturday evening.
he also rejected arguments by the prince s lawyer, andrew brettler, that the lawsuit should be dismissed because ms giuffre, a us citizen, no longer lives in the us. this comes after ghislaine maxwell was convicted this week of recruiting and trafficking young girls to be sexually abused by her boyfriend, the late american financier jeffrey epstein, between 1994 and 200a. on tuesday, judge kaplan will hear oral arguments to decide whether virginia giuffre s lawsuit against prince andrew will proceed. aruna iyengar, bbc news. the latest headlines on bbc news. secondary school pupils are to be required to wear facemasks in class in england, as coronavirus cases continue to surge across europe. fears a quarter of uk public sector workers could be off due to coronavirus as firms are warned to make contingency plans. france will cut the covid self isolation period from ten to seven days, in a bid to ease staff pressures.
thrown out prince andrew s attempt to halt proceedings in a civil lawsuit against him. the duke of york s lawyers had argued that virginia giuffre who has accused him of sexually assaulting her when she was a teenager lives in australia, so is not a us resident. but they did lose that argument. prince andrew has consistently denied the allegations. aruna iyengar has this report. seen here at the age of 17, virginia roberts, now giuffre, with prince andrew on the left and ghislaine maxwell in the background. ms giuffre has accused prince andrew of sexually assaulting her when she was a teenager at the homes ofjeffrey epstein, the convicted child sex offender, and ghislaine maxwell. prince andrew has consistently denied the allegations. the civil lawsuit seeks unspecified damages. two efforts to stall the case were blocked on saturday. us federaljudge lewis a kaplan told the prince s lawyers they must hand over key legal documents before a crucial court hearing in new york on tuesday
three orfour hours. they did not find the individual and that individual has then made it into north korea. one of the things we do know, and certainly one of my sources is telling me, is it is a civilian but we don t know if it is a south korean citizen or whether or not it was a north korean defector who was here in the south, who may have wanted to try and go back north. in the uk, 20 conservative mps and peers have called on the prime minister to tackle the spiralling cost of living. five former ministers are among the signatories of a letter to the sunday telegraph, which follows huge increases in wholesale gas prices. 0ur political correspondent chris mason reports. wholesale gas and electricity prices are rising steeply. the boss of one energy firm is predicting an enormous crisis this year as a consequence. now 20 tory parliamentarians are expressing their concerns, too. their letter has been organised