Michaela Mabinty DePrince, the ballerina born during a civil war in Sierra Leone who performed in Beyoncé’s ‘Lemonade’ visual album, has died aged 29, according to an announcement posted to her official Instagram page.

“Her life was one defined by grace, purpose, and strength. Her unwavering commitment to her art, her humanitarian efforts, and her courage in overcoming unimaginable challenges will forever inspire us,” the post read.

“She stood as a beacon of hope for many, showing that no matter the obstacles, beauty and greatness can rise from the darkest of places.”

No cause of death has been given. Her sister Mia said she was in a “shock and deep sadness”.

DePrince made history as the youngest principal dancer at the Dance Theatre of Harlem and went on to dance with the Dutch National Ballet and the Boston Ballet, where she was a second soloist.

Her talent was brought to a wider audience with a cameo in ‘Lemonade’, the video that accompanied Beyoncé’s album of the same name. DePrince told the WSJ she thought it was a joke when she heard the singer wanted her for the video, who told DePrince in person it was an ‘honor’ to have her star.

Born during Sierra Leone’s brutal war and sent to live in an orphanage after both of her birth parents died – her father was killed by rebels and her mother starved to death – DePrince had an early life marked by the horrors of war.

At the orphanage, she was called “the devil’s child” and was ill-treated by orphanage carers because she had vitiligo – a skin condition that causes blotches of lightening skin. She witnessed one of her teachers be murdered by rebels and was stabbed by a little boy while trying to save her.

Called Mabinty Bangura when she was born, DePrince first saw a ballerina on the cover of a magazine outside the orphanage when she was just three years old.

“I was just so fascinated by this person, by how beautiful she was, how she was wearing such a beautiful costume,” said DePrince. Though she had no idea what ballet was, she kept the magazine cover and dreamt of one day becoming as happy as the dancer in the photo.

Shortly after, DePrince was adopted by a couple from New Jersey and began a new life in the United States. Her family nurtured her love for ballet and enrolled her in classes.

“From the very beginning of our story back in Africa, sleeping on a shared mat in the orphanage, Michaela (Mabinty) and I used to make up our own musical theater plays and act them out. We created our own ballets,” wrote her sister Mia, who was also born in Sierra Leone and adopted by the same family, in a statement.

DePrince went on to earn a full scholarship to the American Ballet Theater’s summer intensive at the age of 13 and earned another scholarship in the youth America Grand Prix, the biggest ballet competition in the world.

It was not a journey without prejudice. As a Black girl in the predominantly white preserve of ballet, she almost quit at the age of 10 when a teacher said she did not want to put effort and money into Black dancers.

“Despite being told the ‘world wasn’t ready for black ballerinas’ or that ‘black ballerinas weren’t worth investing in,’ she remained determined, focused, and began making big strides,” wrote dancer Misty Copeland in a tribute posted to social media. “Michaela had so much more to give,” she added.

In 2014, DePrince co-authored a memoir about her life with her adoptive mother called ‘Taking Flight: From War Orphan to Star Ballerina’ and went on to become an ambassador for War Child Holland, promoting the well-being and mental health of children living in war zones.

“This work meant the world to her,” wrote her family in their statement, asking that people donate to the organization in her memory.

A Russian counteroffensive to recover parts of Kursk lost to Ukrainian forces following a surprise, cross-border attack is underway but is yet to gain momentum.

Ukraine launched its assault last month, capturing scores of settlements, a move that stunned even Kyiv’s allies. But from the beginning observers have said it was unlikely that it would be able to hold on to its gains.

Geolocated video shows that Russian units have retaken a couple of villages, but the situation remains fluid. Both the quality and number of Russian troops committed to the region are hazy, and reliable frontline accounts are few and far between.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has acknowledged the start of Russia’s counteoffensive and says it intends to deploy 60,000 – 70,000 troops in the Kursk region. But he said Friday that the Russians “have not yet had any serious success. Our heroic soldiers are holding on.”

The US has assessed that Russia would need up to 20 brigades – about 50,000 men – to expel Ukrainian forces from Kursk, but Defense Department spokesman Major Gen. Pat Ryder said Thursday that Russian actions so far were “marginal” and analysts have not seen the sort of mass or quality that would quickly drive out the much smaller Ukrainian force.

Some high-caliber units do appear to be involved in the Russian counter-offensive geolocated video showed elements of the elite 51st Airborne Regiment involved in an assault on Thursday. But the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) assesses that little of the Russian grouping in Kursk “is comprised of combat experienced units.”

Initial indications are that Russian forces may try to cut off Ukrainian troops near the town of Korenevo before beginning a larger-scale counteroffensive operation.

Video surfaced of the Russian flag – and incidentally, the flag of the Wagner private military company – being raised in the village of Snahost. But the officer said the situation had stabilized and there was fierce fighting in another nearby village.

There are also signs that Ukrainian units may be developing a new assault route into a different part of Kursk, near the town of Veseloe. This might be intended to distract Russian forces.

“By launching surprise offensives across the thinly defended border, Ukraine can pursue operational-level guerrilla warfare to support an overall strategy of exhaustion,” says Robert Rose of the Modern War Institute at West Point.

Despite the gathering Russian counterattack in Kursk, and mounting Ukrainian losses, Zelensky insists the incursion into Kursk is necessary and valuable, and has slowed Russian advances in eastern Donetsk, where the city of Pokrovsk is under immediate threat. Russia’s President Vladimir Putin is seeking to fully capture four eastern Ukrainian regions he already partly controls, and most of the fighting in the war has focused on this area.

“The speed [of the Russian advance] in the Donetsk sector was even faster before the Kursk operation. And not only in Donetsk [sector], but in the whole of the east,” Zelensky said.

While Russian momentum slowed in the first week of September, no significant units were withdrawn to fight in Kursk, although some were redeployed from less contested areas along the 1,000-kilometer (621-mile) front line. The Kremlin appears to prioritize the goal of progress in Donetsk over retrieving lost Russian territory – for now.

The Ukrainians have offered several reasons for the Kursk operation – that it would force Russia to redeploy troops currently committed on the front-lines in Ukraine; that it would provide Ukraine with land to trade in any negotiations; that it would make a mockery of Putin’s ‘red lines’; and that it would provide a pool of prisoners-of-war to exchange (which it already has.)

Zelensky claims that the Kursk operation has shown Putin’s warnings about the consequences of escalation to be hollow.

Zelensky has now added another justification for the Kursk offensive: that it forestalled a Russian plan to take a large swathe of northern Ukraine as a buffer zone, a plan that would have swallowed “regional centers.”

He told the Kyiv panel that “information from our partners” indicated that the Russians intended to create “security zones” deep inside Ukraine.

The ISW, a think-tank in Washington DC, said Friday that the Russian military command may have intended “additional offensive operations along a wider and more continuous front in northeastern Ukraine to significantly stretch Ukrainian forces.”

For now, such Russian ambitions are on hold. They still hold the advantage in firepower and men along most of the existing frontlines and will continue to use the tactic of intense bombardment – followed by infantry advances through the ruins of what has been destroyed – as a way of grinding down the enemy.

The Ukrainians have several immediate priorities: creating and strengthening defensive lines in the east and accelerating the formation of new units. They are developing longer-range strike capabilities to degrade Russian infrastructure such as airfields and fuel depots. And they are demanding greater freedom to use precision western missiles in strikes deep inside Russian territory.

Zelensky told Fareed Zakaria Friday that Russia’s guided aerial bombs, known as FABs, were responsible for 80% of destroyed infrastructure – and Ukraine urgently needed to hit the airfields from which they are launched.

This appeal appears to be gaining traction. UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer said at his meeting Friday with US President Joe Biden that “the next few weeks and months could be crucial – very, very important that we support Ukraine in this vital war of freedom.”

But the Biden Administration is wary of the consequences of what the Kremlin sees as an escalation that would bring NATO directly into the conflict.

The Kursk incursion may encourage Ukraine to develop another tool that “could fundamentally change Ukraine’s approach to fighting,” according to Rose at the Modern War Institute.

“Ukraine cannot use manoeuvre to achieve a decisive victory over Russia. What it can do is use manoeuvre to exploit vulnerabilities, force Russia to over-extend, create chaos, encircle Russian forces, and capture Russian equipment.”

The crux, according to Matthew Schmidt, University of New Haven Associate Professor of National Security, is how Ukraine changes Putin’s decision-making, whether in Kursk or by much deeper strikes inside Russia, or both.

“Does it make him negotiate? Does it cause him to pull back or pause in Donetsk?”

Kursk may have succeeded in persuading Biden and other western allies to approve deeper strikes, Schmidt says – and “If follow-on attacks can sustain the war deep inside Russia, so it affects Russians and then affects the Kremlin’s decision making.”

That would define it as a success. But we need to ask the bigger question, as the US eventually did in Iraq, says Schmidt. “How does this end?”

Hundreds of people, mostly women, gathered in cities around France on Saturday in support of Gisèle Pélicot, a woman whose husband is on trial, accused of drugging her and recruiting dozens of strangers to rape her over nearly a decade in a case that has shocked the nation.

Feminist associations have called for some 30 gatherings in cities ranging from Marseille to Paris, where on the Place de la Republique banners read “Support to Gisèle” or “Shame Must Change Camp” or “Victims We believe you”.

As her extraordinary story has rippled through France since the trial began earlier this month, Pélicot, now aged 72, has become a symbol of courage and resilience and of the fight against sexual violence.

It was her decision to forgo a private trial and instead insist on a public trial, due to run until December, to alert the public to sexual abuse and drug-induced blackouts, her lawyers have said.

“We thank her a thousand times for her enormous courage,” feminist Fatima Benomar from the “Coudes a Coudes” association told BFM TV, adding the gatherings were also to pay tribute to all rape victims.

The 71-year-old Dominique Pélicot is accused of repeatedly raping and enlisting strangers to abuse his heavily sedated wife in the couple’s home over the course of a decade.

He was initially due to testify this week but was finally excused due to ill health. He is expected to testify on Monday, provided he is in condition to do so.

Prosecutors said Pélicot offered sex with his wife on a website and filmed the abuse. Fifty other men accused of taking part in the abuse are also on trial.

Pélicot’s lawyer Beatrice Zavarro has told French media Pélicot admits to his crimes. Some of the other defendants have admitted their guilt while others say they thought the wife had pretended to be asleep, according to French media.

They each face up to 20 years in jail if found guilty.

At least four people have died, thousands of homes have been damaged and hundreds have been evacuated after some of the heaviest rain in years hit central and eastern Europe.

A slow-moving low pressure system dubbed Storm Boris dumped a month’s worth of rain onto several of Europe’s historic capitals, including Vienna, Bratislava and Prague.

Four people have died in Romania, where the rainfall left hundreds stranded in flooded areas. Rescue services have been launched in hard-hit counties as authorities warn that they have recorded the heaviest rainfall in 100 years over the past 24 hours.

Rivers burst their banks in Poland and the Czech Republic. In Poland’s south, authorities ordered the evacuation of residences in the town of Glucholazy. The level of the river Biala Glicholaska rose by two meters, or 6.5 feet, overnight into Saturday.

After a difficult night and hundreds of incidents reported Poland’s Interior Minister, Tomasz Siemoniak told TVN24 they were “focusing on what the threats will be in the next few hours.”

Significant flooding is expected to continue in the Czech Republic, where authorities have ordered mandatory evacuations for some areas. Footage released by the Czech Republic Fire and Rescue Service showed flooded streets in the southern Benešově nad Černou municipality, where two women who didn’t follow evacuation orders had to be rescued by boat.

In Germany, southern and eastern states in particular are preparing for flooding. Flood warnings have been issued for rivers in the state of Saxony. In neighboring Austria, heavy rainfall has caused water levels to rise in several rivers, leading to rescue services being called out to parts of the country overnight.

Widespread and significant flooding is expected to continue through the weekend.

Red alerts, the highest level of warning, have been issued for portions of Poland, Germany, the Czech Republic, Austria and Slovakia. This level of alert is associated with “intense meteorological phenomena” and “major damage is likely,” according to Meteoalarm.

At least two people have been killed and 29 injured in a train collision in Egypt, the country’s health ministry said Saturday.

Thirty ambulances and reinforcement medical teams were sent to the scene of the collision in the city of Zagazig, the capital of Al Sharkia governorate, the ministry said in a statement.

The injured people were transferred to Al-Ahrar and Zagazig University hospitals in the city, and “rescue operations are still ongoing,” the statement added.

Images from the scene showed crowds of people gathered around the twisted wreckage of the trains as the rescue operations took place.

There has been a deadly accident on Egypt’s aging railway system almost every year for the past 20 years. Egypt recorded 2,044 train accidents in 2018 and 1,793 the year before, according to the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS).

In 2021, at least 32 people were killed and 165 injured when two trains collided. In 2019, at least 25 people were killed and dozens injured in a fire at Ramses station in central Cairo, the country’s busiest, after a train collided with the platform, causing its fuel tank to explode.

A collision between two trains in Alexandria, Egypt’s second largest city, in August 2017 left more than 40 dead and many more injured.

In 2012, 44 children died after a train crashed into a school bus in Egypt’s Asyut governorate.

But the most lethal accident in Egyptian rail history occurred in 2002, when a fire on a passenger train traveling south from Cairo to Luxor killed more than 360 people.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

Venezuela says it has seized 400 US rifles and arrested foreigners – Americans among them – who it claims are linked to an alleged plot to “destabilize” the country.

The Venezuelan interior minister Diosdado Cabello made the claim in a press conference on Saturday. The minister said that in addition to the Americans, two Spanish and one Czech citizen were arrested.

This is a developing story and will be updated.