Rob Corp
BBC Verify Live editor

BBC Verify Live is drawing to a close but we are here through the evening carrying out verification for our colleagues across BBC News.

Our team in Washington DC is keeping an eye on election day in the US as voters head to the polls to elect a mayor in New York City and governors in Virginia and New Jersey.

Here on the live page we brought you verified videos of an apparent attack on a petrochemical plant in Russia. And this afternoon our team confirmed videos from a town in Ukraine that appears to have been struck in an aerial attack.

Chancellor Rachel Reeves spoke earlier about the UK economy ahead of her Budget on 26 November. We looked into what taxes she might put up and why the cost of government borrowing has risen. You’ll be able to read policy and analysis correspondent Ben Chu’s full write up on the BBC News website and app this evening.

As ever - you can get more of our investigations, analysis and videos on the BBC Verify pages of the BBC website.

Aisha Sembhi
BBC Verify journalist

Tech billionaire Elon Musk has used his X social media platform to claim that the New York mayoral election ballot paper is “a, external scam, external” because some candidates’ names appear twice.

But there’s a reason for this. In the state of New York, candidates can be on the ballot more than once if they’re endorsed by multiple parties. So Zohran Mamdani, for example, appears twice - for the Democrats and also for the Working Families party.

Candidates can also appear more than once if they run on ballot lines detached from an official party. So on today’s ballot Curtis Sliwa appears as the Republican Party candidate - but also on the “Protect Animals” line.

Emma Pengelly
BBC Verify journalist

Image source, Telegram

We’ve been speaking to an expert at the US-based Institute for the Study of War (ISW) think tank about the verified videos we brought you earlier from Pokrovske. They show the aftermath of what Ukrainian media is reporting as a Russian glide bomb attack.

A reminder that we can’t tell from the footage alone what kind of weapons were used.

But, according to the ISW’s Russia and Geospatial Intelligence team lead George Barros, the reported strike is likely part of Russian preparation of the battlefield to support planned offensive operations deeper in the Dnipropetrovsk region.

The reported attack took place 13km (eight miles) from ISW’s current assessed frontline in Ukraine and less than 9km from where Russian sources claim Russia’s forces have advanced, he said.

Glide bombs are cheap and destructive weapons made by adding fold-out wings and satellite navigation to old munitions. They’re used by Russia to launch devastating attacks against Ukrainian targets near the frontline from a distance with fighter jets.

“Russian forces use glide bomb strikes to shape the battlefield ahead of infantry pushes, so this strike indicates that Russian forces seek to keep advancing beyond Zaporizhia and Donetsk oblasts - two of the four provinces that the Kremlin's declared annexed in 2022,” Barros added.

Gerry Georgieva
BBC Verify researcher

Earlier today UK Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch criticised the high number of young people out of work and said “each young person not in employment, in education or training is costing the economy nearly £200,000” over their lifetime.

The group she was referring to are generally referred to as Neets - young people not in education, employment or training.

We found a few studies that have looked into the costs of young people being Neet, including government reports, but the average costs they found were lower than Badenoch’s suggestion.

Recent analysis by the Careers and Enterprise Company, external - the careers education body supporting schools in England - found that each young person who becomes Neet at 16 or 18 has an estimated lifetime fiscal cost of over £50,000 through higher welfare use, lower tax receipts and reduced productivity.

A similar estimate of £56,000 in lifetime costs was given in a government report 10 years ago, external. While this report is from some time ago, it remains the figure the Department for Education cites, external.

We asked the Conservatives for the source for Badenoch’s statement this morning but haven’t received a response.

Image source, Reuters

Click play above to watch the three videos we've verified showing the aftermath of what appears to be an attack on the Ukrainian town of Pokrovske.

Emma Pengelly and Paul Brown
BBC Verify

Image source, Telegram

In the last hour we’ve verified three videos newly posted online apparently showing the aftermath of an attack on a rural settlement in Ukraine’s south-eastern Dnipropetrovsk region.

In the footage, taken from a street in the town of Pokrovske, we can see two buildings on fire and local people looking at the damage. The three videos show the same aftermath and we matched the location to Pokrovske as the footage clearly shows a Soviet-era fighter jet mounted on a plinth along with a blue-domed church and road layout that can be seen on Google Maps.

We took screen grabs from each clip and ran them through search engines to check they’re new. The weather conditions in the video - dry with patchy cloud - is what was forecast for the area today.

We can’t tell from the footage who carried out this attack and what kind of weapons were used.

Pokrovske is not to be confused with the similarly named city of Pokrovsk in Donetsk region, which is 80km (50 miles) east and a strategic logistics hub for the Ukrainian army.

Benedict Garman
BBC Verify senior journalist

Image source, X

Dramatic video of an explosion in south-east Gaza has prompted speculation it shows a “new type of Israeli missile” with some social media posters turning to Elon Musk’s AI chatbot Grok for answers.

The aerial footage filmed in al-Bayuk, east of Rafah, shows a tall black smoke plume and a blast wave travelling outwards as dust rises from nearby ruins. Excavators can be seen nearby.

While Grok is telling users on X the video “depicts conventional Israeli air strikes” and “conventional missile strikes” three weapons experts BBC Verify spoke to said it was likely a controlled detonation of explosives placed by the Israeli military and triggered remotely.

Image source, X

Justin Bronk, senior research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, said the explosion “looks consistent with a controlled detonation of a buried cache of munitions”.

Israeli defense engineer and analyst Uzi Rubin said the absence of “anything falling from above before the explosion” in the video indicates it is “a demolition operation” using explosives put in place by the engineering corps and triggered from a distance.

Satellite imagery suggests nearly all the buildings whose ruins are visible in the footage have been destroyed since the ceasefire started on 10 October.

Shruti Menon
BBC Verify senior journalist in Delhi

India’s purchases of Russian crude oil rose slightly in October compared with the month before, according to new data.

The increase comes as the US prepares to enforce sanctions on two of the largest Russian oil firms - Rosneft and Lukoil - on 21 November over Russia’s ongoing invasion and occupation of Ukraine.

Sumit Ritolia, lead analyst at Kpler, told BBC Verify that they expect to see an increase in Russian crude deliveries in the coming days before the sanctions take full effect.

“We see reductions in Russian crude arrival (to India) post 21 November,” Ritolia said, adding that most Indian refiners are expected to comply with US sanctions.

Among India’s top five crude suppliers, the US climbed from fifth to fourth place in October - its highest level of exports to India since March 2021. According to a Kpler report, this comes as India attempts to diversify where it gets oil from and is not driven by sanctions.

India is currently the world’s largest buyer of Russian seaborne crude, followed by China, with Turkey a distant third. Asia continues to be a key market for Russian oil as sanctions from the US, UK and EU intensify.

This uptick in oil imports comes as US President Donald Trump continues to put pressure on India to halt its Russian oil purchases. India says it puts its energy security first when deciding where to buy oil from.

Peter Mwai
BBC Verify senior journalist in Nairobi

A satellite image wrongly claiming to be evidence of mass killings in Sudan has gone viral, when it appears to actually show cows or other animals at a watering hole.

A post on X, which has been viewed more than eight million times, says it is “the most disturbing Google Earth image ever”.

The false posts seem to be mistaking cattle for dead bodies and the darker colour of the ground at the watering point for blood stains.

Examining past satellite imagery on Google Earth we can say the picture, taken in Kumia in East Darfur state, is from March last year. Images from 2022 also show the location where we can see the same pond.

A close look at the image shows the objects on the ground are casting shadows - in a direction consistent with nearby buildings - indicating they are standing upright on four legs rather than prone like human bodies would be.

The claims seem to be influenced by recent Yale University analysis of satellite imagery from el-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur recently captured by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in the civil war.

Researchers concluded that objects consistent with bodies of humans and blood stains can be seen in images they analysed.

Nathaniel Raymond, of the Yale Humanitarian Research Lab, and other satellite analysts on social media have also described the image as showing cows not people.

The RSF has been accused of carrying out mass killings in the city by the World Health Organisation and Sudanese authorities. BBC Verify has also documented videos of a high-profile RSF fighter executing unarmed people.

Yi Ma
BBC Verify researcher

Image source, Facebook/Probreng Laagan

I’ve verified video from the Philippines which shows houses in the city of Cebu under water after it was hit by Typhoon Kalmaegi - which has killed at least 26 people in the country, the civil defence agency says.

One verified clip - which I geolocated using publicly available satellite imagery and made sure was new by checking for previous copies by reverse image searching - gives an idea of the storm’s destructive impact on Cebu province.

The footage shows properties have been inundated by flash flooding while vehicles in the street are swept away.

Philippines state news agency reported earlier today, external that efforts were under way to restore power to more than 3,000 villages.

The national weather agency says Typhoon Kalmaegi is moving north-west and , externalis maintaining its strength.

Nicholas Barrett
BBC Verify researcher

Chancellor Rachel Reeves said in her Downing Street speech this morning that “after the pandemic the UK had higher death rates and higher debts than its peers”.

Analysis by the BBC has shown that in the three years to February 2023, the rate of deaths in the UK went up by more than 5%, which was more than France, Germany and Spain - all up between 3% and 4.5% - but less than Italy's figure of more than 6%.

The US and eastern European countries like Poland were harder hit with death rates more than 10% above their pre-pandemic levels.

The King, external’, externals Fund think tank has said, external “excess mortality in the UK during the pandemic exceeded that of most comparable western European countries”.

According to the International Monetary Fund, external by 2022 the UK’s debt amounted to 99.6% of GDP. At the time, this was lower than France (111%), Italy (138%) and Japan (248%).

In fact, with the exception of Germany (64%), the UK’s debt as a percentage of GDP was lower than all the other G7 countries at the end of the pandemic.

Ben Chu
BBC Verify policy and analysis correspondent

In her speech this morning Chancellor Rachel Reeves said UK borrowing costs have gone up around the world since her Budget last year.

The UK has the highest 30-year sovereign borrowing costs in the G7 group of industrialised nations at 5.17% today, according to data from Bloomberg.

That's up from 4.82% on the day of the last Budget on 30 October 2024, an increase of 0.35 percentage points.

However, that’s not the biggest increase in the G7 over that period.

30-year borrowing costs have risen by more in Japan (0.86 percentage points), France (0.64 percentage points) and Germany (0.61 percentage points).

The reasons why the UK has higher long-term market borrowing costs than peer countries are not clear.

Some financial market analysts attribute it to higher and more persistent consumer price inflation in the UK than other nations in the G7 in recent years, which could put pressure on the Bank of England to keep its own interest rate higher for longer.

Others attribute it to the Bank of England selling its UK sovereign bonds - purchased in the years after the 2008 financial crisis to support the economy - more rapidly than other central banks.

Some analysts suggest it could be the legacy of the 2022 mini-budget during Liz Truss’ time as prime minister that first pushed up UK long-term borrowing costs relative to the rest of the G7.

And others , externalthink the proven political difficulty of UK governments in cutting spending could also be a factor, external.But there is no consensus on the reasons.

Richard Irvine-Brown
BBC Verify journalist

The internet has partially returned to Tanzania after being shut down since the disputed re-election of President Samia Suluhu Hassan on Wednesday.

Hundreds of people have reportedly been killed in protests and violence in the wake of the contested vote, which is when internet monitoring organisation NetBlocks has said network connectivity was first turned off by the Tanzanian government.

Netblocks confirmed yesterday connectivity had been restored, but added that significant restrictions still apply to social media and messaging platforms.

Isik Mater, director of research at NetBlocks, told BBC Verify these restrictions "limit access to information at a critical time". "The internet is a basic digital right and essential for transparency and public participation during elections,” she added.

Because shutdown has prevented Tanzanians from sharing what’s happening, another consequence of it has been old images from other countries wrongly being posted on social media as if from recent unrest.

One video claimed to be soldiers blocking a street in Tanzania, but matched footage shared by Madagascan social media accounts during protests there in October.

Another showing hundreds of protesters in the streets is at least six years old and from Port au Prince in Haiti. This is clear because a sign for the Office Nationale d’Assurance-Vieillesse, a Haitian government department, is visible in the background.

Anthony Reuben
BBC Verify senior journalist

Image source, Reuters

It seems likely from this morning’s speech that Chancellor Rachel Reeves is planning to raise taxes, but she carefully avoided giving any details about which ones could go up.

Her problem is that if she needs to raise substantial amounts of money the easiest way to do so would be to increase one of the big revenue raisers: income tax, National Insurance or VAT - but Labour’s general election manifesto last year promised not to do that.

Putting 1p on the basic rate of income tax, for example, would raise £7bn or £8bn a year, according to the government’s calculations, external. Putting 1p on the higher rate would raise about £2bn a year.

If the chancellor is ignoring the three biggest revenue raisers the next four biggest are corporation tax, council tax, business rates and fuel duties.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies think tank said, external that raising tens of billions of pounds in taxes without breaking Labour’s manifesto pledges would be “difficult, but not impossible”.

But it warned that “many of the tax-raising options outside the ‘big three’ would have particularly damaging effects on growth and welfare”.

Emma Pengelly
BBC Verify journalist

Image source, Bluesky

We’ve verified material posted online showing the result of what Russian officials say were Ukrainian drone attacks inside the country overnight.

According to the Ministry of Defence in Moscow, external 85 Ukrainian drones were intercepted and destroyed mostly in the Voronezh and Nizhny Novgorod regions.

Video from Sterlitamak in the Bashkortostan region, which is around 1,000km (620 miles) away from the border with Ukraine, captured an explosion at a petrochemical plant. Regional governor Radiy Khabirov later said Sterlitamak was attacked by two drones and “debris fell in an industrial zone”.

We’ve verified the footage that shows an orange glow in the direction of the plant. We were able to geolocate it by matching the row of red and white chimneys at the site as well as a car park and fencing in the foreground to satellite imagery.

A photo, also captured in Sterlitamak, shows smoke plumes in the direction of the plant at dawn. We were able to pinpoint this location by matching the supermarket front and building roofs to street-level images.

Rob Corp
BBC Verify Live editor

Good morning.

We’re currently working through reports of attacks in both Russia and Ukraine overnight. Our team is verifying videos that appear to show the aftermath of an attack on a petrochemical plant in Russia’s Bashkortostan region and strikes on the Ukrainian port city of Odesa.

Our fact-check team has been listening to UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ speech this morning where she spoke ahead of this month’s Budget. We’re checking out some of the points she said were affecting what will be announced on 26 November.

Elsewhere we’ll bring you analysis of new figures that show India imported slightly more Russian oil in October compared with September. That’s despite US President Donald Trump putting additional tariffs on Indian goods in an attempt to force it to reduce its purchases of supplies from Russia.

And BBC Verify has pieced together what happened when 10 people were stabbed on a high-speed train from Doncaster to London on Saturday. You can watch our report by clicking play above.