A US Air Force sergeant with links to the far-right Boogaloo Bois movement has been charged with the murder of a federal security officer in California, the FBI says. Steven Carrillo is accused of killing David Patrick Underwood outside the courthouse in Oakland during Black Lives Matter protests last month. He was already charged with the murder of another officer eight days later.

Damon Gutzwiller was killed in an ambush near Santa Cruz on 6 June. Mr Carrillo, who is stationed at Travis air force base, was arrested during a subsequent confrontation. He appears to have used his own blood to write various phrases on the bonnet of a car he stole, the FBI said, including “boog” and “stop the duopoly”. “Boogaloo” is a term used by extremists to reference a violent uprising or impending civil war in the US, the FBI said. Adherents of the loose grouping known as Boogaloo Bois, which some liken to a militia, are anti-government and often carry assault weapons.(BBC)…[+]

The uncle of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has been sentenced to four years in prison by a Paris court for money-laundering. Rifaat al-Assad was convicted of embezzling Syrian state funds to buy homes and offices worth €90m (£80m) to build a French property portfolio. The 82-year-old former vice-president denies any wrongdoing. His lawyers say he will appeal.

His property assets in Paris and London will be seized, the court ruled. Assad, who was hospitalised with internal bleeding in France in December, was not in court for the ruling. His London property is believed to be worth €29m (£26m).  He was once the second most powerful man in Syria – the military commander at the right hand of his brother Hafez, who led Syria from 1971 until his death in 2000. Rifaat is known as the “Butcher of Hama” by some Syrians because of his alleged role in the bloody suppression of an anti-government uprising in the city in 1982 but he has denied any responsibility for the massacre. Between 10,000 and 20,000 people are estimated to have died.

Since 1984, when he led a failed coup against his brother, Rifaat has mostly lived in exile in France and Spain. After Hafez died in 2000, Rifaat proclaimed himself his brother’s legitimate successor. But Bashar became president.

When Syria descended into civil war in 2011 he called on his nephew to step down.(BBC)…[+]

The US Department of Justice has filed a lawsuit to prevent former National Security Adviser John Bolton from publishing a new book about his time at the White House. According to the complaint, the book contains “classified information”. The move comes a day after President Donald Trump said Mr Bolton could face “criminal problems” over the release.

The book, entitled The Room Where It Happened, is due to be released on 23 June. “I will consider every conversation with me as president highly classified,” Mr Trump told reporters on Monday. “So that would mean that if he wrote a book and if the book gets out, he’s broken the law and I would think he would have criminal problems.”

However, the non-profit American Civil Liberties Union said that “any Trump administration efforts to stop John Bolton’s book from being published are doomed to fail”. Mr Bolton’s lawyer, Charles Cooper, said they were looking through the lawsuit and “will respond in due course”. In January, the White House said the book contained “top secret” details that must be removed, although Mr Bolton rejected this.(BBC)…[+]