Aktarer Zaman founded the website Skiplagged.com in 2013. It helps travelers book flights using what it calls "hidden city ticketing."

The idea is that travelers wanting to fly from Dallas to Los Angeles, for example, are instructed to book a flight to an alternative destination, say San Francisco, with a stopover in Los Angeles. They then don’t bother to take the last leg of their journey.

While it is not always the cheapest way to travel, Zaman discovered that in many instances, it is. Airlines will often offer cut-price fares to attract fliers to regional airports — but they sometimes route these flights through major hubs.

The strategy works only for those booking a one-way flight and traveling with carry-on luggage (hold luggage will automatically be sent to the final destination on the ticket).

But United, and the US-based flight booking website Orbitz, have said the entrepreneur's "unfair" website promotes "strictly prohibited" travel — and is seeking $75,000 in compensation for loss of revenue.

Zaman, a New York resident, insists that he has broken no law and is simply exposing an "inefficiency" in airline prices that has been common knowledge among aviation insiders for years.

Hidden-city ticketing "has been around for a while, it just hasn't been very accessible to consumers,"Zaman told CNN.

Nick Trend, Telegraph Travel's consumer editor, said such ticketing anomalies could also be found in Europe.

"Despite the simpler ticketing arrangements introduced by no-frills airlines, there are plenty of cases where savings can be made by being creative — especially from airlines which structure their tickets in a more traditional way.

"For example, if you are looking for a cheap single fare on some routes, it can can still be more cost effective to buy a return and not use the second leg. Clever routing can also make you savings on some UK rail fares."

Skiplagged.com has launched an appeal on its website for donations to fight the lawsuit and has already raised more than $9,000.

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North Korea has set up a dedicated military team given the task of keeping The Interview away from the eyes of its citizens.

Pyongyang has been widely blamed for a crippling cyber attack on Sony Pictures in an effort to halt the release of the film, a slapstick comedy starring James Franco and Seth Rogan that portrays the killing of Kim Jong-un, the North Korean leader.

Under pressure, Sony reversed an earlier decision to cancel the film and its notoriety immediately raked in $15 million in the first four days after it was made available online. More than 330 cinemas across the US also showed the film, earning Sony an additional $2.8 million in the same time frame.

The movie was also illegally downloaded an estimated 1.5 million times in the first two days after its initial release, with China and South Korea accounting for the majority of that total.

Apparently concerned that pirate DVDs of The Interview are about to flood across its borders - attached to balloons floated across the Demilitarised Zone from South Korea by dissidents and defectors, or by smugglers operating across the porous border with China - the North Korean regime has ordered a crackdown.

South Korea's Chosun Ilbo newspaper reported that a three-star general from the State Security Department has been put in charge of the new unit, based in Hyesan, on the border with China.

"The regime has started cracking down on the black market, while keeping a close watch on smugglers in the border area," a source told the paper. "Officials are visiting homes and checking computers and DVD players."

Toshimitsu Shigemura, a professor at Tokyo's Waseda University and an authority on North Korean affairs, says the regime had little choice but to attempt to close North Korea's borders to the film.

"The movie is no threat to North Korea, but it is a clear danger to the ruling system," Professor Shigemura told The Telegraph. "As the leader in North Korea has absolute power, every effort must be made to save face in a situation such as this.

"There is also a threat to the Kim regime's legitimacy, which the film raises uncomfortable questions over," he added.

With the majority of North Korea's Internet sites still out of action, a cyber attack which Washington has declined to take the credit for but which the North has said is tantamount to an act of war, there have been new suggestions that North was not the source of the assault on Sony Pictures.

In an on-line exchange with the Lizard Squad printed in The Washington Post, a member of the "cyber-terrorist" group claimed a degree of responsibility for the attack and said the group provided Sony employees' log-in details to the Guardians of Peace.

Other reports seem to suggest the heack was the work of a disgruntled former Sony employee. According to the Politico website, FBI agents have been briefed by a security firm that says its research points to a fired Sony staff, not North Korea.

Sony's computer system crashed on November 25, with a final message reading "Hacked By #GOP" and a red skull appearing on employees' screens before they went dark.

The hackers also published a number of completed Sony films that were awaiting release on online downloading sites, including Annie and Still Alice.

In further messages, the hackers said The Interview is "harming the regional peace and security and violating human rights for money".

Analysts pointed out that Pyongyang had previously made nearly word-for-word claims about the film threatening regional security.

The United States said on Monday that it stands by the FBI's determination that North Korea was responsible for the attack.

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Russia has said annual inflation hit 11.4pc in 2014, the highest level since the financial crisis of 2008.

The sliding rouble — hit by lower oil prices and Western sanctions — has significantly pushed up prices, with food up by 15.4pc for the year, the state statistics service said.

Inflation crept up 2.6pc in December, a month when the ruble experienced a dramatic crash on December 18, falling by 20pc in a single day and triggering fears of a full-blown bank run.

The currency has stabilised over the past week between 50 and 60 roubles to the dollar - more than 40pc weaker than at the beginning of the year.

Russia's inflation in 2013 was 6.5pc.

The economy — sluggish for the past two years — was dealt a double blow this year as oil prices reached a five-year low and Western countries imposed sanctions over Moscow's involvement in the conflict in Ukraine, cutting off Russia's banking system from foreign lending.

As a result, the economy shrank in November for the first time in five years, and is expected to enter recession in the first quarter of 2015. Russians' real earnings also fell.

Officials expect the economy to shrink by 4pc next year if oil trades at $60 a barrel.

The rouble's decline has sparked fears about Russian companies and their ability to service billions of dollar-denominated debt, while the Russian central bank has raised interest rates to 17pc, sacrificing growth in order to protect the currency.

Mr Putin this month conceded tough times were ahead and did not issue any roadmap for recovery, merely saying that the economy will rebound by 2017 in line with global trends.

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HarperCollins, one of the world's largest publishing houses, sells English-language atlases to schools in the Middle East that omit Israel.

Collins Middle East Atlases show Jordan and Syria extending to the Mediterranean but do mark the position of the West Bank.

“The publication of this atlas will confirm Israel’s belief that there exists a hostility towards their country from parts of the Arab world. It will not help to build up a spirit of trust leading to peaceful co-existence,” said Bishop Declan Lang, the chairman of the Bishops' Conference Department of International Affairs, to The Tablet.

“Maps can be a very powerful tool in terms of de-legitimizing 'the other' and can lead to confusion rather than clarity. We would be keen to see relevant bodies ensure that all atlases anywhere reflect the official United Nations position on nations, boundaries and all political features," added Dr Jane Clements, director of the Council of Christians and Jews.

However, Collins Bartholomew, the subsidiary of HarperCollins that specialises in maps, said that including Israel would have been “unacceptable” to their customers in the Gulf and the amendment incorporated “local preferences”.

The Tablet said it had discovered the customs officers in one unnamed Gulf country only permitting the import of school atlases once Israel had been deleted by hand.

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Software glitch is the latest problem to dog state of the art fighter which is costing American taxpayers nearly $400 billion (£257 billion)

The much vaunted new F35 stealth jet has run into fresh problems with a software glitch meaning that it will not be able to use its on-board cannon.

Even though the jet, which is costing American taxpayers nearly $400 billion (£257 billion) will enter service next year, reports in America say it will take a further four years before it will be able to shoot its gun.

This will cause huge embarrassment for the programme, which has been dogged by delays, soaring costs and glitches since its inception in 2006.

Billed as the world’s most advanced – and expensive - fighter jet, the cost per plane has nearly doubled and it will be six years late in entering full production.

The F35 has been the Pentagon’s flagship programme with 2,443 due to be deployed across all three services.

However according to the Daily Beast, the F35 still does not have the software it needs to operate the four barrelled rotary cannon.

This will be a particular problem when the aircraft is being used to support ground troops because a gun is more precise than dropping a small bomb in the area – with the latter more likely to cause friendly fire casualties.

Earlier this year the F35 jump jet, which was supposed to be the star attraction at the Farnborough Air Show, failed to appear after the entire fleet was grounded following a fire at a Florida air base in June.

Other problems for the fighter, which is being manufactured by Lockheed Martin, have included discovering that the engine can shut down when the fuel gets too hot to work as a coolant.

In Britain, the Ministry of Defence has ordered 14 F35s, of which a handful are already being tested in the United States.

A contract for the first four was signed a few months ago and the first stealth jets are due to operate from RAF Marham in Norfolk from 2018.

However in the United States there has been increasing criticism of the programme, even from within the administration.

In January the Pentagon’s testing office described the F-35’s performance as “immature” and two months later the administration’s own accountability office highlighted delays in software delivery and its effectiveness.

SEE ALSO: Why the Pentagon is spending so unbelievably much on the F-35

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America’s closed economy can handle a surging dollar and a fresh cycle of rising interest rates. Large parts of the world cannot. That in a nutshell is the story of 2015.

Tightening by the US Federal Reserve will have turbo-charged effects on a global financial system addicted to zero rates and dollar liquidity.

Yields on 2-year US Treasuries have surged from 0.31pc to 0.74pc since October, and this is the driver of currency markets.

Since the New Year ritual of predictions is a time to throw darts, here we go: the dollar will hit $1.08 against the euro before 2015 is out, and 100 on the dollar index (DXY).

Sterling will buckle to $1.30 as a hung Parliament prompts global funds to ask why they are lending so freely to a country with a current account deficit reaching 6pc of GDP.

There will be a mouth-watering chance to invest in the assets of the BRICS and mini-BRICS at bargain prices, but first they must do penance for $5.7 trillion in dollar debt, and then do surgery on obsolete growth models.

The MSCI index of emerging market stocks will slide another third to 28 before touching bottom.

The Yellen Fed will be forced to back down in the end, just as the Bernanke Fed had to retreat after planning a return to normal policy at the end of QE1 and QE2.

For now the Fed is on the warpath, digesting figures showing US capacity use soaring to 80.1pc, and growth running at an 11-year high of 5pc in the third quarter.

The Fed pivot comes as China’s Xi Jinping is trying to deflate his own country’s $25 trillion credit boom, early in his 10-year term and before it is too late. He does not need or want uber-growth. The Politburo will more or less keep its nerve as long as China continues to meet its target of 10m new jobs a year – easily achieved in 2014 – and job vacancies outstrip applicants.

Uncle Xi will ultimately blink, but traders betting on a quick return to credit stimulus may lose their shirts first. Worse yet, when he blinks, a tool of choice may be to drive down the yuan to fight Japan’s devaluation, and to counter beggar-thy-neighbour dynamics across East Asia. This would export yet more Chinese deflation to the rest of the world.

At best we are entering a new financial order where there is no longer an automatic “Fed Put” or a “Politburo Put” to act as a safety net for asset markets. That may be healthy in many ways, but it may also be a painful discovery for some.

A sated China is as much to “blame” for the crash in oil prices as America’s shale industry. Together they have knouted Russia's Vladimir Putin. The bear market will short-circuit at Brent prices of $40, but not just because shale capitulates. Marginal producers in Canada, the North Sea, West Africa and the Arctic will share the punishment. The biggest loser will be Saudi Arabia, reaping the geostrategic whirlwind of its high stakes game, facing Iranian retaliation through the Shia of the Eastern Province where the oil lies, and Russian retaliation through the Houthis in Yemen.

Mr Putin will achieve his objective of crippling Ukraine’s economy and freezing the conflict in the Donbass, but only by crippling Russia in the process. Controls will not stem capital flight. Mr Putin will have to choose been a dangerous loss of foreign reserves and a dangerous chain of corporate bankruptcies. He will continue to pawn Russia’s national interest to Beijing in order to save his Siloviki regime, but wiser heads in Moscow will question how a perpetual dispute with Europe and the revival of a dying NATO can possibly be in Russia’s interest. They will check his folly.

The European Central Bank cannot save the day for asset markets as the Fed pulls back: it does not print dollars, and dollars are what now matter. Nor is it constitutionally able to act with panache in any case. While Mario Draghi and the Latin bloc could theoretically impose full-fledged QE against German resistance, such Frechheit would sap German political consent for the EMU project. Mr Draghi will accept a bad compromise: low-octane QE that makes no macro-economic difference, but noisy enough to provoke a storm.

The eurozone will be in deflation by February, forlornly trying to ignite its damp wood by rubbing stones. Real interest rates will ratchet higher. The debt load will continue to rise at a faster pace than nominal GDP across Club Med. The region will sink deeper into a compound interest trap.

The political triggers for the next spasm of the EMU crisis are complex, yet trouble must come since the North-South gap is as wide as ever in key respects, and the depression drags on. The detonator may of course be Greece. If Syriza rebels hold their poll lead into the snap-election this month, a cathartic showdown with Brussels will occur in short order.

The EU creditors may agree to debt forgiveness for Greece, but they might equally refuse to talk with a gun held to their heads. There is a 50/50 risk that they would instead switch off life-support and eject Greece, calculating that they now have the back-stop machinery to stop contagion. In this they would be wrong.

Breaking my normal rule of discussing equity prices let me say only that the S&P 500 index of Wall Street stocks will not defy monetary gravity or the feedback loops of global stress for much longer. Half the earnings of US big-cap companies come from overseas, repatriated into a stronger dollar, and therefore worth less in reporting terms.

The index has risen at double-digit rates for three years, further inflated this year by companies buying back their own shares at a pace of $130bn a quarter, often with borrowed money. The profit share of GDP is at a post-war high of 12.5pc (much like 1929), an untenable level as US wages start to rise and the balance of power swings back to labour. The S&P index measuring the price-to-sales ratio is higher today than at its pre-Lehman peak.

Expect a shake-out of 20pc comparable to the LTCM crisis in 1998 when the wheels came off in Russia and East Asia, though don’t be shocked by worse. Emerging markets are a much bigger part of the world economy today, and their combined debt ratio is a record 175pc of GDP.

Once these hiccups are behind us, we can look forward to sunlit uplands as always. Happy New Year.

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When the South African billionaire Elon Musk split up with his wife Talulah Riley for the first time, he told the whole world.

"It was an amazing four years. I will love you forever," the entrepreneur tweeted to the British actress in January 2012. "You will make someone very happy one day."

Eighteen months later, that happy person appeared to be him as the couple tied the knot again in July 2013.

Yet the rekindled romance did not last. On Wednesday - the day many people make vows for the coming year - the couple officially split up for the second time. Mr Musk filed for divorce in a Los Angeles court on New Year's Eve.

The couple said they were splitting amicably and that Mr Musk agreed to give Riley $16 million in cash and other assets as part of a financial settlement, according to a joint statement. The divorce papers said property would be split based on a prenuptial agreement.

The couple first wed in 2010. They had no children together, but Mr Musk has five sons from a previous marriage.

Mr Musk and Ms Riley, who has featured in such films as Pride and Prejudice and St Trinians, were together for a year after they remarried. However they have lived apart the past five months while Ms Riley wrote and directed her first feature film, "Scottish Mussel” in the UK.

The two said they remain friends. This time round, Mr Musk has not tweeted news of the divorce.

Before his marriage to Ms Riley, Mr Munk was married to Canadian novelist Justine Musk for eight years. She later described herself as his "starter wife".

After their split, her blog became an internet sensation with millions around the world logging on for regular updates.

In a later magazine interview she said: “As we danced at our wedding reception, Elon told me, "I am the alpha in this relationship." I shrugged it off, just as I would later shrug off signing the postnuptial agreement, but as time went on, I learned that he was serious.”

Mr Musk responded by denying on his website that he had “run off” with Ms Riley.

He said: “It is worth mentioning that Talulah, as anyone who knows her would attest, is one of the most kind hearted and gentle people in the world. The cliché that has been propagated, of me abandoning a devoted wife to "run off" with a young actress, could not have been more falsely applied.”

Labelled by the New York Times as ‘Tony Stark without the Iron Man suit’, Mr Musk considered to be one of the most innovative and creative technological industrialists in the world

He began with Zip2, which produced online content publishing software that was purchased in 1999 for nearly $340million.

For his next venture, Mr Musk helped create PayPal, the online money transfer and payment service. Ebay bought PayPal for $1.2billion in 2002.

He founded Space X later that year -- a outer space exploration company which launched the first privately-owned liquid-fueled rocket ever to enter space in 2009.

Mr Musk also founded Tesla Motors, an electric car company that had a $226million initial public offering in 2010.

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U2 frontman Bono has revealed he may never play the guitar again after breaking his arm in a recent bicycle accident.

The 54-year-old Irish rock star fractured his arm and shoulder in six places when he came off his bike in New York in November.

He underwent a five-hour operation in the US, which involved having three metal plates and 18 titanium screws fitted in his elbow.

He was expected to make a full recovery but has now revealed that the long-term effects of the accident and surgery mean he may no longer be able to play the guitar on stage.

But the musician, who is better known for his vocals, joked that few people would necessarily miss his efforts.

In a letter to his fans posted on the band’s website, Bono said he was having to work hard to recover physically from the accident.

He wrote: "Recovery has been more difficult than I thought. As I write this, it is not clear that I will ever play guitar again. The band have reminded me that neither they nor western civilization are depending on this.

"I personally would very much miss fingering the frets of my green Irish falcon or my (red) Gretsch. Just for the pleasure, aside from writing tunes.

"But then does the Edge, or Jimmy Page, or any guitarist you know have a titanium elbow, as I do now? I'm all elbows, I am."

Bono said he had decided to cancel all his public appearances and diary commitments to prepare for the band's coming tour, which is due to begin in Vancouver in May.

He wrote: "The consequences of this freak accident are significant enough that I will have to concentrate hard to be ready for the U2 tour in fitness terms," he said.

"As a result I have canceled every public appearance and decided this missive is all the communication I can manage for the first half of 2015, beyond muttering and singing to myself of course."

After the accident, Bono's orthopaedic trauma surgeon, Dean Lorich, said the rocker would require intensive and progressive therapy.

It is understood Bono was trying to avoid another cyclist when he came off his bike in Manhattan.

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Amal Clooney, the leading human rights barrister, was threatened with arrest by Egypian officials after she identified flaws in the country's justice system that led to the jailing of three Al Jazeera journalists, it has emerged.

British-Lebanese lawyer Mrs Clooney, who married American actor George Clooney at a lavish ceremony in Venice last September, represents Mohamed Fahmy, one the three journalists convicted of terrorism in December 2013.

On Thursday, an Egyptian court ordered the retrial of the three journalists, acknowledging major problems with their initial conviction.

The sentences handed to Mr Fahmy, Al Jazeera's Egyptian-Canadian bureau chief, as well as Australian former BBC journalist Peter Greste and Egyptian freelance producer Baher Mohamed, had provoked international outrage.

In an interview, Mrs Clooney said a report she had co-authored on the independence of Egypt's judiciary - a politically sensitive subject in the north African country - was deemed so controversial that she was warned she could be arrested if she visited Cairo.

"When I went to launch the report, first of all they stopped us from doing it in Cairo," Mrs Clooney said. "They said: 'Does the report criticise the army, the judiciary, or the government?' We said: 'Well, yes.' They said: 'Well then, you're risking arrest.'"

In Egypt, insulting the judiciary is an imprisonable offence.

The document, compiled on behalf of the International Bar Association, highlights wide-ranging powers that Egypt's government can wield over judges and state prosecutors, and recommended an end to its handpicking of judges in high profile cases.

Mrs Clooney went on a fact-finding mission to Egypt to compile the report in June 2013, before its publication last February.

"That recommendation wasn't followed, and we've seen the results of that in this particular [Al Jazeera] case where you had a handpicked panel led by a judge who is known for dispensing brutal verdicts," she told the Guardian.

Mr Fahmy has enlisted Mrs Clooney as his international counsel, along with London-based barrister Mark Wassouf, after becoming dissatisfied with the quality of legal support offered by Al Jazeera.

Mrs Clooney, who is also advising Greece on return of Parthenon marbles to Athens, has made high profile calls for her client's release.

In August, she wrote: "Sentencing a political opponent to death after a show trial is no different to taking him out on the street and shooting him. In fact, it is worse because using the court system as a tool of state repression makes a mockery of the rule of law."

She has also called on the Egyptian government to release Mr Fahmy on medical grounds, after disclosing that he is suffering from Hepatitis C, as well as having lost the full use of his arm after a pre-existing shoulder injury was exacerbated by weeks spent sleeping on the prison's stone floor.

The Al Jazeera three journalists were arrested in Cairo's Marriott Hotel in December 2013 and accused of helping a "terrorist organisation".

They were sentenced to between seven and 10 years in prison last June in a politically charged case that drew the United Nations to question the independence of Egypt's judiciary.

The lengthy trial was adjudicated by a judge, Mohamed Nagy Shehata, who has become notorious for severe sentencing. He recently handed out 188 death sentences in a single trial.

But on New Year's Day, an appeals court judge ordered that the journalists be retried, offering new hope. Even if they are not acquitted, the two foreign nationals would be eligible for deportation, while all three men would be eligible for a presidential pardon.

The families of Mr Fahmy and Mr Greste have since confirmed that their lawyers have lodged an official request for the two men to be deported if they are not acquitted.

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A British couple stranded in New York with a feared £130,000 ($199,257) medical bill after their baby son was born prematurely have been told they may not have to foot the bill.

Katie Amos and Lee Johnston were on a five-day holiday in the Big Apple when Ms Amos went into labour 11 weeks early.

They had been told their baby may not be able to fly until March 10, leaving them unsure of how they were to fund their unexpected stay.

But in an apparent U-turn, the hospital caring for their son has now promised “there will be no financial impact to the family”.

Ms Amos and Mr Johnston had flown from the UK on Boxing Day for a Christmas break, and were stunned when their son Dax arrived on December 28, weighing just 3lb.

They had been walking through Central Park as part of a movie tour when Ms Amos went into labour.

Richard Crow - a friend of Ms Amos, 30, and Mr Johnston, 29, from Burgh-le-Marsh in Lincolnshire - set up a campaign on a fundraising website on New Year’s Day.

By Friday afternoon a fundraising page entitled “Dax’s Tale of New York” had raised $9,577.68 - but it appears the money may now not be needed.

Mr Crow wrote on a fundraising Facebook page : "Great news! I believe I can confirm that all medical bills will be covered! It's been a long wait but well worth it!

"Due to the publicity that has gone on around the whole story, it has forced them to pay!"

On Friday a hospital statement said: “Lenox Hill Hospital continues to work with the insurance carrier regarding payment approvals for all services rendered by the hospital, anesthesia and physician services from their insurance carrier. We will ensure that there will be no financial impact to the family.

“In addition, our staff has been going above and beyond to ease the overall experience for the family, from arranging a place to live for the duration of their stay to helping them communicate with their family in the UK.”

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AirAsia Flight 8501 did not have permission to fly to Singapore on the day it crashed into the Java Sea, transport officials have said as search chiefs said they had found “two big objects” believed to be from the missing plane.

AirAsia’s Airbus 320 disappeared around 40 minutes after taking off from the Indonesian city of Surabaya last Sunday morning with 162 people on board.

However, the company was only authorised to fly that route on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, Indonesia’s transport ministry said.

"It violated the route permit given, the schedule given, that's the problem," Djoko Murjatmodjo, the head of air transport, told AFP on Saturday.

It was not immediately clear why AirAsia had been flying that day if it did not have permission. All the company’s flights from Surabaya to Singapore have now been ordered to stop. The transport ministry has announced a full review of all AirAsia flights.

Sunu Widyatmoko, the chief executive of AirAsia’s Indonesian subsidiary, confirmed government officials had suspended the airline’s permission to fly from Surabaya to Singapore but declined to comment further.

Meanwhile search teams operating in the Java Sea reported detecting an oil slick and “two big objects” believed to be parts of the plan’s main fuselage.

“With the oil slick that we found and the discovery of the two big objects, I can confirm that this is the big part of the AirAsia plane we have been looking for all this time,” Bambang Soelistyo, the head of Indonesia’s search and rescue agency, told reporters.

Teams of divers were expected to explore those objects on Saturday, weather permitting.

As the search entered its sixth day, with around 60 vessels and 20 aircraft now involved, there was renewed speculation that “extreme weather” had contributed to south-east Asia’s third major airline catastrophe of 2014.

A 14-page "meteorological analysis" from Indonesia's Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency said one likely scenario was that icing, caused by bad weather, had “damaged” the Airbus’s engines.

"This is however just one analysis of what likely happened based on available meteorological data, and is not the final determination on the cause of the incident,” said the report, quoted by Singapore’s Straits Times newspaper.

Tony Fernandes, the AirAsia chief, has hinted extreme weather played a major role in the tragedy. “What we are beginning to see is that there were some very unique weather conditions,” he said earlier this week.

“I continue to have full faith in our operations in Indonesia and elsewhere,” he added.

As Indonesian rescue teams flew the bodies of 12 more victims back to Surabaya for identification and burial, heart-breaking reports emerged about a 15-year-old Indonesian girl who lost her entire family in the tragedy.

Chiara Natasya Tanus, a Surabaya-born student who was attending school in Singapore, lost both parents and both brothers - aged 17 and 9 - in the crash. They had been coming to visit her for New Year’s Eve and when they did not arrive at Sinagpore airport as expected last Sunday she returned home to her dormitory.

“We were supposed to have the best time in Singapore - we planned to spend the rest of holidays together,” the orphaned teenager told Indonesia’s Jawa Pos newspaper.

“I was so excited. I was looking forward to showing my dormitory to my family,” she added.

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A terror leader wanted over the assassination attempt on Malala Yousafzai has account in his name on LinkedIn, the networking site for professionals

A senior Taliban commander who has threatened attacks against Britain is using LinkedIn, the business networking site for professionals, in an apparent attempt to recruit terrorists.

Ehsanullah Ehsan, one of the world’s most notorious terrorist leaders, has 69 connections on LinkedIn, indicating a sizeable network. Ehsan does not hide his associations and openly promotes himself on LinkedIn as spokesman for TTP Jammat-ul-Ahrar, a splinter group of the Taliban.

He describes himself as “self-employed” and says he has been a spokesman since January 2010. Ehsan even lists his skills as “jihad and journalism” and provides details of his school, employment history and language skills. He also includes his photograph.

Pakistan authorities placed a $1 million (£650,000) bounty on his head after he boasted of the Taliban’s responsibility for the attempted assassination of Malala Yousafzai, who was shot in the head in October 2012 for wanting to go to school. Malala, now 17, was widely praised for her courage and later awarded the Nobel peace prize.

After the attack, Ehsan said: “She was pro-West, she was speaking against Taliban and she was calling President Obama her idol. She was young, but she was promoting Western culture in Pashtun areas.”

At the time Ehsan was spokesman for Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), the Pakistan wing of the Taliban, which carried out the attack and other terrorist atrocities. Last year, Ehsan, along with other former commanders of the TTP, formed TTP Jammat-ul-Ahrar.

On his LinkedIn page Ehsan describes TTP Jammat-ul-Ahrar as his current employer. The group’s leader, Omar Khalid Khorasani, is considered to be one of the most ruthless terrorists in the region and has been compared in terms of his barbarity to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil).

The disclosure that Ehsan has an open profile on LinkedIn is potentially embarrassing for the site. Other social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter have been criticised for failing to clamp down on hardliners using their sites to promote extremism.

Ehsan has been increasingly active in recent months as his Taliban splinter group has tried to establish itself in the region. The group has close links to Britain, and, in October threatened attacks against the UK in reprisal for the arrest in London of Anjem Choudary, the radical Islamist cleric, and eight other British extremists.

One of Choudary’s closest confidantes, Misra Tariq Ali, an NHS surgeon, has joined Ehsan in hiding in Pakistan. Ali, 39 – as first reported by The Sunday Telegraph – fled the UK, where he faced assault charges, to join TTP Jammat-ul-Ahrar. Ali, who lived in east London, also appears to have a LinkedIn account, although his details are not visible to the public.

Ali and Ehsan later appeared in a recruitment video in which they goaded the Pakistan Army and urged its soldiers to rise up against the officers.

In a further message, Ehsan warned that his terrorist group planned attacks against the UK and its citizens abroad unless Scotland Yard ended its investigation into Choudary.

After being approached by The Telegraph, LinkedIn took down Ehsan’s account on Friday night.

A spokesman said the company’s security team had decided to “restrict it”, meaning it was no longer in operation. But she said it was not clear if the account belonged to Ehsan or was a fake account, established by another party. She said the IP address of the account, indicating where in the world it was set up, suggested it was fake. She said the “lack of Taliban recruiting messages” was another clue.

The spokesman added: “[I] Can’t say for certain that it is someone else … But I can say that our security team has a high degree of confidence that it is a fake account, which is reason enough to restrict it. [I] Also can’t say for certain who might have set it up if it is fake.”

SEE ALSO: 12 big geopolitical events we think will happen in 2015

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More than 1,200 luxury cars, including Jaguars and a Rolls-Royce Wraith worth at least £35 million ($53 million USD), could be scrapped after the cargo ship transporting them ran aground in the Solent.

The Hoegh Osaka vehicle carrier was deliberately run aground on a sandbank between Southampton and the Isle of Wight, on Saturday night to prevent it capsizing after it began listing dangerously.

The ship was carrying 1,200 Jaguar sports cars and Land Rover 4x4s, 65 BMW Minis, 105 JCB diggers and a single Rolls-Royce Wraith – worth an estimated £260,000 – all destined for the Middle East.

After a similar incident in the North Pacific in 2006, more than 4,700 brand new Mazdas were scrapped after the car transporter carrying them, the Cougar Ace, developed a 60-degree list off the coast of Alaska.

The cars were salvaged and had no visible damage but the manufacturer scrapped them in case to avoid potential legal action in the event of future road accidents.

A BMW spokesman told The Times that the 65 Minis on the Höegh Osaka were insured but suggested that they could still be sold if only minor repairs were needed.

"We'll have to see what their condition is once the salvage company gets inside the hold," he added.

A salvage operation could take "weeks or months", the Maritime & Coastguard Agency (MCA) said, and would not even begin in earnest for several days as strong winds would make conditions too rough to work.

Salvage workers boarded the 51,000 – ton vessel, which is listing at about 50 degrees, on Monday, as the ship became a tourist attraction with car parks along the coast filling up with sightseers.

Experts said the ship would need to be anchored to prevent it slipping further down the sandbank during the high winds. Salvage workers will then attempt to right the ship and refloat it as soon as possible.

Alex Davis, partner and head of the casualty response team at the shipping law firm Stephenson Harwood, said: "Time is the enemy here; the longer the vessel is aground, the more likely she is to become further damaged and to deteriorate. They will be looking to move as fast as is technically possible."

Mr Davis added: "You are unlikely to be buying the Jaguars after this."

He said the likely causes of the ship listing were cargo shifting, water getting in, or both.

Rod Johnson, marine manager at Stephenson Harwood and former chief coastguard, said the vessel would be likely to require a technique known as "parbuckling" to right it.

"Parbuckling is good old – fashioned grunt: you attach the cables to the ship in the appropriate position and pull," he said. "It won't float until it's upright because if you try to float it while it's lying on its side, water will simply move up the low side of the ship and pour in through open hatchways and vent pipes and the ship will capsize."

Floating cranes may be anchored next to the ship and used to winch it upright. The weight of the cargo would have to be redistributed and water pumped out to prevent the ship listing again, before it could be refloated using tug boats.

The Hoegh Osaka had not long set sail when it ran into trouble, after which the 24 crew members and a pilot were taken to safety by Coastguard helicopter and RNLI lifeboats. Two people suffered nonlife threatening injuries and were taken to hospital. No fuel has leaked.

Hugh Shaw, the Secretary Of State's Representative for Maritime Salvage and Intervention, said there would be no "quick fix". 

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For 11-year-old Montgomery Philip, childhood is over. Six months ago he would have been playing football with his schoolmates, but now his job is to care for his 10-monthold baby brother Jenkie.

The pair are both victims of the Ebola virus. Not because they caught the disease, but because they live in Joeblow, Liberia, where the devastating outbreak has killed every mother in the village.

The women died because social convention decrees it is they who tend to the sick and bury the dead.

When a man brought Ebola to the village and passed it on to his wife, it was 14 mothers who cared for her and eventually laid out her body. One by one they caught the disease and died, leaving 15 children orphaned.

Chloe Brett, 28, from Norwich, has been working with the British charity Street Child to try to find homes for the children left behind in the aftermath of the outbreak.

"Seeing Montgomery struggle to change the baby's nappy without any guidance is something that made me realise just how devastating this disease can be on those left behind," she said. "He was a helpless 11-year-old having to become a man well before his time.

"Although it feels like Liberia is coming out of the end of the crisis, it is now dealing with the aftermath, and what it has left behind is huge groups of children who are on their own. When we visited Joeblow, it seemed normal at first, with children in the street, men, a couple of old women. But then we realised there were no other women anywhere.

"We talked to a man who had survived Ebola and he told us what had happened.

All of the women had caught the disease.

"It's now a village of no mothers and very confused children with blank looks on their faces."

Nearly 7,000 people have died from Ebola and more than 18,000 have caught the disease, mainly in West Africa. Liberia has been hit the hardest, with 3,290 deaths so far compared with 2,085 in Sierra Leone and 1,525 in Guinea.

Street Child been working in Liberia to find homes for orphaned children over the past five years, but the Ebola crisis has made the situation far worse.

The charity estimates that the disease has left 30,000 orphans in West Africa. So far, it has helped 8,000 find new homes with relations or neighbours. Many children are being looked after in two shelters in the country's capital, Monrovia.

Children with sick parents also need to be quarantined for 21 days to make sure they have not contracted the illness.

The orphans are placed in groups of three, but if a child starts to show symptoms of Ebola, they are isolated immediately - a terrifying prospect for a youngster who has just lost their parents.

According to Unicef, just 800 children have been resettled in Liberia to date.

"The future for these children is bleak if they do not find new homes," added Miss Brett, who is the Liberia programme director at Street Child.

"I saw Montgomery carrying his 10-month-old brother - that is life for him now. He won't be able to go back to school if he is looking after his brother.

"All the children wear rags because all their clothes and possessions have had to be burnt as a precaution because of the disease.

"We try to find relatives or neighbours to take the children in, but the community is scared.

"We went to one slum where every home had been affected. Every door we knocked on, we found more children who needed homes."

Miss Brett has come across households in the back streets of Monrovia where children have been sleeping with the dead body of their father for three days.

Neighbours had turned away the youngsters, fearing they could be infected.

Many simply cannot afford to feed another mouth. Ebola has caused the price of rice to increase by at least 20 per cent in Monrovia, and in some locations it has almost doubled.

Tom Dannatt, Street Child's chief executive, said: "Thirtythousand children in West Africa will have spent this Christmas mourning the loss of a mother or father as a result of Ebola.

"They want for the most basic of human needs while the majority of us in the UK have been enjoying indulgence and celebration."

He added: "I have no doubt that aid from larger organisations is coming, but there is an immediate need which we at Street Child can meet right now. We just need the financial support.

"On my last trip to Sierra Leone in November, when I spent time with Street Child teams visiting some of the hardest-hit communities, I learnt three things.

"Firstly, we know about Western aid and medical Ebola heroes, but the heroism of so many Sierra Leoneans at community level is inspiring - and underreported. We should invest more in these people.

"Secondly, the medical and military effort is impressive, but the pure humanitarian aid response appears to have hardly begun.

"Thirdly, not enough Sierra Leoneans know 'enough' about Ebola - especially in the most rural and poorest places."

"Montgomery looks after his brother now. That is his life".

Visit street-child.co.uk/ebolaresponse for more information

SEE ALSO: A Patient Possibly Exposed To Ebola Is Heading To Nebraska For Observation

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As if the first week back at work wasn't bad enough, let's remind ourselves that it's also the week of the year when our relationships are more likely to come to an end.

January 3 has been nicknamed 'Divorce Day' by witty solicitors who see a spike in business during the first few days of the year as couples who managed to hold it together in the run up to Christmas finally crack.

The majority of January dumpings have been brewing since way back in November. But then plans got made, presents were purchased, plane and train tickets were booked, families were obliged and before we knew it, and because no one wants to be alone at Christmas, we were pulling crackers with someone we were sick to the back teeth of.

Even before the last of the turkey leftovers had been scraped into the pedal bin many people, even if only in the back of their minds, would have been formulating an escape plan. The reality of Christmas, without the distraction of work, throws our relationships into sharp relief. For a period that's supposed to be about reconnection and gratefulness, we often see an unpleasant side to people. There's no avoiding the fact that our partner gets shamefully drunk at every opportunity, treats their family with disinterest and aggression, or spends money from the joint account like it's going out of fashion on non-recyclable tat they'll leave for landfill by Epiphany. Are you really as compatible as you thought you were?

And on top of all that blossoming resentment is the crap Christmas present, possibly the final nail in the coffin. It's almost like they haven't been listening to the hints you've dropped/written down on Post-it notes and stuck to the fridge door/their face. I find partners often buy presents for the person they want you to be rather than the person you are (this is why so many men get lingerie shopping wrong; as much as you can attempt to dress her up as one, it's unlikely she is going to act like a Babestation sex-machine who enjoys wearing nylon bustiers and fishnet stockings).

A boyfriend once bought me a customised book of photos of us together that he had pulled from Facebook. He wanted me to be more romantic, I think; less materialistic and more schmaltzy. But I wanted handbags, not manufactured sentimental clutter.

He's now with a girl who is totally fine with an Argos engagement ring and I spent Christmas with my dog, so we're all in a much better place, I think.

But we'd be wrong to pin all the blame on our other halves for all these January break-ups. With all the naval-gazing that goes on at this time of year, many break-ups are a form of avoidance. Sometimes it's easier to end a relationship than take a long hard look at the things you're not happy with in yourself. We can blame a relationship for everything we failed to do; every missed opportunity, pound gained or overspent. Surely it was the useless, stifling boyfriend who was holding us back in 2014, not our own laziness.

All of which would be depressing enough, except the number of New Year break-ups seems to be rising.

Divorce and family law specialist Marilyn Stowe explains, “There has been a general increase in new clients contacting the firm over the Christmas period and in January after the New Year, but over the last two years there has been a very noticeable jump.

"I attribute this to the 'Black Friday' effect – where growing media attention seems to have dictated a massive rush to buy on a day which previously meant nothing to people in the UK. Similarly, I am earnestly assured that 'January is the month to get divorced' by everyone because its repeated constantly by the media, so it’s turning into a self-fulfilling prophecy. Also Christmas holidays are getting longer, many people are off work for two weeks rather than a few days, which means an increase in stress, expenditure, alcohol, potential for arguments.”

So how does Stowe advise those who knock on her door in January?

“Not everyone proceeds [with a split] when they’ve calmed down and had time to think about things. I advise people not to panic and rush into letting a high-pressured couple of weeks potentially spoil the rest of their life and that of their children. We then tend to see a percentage of clients actually going ahead in March/April when they've made a calm decision, and also a sharp spike in client numbers after the long school holidays in September.”

How then can you make sure your relationship survives the January hump? A good place to start is by looking at why we make and break New Year's resolutions. Relationships are like fitness - it doesn't get better without you putting in tons of effort and getting out of your comfort zone. But faced with the prospect of hard work for long-term gains, most of us prefer to set ourselves impossible targets and feel frustrated when life falls short.

So the first step is not making the flaws into such a big deal. Your relationship's intensity will peak and wane; that's life. Lower your expectations of your partner a little, they need not be your only source of validation, solace and social entertainment, so reduce the amount of emotional responsibility you put on them and work on yourself.

Intimacy is like an elastic band not a concrete slab; let yourselves stretch apart and come back together; try to loosen the slack and give each other breathing space throughout December and January.

Relationship resolutions are like any other New Year pledge in that negative intent is harder to maintain. Form positive habits instead. Rather than saying "I'm never drinking wine ever again” (not likely), try saying "I will go to bed at a reasonable hour and then wake up with a walk along the river," (you're tricking your brain in to not going to the pub by promising yourself a delightful reward instead).

So instead of staying "I will stop arguing with my partner" (unrealistic) say "I'll cook a delicious dinner for the two of us once a week". Set yourself rewards rather than punishments, frame it in an attractive and achievable way that feels like a treat.

Be realistic: pledge to drink more water, not to lose 20 lbs by February 1. Similarly, don't book a tandem parachute jump, just ask her every evening how her day was. You'll find it much easier to stick to your resolutions and more enjoyable.

And if there's one promise we should all make it's to stop believing the hype people spout about their relationships on social media: there is a reason they are posting kissing pics and #soinlove status updates (or, heaven forbid, post-sex selfies) and not actually just enjoying each other's company.

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Charb

Charb - real name Stéphane Charbonnier - was the director of publications at Charlie Hebdo from 2009. He had a regular slot in the magazine called “Charb n'aime pas les gens,” or “Charb doesn’t like people”.

His published works included “I Don’t Like Smokers”, “I Don’t Like Retirement” and “I Am Very Tolerant”.

Translated caption: Teachers are increasingly the victims of school-based violence. School inspector: "What do you mean you didn't finish the course?!"

Tignous

Tignous - real name Bernard Verlhac - contributed to the weekly news magazine Marianne and the monthly Fluide Glacial as well as Charlie Hebdo. His published works included “Pandas in the Mist” and “Five Years of Sarkozy”.

Translated caption:"What does 'transference' mean?""It's when your money arrives in your therapist's account"

Wolinski

Georges Wolinski, who was 80-years-old when the attack took place, had contributed to Paris Match, Le Nouvel Observateur and Paris-Presse, amongst others. He had also been the editor-in-chief of the monthly magazine Charlie Mensuel.

Translated caption:"To think, 40 years ago I was up on the barricades...""Try do forget all that, Dad"

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The Ministry of Defence has again been forced to call for US military assistance to help track a suspected Russian submarine spotted off the Scottish coast.

Two US Navy aircraft were drafted in to conduct anti-submarine patrols along with a Royal Navy Frigate near the home of the UK’s Trident fleet at Faslane, Argyll.

Critics claimed the US deployment raised questions about the UK's ability to protect its nuclear submarines following the scrapping of the RAF's £4bn fleet of Nimrod surveillance aircraft in 2010.

Peter Roberts, a senior fellow of the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies, told The Independent : “It has left a gaping chasm in the UK's capabilities and left us highly dependent on cooperation from our allies.”

It is thought the Russian presence could be linked to the reported departure of one of the Royal Navy's Vanguard-class nuclear submarines from Faslane naval base at Gare Loch on the River Clyde. The Vanguards carry Trident ballistic missiles.

Such "visits" from Russian subs have reportedly been "happening quite often" off the north and west coasts of Scotland.

The operation follows a deployment in November of two US Navy Orions, a Royal Canadian Air Force Aurora and a French Dassault Atlantique.

It was suggested at the time that a suspected Russian submarine may have been trying to track one of Britain's four Vanguard-class boats after a fishing trawler spotted an "unknown submarine periscope" close to Faslane.

The search came a month after another suspected Russian submarine was spotted off Sweden’s Stockholm archipelago and as relations with the Kremlin are at their worst since the Cold War.

This week, US crews coordinated with the anti-submarine frigate HMS Somerset, which has been operating off Scotland for a month.

A source at RAF Lossiemouth is reported to have disclosed that the US aircraft, known as Skinny Dragons and usually based in Hawaii, have been flying up to two missions a day since New Year's Eve.

Mr Roberts, added: "HMS Somerset is a capable platform and I have no doubt that her deployment alongside these US Navy aircraft is related to the reported departure of a Royal Navy Vanguard ballistic missile submarine from Faslane, and the countering of any Russian deployment from over the horizon."

Angus Robertson MP, SNP defence spokesman, whose constituency contains RAF Lossiemouth, said the deployment showed that Britain had resorted to going to its allies with a "begging bowl".

An MoD spokesman said: "We can confirm that the UK recently requested assistance from allied forces for basing of maritime patrol aircraft at RAF Lossiemouth for a limited period. The aircraft have been conducting maritime patrol activity with the Royal Navy; we do not discuss the detail of maritime operations."

The search for the unidentified foreign vessel was likened to the script from Sean Connery’s 1990 film The Hunt for Red October, in which the actor played a Soviet commander who defects to the US in a submarine equipped with ballistic missiles. 

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Fitch has downgraded Russia's credit rating and painted a horrific picture of a struggling economy rocked by a collapsing rouble, falling oil prices, high inflation and declining international reserves.

The ratings agency cut the country to BBB- from BBB with a negative outlook, meaning further downgrades are possible.

But it was the language Fitch used in its reasoning that was most shocking.

Russia's economic outlook "has deteriorated significantly" in just six months, Fitch stated. Gross Domestic Product will shrink 4pc this year, the agency added, far worse than the 1.5pc contraction it previously expected. "Growth may not return until 2017," Fitch said.

Western sanctions, imposed after President Vladimir Putin's took Russia into neighbouring Ukraine, "continue to weigh on the economy" but the plunging oil price is causing just as much, if not more, damage to one of the world's energy giants.

The price of a barrel of Brent crude has collapsed by more than 50pc since the middle of last year as Opec, the group of leading oil-producing nations, refused to cut production amid intense pressure from the US shale revolution.

"Plunging oil prices have exposed the close link between growth and oil price [in Russia]," Fitch wrote.

"Commodity dependence is high: energy products account for almost 70pc of merchandise exports and 50pc of federal government revenue, exposing the public finances and the balance of payments to external shocks," Fitch wrote.

Brent crude was trading at less than $50 a barrel on Friday, down from more than $111 in June last year.

Fitch has predicted that prices will recover to around $70 a barrel this year, a view shared by Igor Sechin, the chairman of Rosneft, which has been hit so hard by the oil price collapse that it has been forced to has request $46bn in state aid to help meet repayments and cover investment.

However, if oil stays significantly below $70 a barrel, "it could precipitate a deeper recession and put further strain on public finances, severely limiting the authorities' room for manoeuvre".

“If oil drops to $45 or lower and stays there, Russia is going to face a big problem,” said Mikhail Liluashvili, from Oxford Economics. “The central bank will try to smooth volatility but they will have to let the rouble fall and this could push inflation to 20pc.”

The rouble, which has slumped around 20pc since Christmas and was trading at 63 against the dollar on Friday, is in lockstep with Brent crude. Fitch cited the collapsing currency as one of the reasons Russia's banking sector has suffered a major shock, the others being "intense market volatility" and the central bank's decision to hike interest rates from 10pc to 17pc .

That shock move - Bank of Russia’s sixth increase in 2014 - took rates to heights not seen since the country’s default in 1998, and “is aimed at limiting substantially increased rouble depreciation risks and inflation risks”, the bank said.

Fitch expects Russian inflation, which stood at 11.4pc at the end of 2014, to remain in double-digits through this year before falling to 8.5pc by 2016. "The prospects of the [central bank] realising its end-2015 inflation target of 4.5pc now look remote, particularly if the exchange rate falls further, potentially leading to still higher interest rates," Fitch wrote.

This all comes as international reserves "fall faster than Fitch expected".

"Renewed intervention to support the rouble, whether by the central bank or the Finance Ministry, could further reduce reserves."

Russia's government has so far ruled out imposing capital controls to stem the outflow of money, knowing that such a move would go hand-in-hand with the loss of financial credibility.

However, Russia’s foreign reserves have dropped to the lowest level since the Lehman crisis .

Central bank data show that a blitz of currency intervention depleted reserves by $26bn in the two weeks to December 26, the fastest pace of erosion since the crisis in Ukraine erupted early last year.

Total reserves have fallen from $511bn to $388bn in a year. The Kremlin has already committed a third of what remains to bolster the domestic economy in 2015, greatly reducing the amount that can be used to defend the rouble.

Fitch ended its scathing assessment of Russia with a look at the country's government, labelling it a "weakness".

"Governance is a relative weakness: Russia scores badly on World Bank and Transparency International indicators, for example. Russia's current predicament has done little to hasten the onset of a more liberal economic policy agenda and raises the risk of greater isolationism. The business environment has long hampered diversification outside the energy sector."

This article was written by Andrew Trotman from The Daily Telegraph and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

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The fugitive girlfriend of one of the Islamist terrorists responsible for a wave of deadly attacks in France last week once told police she and her boyfriend often discussed al-Qaeda attacks.

Hayat Boumeddiene told investigators her boyfriend Amedy Coulibaly believed people who had suffered injustice had the right to “take up arms against the oppressors”, though they both condemned violent attacks.

Coulibaly was shot dead on Friday after killing a policewoman and then in a separate attack killing four people when he took hostages at a Jewish supermarket in the French capital.

His 26-year-old girlfriend who remains the focus of a huge hunt also told detectives she had embraced strict Islam after a difficult childhood in which she was separated from her family and passed from carer to carer.

Turkish counter-terrorism officials disclosed they had tracked Boumeddiene’s mobile phone to a border town next to Syrian territory held by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, known as Isil or Isis.

The phone’s signal was detected in the town of Akcakale on January 8, but then disappeared, the Financial Times reported.

The town harbours Isil sympathisers and the porous border into Syria is easy to cross.

Boumeddiene flew to Istanbul from Paris via Madrid on January 2. CCTV images from Istanbul airport confirm her arrival, Turkish officials said.

The French authorities only passed on Boumeddiene’s name to Istanbul on January 9. Turkish officials say there is no evidence any of the other attackers passed through Turkey.

French police say she remains a crucial witness for the attacks. Boumeddiene was in “constant and sustained contact” with Izzana Hamyd, wife of Cherif Kouachi who was one of the gunmen who shot dead 12 at the offices of Charlie Hebdo.

The pair made more than 500 calls to each other during the course of 2014, underlining how close the two sets of attackers were police say.

A judicial source said: “She was and is considered, at least, as a crucial witness, simply because she was the companion of Coulibaly for over five years.”

Details of her upbringing emerged in a 2010 police transcript from when the couple were questioned over their role in the failed prison escape of Smaïn Ait Ali Belkacem, architect of the 1995 attacks on Paris' RER suburban railway, Le Parisien reported.

Boumeddiene was born to a large French Algerian family of seven children in Villiers-sur-Marne and her mother died when she was young.

She told detectives in 2010: “I was placed in care at the age of 12, because I did not accept the speed with which my father remarried after the death of my mother. I changed carers numerous times because I was beaten often.”

Her father, Mohamed, still lives in the Villiers sur Marne suburb of south eastern Paris. Family members on Sunday declined to talk at his apartment in a rundown housing block. The mosque he attends nearby was under guard by French police carrying automatic weapons.

Boumeddiene told police she and Amedy met through “mutual friends”.

“We were both became interested in Islam at the same time. It happened quickly, that's what I think. I think Amedy found a sense of balance — he did too. We talked together.

She said she turned to Islam because it “calmed” her after her difficult childhood.

She said: “I had gone through a difficult time, and this religion answered all of my questions.

Boumeddiene decided to start wearing a full veil soon after she met Coulibaly, which led to her losing her job as a cashier.

She said: “Since then, I have gone out less. And sometimes it's difficult for me, even though it's a personal choice.”

When asked if the couple discussed al-Qaeda attacks, she said: “Yes ... Generally we have the same point of view. We condemn all of the attacks that happen.

She said Coulibaly “condemns them too, but he has a feeling that, um, how do you say it? With the bad things that happen to innocent people in occupied countries, it's normal that those people who suffer injustice defend themselves and take up arms against the oppressors.”

This article was written by Ben Farmer and Gregory Walton in Paris from The Daily Telegraph and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

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Dramatic new CCTV footage has emerged of Said and Cherif Kouachi, the al-Qaeda supporting brothers who killed 12 people at the offices of Charlie Hebdo last Wednesday, robbing a petrol station at gunpoint.

One of the brothers appears to have a rocket launcher slung over his shoulder and is brandishing an automatic weapon, as the pair fill a plastic bag with food and water. They are also said to have stolen petrol before driving off in the direction of Paris.

The robbery of the petrol station around 50 miles northeast of Paris on Thursday morning was the first reported sighting of the suspects after they launched their deadly attack on the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo's Paris headquarters.

The manager of the Villers-Cotterets service station alerted police to the incident after recognising the French-Algerian brothers from the mugshots issued by police in the wake of the Paris shootings.

A massive manhunt was launch in the nearby Forest of Retz, an area the size of Paris, immediately after the petrol station robbery, but it was not until the following day that the brothers were killed in a hostage situation in nearby Dammartin-en-Goele.

Said and Cherif Kouachi were both killed after they came out shooting following a six-hour siege at a printworks. Their sole hostage survived.

Said and Cherif Kouachi’s faces were unknown to the French public before Wednesday’s terrorist attack in Paris.

But to the French police, they were very well known indeed — and it must have been with despair that the authorities realised that the men they had once watched so closely had been allowed to drop off their radar, slip away, and plot their attacks.

Indeed, both brothers were being watched intently as long ago as spring 2009, according to Le Parisien.

Yet French authorities stopped the surveillance in July — just six months before the Paris attacks — because they were deemed to be of low risk.

This article was written by Andrew Marszal from The Daily Telegraph and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

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