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Brazil's President Lula da Silva won an unprecedented fourth term after a bitterly contested election against right-wing challenger Flavio Bolsonaro, with results surprising many after Bolsonaro had won the first round. Bolsonaro is refusing to recognise the result and says he will fight it in the courts. Lula thanked younger voters for turning out in large numbers, and the report said about three million more voters turned out in the second round, with a WhatsApp group and viral social media images helping mobilise supporters. A former ambassador to Brazil said the Supreme Electoral Court had certified the result and the election was over. In Serbia, a student-led protest movement won a surprise victory in parliamentary elections, with Aleksandar Vučić admitting defeat after 14 years in power and celebrations in Belgrade. The movement drew up a student list made by five main university cities, selecting public personalities with no political experience; voters chose 139 of them for parliament, and they must now choose ministers and a prime minister under the movement's watch.

In the UK, Prime Minister Andy Burnham left the door open to a potential referendum on returning to the EU's freedom of movement rules. He is expected to set out options for the UK's future relationship with Brussels at next month's EU summit, likely including the customs union, the single market and rejoining the EU. The transcript says full rejoining could only happen after another referendum and no decision has been made on whether a public vote would be needed; the Conservatives accused him of not thinking through his plans, Reform UK called returning to freedom of movement mad, and the Liberal Democrats said free movement would be good for economic growth. On the eve of Israel's general election, the outcome was described as on a knife edge and the vote as a referendum on Benjamin Netanyahu, with security and the conscription of the ultra-Orthodox Haredi community among major issues. A new Haredi party, Haredi Public, was calling for change within the community and allowing two Haredi women to run for the Knesset for the first time; Netanyahu had called on the party to pull out. Polls put Netanyahu's Likud and Gadi Eisenkot's Yashar two seats apart, with the opposition ahead by as much as six votes in coalition terms, and the president would choose who gets the chance to form a government.

Senior doctors in England will stage a two-day strike next month in a dispute over pay and pensions, with their union saying earnings have fallen significantly in real terms despite recent pay rises. Consultants last walked out in 2023; the BMA said consultants did not want to strike but felt pushed into it and were open to talks with a credible funded package, while the health secretary called the action irresponsible and government sources said the pay demand could cost two to three billion pounds and was not affordable. In breaking news from the US, a judge ruled that the Trump administration's firing of prosecutor Maureen Comey was unlawful. She had led criminal cases against Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell and was terminated in July shortly after the federal trial of Sean Diddy Combs, whose prosecution she led; her lawsuit claimed political retaliation against her father, former FBI chief James Comey, and that she was axed without explanation or cause.