The US Navy has confirmed it is investigating 15 sailors working mainly in the nuclear reactor department of the aircraft carrier Ronald Reagan for allegations of LSD abuse.

Lt. Joe Keiley, spokesman for the Seventh Fleet, based in Japan, said that two sailors are already heading to court-martial accused of using, possessing and distributing the hallucinogenic drug, while three are waiting to see whether they will be charged as well.

Another 10 sailors were administratively disciplined. Of the 15, 14 worked in the nuclear department.

News of the LSD ring was first reported by The Wall Street Journal in February, but Lt Keiley confirmed that the initial investigation had resulted in charges.

When the allegations were first reported, the Seventh Fleet – beset by a series of problems – issued a statement saying that “the Navy has zero tolerance for drug abuse and takes all allegations involving misconduct of our sailors, Navy civilians and family members very seriously.”

Japanese authorities were also initially brought into the investigation because of suspicions that drugs were sold to Japanese residents. They dropped the case in June.

Lt Keiley said that the accused sailors had had their work reviewed.

“Out of an abundance of caution, Ronald Reagan leadership reviewed the work previously performed by the accused sailors and no improper work was identified,” he said, in an email to Navy Times.

The two facing court martial are named in charge sheets as Machinist’s Mate Nuclear 2nd Class Andrew W. Miller, who faces charges of using, possessing and trafficking the drug from January to February of this year, and Electrician’s Mate Nuclear 2nd Class Sean M. Gevero.

Gevero is also charged with distributing LSD and possessing nandrolone decanoate, an anabolic steroid.

Lawyers for the two men have not commented publicly.

Lt Keiley refused to say what rank the other 13 sailors held, but said the ship was never at risk. 

“Propulsion plant operations and maintenance are supervised by senior personnel,” he said. “Due to the defence in depth of the design and operation of the propulsion plants, the reactors aboard (the Reagan) remain safe.” 

The Seventh Fleet has been plagued by problems over the past year. 

In 2017, two ships – the USS John S. McCain and the USS Fitzgerald – were involved in separate collisions with commercial vessels, killing 17 sailors.

In August 2017 Vice Admiral Joseph Aucoin, commander of all US naval forces in the eastern Pacific, was fired as the result of a “loss of confidence in his ability to command,” the Navy said.

The nationalist Alternative for Germany party (AfD) has been plunged into renewed controversy after it emerged that one of its members posed for photographs on a “pilgrimage” of sites associated with Adolf Hitler.

The politician in question, who has not been named under German privacy laws, posed holding a candle outside Hitler’s birthplace in the Austrian town of Braunau am Inn.

He also posed with a picture of the Fuhrer close to his mountain retreat at Berchtesgaden in the Alps, and with a banner bearing a swastika and SS runes. 

Details of the pictures, which were taken on a tour of Nazi sites the politician made with colleagues in 2015, emerged this week in a report in Thüringer Allgemeine newspaper.

The AfD admitted the existence of the photographs and said the politician concerned had resigned from the party.

Although he has not been publicly named, he is understood to be a senior figure in the party’s regional association in Thuringia, and an associate of Björn Höcke, one of the most controversial figures in the AfD.

There were calls for Mr Höcke to be expelled from the party last year after he called for a “180-degree turn” in German attitudes to the Second World War. The politician involved in the latest controversy is understood to have served on the panel that found in Mr Höcke’s favour.

The AfD has known about the existence of the photographs since September and took immediate action, the party said in a statement.

“The person concerned was clearly reminded by the state board that such incidents are unacceptable and incompatible with AfD membership,” Torben Braga, a party spokesman said. The politician had resigned from the party the same day, he said.

Details of the pictures emerged only days after another AfD politician was caught up in a scandal over old photographs of her posing alongside wine bottles with Hitler’s image on the labels.

Jessica Biessmann, a member of the Berlin regional parliament, is facing moves to expel her from the party over the wine bottle photographs, which were originally posted on the internet ten years ago but re-emerged this week.

The twin scandals come amid press reports that several AfD members who were elected to the Bavarian regional parliament last weekend are under surveillance by the German intelligence servives as a possible threat to national security.

Only certain individuals are under surveillance, and not the party as a whole, a spokesman for the Bavarian regional intelligence service told Münchner Merkur newspaper.

Paris has finally found a place for a sculpture of a giant bunch of gaudy tulips offered by American artist Jeff Koons in the wake of the terror attacks but which purists complained would lower the tone of the City of Light.

Mr Koons had described Bouquet of Tulips, a 10-metre (34-foot) work of bronze, stainless steel and aluminium weighing 33 tons as a token of “remembrance to the victims of the terrible tragedies” that rocked the capital in 2014 and 2015, adding that he wanted “to give hope to the surviving family members”.

Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo initially said the multi-coloured sculpture would be installed for all to see opposite the Eiffel Tower and in front of the Palais de Tokyo and the Museum of Modern Art of the City of Paris near Trocadéro.   

She hailed it as a "symbol of generosity and sharing", which shows "our capital’s ties with the United States are unbreakable”.

The Bouquet of Tulips features a hand holding the huge flowers in a gesture designed to ape the Statue of Liberty grasping her torch.

However, critics failed to see eye to eye with the mayor.

In an op-ed in Libération newspaper, some 23 figures from France’s art and culture world slammed the choice of a prime location – at the heart of the city’s modern and contemporary art offerings – adding that the museums had no symbolic connection with the Paris attacks.

While Mr Koons was a "brilliant and inventive" artist in the 1980s, he had since morphed into a symbol of "industrial", assembly-line art, they scoffed.

Françoise Nyssen, the culture minister, pledged to find a home for the sculpture at a location that was "popular, visible and shared by everyone”, while the mayor has defended her choice and has been backed by the French government.

"Can you just imagine the international controversy if the city had told the Americans ‘We don’t want your present?’," she said.

After months of dithering, on Friday, Christophe Girard, Paris’ deputy mayor in charge of culture announced that the sculpture would no doubt be installed in the municipal gardens of the of the Beaux-Arts museum in the Petit Palais, opposite the Grand Palais by the Champs-Elysées.

He said the position near the American Embassy was “a very strong symbol and a reaffirmation of our friendship with the American people”.

"We were split between various options… but Jeff Koons never changed his mind about wanting it in the centre of Paris, near where the attacks took place," he added.

Private foundations would pay for installation but as for its upkeep, Parisian taxpayers would foot the bill, he said.

Mr Koons was the subject of controversy of a different kind last month in Paris, where he was accused in court of plagiarising an iconic French clothing advertisement for one of his celebrated sculptures, Fait d’Hiver.

Advertising creative director Franck Davidovici sued Mr Koons, among the world’s most bankable living artists, for €300,000 (£270,000) for copyright infringement, saying he had produced what his lawyer called a “servile copy” of a famous advertising campaign he ran in 1985 for French clothing brand Naf-Naf.

A verdict is due on November 8.

Tourists landed by the boatload Friday on the Philippines’ Boracay island, which re-opened with a slew of new rules after a six-month shutdown aimed at undoing the impact of years of unrestrained mass tourism.

Rodrigo Duterte, the Philippine president, shuttered the tiny white-sand island in April, declaring it a "cesspool" where businesses flushed raw sewage into the once pristine turquoise waters and trash soiled in beaches.

Among the first to land after the government threw open the doors just past dawn were first-timers attracted by the prospect of a spruced up, less crowded island.

Once a quiet hideaway favoured by backpackers, the tiny island was transformed by overdevelopment into a mass destination seeing some two million visitors per year.

Under the new regime, the beachfront is cleared of the masseuses, vendors, bonfires and even the builders of its famous photo-op sandcastles that once crowded it.

All water sports save for swimming are also banned for the time being, while Boracay’s three casinos have been permanently shut down in line with Mr Duterte’s wishes.

Buildings were bulldozed and businesses pushed back to create a 30-metre (98-foot) buffer zone from the waterline.

Away from the water the sound of machinery and hammering echoed in the air as resorts made improvements to meet new requirements and crews toiled away on a widened main road.

Boracay, which major travel magazines consistently rate as among the world’s best beaches, measures a mere 1,000 hectares (2,470 acres).

Yet it was seeing up to 40,000 sun worshippers at peak times, with tourists spending $1 billion (£780,455) a year but also leaving mountains of garbage and overwhelming the sewage system.

The new rules say 19,200 tourists will be allowed on the island at any one time, with the government aiming to enforce that by controlling the number of available hotel rooms.

Scores of hotels and restaurants were ordered to close because they did not meet standards, while just under 160 tourism-related businesses have been approved to re-open.

Drinking and smoking are banned and the huge multi-day beach parties dubbed "LaBoracay" that drew tens of thousands of tourists during the May 1 Labour Day weekend will be a thing of the past.

The Boracay Foundation, the main business industry group on the island, said the sector supports the new regulations aimed at cleaning up the resort.

"The rules and ordinances are really perfect… it’s just a matter of implementation," its executive director Pia Miraflores told AFP.

"For a long time we’ve been asking for the political will to implement the rules and regulations," she added.

Tens of thousands of workers were left unemployed when the island’s tourism machine was deprived of visitors. They cheered as the guests began to arrive.

Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has called the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi "heinous" and vowed to bring the perpetrators to justice, in his first public address since the death.

The prince spoke at the Future Investment Initiative conference in the Saudi capital of Riyadh to a packed auditorium, which had waited patiently to hear whether he would comment on one of the kingdom’s worst scandals in recent history.

Prince Mohammed called the death of the Washington Post columnist “painful for both the Saudi people and the world”, but claimed it was being exploited by some to drive a wedge between Saudi and Turkey.

“I want to send them a message: They will not be able to do that as long as there is a king called King Salman bin Abdulaziz and a crown prince called Mohammed bin Salman in Saudi Arabia, and a president in Turkey called Erdogan,” said the prince, who was part of a panel discussing economic reforms in the region.

The heir-apparent said the two countries would work together to bring the perpetrators to court, without addressing accusations he ordered the killing of one of his most prominent critics.

To add to the oddity of the event, Prince Mohammed appeared on stage alongside Lebanese prime minister-designate Saad Hariri, whom he is accused of kidnapping and forcing to resign live on air from Riyadh last year in an apparent disagreement over growing Iranian influence in Lebanon.

He joked that Mr Hariri would only be staying in the kingdom for two days this time. 

The Saudis have tried to portray business as usual at the forum – viewed as the jewel in the crown prince’s Vision 2030 plan for the country.

Prince Mohammed claimed during his address that the country’s growth would be much better in 2019 than this year, as kingdom begins to see through his plans to diversify away from oil.

To a standing ovation, MBS, as he is nicknamed, said economic transformation in Saudi would "restore the Middle East to its past glory".

But missing from the audience were Western politicians, top world bankers and company executives, who declined to attend in an attempt to distance themselves from the saga.

Saudi has tried to reassure foreign banks who have chosen to boycott the forum that they would not be penalised.

Beyond the conference, the drip-drip of revelations in the case has tested ties between Saudi and its traditional Western allies.

While US President Donald Trump has offered a degree of protection to the 33-year-old crown prince, it appeared today that this would not be unconditional.

President Trump said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal published late on Tuesday that Prince Mohammed bore ultimate responsibility for the operation that led to Khashoggi’s killing. 

In his toughest comments yet, Mr Trump she he wanted to believe the prince when he said that lower level officials were to blame for the killing at the Saudi mission.

But he suggested responsibility lay higher up: "Well, the prince is running things over there more so at this stage. He’s running things and so if anybody were going to be, it would be him."

An adviser to Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Prince Mohammed had "blood on his hands" over Khashoggi, the bluntest language yet from someone linked to Turkey’s president.

Mr Erdogan himself kept up his pressure on Saudi Arabia on Wednesday.

"We are determined not to allow the murder to be covered up and for those responsible – from the person who gave the order to those who executed it – not to escape justice," he said.

On Wednesday, Saudi officials finally granted permission to Turkish police to search a well in the garden of the Saudi consulate in Istanbul as part of their investigation.

The well was at centre of speculation yesterday that it may contain body parts belonging to the journalist.

Donald Trump is expected to wield the axe in the wake of Tuesday’s midterm elections, with figures close to the president predicting that cabinet members will be forced out. 

The US president did not push back on suggestions he would reshuffle his administration when talking to reporters earlier this week, saying pointedly: “For the most part, I love my cabinet.”

Another shake-up would likely further consolidate power under Mr Trump, removing moderating forces who at times have urged caution over policy, much to the president’s frustration.

It would also once again push up the turnover figures for Mr Trump’s White House, already one of the highest for a modern-day president. 

More than 38 million Americans voted early in the elections – a huge rise on the 27 million who did so in the 2014 midterms.

In Texas, Arizona and Nevada early ballots alone exceeded the entire 2014 voting totals, showing a country energised by this year’s congressional and state-wide elections. 

The results offer an insight into the mood of the electorate two years after Mr Trump’s shock victory, which put a man with no government or military experience into the White House. 

With the election now over, Mr Trump is predicted to make widespread personnel changes. Sebastian Gorka, Mr Trump’s former deputy assistant, predicted one or two cabinet members could go. 

"Every White House has some changes in year three. This one will be no exception,” he told The Daily Telegraph.

Speaking to reporters on Monday before a final day of campaigning, Mr Trump made little effort to downplay the possibility of a shake-up. 

"Administrations make changes usually after midterms and probably we’ll be right in that category. I think it’s very customary,” he said. 

Jeff Sessions, the US attorney general who Mr Trump has repeatedly chastised for recusing himself from the Russia investigation, is among those in the most precarious position. 

Mr Sessions has become a frequent target for Mr Trump’s tweeted criticism and key Republican senators who had been publicly backing him now seem resigned to his departure. 

Rod Rosenstein, the deputy attorney general overseeing the Russia probe, could also be at risk. He appeared on the eve of leaving in September before a decision was delayed. 

Mr Rosenstein faced embarrassing reports that he proposed wearing a wire when meeting the president at the height of the fallout over FBI director James Comey’s sacking.

He said the comment was a joke.  However his departure would complicate Robert Mueller’s probe on Russian meddling in the 2016 election, which has dogged the Trump presidency, as a new overseer would need to be picked. 

Mr Mueller has made few public moves in recent weeks as the election came to a head, but his probe is expected to reenter the spotlight before Christmas.

He continues to push for an interview with Mr Trump, a row that has played out behind the scenes all year. 

Other question marks hang over Kirstjen Nielsen, the homeland security secretary whose failure to drive down immigration has angered Mr Trump, and Jim Mattis, the defence secretary seen as a moderating force who the president publicly suggested could leave last month. 

A new US ambassador to the United Nations is also due to be announced this week after Nikki Haley decided to leave.

Heather Nauert, the top State Department spokesman and former Fox News reporter, is the front-runner for the job. 

Speaking before the polls opened, Mr Trump suggested he could soften his tone after an election campaign where he deployed heated warnings over the threat posed by illegal immigration. 

Asked about regrets from his time in office during an ABC7 interview, Mr Trump said: "I would like to have a much softer tone. 

"I feel to a certain extent I have no choice, but maybe I do. Maybe I could have been softer from that standpoint."