Headline

Mum Of 3 Hospitalised With Bullet-like Holes After Agonising BBL

Published

1 year ago

September 10, 2024

A mum-of-three has been left with “bullet wound’ holes in her bum after an agonising Brazilian Butt Lift she bought on Facebook.

Melissa Crawford, 30, had always been self-conscious of her “flat” backside and when childbirth left her looking like an “ironing board”, she began searching for ways to feel more confident in her body.

While scrolling through Facebook, she came across a salon in her local city of Belfast that was offering customers a “Liquid Brazilian Butt Lift” (BBL) for £1700, which involves plumping out the buttock tissue with injections of dermal filler.

Ms Crawford underwent the non-surgical procedure in May this year, alongside facial filler, but she suffered extreme complications.

Ms Crawford had a litre of filler injected into her backside with a giant needle usually used for liposuction procedures. She claims she was never told to sign any documents or shown details of the products being put into her.

Just 24 hours after the procedure, which she says was more painful than childbirth, abscesses began growing on her bottom.

A liquid BBL is different from a traditional procedure, which involves transferring fat from other areas of the body, such as the hips or stomach.

“I have always been really self conscious about my bum because it’s quite flat,” Ms Crawford said.

“Growing up I was more of a boob girl than a bum girl and then I had kids and my boobs went. I just look like an ironing board.”

Although she had never heard of the salon before and only saw a few Facebook posts from the beautician, not many places offered the procedure so she decided to go with it.

The beautician reassured her, explaining she had done the procedure on herself.

“She did the bum filler first. She just asked if I was allergic to anything but I didn’t have to sign anything,” Ms Crawford said.

“I remember panicking here as I didn’t think this was a good sign but I wanted the treatment done so badly.

“She didn’t show me what she was going to use and didn’t show me any of the expiry dates on the products.

“She just got a big see-through bag with pre-filled syringes. It was so heavy and massive.

“She injected me with lidocaine [for numbing] in a few spots on my bum.

“It looked like a lipo needle. I could feel it and didn’t think I’d be able to do it.

“She started crunching. It sounded like rocks being crunched together and she told me it was just her breaking away fat from the skin. It was excruciating and sweat was lashing off me.

“She filled one cheek and then filled the other side. She had suggested a litre of filler in my bum.

“I was stuck to the bed in sweat. My clothes were soaked and I was biting my hand.

“It was excruciating. When she was done, I was so relieved. I felt like I was going to pass out.”

After the procedure the beautician told Ms Crawford she could sit down, but she was in too much pain.

“She said it was just swelling and I would need to lay on my stomach for the first night but then I would be okay,” Ms Crawford added.

Ms Crawford claims she reached out to the aesthetician about the pain swelling she was experiencing but her concerns were ignored, she said.

After being prescribed antibiotics by her GP to bring down a fever, she reached out to another aesthetician who told her to go straight to hospital in case of life-threatening sepsis.

“I felt constantly lightheaded and I couldn’t eat. Even with the medicine given by the doctor, I was waking up in the middle of the night and sweat was lashing off me.

“I was in agony. It was like this horrible throb and I felt like somebody had just pushed a brick in my bum that was scolding.”

On May 21, Ms Crawford underwent surgery to have the filler drained from her body and abscesses removed.

She says she was left with two “gaping” holes in her backside and “hip dips” all the way around her bottom.

She recalled: “The surgeon came down and told me he needed to remove this [the filler] now as it was in my bloodstream.

“I was rushed in for emergency surgery and I came out with two holes in my bum.

“They were massive and this is where they had removed the abscesses from.

“I had to have my holes packed every day. It looked like I had two massive stab or bullet wounds [in my bum].

“One of the holes was two inches deep and the other one was slightly smaller.

“I was devastated. At the time, I was just relieved to get it [the filler] out and recover from this.

“But as time went on, I had big massive dents in it.

“Where your bum naturally fills out, I have two gaping holes and dents in it so it looks like I have hip dips all the way around my bum now and it looks horrendous.”

As well as her liquid BBL, Ms Crawford claims the facial filler carried out by the beautician left her looking like “Quasimodo”.

She said: “My eye was droopy. ‘It was causing my eyelash extensions to point downwards and I couldn’t see and it felt so heavy. I felt like Quasimodo.

“I couldn’t function. I couldn’t drive or speak to people because I felt a mess.”

Ms Crawford says the whole experience has put her off getting filler for life and is now warning others about her own physical and mental repercussions following her treatment.

“I can’t wear jeans or dresses. I just wear baggy clothes now. I can’t go in for any kind of surgery now to fix it so I’m stuck with this for life,” she said.

“It was my biggest insecurity and now I feel stupid. It breaks my heart. It has put me off filler for life. It’s given me the scare I needed.

“They [the holes] are healing well. But they are massive and take up most of the side of my bum and they are hideous and I will be permanently scarred from it.”

Headline

Sweden To Charge 18-year-old Over IS Terror Plot

Published

2 hours ago

November 4, 2025

Editor

The Swedish Prosecution Authority said Tuesday it intended to charge an 18-year-old man for planning a terrorist act in Stockholm on behalf of the Islamic State group.

According to prosecutors, the planning took place between August 2024 and February 2025.

“We believe the purpose of the preparations was to induce serious fear in the population, in the name of the Islamic State. The criminal act could have seriously harmed Sweden,” Deputy Chief Prosecutor Henrik Olin said in a statement.

Prosecutors did not provide details of the plan but said the man was also suspected of “preparation for serious crimes under the act on flammable and explosive goods and training for terrorism”.

Prosecutors said they planned to file the charges on Thursday and that a press conference would be held the same day.

The young man will also be charged alongside a 17-year-old boy with attempted murder in Germany in August 2024.

Both of them are also suspected of “participation in a terrorist organisation,” according to the statement.

The man was arrested in Stockholm on February 11 and has been in custody since then.

AFP

Headline

US Shutdown Hits 35 Days, Tying Longest In History

Published

2 hours ago

November 4, 2025

Editor

The US government shutdown entered its 35th day on Tuesday, matching a record set during President Donald Trump’s first term, as lawmakers voiced hope over progress behind the scenes to end the dispute.

The federal closure appears almost certain to become the longest in history, with no breakthroughs expected before it goes into its sixth week at midnight — although there were fragile signs in Congress that an off-ramp is closer than ever.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune set the buoyant mood music on Monday when he told reporters he felt “optimistic” that newly energised talks between warring Republicans and Democrats could end in a deal before next week.

The government has been grinding to a halt since Congress failed to pass a bill to keep federal departments and agencies funded past the end of the last financial year on September 30.

“I’ll be honest with you, I don’t think any of us expected that it would drag on this long. We didn’t believe, we couldn’t have imagined,” House Speaker Mike Johnson told a news conference arranged to mark the six-week milestone.

“It’s now tied for the longest shutdown in US history. And we didn’t think we’d have to come in here every single day — day after day after day — and repeat the obvious facts to the American people and to put on display every day what is happening here.”

Some 1.4 million federal workers — from air traffic controllers to park wardens — have been placed on enforced leave without pay or made to work for nothing, while vital welfare programs and even paychecks for active-duty troops are under threat.

Both sides remain dug in over the main sticking point — health care spending.

Democrats say they will only provide votes to end the funding lapse after a deal has been struck to extend expiring insurance subsidies that make health care affordable for millions of Americans.

But Republicans insist they will only address health care once Democrats have voted to switch the lights back on in Washington.

While both sides’ leadership have shown little appetite for compromise, there have been signs of life on the back benches, with a handful of moderate Democrats working to find an escape hatch.

A separate bipartisan group of four centrist House members unveiled a compromise framework Monday for lowering health insurance costs.

Democrats believe that millions of Americans seeing skyrocketing premiums as they enroll onto health insurance programs for next year will pressure Republicans into seeking compromise.

But Trump has held firm on refusing to negotiate, telling CBS News in an interview broadcast Sunday that he would “not be extorted.”

The president has sought to apply his own pressure to force Democrats to cave, by threatening mass layoffs of federal workers and using the shutdown to target progressive priorities.

Last week his administration threatened to cut off a vital aid programme that helps 42 million Americans pay for groceries for the first time in its more than 60-year history, before the move was blocked in court.

And the president has returned to a familiar playbook of demanding the elimination of the Senate filibuster — the 60-vote threshold for passing most legislation — so Republicans can pass government funding themselves.

“Terminate the filibuster now, end the ridiculous shutdown immediately, and then, most importantly, pass every wonderful Republican policy that we have dreamt of for years, but never gotten,” Trump fulminated in an all-caps social media post.

Preserving the filibuster — which senators say protects the voice of the minority — is one of the few issues on which Republicans are willing to defy Trump and radical reform seems highly unlikely.

“The votes aren’t there,” Thune told reporters on Monday.

AFP

Headline

China Backs Nigeria, Warns Against Foreign Interference

Published

2 hours ago

November 4, 2025

Editor

China has urged the international community to respect Nigeria’s sovereignty following a US threat of military action.

The Chinese government reiterated its support for President Bola Tinubu’s administration, commending the government for guiding the country along a development path tailored to its national conditions.

According to a report sourced from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, People’s Republic of China’s website, the Spokesperson for China’s Foreign Ministry, Mao Ning, stated this at a press briefing on Tuesday in Beijing.

She said, “As Nigeria’s strategic partner, China opposes any attempt by foreign powers to use religion or human rights as a pretext to meddle in another country’s internal affairs or impose sanctions and military threats.”

Recently, the US threatened Nigeria with possible military action due to the alleged persecution of Christians in the country.

The United States President, Donald Trump, had threatened to deploy military forces in Nigeria if the alleged genocide against Christians is not stopped in the country.