Nonstop flights are available from most major airports. More information for your vacation planning is available at aruba. Com. And now, bbc world news. Laura this is bbc world news america. Reporting from washington, i am laura trevelyan. More than a week after Hurricane Maria hit, the people of puerto rico are in desperate need of help. Tonight, we hear from the mayor of san juan. More warning signs missed before half a million Rohingya Muslims fled into bangladesh . And a new exhibit takes us up close and personal with those who shaped american history. Laura welcome to our viewers on Public Television in america and around the globe. The conditions in puerto rico are increasingly dire more than a week after Hurricane Maria ripped through. Federal aid is arriving, but there are serious questions about whether it is coming fast enough, and desperation is setting in. Much of the island is without power or Running Water. Supplies that have arrived are stuck in a bottleneck. A brief time ago, i spoke with san juans mayor, carmen yulin cruz, and asked her for an update on conditions. Mayor cruz they are dire conditions, horrific conditions, devastation like i have never seen before. We still dont have power in puerto rico, and presumably wont come back for the next six to eight months. People do not have Running Water , most of the population. As you leave the metropolitan area of san juan, conditions worsen. I had a crew that just made their way into san juan today simply from the mayor of a municipality at the center of puerto rico, asking for food and water, because they say people are drinking out of a creek, the same creek where they are washing their clothes and bathing themselves. They are quite concerned about what the Health Conditions will be, and if there is any issue that will come about from that. People are starting to get desperate. The lines for gas are milelong lines. It is very unnerving. People are desperate for help, but for basic help. This is the one thing we want to convey. , we are seeing images of aid stacked in the ports. What is it that you need to get aid to the people . Is it gas and trucks and drivers . Mayor cruz they are saying that lack of energy, they are unable to take reportedly 3000 of those tankers are there waiting. Just imagine, you are hungry and you are in front of the supermarket watching all of the ham and the cheese and the bread. Well, this is exactly what is happening. I think we need to be a lot more creative, a lot more proactive. I want to thank all the fema employees that are working very hard. But we also need to let the red tape and bureaucracy be a thing of the past. Fema employees are you to do are eager to do their job. They represent the United States values, the shared values that as a country we share. They are eager to help, as they have done in houston and florida and other places. But there seems to be some sort of bottleneck and some sort of problem in getting the supply chain of aid moving. We are fortunate in the city of san juan that we have resources sent to us this morning. And we thank i personally thank the white house for listening to us. We hope and expect that in the next 24 to 48 hours at most, we will begin to see the supply chain of aid moving in san juan, and perhaps also in puerto rico. Laura mayor carmen yulin cruz, thank you so much for joining us. The unfolding emergency in puerto rico. Now, the United Nations has been accused of a series of failures leading to the Current Crisis in myanmar. The secretarygeneral has acknowledged today that it is the fastest developing refugee emergency. More than half a million rohingyas have fled to bangladesh. The bbcs jonah fisher has seen internal u. N. Documents outlining concerns about how the conflict has been handled. He has this report. Reporter in a months since Rohingya Muslims first began fleeing into bangladesh, the United Nations has been at the forefront of the response. Delivering aid and making robust statements condemning the burmese authorities. The situation remains or seems a textbook example of the ethnic cleansing. Reporter but could and should the u. N. Have done more before the killing and burning started . Very disturbing to think that some of this could have been prevented. Is a lawyer and aid worker, and between 2013 and 2015, she ran the office of the top United Nations official in myanmar. This is her, a canadian. It was a stressful time. She says her boss was afraid of upsetting the burmese government, that any suggestions that they stand up for the rohingyas human rights was offlimits, even in internal meetings. Well, you could do it, but it had consequences. It had negative consequences that maybe you were no longer invited to meetings. Or your travel organizations were not clear. The atmosphere was created were talking about these issues was not done. Reporter she says she repeatedly warned her boss about the possibility of rohingya ethnic cleansing, but she was labeled an alarmist and troublemaker, and frozen out of her job. The u. N. Acted the way it did in very simple terms because it was preferring to keep its good relationships with the government over protecting the rohingya. Reporter her comments have been confirmed off the record by other senior u. N. Staff. This man is more used to speaking out. This is him where he was for six years the u. N. s special rapporteur for human rights in myanmar. He told me via skype from argentina that he was asked not they tried to stop him covering rohingya issues when he visited, and he was asked not to go to northern rakhine state. I asked why. There was no answer. It was just, try not to bring trouble with the authorities. Reporter the u. N. Is aware that it does have a problem. This report, commissioned by the u. N. Two years ago, and leaked to the bbc, says they focused too heavily on the over similar oversimplified hope that development and investment itself would reduce tensions. A memo prepared for the new u. N. Secretary general called the u. N. In myanmar glaringly dysfunctional. Could the United Nations have stopped this burmese Army Offensive . The answer is almost certainly no. But things just might have been different if there had been a coherent strategy over the last few years demanding that the rohingyas basic rights be respected, and making aid to other communities conditional on the rohingyas being treated better. After the damaging internal reports, the u. N. Announced in june that she would leave her job. But myanmar seems to quite like her, and has blocked her replacement, so she is still here. She is fair and she is not biased. Whoever is biased towards the rohingya wont like her. Reporter she declined to be interviewed for this piece, but in a statement, her office said, we strongly disagree with the accusations that the resident coordinator prevented internal discussions, and stressed that she had the backing of the uns secretarygeneral. In the last month, half a million rohingya have fled myanmar into bangladesh. Their tales of atrocities and abuse are a reminder of the warnings that went unheard. Hard to say which action would have been able to prevent this, but what i know for sure is that what was done was never going to prevent it. Why not . The way it was done simply ignoring the issue. Reporter jonah fisher, bbc news. We went a short time ago to the United Nations, where the Security Council was briefed on the crisis. What was said by whom about the plight of the rohingya today . Reporter the Security Council heard various accounts from the secretarygeneral, from those who had fled, boneling testimony. The council heard how whole villages in northern rakhine had been torched to the ground in a campaign to basically drive out muslim minority. He said they had suffered excessive violence and severe human rights violations. Civilians were targeted by indiscreet fire and weapons and landmines. They were also sexually targeted. This is mainly women and children who were affected. Laura are there many proposals to contain the situation, like an armed embargo against myanmar . Nada well, that is exactly what almost 90 nongovernmental organizations have urged the Security Council to do, to to impose an arms embargo and sanctions against those who are known to have committed these violations. But that is very unlikely. Chin on the Council Holds veto power. They are a diplomatic and economic ally of of myanmar. They have said that the burmese government should just engage in dialogue in the council today. That is a nonstarter. The u. S. Ambassador nikki haley did suggest that countries should stop providing the military with weapons until they get really clearcut assurances that accountability will be in place. But, laura, i think what you heard from across members of the council is a need for the root cause of this to be addressed in which his nationality for the rohingya. Laura thank you so much for joining us. In other news from around the world, the Islamic State group has released an audio recording of what it claims is its leader, abu boxer albaghdadi. The message is not a company by video or pictures. Washington says it has yet to verify the recording, but has no reason to doubt the authenticity. U. S. Congressman Steve Scalise was given a standing ovation as he returned to capitol hill for the First Time Since he was seriously wounded by a gun man in june. Republicans and democrats united in cheering him as he entered the chamber on crutches. Venezuela, where the political turmoil is causing hundreds of thousands to flee across the border into neighboring countries. Colombia is taking people in search of basic supplies and a better life for their families. Our south american correspondent katy watson has been to the colombian border town and has this report. Katy it is oneway traffic at this time of day. A short walk across the bridge into colombia, into a different world. Dozens of mothers were taking their babies to get vaccination. Many more had empty bags to stock up on food. Others are leaving for good. She is saying goodbye to her son and his girlfriend. They are on their way to chile. They have no choice. It is the only way to have a future. There are mixed emotions as the family goes their separate ways. Feel, but also really happy. Feel sad, but also really happy. Katy the crisis is so bad in venezuela that many people cannot afford to eat more than one meal a day. The local church is helping out. 700 or 800 people have come to lunch here. Many who come to venezuela have a bite to eat and then return. When you have Food Shortages and such high inflation, which means food is so expensive, this is the only chance for many to get a decent meal. There are record numbers of malnourished children. Three quarters of venezuelans have shed weight in the past year, an an average of nine kilos. Veronica is five months pregnant. She cannot find work in venezuela. She travels two hours every day with her mom to sell fruit at the market in colombia. This is the only proper meal of the day. Look at the weight i have lost. I used to be healthy and strong. Katy 25,000 venezuelans crossed the border here every day. While many return, an increasing number are choosing to stay. Authorities are feeling the pressure. They say, ok, were going to help you. And when the situation gets worse, we see tons of people, and they say, weight, stop, we cant receive anymore, and we cant help anymore. Katy her father was killed by paramilitaries. Her family fled to venezuela when she was a child. Now a single mother of 2 little boys who are venezuelan, she has had to return. She is desperate. I need to find food for my kids and find a job that will allow me to look after my boys. , some partsht become dormitories. 300 people, families included, sleep on this roundabout every night, and some have been here for months. Increasing numbers turned to prostitution to earn some money, desperate to move forward any way they can. Katy watson, bbc news, on the colombian border. Laura you are watching bbc world news america. Still to come on tonights program, scholar, diplomat, architect of the nuclear age. How the work of james conant is still relevant in todays world. Hugh hefner, the founder of playboy magazine, has died. He was 91. He First Published in the magazine in his kitchen in 1953, with Marilyn Monroe as the first centerfold. James cook looks back at his life. James hugh hefner was the teenage boy who never grew up. He lived a life of adolescent fantasy, which he called sexual liberation. For the son of puritanical christians, this was some rebellion. The libertine lifestyle sprang from the pages of a magazine he started at his Kitchen Table that became a lucrative global brand. His first nude centerfold, Marilyn Monroe, didnt get a penny from playboy, but many were happy to use the publication for their own ends. Pushing the boundaries was not always easy. Hugh hefner battled against censorship, for free speech, he said. I think i take the greatest pride over 50 years now in the impact that i think i personally and playboy has had in the change in the social sexual values of our time. James and change they did, no more so than at the playboy mansion here in los angeles. For hugh hefner, all of this, the mansion, the money, the multiple girlfriends, was about freedom, freedom to live whatever life you like. For his many critics, it was about freedom for men only. To look back at that period and say it was liberating for women is fatuous. It was liberating for men, not for women. Of course, men said they read playboy for the articles, and some were serious. Hugh hefner showcased countless great authors like norman mailer, ray bradbury, and margaret atwood. But his legacy was built on was sex, which in his words regarded women like objects. Laura from the early days of chemical weapons to the manhattan projects creation of the first atomic bomb, james conant was a pivotal figure in the nuclear age. His granddaughter has written his life story, called man of the hour. She joined me a short time ago to talk about this glorious scientist. Your grandfather helped to lead the secret project to develop the atomic bomb. You say in the book that he hoped the bomb would never become reality. Was he conflicted . Yes and no. They were all conflicted. They knew how terrible the weapon would be. They wanted it to work because they thought the germans had one and they had to get it first. They knew it was going to change the world forever. Part of them hoped it couldnt work for even the germans or us, and this nightmare weapon would go away. Laura and yet your grandfather argued that it should be used on hiroshima. What was his reasoning . Because it was such a term of such a terrible weapon committed have been made, and he knew it was only a short number of years before everybody would have it. The secret couldnt be kept. He thought that if we could end one horrible war and demonstrate it to the world, nobody would use it again, because it is too terrible. Laura he was a stiff upper lip type. Did he ever regret the decision even in private . Publicly, never, because he felt he had to be loyal to truman. Privately, he agonized over the nagasaki bombing, three days after the hiroshima bombing, such a short time. The scientists had no say in that position, it was a military decision, but it was a difficult one to deal with. Laura james conant was an anraordinary man, not only atomic scientists, but in education reformer, responsible for the standardized test we have today, and a cold war diplomat as well. What most surprised you about him . The scope of his ambitions and adjust his just his confidence. He really was a defender of democracy. He really felt he understood how to guide our country forward and map out the Cold War Nuclear policy for the world. And that kind of confidence and courage to make those kinds of decisions is daunting. You look around today and you think, well we could use a few more men like that. Laura we certainly could. And yet he paid a price in his private life. You write very interestingly about his wife, peggy, that she struggled to live up to her husbands high standards. How did that manifest itself . He was a perfectionist and brilliant and she felt completely overshadowed. It made her feel incompetent. She was quite depressive. It was really sad, really. He was impossible to live with and measure up to, and his sons ended up feeling the same way. So there is a price to be paid. Laura when he died, the New York Times said there was a conant vacancy in American Public life. As you look back on his extraordinary life, what do you think his enduring legacy is, and his example for all of us today . I think his legacy is he had enormous faith in the country, and felt it was unique, and that our form of government and the equality of opportunity and social mobility that characterized america had to be defended, and that was the key, but there was no point in having these weapons if we let that you erode from within. His legacy today is that it is fine to have these armaments and defend our borders, but we also have to defend our ideals. Laura we do indeed. Jennet conant, thank you for joining us. Thank you for having me. Laura the most recognizable figures in u. S. History are ready for their closeup. Yes, the american president s are on display at the National Gallery in washington, d. C. They are being showcased with much more Historical Context than ever before. Jane obrien has been for a president ial viewing. Jane few individuals have to defined americas history as much as the nations 45 president s. But this is no hallowed hall of veneration. These are intimate encounters with men who were deeply human and mired in contradictions. They are very important to our identity as americans today to consider those contexts and understand these president s not at these glorified men, but as individuals who had flaws and defects of character, just like everybody else. Jane that context