this is bbc news. welcome if you re watching here in the uk, on pbs in america or around the globe. i m mike embley. our top stories: a stark warning from president trump that he will deploy the army to end the widespread protests across the country triggered by the death in police custody of the unarmed african american, george floyd. if a city or a state refuses to take the actions that are necessary to defend the life and property of their residents, then i will deploy the united states military, and quickly solve the problem for them. in minneapolis, the official post mortem examination finds the death was a homicide. the victim s brother tells demonstrators violence would not bring the changes the black community deserves. my family is a peaceful family, my family is god fearing. let s do this another way. let s stop thinking that our voice don t matter, and vote! protests against police brutality continue. at least a0 cities and washington dc have imposed curfews, with a heavy police presence at the white house. moments after he threatened to deploy thousands and thousands of us troops against the protests and riots that have engulfed dozens of american cities, president trump has been on an extraordinary walkabout through downtown washington dc. he eventually stopped for photos, holding a bible, in front of the so called church of presidents, damaged in the disturbances. a peaceful protest outside the white house was tear gassed by police to clear the president s path. earlier he d told state governors they must dominate the protests and get much tougher. the death of george floyd, in minneapolis, which sparked the latest unrest, has now officially been declared a homicide. the following measures are going into effect immediately. first, we are ending the riots and lawlessness that has spread throughout our country. we will end it now. today, i have strongly recommended to every governor to deploy the national guard in sufficient numbers that we dominate the streets. mayors and governors must establish an overwhelming law enforcement presence until the violence has been quelled. if a city or state refuses to take the actions that are necessary to defend the life and property of their residents, then i will deploy the united states military and quickly solve the problem for them. i am also taking swift and decisive action to protect our great capital, washington, dc. what happened in this city last night was a total disgrace. as we speak, i am dispatching thousands and thousands of heavily armed soldiers, military personnel and law enforcement officers to stop the rioting, looting, vandalism, assaults, and the wanton destruction of property. we are putting everybody on warning, our 7 o clock curfew will be strictly enforced. those who threaten innocent life and property will be arrested, detained and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. i want the organisers of this terror to be on notice that you will face severe criminal penalties, and lengthy sentences injail. this includes antifa and others who are leading instigators of this violence. one law and order. and that is what it is one law. we have one beautiful law. and once that is restored and fully restored, we will help you, we will help your business and we will help your family. america is founded upon the rule of law. it is the foundation of our prosperity, our freedom and our very way of life, but where there is no law, there is no opportunity. where there is nojustice, there is no liberty. where there is no safety, there is no future. we must never give in to anger or hatred. if malice or violence reigns, then none of us is free. i take these actions today with firm resolve and with a true and passionate love for our country. by far our greatest days lie ahead. the official post mortem examination of george floyd has declared his death a homicide as a result of compression to the neck while being restrained. the official report was published shortly after an examination commissioned by the floyd family, concluded he died from asphyxiation. earlier, his brother, terence, spoke at the scene of his arrest. in every case of police brutality, the same thing has been happening. y all protest, y all destroy stuff and, if they don t move, nobody don t move, because it s not their stuff, it s our stuff? so they want us to destroy our stuff. they re not going to move. let s do this another way. terrence floyd there, the brother of george floyd. professor rachael vanlandingham is a retired air force lieutena nt colonel and security expert at southwestern law school, she joins me from los angeles. thank you very much for your time. lots of people are wondering whether the president can actually do what he is threatening to do, or says he has already started to do. people are talking about the insurrection act of 1807. well, the insurrection act of 18 seven, which replaced the previous militia act, but has not been used in such a situation since president lincoln called forth the militia to put down the so called insurrection that started and prompted the civil war. so the insurrection act is a mechanism that operates, it is federal statute, based on congress constitutional authority under article one. it authorises the president to use federal troops, federal military troops, including, he can federalised the state ‘s national guard is, to enforce domestic law within the united states. but there are three different predicates for using that, for using this authority. first, which is most typical, is at the request of a state, usually the state governor. in 1992 the state governor here in los angeles, where i live, called and requested help from the first president bush to put down the 1992 riots that erupted because of the unfair acquittal, i m just erupted because of the unfair acquittal, i mjust acquittal of the killers of rodney king, again, police officers. two, the president can make a determination that rebellion or obstruction of federal law is preventing, or that state authorities themselves are preventing the compliance of federal law. that is what president eisenhower and president eisenhower and president kennedy relied on, that authority, to enforce segregation and call forth the us military to enforce, excuse me, desegregation, of course, in the late 1950s and early 19605, in the late 1950s and early 1960s, and alabama, mississippi and arkansas. that brings us to the third situation. this is one that we have not yet had in the united states under the insurrection act. that is an authority the president can find that there is some kind of insurrection which is domestic violence or an unlawful combination thereof, which threatens the enforcement of federal law, and deprives citizens of their federal rights, deprives citizens of the total rights. but is rather broad, and i do not think the situation right now has risen to the level of anything like the 1992 riots. for example, in los angeles, in which we had over 2000 individuals seriously injured, 63 people died, almost 4000 fires were set, 1000 buildings destroyed. that was the point at which the governor of california requested for federal forces to of california requested for federalforces to come of california requested for federal forces to come in. of california requested for federalforces to come in. we don t have that in the united states, and what is important to remember is that the state governors have their own local law enforcement, they have the ability to call forth their national guard, the militia, the citizen soldiers can engage in law enforcement and have a long and proud tradition since the founding of this nation of helping enforce domestic law and keep the peace. and state governors, especially after katrina, hurricane katrina in 2005, engaged in and implemented different prostate agreements, so that they can request help from fellow state governors to send those other state national guards and to augment their own. because there is a fear, a deep seated fear that goes back to the federalist papers, to the founding fathers of the united states, and mothers, of the standing army, the us military, the federal military being deployed against us citizens. the standing army was always something to be feared as a threat to democracy and it was to be kept small and used for foreign wars, not internal use in the united states. so there isa in the united states. so there is a fear that president trump is a fear that president trump is using this politically, but he is fear mongering and using the military as, essentially, a proper, which does such a horrible disservice and disgrace and deflects from the tragic murder and death of mr floyd and detracts from the alternate message, the issue here, which is institutionalised, systemic racism in the united states, that president trump has u nfortu nately that president trump has unfortunately contributed to and condoned. i m happy to a nswer and condoned. i m happy to answer other questions. professor, i will have to ask you to be brief on this one, though i know that these are complicated matters that you have to be precise, deep president is also talking about designating this so called antifa a terrorist organisation. there are problems with that, aren t there, quite apart from the fa ct there, quite apart from the fact that antifa is not an organisation? there are huge problems. what he did was meaningless, completely symbolic. it has no legal teeth. under us federal law, and under us supreme court jurisprudence, there is a us federal law that allows the state department or the president to list a foreign terrorist organisation to be a terrorist organisation to be a terrorist organisation, and therefore anyone known to provide material support to such an organisation, that is a crime, a federal crime under us federal law. however, he is not allowed to name any domestic organisation, if antifa, this was collective of seemingly autonomous groups is actually an organisation. nobody can be arrested for belonging to a domestic group. we have freedom of assembly. congress tried to do that during the horrible mccarthy days of anti communism in the smith act, and the supreme court said, not so fast. it is only allowed for foreign terrorist organisations and there are no indications that this is an organisation or that this is an organisation or that it that this is an organisation or thatitis that this is an organisation or that it is foreign. therefore nobody can be arrested for a crime in the us for being a so called member of antifa. they can, however, just like the white aryan brotherhood, or the white aryan brotherhood, or the other white supremacist groups, which have not had president trump label is a terrorist organisation even though they were in cha rlottesville though they were in charlottesville and have been protesting on state capitals on the governors keeping their own people safe, they can be arrested if they actually commita arrested if they actually commit a crime. they can be arrested for the conduct, if they are engaging in assault or battery or property vandalism, or otherwise committing crimes. that is when individuals can be arrested for, not for belonging to an organisation. this is the united states, president trump, andi united states, president trump, and i really hope our courts and i really hope our courts and our law enforcement and our military keep it that way. professor, very briefly, if you can, there are people wondering if what the president is really seeking is martial law. well, if he is seeking it, it is unconstitutional. and i really had the military would say no and say that is an unlawful order. that hope. martial law is the actual taking of of local governance, taking over the courts, taking over law enforcement. even if he invoked the insurrection act, but does not allow him to engage in martial law, it does not allow the military to engage in martial law. they still have to obey the same rules and constitutional restrictions regarding proper use of force. they can t just regarding proper use of force. they can tjust go in and start shooting people, because they are engaged in his protest, right? they can arrest people, and if someone poses a serious risk of imminent, and imminent serious risk of deadly or serious risk of deadly or serious harm to an individual, toa serious harm to an individual, to a police officer or a national guardsman, or to a civilian, that is when deadly force can be used. it is the same exact standard as applies to local law enforcement, and to local law enforcement, and to the police, i would sure hope our us military is going to exercise even more self discipline than what our police have been exercising over the last days and decades and months. professor, thank you so much for your expertise and your insights. stay with us. much more to come on bbc news. the queen and her husband began their royal progress westminster. the moment of crowning, in accordance with the order of service, by a signal given, the great guns of the tower. tributes have been paid around the world to muhammad ali, who has died at the age of 74. outspoken but rarely outfought, ali transcended the sport of boxing, of which he was three times world champion. he was a real fighter and he fought all the way to the end, even through his illness. yes, he did. uefa imposes an indefinite ban on english clubs playing in europe. today is the 20th anniversary of the release of the beatles lp, sergeant pepper s lonely hearts club band, a record described as the album of the century. this is bbc world news, the latest headlines: president trump visits the washington church damaged by protesters, after issuing a stark warning that he will deploy the army to end the demonstrations triggered by the death of the unarmed african american, george floyd. protests against police brutality are continuing in dozens of cities across the united states, including the nation s capital, washington, where a curfew is now in place. there is broad agreement the us has not experienced such protists since the assassination of martin luther king. again, the deep mistrust and hostility felt by millions of african american police have been exposed. the words state of emergency seem inadequate to describe what s happening in america right now. not since the assassination of martin luther king in 1968 have we witnessed such widespread racial turbulence. chanting: black lives matter, black lives matter! if we render these pictures in black and white, they d look like they came from the 60s. # we are not afraid.#. that was the decade when the struggle for black equality achieved such landmark success. the civil rights movement pushing for legislation that ended segregation across the american south and guaranteeing voting rights for black americans. but there was unfinished business. police brutality has always been hard to legislate against. african americans have never achieved equality in pay a form of income segregation that persists today. the racism is a sore that has been festering over and over and over and over again. and it s like when the sore is about to heal, the wound is reopened again by incidents like this and you have to start all over again. and the question is, how much can people take? cheering many hoped the election of america s first black president would repair, even heal america s racial breach, but barack 0bama never wanted his time in office to be defined by the colour of his skin. in terms of racial progress, his presidency was less historic than the fact that he became president. this american carnage stops right here and stops right now. he was followed into office by donald trump, whose political rise started when he disputed whether ba rack 0bama was born in america a groundless accusation. many reasons explain his victory in 2016, but mr trump certainly benefited from a backlash against a black president among some white voters. america is being hit right now by three simultaneous convulsions. a pandemic that s disproportionately affecting people of colour, an economic shock that s disproportionately affecting people of colour and civil unrest caused by police brutality that disproportionately affects people of colour. racial division is america s default setting. so what we re seeing here is not some aberration, but rather the continuation of an unbroken historical thread. nick bryant, bbc news, new york. more reaction to this. i spoke toa human more reaction to this. i spoke to a human rights lawyer who dedicated his career looking at human rights. i think i think it s a representation of what we ve seen throughout history. since we ve had people of african descent on what is the soils of when this land was called the united states of america, there s been a history of violence against them. the police we ve seen in the streets right now other police that came out in slave patrols so it s another iteration of the same cycle. that s the concern as much as anything, there is the same cycle going on and in the past, this cycle has not changed anything. there must be a worry, mustn t there, among the people protesting, even people who are not involved in the violence or disturbance or any looting, all this plays into the hands of the president who says he is tough as he sees it. all this could help in the election. it may not ring any of the change that the protesters want. well, perhaps. it think the most important thing is that donald trump ran on a campaign of law and order and people have gone into the streets to reject that so he can continue to make calls to the military and deploy the national guard but at the end of the day, people are sick and tired of watching people, black people especially, with their faces on the pavement, with white officers kneeling on their back, so there s no amount of threat that donald trump can do against people who have already seen that history. before there was donald trump, there was richard nixon, there was ronald reagan. we ve had iterations of donald trump who have also been law and order police focused and have decided to use that against people of colour, poor people, homeless people, queer people, native people. this country was built on using police in order to build up the capitalist system we have today. so donald trump threatening today, people don t feel intimidated by that because they ve had enough. as long as people continue to go into the streets, we will keep ignoring on what he s spewing out of the white house. this is a president who is not known for is empathy, when his inaugural speech talked about american carnage. there must be concerned about what comes next from this president, surely? sure, the thing is, we don t need an empathetic president, we don t need to rely on donald trump s benevolence to stop the police violence. we can have the most benevolent president in the history of this country but until police officers start losing power, we start shrinking budgets, reducing contact between them and civilians, that s when we get to the heart of the problem. not putting all our hopes and dreams into someone who is the leader of the country and they are nice and empathetic or understand because we had a president who was empathetic to our cause and that did not eliminate the violence of police brutality that we still see today so until we have complete transformational systemic change we can t rely on whether our leaders are nice or sympathetic to our cause. another main story here, people in england have seen that the biggest relaxation of the lot down. there has been criticism from some scientist that it has occurred too soon. enjoying new freedom in england today to meet outdoors in larger groups with social distancing. the rules in wales changed today as well. scotland and northern ireland have already loosened the guidelines on meeting outdoors. so as the restrictions are eased, how will the authorities monitor the spread of the virus and try to keep it in check? a full testing and contact tracing system is seen as essential. as well as testing people, ministers say tracking down recent contacts of those who test positive will be vital to stopping the spread of the virus. contact tracers have been appointed and the system launched, but already there are concerns. 0ne contact tracer who wanted to be anonymous told us he had been given very little work since the launch last thursday. we ve heard reports from some contact tracers that, since they started work in england last thursday, they ve had very little, if anything, to do. what do you think is actually happening with the system? we ve hired, as you all know, 25,000 people to work as contact tracers. and the level of incidence of disease has come down. so actually, we have more capacity than we need. this is a good thing. they were pressed for the numbers of people so far contacted and said those figures would be available soon. then there s the r that s the virus reproduction number. this shows how fast the virus is spreading. anything above one is when an individual is infecting more than one other person. the aim is to keep it below that, which means the virus is receding. the latest official estimate is a range between 0.7 and 0.9, which doesn t leave much headroom. data on infections and deaths will be closely scrutinised. the daily number of new cases has been falling. the line shows the rolling average that s the trend though that does not include people who have not been tested. that s thousands more. the figure for reported deaths has also been coming down steadily, but the rolling average has stalled in the last few days. in the last week or two, we have seen a relatively persistent steadying of the death numbers and a very long tail of this epidemic curve, if you like. we ll be watching closely to see if that is maintained and persistent or if even that increases in coming weeks. an extra 445 deaths have been added to the total because of delayed reporting in previous weeks. 0ne health leader has said this is a dangerous moment and easing of lockdown measures should be painstakingly slow, as scientists watch developments. hugh pym, bbc news. a reminder of the main story. moments after threatening to deploy thousands and thousands of us troops against the protesters, president trump has walked out of the white house staging a photo op outside of washington church damaged by protesters. michael carrick, who preached at the wedding of prince harry, has protested at the use of the church and the bible for partisan political purposes. let just show you live pictures from minneapolis. protest against the death of george floyd still going. derek chauvin, the officer dealing on his neck just before chauvin, the officer dealing on his neckjust before he died will appear in court next week, it has been announced. much more on all the news anytime on the bbc website. hello there. on monday, the temperature reached 28 celsius, and it was the warmest day of the year so far in northern ireland. and whilst it s going to be another very warm day for many today, the outlook is for it to turn much, much cooler. what s happening? well, we ve been dominated by high pressure for weeks now, which has brought us the warm and sunny weather. the high is retreating into the atlantic, and to the north of that weather front, there is much cooler air. that cooler air will get swept down across the whole of the country later this week as a northerly wind develops. there is likely to be some rain around as well. now early morning, we ve got rain across the far north of scotland. otherwise, it s dry, clear, temperatures typically 8 11. and once any early mist and fog patches clear away from england and wales, it s going to be another sunny, warm day for many places. but we ve got rain in northern scotland, where it s cooler, and we could see showers and cloud developing further south across scotland into the far north of england later, and also potentially in northern ireland. so here, temperatures will be 22 degrees. the highest temperatures are likely to be towards the southeast of england, say, 27 in the london area. it will be as windy as it s been over the past few days also. so we ve got cooler air heading ourway. there s also going to be some rain in that cooler air, but it could prove rather hit and miss, and of course there were large parts of the country that were extremely dry during may. and we re uncertain as to how much rain there will be on wednesday across east anglia and the southeast of england. maybe a bit wetter across other parts of england and into wales, and probably largely dry in northern ireland and the western side of scotland. but there will be a stronger northerly wind, which will make it feel cooler everywhere. temperatures are continuing to drop away, probably peaking at 20 degrees in the south east. and those temperatures actually are near normal, really, for this time of year. given how warm it s been, this is going to be a bit of a shock to the system. move things to thursday, and those temperatures fall even further, perhaps a few degrees below average for this time in june. and on thursday, there ll be a lot of cloud around. it may not be quite as windy. at one stage, it looked like most of the showers will be in the north. now it looks like the showers are moving further south across england and wales. where is the high pressure by the end of the week? it s here, well away from the uk. we re going to be dominated by low pressure, some stronger winds, some cooler air and still the potential of some showers on friday.
this is bbc news, the headlines: moments after he threatened to deploy thousands and thousands of us troops against the protests and riots that have engulfed dozens of american cities, president trump has walked out of the white house to stage a photo op outside a historic washington church damaged by protesters. the episcopal bishop of dc has said he is outraged at the use of the church as a political prop. protests against police brutality and the death of george floyd in minneapolis are still going on, despite more than 40 curfews. the official post mortem examination has declared mr floyd s death a homicide. derek chauvin, the officer kneeling on his neck before he died, will appear in court next week. the music industry is to observe a day long blackout on tuesday, in response to george floyd s death. a number of major record labels, have announced they are suspending business, and working with communities to fight racial inequality. some artists have also cancelled radio appearances and media interviews.
with xfinity a breeze. visit xfinity.com/moving today. this is cnn breaking news. hello and welcome to our viewers here in the united states and all around the world. i m michael holmes. well, from a pandemic to pandemonium, right now in cities across the u.s., the health crisis that has consumed almost every aspect of life for months now, is being upstaged by a social crisis. one that has been simmering for generations. protestors, nationwide, have been expressing pain and anger over the death of an unarmed, african-american man. his name was george floyd, who died in police custody earlier this week in minneapolis, minnesota. now, the violent protests there last night exploded across the country today. from washington to new york, atlanta, and detroit. and to dallas, denver, los angeles, san jose, and more. a few of those demonstrations turning very ugly, with people setting fires, damaging property, and hurling objects at police. some of that destruction happened right here, at cnn s world headquarters. this day of rage, coming as prosecutors in minnesota announce the first charges related to floyd s death. fired minneapolis police officer derek chauvin is now charged with third-degree manslaughter. you might find the following documents disturbing. the charging document says he had his knee on floyd s neck for more than eight minutes. even though floyd repeatedly said i couldn t breathe. the document said floyd was unresponsive for almost three minutes before chauvin removed his knee from his neck. anticipates charges for the other officers as well and new video you see now shows the video from a different angle. and might shed more light on the extent of their involvement. you see three officers leaning on his body there. now, friday night, there were some very tense moments in minneapolis between police and protestors. earlier, our chris cuomo asked cnn sara sidner if perhaps police were lining up on one minneapolis street to distract growing groups of people. have a listen. it is not a distraction. there are a couple hundred, i think, officers that have come this way. they have already told the crowd that this is an unlawful assembly. just like you heard kyung talking about. except for here, there was a curfew that was supposed to start at 8:00 that they haven t been enforcing. now, they ve been enforcing. here s what s happening. as they advance street by street, the protestors then back up and set up a barricade. they are using whatever they can. right now, it s trash cans. they set things on fire to try and put something between themselves and the officers. they pick up rocks. they throw them at the officers. the officers then return, usually, with some sort of teargas or shooting rubber bullets. we have seen people get injured from the rubber bullets. and then, officers will start to advance again. the crowd backs up. and then, you see this scenario, literally, street by street, we are watching this. now, we are about three blocks from the fifth precinct. you see there? you see there? someone throwing a rock. now, if you wait a bit, you will start seeing you will start seeing the teargas and the rubber bullets and, you know, the rubber bullets have been flying by us. and the teargas has been coming in between us. but people will start coming up. and we have heard people here say, look, we are not going to stop fighting about this right now because they don t feel like they ve ever been heard enough. and now, they ve unleashed they ve just unleashed all emotions to try and deal with this. so the police, though, from their perspective, they don t want to see any more destruction. we are now in a regular neighborhood, chris. let me look around just a tiny bit and go around the fires. we are in a neighborhood with people s homes. like, this isn t in the same area where you were seeing things go down in the third precinct. we are now backed up into a neighborhood, where folks live. we see we see some elderly folks looking out the window with their phones recording. but these are homes here. and what these guys have not done anything to the homes, they have stayed in the street. and their focus is directly on the police. who have made a move. they are now just stopped about three blocks from the fifth precinct. and every now and then, you see that bright light. they will shine a bright light. and then, you may see some teargas coming from there as well. every time someone comes up to throw a rock, that s where you are seeing this cat-and-mouse game here. and then police are returning fire with teargas and rubber bullets. sara sidner reporting there. as we said, this violence has been going on in many different places, around the country, including los angeles. our kyung lah is there and we join her now. the latest from where you are, kyung, it is, what, 11:00 p.m. there? and things were heating up earlier. bring us up to date. i just want to give you a sense of where i am right now. you can hear all the sirens. you can see all the police. and i want you to take a look at what s happening over here. these these are officers who are staging. what we have a se ve seen throu evening are police officers staging and then moving into intersections, trying to break up crowds of protestors. the protests, initially, when they started, they were trying to block freeways. they were verbally confronting police officers. and then, as the hours went on, we saw more violence. you ve seen stores looted. a starbucks. a dining a restaurant. a liquor store. a clothing store. and these are just what we saw. a subway. and so what police are trying to do, at this point, is that the lapd has to clear back up a little bit. okay. so what we re going to to follow police officer orders and back away. what they are trying to do is to clear this area, and to clear different parts of los angeles because the protestors have decided to not leave. and after sorry and after the violence and the vandalism, the this was declared an unlawful assembly. there have been at least two los angeles police officers who have been injured. they went to the hospital. there were rocks being thrown at police cars. we ve seen a number of police officer vehicles that have bchb spr been spray painted and the windows smashed. so at this point, they re simply trying to clear the streets. and you can see how they ve made a formation here. when they come across a crowd, michael, they use flash bangs to try to disperse that crowd. we have not seen any protestors injured. and i, personally, have not seen any police officers injured. but the report that we are gating from the los angeles police department is that at least two police officers have, indeed, been injured this evening. michael. have you been able to get a sense of the size of the protests there in l.a.? and what have the protestors been telling you? it s it s very difficult. i i don t think i could give you an accurate number because what i ve seen is that there are larger gatherings of protestors from our affiliate aerial pictures. but i ve only been in crowds that appear to be smaller. and there have been a number of groups. it appears that part of the police tactic is to not allow a large congregation of them to merge into one. and so, they have broken up into these smaller groups. and i ve been among the smaller groups. so it s very, very difficult to tell how big they are. as far as what they re telling us, you can hear it in their chants. they are talking about justice. that they are saying that there will not be peace, without justice. but, also, if you start to look at who s in the crowd, it s a diverse crowd. it appears that not everyone is motivated by, you know, civil rights or by expressing anger, just, at the news events. so it s very, very difficult to tell exactly what everyone is motivated by when they gather this evening. yeah. these protests not always monolithic. different groups, with different aims, and carrying out different actions. kyung lah, stay safe there. it is just after 11:00 p.m. on the west coast. we ll check in with you later. meanwhile, peaceful protests turning violent literally just meters in here in atlanta outside the cnn center. and just a little while ago, the governor, declaring a state of emergency and deploying 500 members of the national guard. as i said, most much of the action happened just outside where i sit now, at the cnn center. a police car in front of this building was set on fire. windows were smashed. a lot of windows were smashed. and some buildings were looted, as well. the chaos continued well into the night. it continues as i speak now, just after 2:00 a.m., here on the east coast. police responded with teargas in some areas. our nick valencia was in the middle of the demonstrations. here is his report. reporter: what started as a peaceful demonstration didn t take long to turn violent. cnn center was one of the targets of the frustration of the demonstrators. they showed up here, in solidarity, with the demonstrations that have been happening in minneapolis, hours after arriving here, though, at cnn center, they began breaking windows. throwing rocks. just look at some of the items that were being tossed towards the police line. in fact, our crew here, along with my photographer william walker and producer kevin conlin, were here as police had a standoff with demonstrators. that video you re witnessing, looking at now, it was intense, to say the least. this scene was chaotic. it was we saw officers at least two officers injured in clashes with demonstrators. look at these windows busted open by an individual who is using a skateboard to smash open the windows. and there was a point and a moment where it appeared as though the demonstrators might actually gain entrance into the cnn center. eventually, that crowd was dispersed by the police using teargas canisters. they were eventually able to pull the demonstration demonstrators back. but it did take hours before the unrest that we saw unfold in downtown atlanta was finally clear from the streets. reporting at cnn center. i m nick valencia. let s get some perspective now from cedric alexander. he is a former police executive and past president of the national organization of black law executives. joins us from pensacola, florida. and appreciate you doing so. you were in law enforcement for 40 years. when when you talk to your former colleagues about what happened in minneapolis and what s happening around the country, what what do they tell you? well, we all are dismayed. we all are very hurt, if you will. very angry because, certainly, what we all observed happened on monday, may 24th, was we all consider a black eye to the profession. because those four men are not indicative of the men and women who are out there tonight that you see helping to control those streets and keep everyone safe and allow them to exercise their first-amendment right. but, we re going to get past this, too. and we just hope that, as we continue in trying to deliver the type of service to the community that they so deserve, that what happened monday is certainly not in any kind of way indicative of the work that men and women do across this country. people are ashamed. and we certainly hope justice is explored, in a fair process for them. and it s no doubt in our mind that they re going the other three are going to be arrested. and due process will take place. but that type of behavior, the loss of life, the way that we observed it, it was cruel. it was mean. and it s not indicative of the profession. well, certainly. certainly, here in atlanta, there was remarkable restraint by police that, you know, i witnessed myself here at the cnn center. i mean, in in the broader sense, you know, it s a problem bad actions by cops, some of course, just a very few. or is it a culture that s devolved in police forces? is there something engrained or systemic that needs to change? well, certainly, it can be systemic. look. you will always hear that there are a few bad apples in the bunch. and there is a lot of truth to that. the problem becomes, it s important having chief two cities myself in my career. it s important that we look inside our organizations, and from top to bottom. because if you can have four people, one that actually kill a man right in front of us. and the other three that stand there. that is suggestive for me of a larger systemic problem that may exist inside of minneapolis police department. so it becomes incumbent upon the leadership, that elected mayor, that chief, to look inside that organization because those types of behaviors. if they could do what they did, on camera, in broad daylight, the question becomes is this indicative of past behavior, where there has been no cameras in dark? so we have to take a look inside of our organizations, and make sure that we don t allow those types of behaviors to exist and to sustain themselves. because it certainly does spoil the whole bunch. and and and people expect far more from their public-safety officials and they should. yeah. i think one other thing that is incredibly disturbing is the new detail that came out on friday about what this officer did and for how long he did it. it was nearly nine minutes with his knee on the neck of a handcuffed man, on the ground. more than two minutes with his knee on george floyd s neck, after he was apparently unconscious. all while bystanders are taping with it and pleading with it. and the officer just didn t seem to care about that. i mean, what did you what did you make of that? i mean, it s a clear display, to anybody that s sitting out here and watching it, looking, that was an individual that was an individual, who we are glad to say got arrested earlier today, who was very callous. has no empathy. no concern. no moral compass, whatsoever, about himself. a man is begging you to let him breathe, and you continued to choke him and rock him with your knee with an appearance that your hand is in your pocket. that is unspeakable. and the american people, and people around the globe, watched it. and if you look at those folks that are out across our cities, across this country tonight, that s anger. they re mad. they feel that they have no other recourse. them doing what they re doing, tearing up property is wrong. there is no excuse for that. but we got to do better than this. we re much far greater country than this. we re much far better than this. but, for those types of attitudes and that type of behavior to exist, in any police department in this country, anywhere, cannot be acceptable to anyone. and policemen and women who work with people like that and suspect and been around them. carry on that type of behavior. you better do it. yeah. yourself and your lifestyle and could possibly be criminally yourself. cedric alexander. really appreciate it. we re right out of time. appreciate you coming on. spending time with us at this late hour. thank you so much. thank you for having me. all right. quick break now. when we come back, we ll get you up to speed on the coronavirus pandemic. yeah. that s still going on. new york, which had more cases and deaths than many countries, is moving to reopen. we ll also have some big developments out of the white house when we come back. when we started our business we were paying an arm and a leg for postage. i remember setting up shipstation. one or two clicks and everything was up and running. i was printing out labels and saving money. shipstation saves us so much time. it makes it really easy and seamless. pick an order, print everything you need, slap the label onto the box, and it s ready to go. our costs for shipping were cut in half. just like that. shipstation. the #1 choice of online sellers. go to shipstation.com/tv and get 2 months free. shi don t have to worry about ththat, do i?are irritated. of online sellers. harmful bacteria lurk just below the gum line. crest gum detoxify, voted product of the year. it works below the gum line to neutralize harmful plaque bacteria and help reverse early gum damage. gum detoxify, from crest. for people with heart failure taking entresto, it may lead to a world of possibilities. entresto helps improve your heart s ability to pump blood to the body. don t take entresto if pregnant; it can cause harm or death to an unborn baby. don t take entresto with an ace inhibitor or aliskiren, or if you ve had angioedema with an ace or arb. the most serious side effects are angioedema, low blood pressure, kidney problems, or high blood potassium. ask your doctor about entresto.
welcome back. a quick update on our top story right now. the fired minneapolis police officer seen on video with his knee on an unarmed black man s neck has been charged with third-degree murder and manslaughter. for the killing of george floyd. the other three officers who were there, as well, and were involved could also be charged. that hasn t happened just yet. the case, of course, inciting pain and a lot of anger across the u.s. georgia s governor activating the national guard after protests in atlanta turned violent. the twin cities of minneapolis and st. paul where the protests exploded last night, are under curfew now. several people there were arrested near a police precinct for ignoring dispersal orders. meanwhile, the number of coronavirus cases and deaths continue to climb. according to johns hopkins university, there are more than 360,000 deaths worldwide. the united states, leading the world, by far, with more than 102,000 deaths. most of those deaths, along the u.s. east coast. new york, of course, was the epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic in the u.s. and the death toll there, more than 29,000 people alone. but, now, the city, poised to reopen in a couple of weeks. well done, new york city. once the epicenter for the pandemic, new york city about to reach a major milestone. it s set to reopen in less than two weeks. june 8th, we have to be smart. again, this is not a happy days here again, it s over. we have to be smart. the city says it will monitor key data, daily, in phase one. and if the numbers reach a certain threshold, it could trigger restrictions again. on monday, five regions of the state are set to move into the next phase, where hairdressers, business offices, and retail can open with some limits. like new york, 24 other states in the country are seeing a downward trend in the seven-day average of new coronavirus cases. in washington, d.c., hair salons reopened today, by appointment. and residents could enjoy dining out, again. but outdoor only. today is the first day of phase one or what i like to call stay at home lite. georgia, which continues to hold steady, will take the major step of reopening bars and nightclubs, with social distancing. still, there is growing concern about the rising cases in 15 states. primarily, in the southeast, like arkansas, which saw its highest single-day increase of community spread coronavirus cases thursday. the situation is critical in alabama, where cases are doubling. two weeks after the state started to reopen. icu beds are filling fast, causing shortages in some cities. the least prepared to deal with this kind of surge, have the least capacity really to do this. and this is what we have been warning about for months now. in washington and california, where the first cases in the country were reported, both states are seeing cases spike. california, just recently feeling its biggest jump since the pandemic started. when you are testing 20 to 30 fold more individuals, you are going to have more positive tests. that s an inevitability. and a grim prediction from the cdc as we move into another month of this pandemic. the agency, forecasting the death toll could surpass 123,000 deaths in the u.s., in the next three weeks. back here, in new york, if those numbers continue to drop. if that june 8th reopening date actually sticks, then we could see construction coming back. manufacturing. curbside retail pickup in new york city. the city says it s actually working with business owners to ease this transition. now, throughout this pandemic, president donald trump has threatened to end the relationship between the world health organization and the u.s. well now, he says, it s happening. here are the reasons he s giving for the move. reasons that have drawn criticism, from both sides of the aisle. china has total control over the world health organization. despite only paying $40 million per year, compared to what the united states has been paying, which is approximately $450 million a year. we have detailed the reforms that it must make, and engage with them directly. but they have refused to act. joining me now is cnn s international diplomatic editor, nic robertson, live from london. i mean, this decision to withdrawal from the w.h.o. in the middle of a pandemic, i mean, from a health perspective, many saying ill-advised because the u.s. is doing so poorly with the virus. but also, if china s influence on the w.h.o., didn t that increase just increase? yeah. i think when the united states look at president trump s actions here, this is a conclusion they are going to come to. this is enabling china, rather than disabling it because their voices at the w.h.o. will be lessened by the fact that the united states voice isn t being heard. the american medical association calls the action senseless. says there will be significant, harmful repercussions. the infectious diseases society says that, you know, the virus doesn t respect international borders. doesn t respect political positions. that everyone needs to work together. and, to that point, the w.h.o., yesterday, actually opened a new portal for sharing information about coronavirus, about therapeutics, about vaccines. about about data. and the the notion that the united states allies can get behind its position, overall, on china and can get behind president trump s position medically here, it just doesn t hold water. so the united states becomes more isolated. china doesn t necessarily get a bigger say at the w.h.o. it s still being criticized by, you know, the united states allies for not providing enough information in the early days about what was happening with coronavirus in china. but, by default, china s voice gets stronger. absent the united states and and a united states that doesn t have its allies at its side. so it does seem counterproductive in diplomatic terms, michael. indeed. nic, thank you. nic robertson in london there for us. we are going to take a quick break here. when we come back, much more on our top story. a night of rage in cities across the u.s. set off by the death of an unarmed african-american man, at the hands of police in minneapolis. we ll be right back.
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minnesotans, who chose to protect our cities, who chose to protect our neighbors and stay home, thank you for that. to all of the first responders who are out there, from firefighters to national guard, to to line crews to utilities workers who are out there to keep us safe, i want to thank you for that. law enforcement is responding the best they can. in this situation. we ll get you all of the numbers that are out there. i want to say, first of all, i, myself, can fully understand the rage. i spoke, this evening, to george floyd s siblings, quite extensively. i understand that rage. we ve talked about it. we we understand what has to happen. what s going on out there right now is not that. the wanton destruction and, specifically of businesses that took generations to build, are being torn down. all of those infrastructures of civil society and the things that make our city great, which which lends me to believe, as we look at this, the disenfranchisement that went with what we witnessed with with george s death is one thing. but the absolute chaos. this is not grieving and this is not this is not making a statement that that we fully acknowledge needs to be fixed. this is life-threatening, dangerous to the most well-qualified forces that are out there facing this. so i want to acknowledge that. i m deeply concerned with the people who you you need to go home. you need to go home. the purpose of this and we re seeing it spread up across the country, is making it more difficult to get to the point where we can deal with these issues. our neighbors are afraid. people are watching this across here and they want to know what s happening. we promised you today, and i want to thank mayor frey for the leadership today. and i think the issue of coordination and and communicating together. this is the largest civilian deployment in minnesota history that we have out there today. and, quite candidly, right now, we do not have the numbers. we cannot arrest people when we re trying to hold ground because of the sheer size, the dynamics, and the wanton violence that s coming out there. colonel langer spoke about this often. seasoned folks who have deployed overseas and seen this and now seeing this here in our neighborhoods. we will talk about this and ways and resources we have left. but, to put this into perspective, the force that we have out there now is about three times larger than the one in the 60s, which is the largest during the race riots and they are out there right now. and the capacity to be able to do offensive actions and they are out there doing that arresting the folks that we can. but, as you ve seen, there s already shots being fired back at our people. this arson that is taking place puts many people at risk. our firefighters are specifically and very open to target and minneapolis fire has been responding heroically. and i tell you all, the citizens, the response time is fast as we want to get it. and that responsibility, as i said, today for coordination, lies with us. i will take responsibility for the underestimating the wanton destruction and the size of this crowd. we have deployed a force that i think as we set down together and talked about, would have, in any other civilian military or civilian police operation, worked. but the terrifying thing is you have aheard people who have seen this and myself looking at this, it resembles more of a military operation at times now, especially ringleaders moving place to place. so i would ask all of us to, again, go home to protect our assets. understanding that the priority of this mission today and the plan to do it was to deploy the assets that we had. to work in coordination, and beef up what we had to do, very, very quickly. in command and control of those, put a joint force together to, first and foremost, protect life, followed by protecting property. followed by restoring order. and the issue, as i ve said this time and time again, whether it was something that now seems so simple to do stay-at-home orders about covid, is to try and get the situation under control to protect all those things. but there is a compact that goes in civilized society that you have to have social buy in. and so, with the elements that are out there now, they are stopping semis by blocking roads and then raiding what s in them. this is not about george s death. this is not about inequities that were real. this is about chaos being caused. and so, my responsibility on this and i do want to thank the mayor. executing a plan is very difficult. and i think the frustrations we all feel certainly isn t aimed at the mayor. he is performing dmadmirably. the same thing with mayor carter of executing together. this is an operation that has never been done in minnesota. the the scope of this has now reached globally or excuse me, across the nation. we were in contact today and had an extensive conversation. general jensen, commissioner harrington and i, and general millie, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, to talk about assets and ways we can help to assess the situation as they are seeing it on the ground. and to put those things into a plan to operate today. that plan has not changed and our folks are out there, as we speak, right now, doing this. our intention is still do those very same things. protect the lives of minnesotans, try and protect as much property as we can, and try and restore order on the streets. i have to do that in a way that protects those who are out there doing that. to ask them to go in a forward motion to try and get some of these people, they are well-coordinated. they will flank these groups. they will do everything possible to cause that destruction. so, with that being said, i m going to have mayor frey come up. a and we ll talk about what the next steps are because i want to be clear. we re about 72 hours into this. the mayor s quick action of activating the national guard, i believe protected as much as we could. i think, now, as we think about this and we re this far into this, it seems almost impossible, two days ago, from an accusation. we went today, planning tonight, for what tomorrow is going to look like because i think minnesotans need to recognize, and we clearly recognize this, what you see tonight will r replicate tomorrow unless we change something that we are doing. the execution of the plan and the quality of the first responders who are out there. you have you have veterans of combat tours overseas. you have state patrol who are seasoned. you have local police and firefighters, who have been doing this for decades. and are the best at what they do. they re just not used to doing it. where you have wanton destruction. and the challenge that we face, and the challenge that the mayor faces. we have to do it with ensuring the safety of those people. ensuring there are legitimate people who want to try and express their grief. the folks who are out there right now want nothing more than entice into conflict. entice something that sets this off even further. entices our folks to get in a situation where we start to lose life. and so, that adds the complexity to it. if it were as simple as just push them and move them back, that would be one thing. they cannot do that. so i want to just reiterate that minnesotans deserve a plan to try and get this. we need to assess that, with all of the tools that we have, with the experience that we ve seen in this. we are certainly in contact with our neighboring states and cooperations, as well as the federal government to think about the best way to do this. the situation tomorrow will be increasingly more difficult because this has spread to other cities in a serious way, which makes the challenge of civil order even that much more difficult. but i do want to and just clarify, to my friend and someone who s led in this and a mayor who should never be put in a position that he was put in. to try and respond. there are a limited number of resources that any city has. and this force that s out there right now bent on this is simply overwhelming what we have on the ground. and so, at this point, it becomes more of a hold what we have and do the best we can. so i want to thank you, mayor frey, i want to thank you you for basically being up for 72 hours. and, every minute, picking up the phone and continuing to adapt to the situation. so, mayor. thank you, governor. and thank you for the command and control today and the partnership. minneapolis, i know you are reeling due to lack of sleep and heartbreak for seeing the events over the last couple of days. i m reeling, too. we, as a city, are so much more than this. we, as a city, can be so much better than this. there is no honor in burning down your city. there is no pride in looting local businesses that have become institutions of a neighborhood. these are institutions that people are counting on. especially, during a time of pandemic. they are counting on grocery stores to get food. they re counting on pharmacies to get medicine. they are counting on their local bank to get cash. if you care about your community, ya got to put this to an end. it needs to stop. you re not getting back at the police officer that tragically killed george floyd. by looting a town. you re not getting back at anybody. if you have a friend or a family member that is out right now, call them. tell them to come home. it is not safe. it is not right. if we care about our city, let s do the right thing now. we are doing absolutely everything we can. our firefighters are hauling around the city, putting out fires, as quickly as they possibly can. our police officers are doing everything to secure corridors, to make sure that the looting stops. and to try and prevent these necessary precincts, which are so essential to safety. right now, chief and chief frietel are in minneapolis, doing everything they possibly can. as i said in the beginning, i am reeling. and i know each and every one of you is, too. let s do right by our city. let s do right by our communities. and let s put ourselves in a position, five and ten years from now, where we look back at this day. and we recognize that this was the point where we decided to make a change. i know, in my heart, that we can do it. because i know, in my heart, that minneapolis is everything that we believe it to be. thank you. thank you, mayor. john. commissioner john harrington. minister department of public safety. yesterday, we put together a unified command structure. a unified command. bringing together minneapolis police department, st. paul police department, sheriffs departments, minnesota state patrol, dnr, and general jensen s men and women of the minnesota national guard. we created a plan that brought together one of the largest civil police forces that we have ever seen in the state of minnesota. larger, frankly, than we had for the republican national convention, even. with well in excess of 2,500 officers total committed to the effort of keeping the peace. we had a very clear mission. the governor was crystal clear and the mayors have been crystal clear that our mission was to keep the peace. to maintain order. and to stop lawless behavior. by 8:00 last night, we began to see that we were going to have to operate on multiple different fronts of criminal behavior. with reports from st. paul that they were actively engaged. reports that we had individuals that were breaching the minnesota freeways around 35 w. that we had crowds of in excess of 2,000 in the lake street area, east of hiawatha. crowds of hundreds in the area of lake street. and crowds of a thousand or more in downtown. we reassessed the assets that we had. the personnel that we had. and redeployed to try and be as at as many of those as we could be at. but we recognize that we simply did not, even with the numbers that i m talking about, have enough officers and personnel to meet all of those missions safely and successfully. we picked missions based on our capacity, and those missions focused on downtown off nicolete and also focused on the precinct area of nicolette and lake. we continue infrastructures around other places that we believed, through good intel, were being targeted and and would have been destroyed. and we have continued to hold those places of critical infrastructure, even as we speak. at the nicolette and lake area, forces were able to rally around that area. they were able to disperse a crowd and make, what i am told is, in the neighborhood of about 50 arrests. we have a mobile field force of in excess of 300. larger than the mobile field force that we utilized last night, to clear the hiawatha and east lake street area. and they have they have been actively engaged. but the level of resistance that we have seen tonight has increased exponentially. we have had officers shot at. we have had what looks to be like improvised munitions that have been targeted toward the officers. we ve had officers injured. and we are in continuing to push that crowd on east of hiawatha with the attempt to try and do what we did last night, which was to move them off of the streets and to restore order there. but we recognize that, as we do that, continuing to hold the area the nicolette and lake and try and maintain order in downtown. that we will need far more officers and far more national guard resources than we currently have. we have created a request for the national guard to substantially increase the number of national guard officers that would be available. and we have reassessed our strategy in terms of our ability to mobilize mobile field forces that have been effective in moving against what is now an armed and more entrenched group of protestors. and what i would really operate and say more that they are an entrenched group of rioters. we have had officers that have been injured. none seriously, at this point. but we have not given up our efforts to try and clear those streets. we will not give up our efforts to clear those streets. we are committed to restoring order in minneapolis. helping st. paul maintain order. and we re getting ready for what will be one of the largest crowds that we have ever heard and that we recognize that we will be at the center of a, not just statewide event, not just a national event but, what is now looking to be like an international event tomorrow. in that same area that we re holding right now, in the area around nicolette and lake. this time, i ask general john jensen from minnesota national guard to provide his comments. good morning. major john jensen. just really quickly, i would like to cover some quick operations that we are involved in. currently, in minneapolis. we are currently have escorted and are supporting three minnesota i m sorry minneapolis fire department teams on fires. chicago and lake. lake and park. and nicolette and 31st street. so we continued our support to the minneapolis fire department, that we began yesterday. we also have over 100 soldiers currently at nicolette mall between hyatt hotel and grand street, supporting traffic-control points, in support of our state highway patrol. this morning at approximately 12:30, i believe, in cooperation and consultation with colonel matt langer, the commander of the minnesota state patrol, the governor authorized the minnesota national guard to increase our strength. the initial request was for 1,000 additional soldiers to support the department of public safety and our state highway patrol. governor waltz and i have looked at different ways that we re going to mobilize this force. and currently, what we re going to use are units that who would normally report to their normal training this weekend. my belief is that we will exceed the 1,000 mark. as the governor mentioned, this will be the largest deployment inside the state of minnesota in history. at the conclusion of tomorrow, i believe that we will have over 1,700 soldiers in support of the department of public safety, the city of minneapolis, and the city of st. paul. you may have you may have seen or heard that, this evening, the president directed the pentagon to put units of united states army on alert to possible operation in minneapolis. while we were not consulted with, as it relates to that, i do believe it s a prudent move to provide other options available for the governor, if the governor elects to use those resources. so, at this time, governor, completes my comments. thank you. thank you, jensen. thank you, commissioner. the situation now is, is the the minnesotans who maybe don t understand this of the force structure we have. we some of this, of course, classified. but where minnesota soldiers are deployed overseas and in support of missions. and and that is a limited force because the national guard is what it is in states. and when we talk about calling up the national guard, it s not like pulling something off a she shelf and it s there. this is a human being, citizen soldier who is working across the state and they get called in. they need to gather equipment and make their things, put their things in order. report to their armory. staff up. and start understanding where their mission is. so it is it is not as easy as it might seem. these deployment levels are reaching deployment levels when we deploy overseas in support of operation and during freedom and some of those types of operations. so the the mission remains the same. to restore order. to protect life and property to the best we can. we are in close coordination, other than this this move by the white house to do that. and i agree with general jensen. as i spoke with president trump the other night, i think it is prudent to have them ready for us to exhaust all resources that we need. and, again, general millie was was quite extensive and we spent quite some time thinking about where those assets are. and they also have to now understand what our federal assets are, into an ever-widening situation when we re losing police precincts in brooklyn and and and some of this unrest spreading across the country. so what i would say, minnesotans, once again, an unprecedented threat to our state. a tragedy that was the catalyst for this. that has morphed into something much different. the challenges of protecting people who wanton destruction is their goal, no regard to life or property, and no sense of civic pride of who we are. that s what these folks are up against. in in a quite dangerous environment. so i would, once again, thank minnesotans who stayed home. thanks for looking out for one another. our goal is to do everything that we can to start to restore order. and and working with our partners on this. and as i said today, once this became a unified command starting last evening, that s the state of minnesota with me. with that, don. governor, for the second night in a row, hundreds of thousands, or maybe millions. all right. there we ve been listening to the governor, tim waltz there, speaking about the situation in minnesota. he says he can fully understand the rage on the streets. but laments the damage the wanton violence, he said, life-threatening, dangerous behaviors, he talked of shots being fired at law enforcement. and said that firefighters are vulnerable. and he said that what he is seeing on the streets resembles more of a military operation than a police operation, in terms of scale and the tactics required to deal with what he said were organized groups, with leadership who want to entice authorities into conflict. thanks for being with us this hour. i m michael holmes. don t go away. i ll be right back, with more news, after the break. the return of drifting
the headlines: india s federal government has announced new plans to deal with a surge in coronavirus infections in delhi as the country struggles to contain its covid 19 infection rate. india s total number of confirmed cases puts it fourth in the world in the pandemic with 12,000 new cases registered in a single day on saturday. the shooting of another african american man during a us arrest has prompted fresh condemnation of the use of deadly force by police. rayshard brooks was shot dead as he fled from officers in atlanta late on friday. the city s police chief has quit and the officer involved has been fired. people joined together in a virtual memorial to mark the third anniversary of the grenfell tower fire. church bells rang out 72 times across london to remember the victims of the disaster. now on bbc news, hardtalk. welcome to hardtalk. i am stephen sackur. we all want to believe that the worst of the coronavirus pandemic is over. governments are easing their lockdowns, focused on economic recovery. but the infection rate is still on the rise. in latin america, in parts of the us and africa as well. my guest today is internationally renowned epidemiologist by one. he was the scientific advisor on the hollywood movie contagion, which predicted a scenario uncannily like today nine yea rs scenario uncannily like today nine years ago. in real life, are we today getting our response right? ian lipkin in new york, welcome to hardtalk. good to be with you. let me start with something you said just a few weeks ago. you said, it would not surprise me if a substantial proportion of the entire world population becomes infected with covid i9. you still feel that way today? i do. it will take some time, but this virus is spreading across the world at enormous speed, and the only thing really between us and the only thing really between us and modified infection of the entire world really is a vaccine, and that is several months away. the knowledge base upon which we develop oui’ knowledge base upon which we develop our efforts to combat covid i9, is it still quite narrow or has it expanded massively over the past three months? there has been a dramatic amount of collaboration worldwide. the speed at which you have seen publications and press releases on the development of drugs, diagnostics, insights into the way in which this virus causes the way in which this virus causes the disease is absolutely unprecedented. and yet the implication of what you first said to me is that none of that expanded knowledge and more effective response is going to make much difference. and if we figure the world polymer population is, what, close to 7 billion, and only looking at the latest figures, 7.5 million have been infected thus far, the implication of everything you are saying is that we are still at the beginning of the beginning of this. yes, but it could be, believe it or not, much worse. so diagnostics have been extraordinarily helpful in allowing us to contain the outbreak, the use of face masks and other kinds of personal protective equipment has moved dramatically in terms of helping us control the spread of infectious diseases, and the rate at which we are beginning to look at drugs and vaccines is also in precedented. to look at drugs and vaccines is also in precedentedlj to look at drugs and vaccines is also in precedented. i know you have made great efforts to develop international collaborations, in particular with china. how much does it matter that we fully understand the origins of this novel current novel covid i9 virus? the origins of this novel current novel covid-19 virus? there are several reasons this is important. some people think this is really an intellectual curiosity and i disagree. first, if we understand where this virus came from and how it transition into humans, there may have been intermediate animals, we will be able to survey for those threats to reduce the risk that not only this virus, but similar viruses might emerge in the future. in addition, if you believe, as i do in most of my colleagues believe, that this virus originated in nature, if we can identify the origin of this virus, then it could put an end to the finger pointing that i think is very disruptive to global science and addressing the challenge of covid i9. so it doesn t help when the chinese say that the united states is responsible or the united states is responsible or the united states that the chinese is responsible. this is a virus that arose in nature and threatens us all. irrespective of nationality. professor lipkin, listen to these words from vice president mike pence. he said, china covered up how dangerous the disease is, it didn t respond sustained human to human transition for a month, tens of those tried to were in the world and it destroyed samples. that is quite a charge sheet. that is quite a charge sheet. i have some insight into this because i have worked with china. ifirst heard into this because i have worked with china. i first heard about it in to late december, and i was aware that it was a coronavirus at the end of december, and this information was transmitted by my colleagues in australia, in shanghai, i communicated this information myself to international institute of health. i don t think that the chinese new as early as early december how the virus was being transmitted. it is very easy to look back on a monday morning and ask what might have been played differently on saturday or sunday, because you have the advantage of hindsight. were there things that could have been done differently? absolutely. there is no question about that. and i think that it would have been helpful if the virus, for example, samples that had been released at an earlier time points, and that people had been invited in to help with understanding. how can you be so sure, as you have expressed to me, that this was a virus that crossed over from the animal population? there are significant numbers of people in the united states, some of them close to the trump administration who still insist there is evidence that it came from a chinese laboratory, perhaps inadvertently released into the human population. i am happy to look at whatever date anyone has that they think supports this point of view, but i have not seen it. the data that i have seen, which we have reported a few months ago, reviewed the sequences of the virus that had been identified in china compared with sequences that had been recovered in in china, as well as in penguins and others, and we concluded that this was a virus that originated in nature. you cannot say incontrovertibly that this virus which was found in back or some intermediate host could not have been inadvertently, and i emphasise that, inadvertently released in some fashion by some human. i can t rule that out. but what i can say is that there is zero evidence that that occurred and there is certainly no evidence to suggest that this virus was deliberately created to cause harm. itjust doesn t. itjust doesn t have any signatures that we typically see to illustrate that sort of a link. the other thing, let mejust finish with sort of a link. the other thing, let me just finish with this, because this is critical. i mean, i think this is critical. i mean, i think this is critical. i mean, i think this is not a constructive line of enquiry anyway because it is here, it is all over the world at this point. we have seen many examples where there have been viruses that emerged in the wild that move into the human population. are we going to blame any country in africa for the emergence of hiv? are we going to blame uganda for the appearance of the car? it doesn t make any sense. professor lipton, as you say, it is here and we have to do with it. i wonder whether it has struck you so forcefully as well in recent months, there are so many uncanny echoes and residences from the movie contagion that you were the science advisor on alongside the writer scott burns and the director steven soderbergh made in believe 2011, we are talking almost a decade ago, and ijust are talking almost a decade ago, and i just rewatch it are talking almost a decade ago, and ijust rewatch it as many people have on their streaming services, and it is an the degree to which info in different ways as that story unfolds it mirrors what is happening in real life. do you take any pleasure in that? i don t take any pleasure in that? i don t take any pleasure in that? i don t take any pleasure in it. it is ironic. the reason we made this film was in fact to prevent something like this happening. so in fact although the film was released in 2011, we began talking about this back into thousand eight and 2009. and it took us thousand eight and 2009. and it took usa thousand eight and 2009. and it took us a long time to try to get all of the details as accurate as we could possibly make them within the constraints of the fact that we wa nted constraints of the fact that we wanted people to actually pay to go and see the movie. 0therwise wanted people to actually pay to go and see the movie. otherwise it was not going to be of any practical value. now, one criticism really out of the movie, and this is ironic, in retrospect, was around the time frame for creating the vaccine, and i remember showing it to the director, anthony felty, at one point in new york. he came in from aprilia fauci. he said he likes various things, lacks the transmissibility and various things, lacks the tra nsmissibility and the various things, lacks the transmissibility and the characters we have, but the timeframe for the creation of the vaccine is com pletely creation of the vaccine is completely unrealistic. i said, tony, he is a good friend of mine, i said, tony, it may be unrealistic now, but it has to become realistic, and infact now, but it has to become realistic, and in fact you now see that the timeframe for creation of a vaccine has moved now from several years to approximately a year. so we were not far off approximately a year. so we were not faroff in approximately a year. so we were not far off in terms of what we thought would be needed. professor lipkin, i just want us both to watch a short clip from the movie stop it involved kate winslet, who is one of the key scientific investigators responding to first news of the virus. let s just have a look together. for every person who gets sick, how many other people are they likely to infect? so for seasonal flu, that is usually about one. small box on the other hand. it is over three. about one. small box on the other hand. it is overthree. before about one. small box on the other hand. it is over three. before we had a vaccine, polio spread at a rate between four and six. now, we call that number. the r naught. there is kate winslet playing a scientist who came to a bad end as she tried to wrestle with this outbreak. i am just intrigued by real life mirroring fiction. you, as we have said, went to china in january when we know that the virus was spreading. he came back to new york, new then found quite soon afterwards that you had covid 19. do you believe that you caught it in china as a result of your scientific exchange? no, this time, so when i went to china in 2003 during sars, i delivered a respiratory tract infection shortly after i return. there i think i became in china. this time i did not become ill in china because i came back, i was isolated for two weeks, i was fine, and then while i was travelling around new york, primarily doing media, i became infected. so this was, and the strain that infected me was, and the strain that infected me was one that came from europe. so there were two major waves of virus that came in. one from china, which was primarily focused on the west coast, and another one that came from europe. there is another twist, which in a sense, is a mirror to fiction. in the movie, there is a sort of radical conspiracy theorist blogger who is convinced that there isa blogger who is convinced that there is a sort of homoeopathic remedy or a treatment for that particular virus in the movie, and he peddles it on his blog and online and it becomes a huge thing and the american public is desperate to get it. now, there is no scientific evidence for this product for scythia in the movie. in real life, the president of the united states has been peddling the notion that this drug that is use of an antimalarial treatment, hydroxychloroquine, could be affected as a treatment and it amazes me that is one of the most senior epidemiologist scientist in the united states, you chose to use is unproven hydroxychloroquine yourself. why on earth did you do that? i am glad you have given me an opportunity to answer this question. so when i became ill, representatives of the chinese government offered to send me convalescent plasma. i couldn t actually find a way to accept it so that i could be treated. that was actually my first choice. i realised that i was not in a position to make any sort of decisions, and the point that i consulted with infectious disease physicians that columbia university, they said to me, we want you to take hydroxychloroquine. this is the dosage, i then consulted with a cardiologist because i have had some hard problems in the past, and he told me that i was cleared to use it. i don t think it made any difference whatsoever, but i have felt for a long time that any doctor who treats themselves has a full fly patient. so i just who treats themselves has a full fly patient. so ijust go with the recommendations of my physicians. as i have said just a moment ago, i don t think it made one difference in terms of my recovery or lack thereof. let s stick with the theme of president trump. i d rather not! well, we need to. the complex relationship between science and politics has been best illustrated by the confusions we have seen in the united states over whether to lockdown, and then how to run the lockdown, and then how to run the lockdown, went to ease the lockdown, what are your conclusions from what you have seen about the efficacy of the current relationship, communication between science and politics? well, let s talk about lockdown first. i think there is no question that lockdown has had a dramatic impact and if you look at the various countries that have implemented lockdowns and testing and tracking and tracing, you see a very strong correlation between that early response and containment. the best example i can provide you is what happens and, if you look at scandinavia, when you compare norway and denmark versus sweden. so, lockdown works. i don t understand why it took so long in this country to get lockdown into position, but we had discussions like that in new york state, and new york city, where i reside, and i think there were delays there that made a huge difference, so unfortunately i think that both our democratic and republican leaders were slow to appreciate the importance of this. may hope, of course is that having learned from this experience, if we ever have something similar in the future, we will respond more rapidly stopping now, i can t account at all for the way in which we have gotten signalling from the white house that has been confusing. i was going to say, it isn t really about the next pandemic, it is about what happens nextin pandemic, it is about what happens next in this one, isn t it? because if one looks at the figures, there are 18 american state where the infection rate is currently rising, including some of the most populous states in the south of the united states. there are doctors, i am going to quote you, director of the harvard global health institute who says that what the easing of lockdown and most of these dates now means is that between 801,000 americans are going to die every single day. we are likely to get another 100,000 deaths by september. it could be catastrophic. do you agree with that? i don t have a crystal ball but i do think that there will be additional morbidity and mortality as a result of easing these restrictions. i am very happy to report that i am not a politician because these guys, women, are being pulled in two different directions by those individuals who feel that the economic pain and poverty and so forth associated with the lockdown is crippling. i don t agree, i think in fact we need to be cautious, and that until such time as we have a vaccine that is effective and prevents disease, and or a drug that can be given orally, our best methods for containment are in fact classical epidemiological lockdown and contact tracing. the most effective thing we have at present right now is the facemask, and that is something that should have been implemented earlier as well. when i left china on february four, eve ryo ne left china on february four, everyone i ve encountered was wearing a facemask. when i came back to the us, with the exception of the jet bridge, nobody was wearing a facemask. so in terms of adaptation then, long term adaptation, so that we can live with the reality that covid 19 is still going to be among us, and as you say until there is a vaccine there is no way that we can have this sort of complete herd immunity to it, what are the most important mitigation things we can do? you have mentioned facemasks, there is a big bait across europe and the world about whether one metre or two metres is the safe physical distance that people should stay apart from each other. there is also a debate about whether it is safe or not safe to reopen places of entertainment including bars, restau ra nts, entertainment including bars, restaurants, that sort of thing. where do you stand on these practical issues that faith societies across the world? well, the further you are away from another individual, the less likely you are to be exposed to this virus. there is no question about that. the question is, what can you do? at columbia university where we have begun to talk about bringing people back to work, and in the classes, we are looking at two metres. that is what trying to do. is the amount of virus in the community begins to drop asa virus in the community begins to drop as a result of these kinds of effo rts drop as a result of these kinds of efforts towards containment, i think you will see people beginning to move closer together. there are, however, some things that i am very concerned about and one of them is bars because what happens, first of all, buyers tend to be small places a nyway all, buyers tend to be small places anyway so people are forced in close proximity to one another, in addition, as they begin to drink and they lose their sense ofjudgement, they lose their sense ofjudgement, they get closer still. so i think restau ra nts they get closer still. so i think restaurants are safer for that reason than bars. in new york state, now, we have restaurants that are beginning to open but they are all opening with the concept of tables that are separated from one another by six feet, and many of these are associated with outdoor dining, because then you have more air exchange. fortunately, as we are coming now to the point where we are opening, we are, at least in the northern hemisphere, in the time of year when people can be outside. now, when we move back into fall, and we have had protests and other sorts of things where people are pushed together but as we move back into fall, people move indoors, many of us anticipate that there will be a dramatic increase in infection again. well, that is depressing but may be even more depressing is the degree to which right now, the highest rates of rising infection are not in the developed world where at least there is the public health infrastructure to ensure treatment for people who are affected, but also there is now the building of a real test and trace infrastructure as well, but now the rising infections are seen and, for example, many countries across latin america, notjust brazil but peru and chill a and mexico and others and chill a and mexico and others and also africa, south africa, is badly affected already. nigeria has some alarming statistics and then you look at the conflict zones in the middle east. yemen, syria, does it seem to you that when we look back at covid 19 in 2020, at the end of the day, the most depressing statistics in terms of death and damage are going to be in the poorest and most vulnerable parts of the world? it s heartbreaking. and the world? it s heartbreaking. and the other thing that we should discuss is the fact that in the developed world as well, there is a disproportionate burden that is placed on people who are poor, who are of colour, so anyway you look at it, this is an awful outcome, and again, when you talked about contagion, the whole idea of putting that movie out was to alert people to the possibility that this could occur, and it s chilling, we meant it to be so, and as you saw at the very end, we tied it all again into the idea of bats. not saying that bats should be exterminated because we need them for many purposes, but the fact remains that this is not the fact remains that this is not the last, and i don t even know that it is going to be the worst health threat of our time. i hope we learn from this. to be clear, you are saying that because of the way in which animal transfer to humans works, the potential for which animal transfer to humans works, the potentialfor pandemics worse than covid 19 is very real and very immediate? it is, and to that point, we have been trying for several years to get off the ground a programme called the global infectious disease epidemiologists network which is designed to provide capacity building support in the developing world, so that people can contain threats within their own borders. they can rapidly recognise them, they can respond and reduce them, they can respond and reduce the burden of morbidity, mortality and economic destruction. so we need to learn from this. it is notjust a question of responding to covid 19, we need to see what we can do to make sure that nothing like this ever happens again. but you say that and your government has just withdrawn completely from cooperation with the world health 0rganization. cooperation with the world health organization. i have absolutely no explanation for that. or, organization. i have absolutely no explanation forthat. 0r, many organization. i have absolutely no explanation for that. or, many other things that have happened in my country. but in terms of being realistic about international collaboration, commitment, to not only meet the challenge of covid 19 but ensure that the next pandemic isn t as disastrous, the outlook does not look good. isn t as disastrous, the outlook does not look goodlj isn t as disastrous, the outlook does not look good. i and others are doing our best. i work in west africa, brazil, mexico, indonesia, saudi arabia, israel, i go wherever anybody invites me to go. india. because this is a global problem. we are one race and we need to support one another. ian lipkin, we have to end there but i thank you very much indeed forjoining me on hardtalk. thank you. hello there. the broad weather pattern is going to change very little over the week ahead. it will be a week of contrasts in the uk, as it was over the weekend. many places in the south of england having a warm and sunny day on sunday. a dramatic skyline, though, in the north west of england following those late in the day thundery showers, and an area of low pressure is keeping this very unstable airacross the uk, so more showers to come. a lot of low cloud is streaming in from off the north sea at the moment so a grey start in some places. but over the weekend, we keep this mixture of warm sunshine, but some heavy and thundery downpours. many places starting dry on monday. grey start for much of scotland and the north east of england, down to lincolnshire and east anglia, burning back to coastal areas, sunshine develops more widely. as it warms up we develop those showers, particularly in the afternoon. some of them heavy and thundery. not many showers across southern england. probably more chance of picking up some downpours as you move northwards across the midlands, wales, into the north west of england and perhaps northern ireland. again a few sharp showers though are possible in western scotland, where it is going to be an awful lot warmer than it will be for eastern scotland, where we are struggling with that low cloud, the haar that s coming in off the north sea. now, many places will end monday dry and probably quite sunny as well, but there will be a few sharp showers still around in the evening. those will then fade away overnight, but we have still got this flabby area of low pressure. not a great deal to see on the pressure chart but enough low pressure and enough instability in the air to bring us more showers. and many places will start the day dry on tuesday again. a grey start for the north east of the uk. should brighten up in most areas, some sunshine but, again, we trigger those showers. probably more widely those showers developing during the day on tuesday. again some slow moving, heavy, perhaps thundery downpours and temperatures again typically into the low 20s, as they will be again probably on wednesday. not a great deal is changing. those showers developing, perhaps this time more towards the west and the south of the uk. so for eastern scotland, north east of england, whilst it may be a bit grey at times, it should be largely dry, and there may be some sunshine at times as well. temperatures not changing a great deal over the week ahead. we keep those heavy thundery showers going through thursday and friday, particularly across more southern parts of the uk as it dries up further north.
this is bbc news with the latest headlines for viewers in the uk and around the world. i m aaron safir. railway carriages in india are being turned into makeshift hospital wards as coronavirus cases surge. the daily number of confirmed new cases has reached almost 12,000. france s president says his country has scored a first victory against coronavirus as he announces a significant lifting of the remaining lockdown restrictions. the killing of another african american man during an arrest in atlanta prompts fresh condemnation and despair. the london protest image of one man carrying another
in northern ireland. and whilst it s gonna be another very warm day for many today, the outlook is for it to turn much, much cooler. what s happening? well, we ve been dominated by high pressure for weeks now, which has brought us the warm and sunny weather. the high is retreating into the atlantic, and to the north of that weather front, there is much cooler air. that cooler air will get swept down across the whole of the country later this week as a northerly wind develops. there is likely to be some rain around as well. now early morning, we ve got rain across the far north of scotland. otherwise, it s dry, clear, temperatures typically 8 11. and once any early mist and fog patches clear away from england and wales, it s going to be another sunny, warm day for many places. but we ve got rain in northern scotland, where it s cooler, and we could see showers and cloud developing further south across scotland into the far north of england later, and also potentially in northern ireland. so here, temperatures will be 22 degrees. the highest temperatures are likely to be towards the southeast of england, say, 27 in the london area. it will be as windy as it s been over the past few days also. so we ve got cooler air heading ourway. there s also going to be some rain in that cooler air, but it could prove rather hit and miss, and of course there were large parts of the country that were extremely dry during may. and we re uncertain as to how much rain there will be on wednesday across east anglia and the southeast of england. maybe a bit wetter across other parts of england and into wales, and probably largely dry in northern ireland and the western side of scotland. but there will be a stronger northerly wind, which will make it feel cooler everywhere. temperatures are continuing to drop away, probably peaking at 20 degrees in the south east. and those temperatures actually are near normal, really, for this time of year. given how warm it s been, this is gonna be a bit move things to thursday, and those temperatures fall given how warm it s been, this is going to be a bit of a shock to the system. move things to thursday, and those temperatures fall even further, perhaps a few degrees below average for this time in june. and on thursday, there ll be a lot of cloud around. it may not be quite as windy. at one stage, it looked like most of the showers will be in the north. now it looks like the showers are moving further south across england and wales. where is the high pressure by the end of the week? it s here, well away from the uk. we re going to be dominated by low pressure, some stronger winds, some cooler air and still the potential of some showers on friday. now on bbc new, hardtalk. welcome to hardtalk. i m stephen sackur. in some countries, the coronavirus pandemic has enhanced unity and solidarity. in others, it has exposed deep fault lines. in india, it s the poor migrant workers who ve been hardest hit by the crisis, which has also seen heightened tensions between the hindu majority and the muslim minority. my guest today is the general secretary of the ruling hindu nationalist bjp party, ram madhav. is prime minister modi stoking intercommunal tensions even in this time of national emergency? ram madhav in delhi, welcome to hardtalk. thank you. let us begin with the coronavirus situation in your country. officials in your government have proclaimed the success of your lockdown policy, have pointed to a relatively low number of deaths, but right now, we see the curve the infection rate curve in india seems to be rising, and rising alarmingly. do you think your government has been complacent? we are 15% of the world s population, yet if you look at the rate of the affected people in india, it is very low, and you are right, that there is some rise in numbers recently, but if you look at the period during the tightened lockdown, that was the first four weeks, it was strictly under control. as we relax the lockdown a little bit, there is a little rise in the cases, but it is very much limited to a few areas, it is contained in that sense. yeah, that s what worries some of the scientists, epidemiologists in your country, that you are easing the lockdown very significantly in large parts of the country, while, to quote bhramar mukherjee, an epidemiologist at the university of michigan, who watches india s case very closely, he said, we see no flattening of the india curve. so why ease the lockdown so significantly now? certain lockdown measures are very much in place even now. there are relaxations in terms of starting up some of the industries, etc, from economic, they have been allowed to restart. but let me tell you when we enforced the first lockdown, that was when we did not have enough preparation in terms of our healthcare facilities. but six to eight weeks down the line, we are fully prepared, i can tell you today we are ready with 900,000 beds, we have hospitals, everything ready, yet we are taking full precautions, we are quarantining people who are travelling to a few destinations, we have not lapsed in our precautions. perhaps the worst worrying thing of all, mr madhav, about the indian situation is the extent to which your sudden dramatic lockdown all those weeks ago forced millions of your poorest people, migrant workers in the big cities to head for home. arundhati roy, the famous indian writer, has written, the lockdown worked like a chemical experiment that suddenly illuminated many hidden things. the urban poor were driven out by employers and landlords, millions of impoverished, hungry, thirsty people, including the young, the old and the sick, were forced to attempt a long walk home. they are now home, the lucky ones who made it, and they are infecting other people in those parts of your country least able to deal with the pandemic. oh, that is a pretty exaggerated statement, i tell you. you see the lockdown that was announced on the 24th and 25th at midnight. was our decision taken at the right time? it was directed at safeguarding the health care of 1.3 billion indians. that has certainly helped in managing this spread of the virus in a very significant way. today i am claiming that it is now restricted to a few pockets in the country. that was essentially because of the timely lockdown. now, as far as the migrant workers are concerned, let me give you some information before we decide about the impact of it. india has 130 million migrant workers. out of that, about 80 million work in other states than their home state. it is bigger than the entire population of countries like germany, countries like the uk. that is the size of our migrant population. out of that, majority of them i would say about 90% of them still stick to their places, they have not done, they have not undertaken this perilous journey, but, yes, you are right, about four million to five million people have taken to the streets to try and reach their destination. mr madhav, how do you feel about the members of your own party, the ruling party, the bjp, who have specifically, explicitly, blamed muslims for spreading coronavirus? firstly, let me tell you in this fight against the virus, we, the 1.3 billion people of india, are united and together. in all aspects of our parties, in aspects of all the differences. no, no, mrmadhav. that s clearly not true, mr madhav. you are not united. it is wrong. we do not endorse it, nor do we ever support any such statement. so, what has happened to kapil mishra, a local bjp leader who is known for his intemperate language, who tweeted, and this is a quote, the tablighi jamaat people that is from the religious organisation who held a meeting, a big meeting in south delhi at the beginning of all this these people, he says, from the tablighi jamaat have begun spitting on doctors and other health workers. it is clear that the aim of these people is to infect as many people as possible with coronavirus and kill them. he has referred to coronavirus terrorists, and he means muslims. yes, all such statements are wrong. we have condemned those statements, we have cautioned or warned such people, if they are indulging in any such statement. but i would just like to make one submission. sometimes if some people talk about tablighi jamaat, please don t take it that they are talking about the entire muslim community. within the muslim community, there is a large section of the people in india and elsewhere who do not approve of the tablighi jamaat behaviour in india. but that is no reflection on islamic society. no reflection. no, mr madhav, i m sure you re aware, this goes far beyond. ..make any such statement, it is wrong and we condemn it. yeah, but mr madhav, what i want to know is what the bjp is doing to stop the communal violence that we have seen since the beginning of the coronavirus epidemic in your country. for example, sayed tabrez and his mother zareen taj, they are two muslim civilians who volunteered volunteered to distribute food and emergency aid in their communities, they were attacked by a gang of bjp activists on april four in karnata ka. what have you done to punish those people who attacked the volunteers, and also, to ensure it never happens again? certainly, any such act of violence will be punished, and if what you are saying is true, we ll certainly take action. but let me tell you for information in india, so many doctors were attacked, so many nurses were attacked, so many voluntary workers were attacked, police officers, their arms were chopped off, certain things have happened during the lockdown. i m not talking in terms of which religion has done it. whoever does such things will be punished in india. we have such a system. we shall never approve of any such activities and we will extinguish them. so, what do you say to analysts who study your communal relations inside india very closely, like gilles verniers at the ashoka university who say the government has seized the opportunity of the lockdown and the coronavirus crisis to go after muslim activists? totally baseless. as far as we are concerned, the government is concerned in this fight, we are all together. you see the ratings of the prime minister by independent agencies cite his popularity to be about 90%. no, 90% is not the hindu population in india. that means everybody irrespective of their religion, supports the actions or the decisions that the government is taking because it s in the interest of the entire population. in india, we do not approve of or we do not see any communal kind of situation or any communal conflict happening. mr madhav, you seem to be living in a parallel universe to many indians, particular muslim indians. are you not aware thatjust last month, the bjp mp subramanian swamy said, muslims, if they become anything like 30% of our population, will be a danger to the country. muslims, he said, are not in an equal category. this is the language of pure discrimination, and it is coming from senior figures in your party. ok, now, i have not directly seen that statement. i take it that what you are saying is true, but you ll be careful if it is not true, you will be sued by subramanian swamy! having said it, we do not as i said, we do not approve of any such sentiments, any such statements. it is a democratic country, people who make the statement, but other parties and other governments, we shall not approve of any such statements targeted at any community or any religion. but, again, ijust wonder on what basis you re telling me all this stuff about harmony and unity in india today are you not aware that the fallout from your own government s citizenship act has included the office of the un high commissionerfor human rights calling that legislation, which, of course, is fundamental to your government s programme, called it, fundamentally discriminatory. first of all, a lot of misinformation and lack of knowledge about attacks is leading people to make all sorts ofjudgements. let me tell you first of all, number one, the so called citizenship act does not apply to a single indian. do you know that? 1.3 billion indians, muslims constitute 200 million out of that. the caa does in no way affect them. so, no discrimination. secondly, and most importantly, it is not a full act. it is pure religious discrimination, mr madhav. in india, there s no discrimination. your message to the world is that you value. ..in india. no, your message to the world is quite clear that you make a distinct category for muslim people, in this case, it is a question of people who come from neighbouring states into india, you give the rights to non muslims to a fast track citizenship, a right which you specifically and explicitly deny to muslims. yes, just as austria has done to the dues, america has done to certain sections, vietnamese refugees, if i am not wrong, even spain has done to certain dues of the second world war time, certain category of refugees, their citizenship has just been just fast tracked. has done tojews. nobody is denied citizenship in india. if one qualifies, for example, i tell you, at least 15 close to 15 pakistani citizens have acquired indian citizenship under our government in the last five, six years. mr madhav. ..citizenship laws doesn t discriminate. mr madhav, i don t want to misunderstand you or put words in your mouth, but when you start telling me about the way in which germany or austria treated the dues. not germany i did not use the words germany. ..i begin to wonder what you re driving at. for example, i was very struck yesterday that your prime minister, mr modi, paid fulsome tribute to one of the great ideologues well, great in mr modi s view, of the hindutva movement, which of course, your previous organisation, the rss, and your current party, the bjp, is very much a part of. now, mr modi said of vd savarkar that he showed extraordinary courage and leadership. we know that mr savarkar, in 1939, was expressing sympathy for what the germans were doing to the dues and said that, 0ur muslims in india are very much like the dues of germany. doing to thejews. there are many people around the world who find this sort of ideological connection and background to the bjp and the rss to be deeply and profoundly disturbing. you have totally misunderstood mr savarkar‘s philosophy. he was never against any community. he was for the greater unity of all the indian citizens irrespective of religion. that s the reason why even leaders like indira gandhi, the congress leader they also have praised his vision, his sacrifice for the nation. he was one leader who was given a 50 yearjail term by the british during the colonial rule in india. he fought for the independence. so, he is one of the misunderstood leaders in india, so you have to. you mean he s misunderstood because his sympathy for what the nazis were doing was ok? is that what you are saying? no, he was not sympathetic to nazis at all. that is a great misinformation that is spread about him. forgive me, but it s notjust critics outside the country that are deeply disturbed by some of the ideology they hear from the rss and bjp. listen to the words of mahatma gandhi s great grandson, tushar gandhi, who spoke to us. he said, the bjp and the rss right wing groupings have polarised indian society, they present a grave danger. the danger is that in ten years‘ time, this country won t be india any more, it will be a fascist dictatorship. those are the words of mr gandhi s great grandson today. that could be his personal opinion. mahatma gandhi himself had attended the rss rally. he had praised the discipline of the rss. he said that, the work i am doing for the uplift of the untouchables, the rss is doing the rss is removing the vast difference between this from society. i fully appreciate that it is what mahatma gandhi himself said. his grandsons are many some of the grandsons are in our party, for your information, the grandsons, they are in part of the bjp today, so don t go by one statement. there are different views. that s why as i said, india is a democracy with totally different views. they are their personal views. on another point, one more quote from you from ms golwalkar, another senior leader of your rss organisation. he wrote admiringly about what the nazis were doing in 1939. he said, quote, to keep up the purity of the race and its culture, germany shocked the world by purging the country of the jews. it was national pride at its highest, said mr golwalkar. firstly, that book, a translation of the book, was disowned by mr golwalkar immediately. second thing i tell you, he already said it was shocking i don t know how shocking becomes praise. he said it was shocking to see this kind of behaviour in the name of nationalism. the rss has never, ever approved of the nazis‘, fascists‘ or of supremacists‘ ideology. they have always sided with the persecuted dues. even to this day we believe the persecution happened against the jewish people and was one of the worst crimes of the 20th century. one more thought on this, and then i want to move on. if you are so sure there is not racism, deep discrimination and communal hate at the heart of your party and movement‘s ideology, how do you react when your own home minister, amit shah, describes migrants from muslim majority bangladesh living in india as, quote, termites who will be thrown into the bay of bengal . it is the classic technique of othering and dehumanising those that you regard as second class. how do you react to it yourself? that particular statement was taken out of context. what was the right context? hang on what is the right context? you tell me, mr madhav, what is the right context for calling a human being a termite? please tell me, how can illegal migrants be persecuted on account of religion by definition? illegal migrants are not welcome in india, and towards that we are taking certain measures. but that statement is taken out of context, which is not correct. you think it is justified to call albeit an illegal muslim immigrant, a termite, an insect? in the context, a termite all these words are taken completely out of context that‘s what i am saying. what we tried to do was to regulate the flow of illegal migrants into india. it is done by every country, not just india. every country that gets the influx of illegal migrants, that is essentially what we are doing. not in a humanitarian spirit or anything. we have humanitarian sentiments about every person but nations have to safeguard their people and livelihoods from illegal immigrants. i want to briefly, if i may, before we finish, touch on kashmir. last august, you revoked article 370 from the constitution, revoked the special status for kashmir. you sent thousands and thousands of troops into the territory and you arrested a large number of kashmiri political leaders. we interviewed shah faesal in india, not kashmir. he spoke to us, i believe, from delhi, not from kashmir. he was arrested hours after talking to us. he is still in detention today. this month his detention has been extended. he is a so called moderate leader, a civilian politician, a kashmiri who is proud to be kashmiri. why on earth is he in detention today? many people have been detained immediately after the important decision that we took on the fifth of august to nullify the impact of article 370. now, most of them have been sent free. mr faesal and a few others, four orfive of them, still face certain issues under what we call the public safety act, but i tell you, these are measures taken based on best information. but they will be set free very soon. hundreds of activists have been set free. they are all set free now. and mr, mr faesal. there is no. there is no justification for it, really, is there, mr madhav? nor is there justification for the continued control of the internet 4g services severely restricted, when doctors in kashmir say they need the best access possible to the internet and public and health information on the internet to deal with the coronavirus crisis. what kind of humanitarians are you in the indian government that won‘t even allow doctors to use the internet in kashmir? you should check the reality before jumping in and accusing us of being inhuman and all that. for doctors in our medical centres, we have broadband services fully available. they are fully working in hospitals and all public institutions. it is only on hand held mobile devices that certain 4g speed is not available. they have 2g speed. so calling it inhuman is far fetched. you should not do that. having said that, the kashmiri health care establishment is doing a phenomenaljob. they are taking care of the covid patients effectively. they have all the facilities available. broadband services are fully available in every home and public institution in kashmir, and full service will be restored very soon. right now because of coronavirus your economy is facing contraction this year. you have rising tensions on your border, notjust with pakistan but also now with china, where you have got a military stand off in ladakh with chinese forces on the disputed border. suddenly the bjp‘s programme for india looks as though it is running into serious trouble. would you agree? the economy is a global challenge, not just for india for the uk. it is a global challenge. as far as india is concerned, we have allotted plans to come out and we have decisions to make. hopefully in two or three quarters‘ time we will come back to better gdp growth rates. having said that, other issues, like the issues happening on the borders, are clearly not finished, and the government is aware of these matters. let me tell you, that is not the first time these things are happening. in the past we have had certain tensions on the indo tibetan border with china, and we have both committed our leaderships to tackle them. diplomatically and on the ground, we have taken a firm stance, but we are practically engaged with the chinese leadership diplomatically. mr madhav, we must end there, but i thank you for joining me from delhi. thank you. my pleasure. hello there. on monday, the temperature reached 28 celsius, and it was the warmest day of the year so far in northern ireland. and whilst it‘s gonna be another very warm day for many today, the outlook is for it to turn much, much cooler. what‘s happening? well, we‘ve been dominated by high pressure for weeks now, which has brought us the warm and sunny weather. the high is retreating into the atlantic, and to the north of that weather front, there is much cooler air. that cooler air will get swept down across the whole of the country later this week as a northerly wind develops. there is likely to be some rain around as well. now early morning, we‘ve got rain across the far north of scotland. otherwise, it‘s dry, clear, temperatures typically 8 11 degrees. and once any early mist and fog patches clear away from england and wales, it‘s going to be another sunny, warm day for many places. but we‘ve got rain in northern scotland, where it‘s cooler, and we could see showers and cloud developing further south across scotland into the far north of england later, and also potentially in northern ireland. so here, temperatures will be 22 degrees. the highest temperatures are likely to be towards the southeast of england, say 27 in the london area. it will be as windy as it‘s been over the past few days also. it it won‘t be as windy. so we‘ve got cooler air heading ourway. there‘s also going to be some rain in that cooler air, but it could prove rather hit and miss, and of course there were large parts of the country that were extremely dry during may. and we‘re uncertain as to how much rain there will be on wednesday across east anglia and the southeast of england. maybe a bit wetter across other parts of england and into wales, and probably largely dry in northern ireland and the western side of scotland. but there will be a stronger northerly wind, which will make it feel cooler everywhere. temperatures are continuing to drop away, probably peaking at 20 degrees in the south east. and though temperatures actually are near normal, really, for this time of year. given how warm it‘s been, this is gonna be a bit of a shock to the system. move things to thursday, and those temperatures fall even further, perhaps a few degrees below average for this time in june. and on thursday, there‘ll be a lot of cloud around. it may not be quite as windy. at one stage, it looked like most of the showers will be in the north. now it looks like the showers are moving further south across england and wales. where is the high pressure by the end of the week? it‘s here, well away from the uk. we‘re gonna be dominated by low pressure, some stronger winds, some cooler air and still the potential of some showers on friday. a very warm welcome to bbc news. my name‘s mike embley. the latest headlines for viewers in the uk and around the world: a warning from president trump that he will deploy the army to end the widespread protests across the country triggered by the death in police custody of the unarmed african american, george floyd. ifa if a city or a state refuses to ta ke if a city or a state refuses to take the action necessary to defend the life and property of their residence, then i will deploy the united states military and quickly solve the problem for them. in minneapolis, the official post mortem examination finds the death was a homicide. the victim‘s brother tells demonstrators violence would not bring the changes, the black community deserves. my my family is
rolls royce announces plans to axe a fifth of its workforce in the wake of coronavirus most of the jobs will go in the uk. the aircraft engine maker is cutting 9,000 jobs amid warnings it take years for the airline industry to recover the unions are furious. nobody‘s trivialising the challenges we face here, but i think it s rash and it s premature for rolls royce simply to resort to sacking and throwing under the bus thousands of uk workers, loyal workers. many of the jobs are expected to go from the main site at derby rolls royce is, you know, the heart of derbyshire. derby is one of the biggest sites, isn t it? if you look at the area it s in, it s huge. to lay off a lot of those people would be devastating for the area. growing pressure on the government from councils and teaching unions to reconsider plans to reopen england s primary schools to some pupils from 1stjune. welcoming back the tourists italy says its airports will reopen in a fortnight, as some of europe s holiday hotspots start making plans for the summer. clapped out of intensive care the fit and healthy gp who spent five weeks on a ventilator. seven weeks. you give yourself goals. and my goal was to get home. it was just to get home. and on the hottest day of the year so far beachlife amid social distancing. and coming up on bbc news watford have resumed socially distanced team training today. it comes after two members of staff and a player confirmed that they d tested positive for coronavirus. good evening and welcome to the bbc news at six. rolls royce says it is cutting 9,000 jobs the bulk of them in the uk in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. rolls royce, whose main site is in derby where it makes plane engines, warned that it will take several years for the airline industry to recover. unions have accused the company of throwing workers under the bus . thousands have already been furloughed on the government scheme. but rolls royce says the impact of the pandemic on the company and the whole of the aviation industry is unprecedented . sarah corker is in derby. these are highly skilled, well paid jobs, and this is a huge blow, not just for the thousands of people working here, but for the whole economy. rolls royce has a big sites in bristol, glasgow and nottinghamshire, and this pandemic is thrown of the aviation sector into turmoil, and it is now hitting the order books of manufacturers. derby is a city shipped by manufacturing. rolls royce is one of its largest employers. but tonight, thousands of jobs its largest employers. but tonight, thousands ofjobs at this huge site, the compa ny‘s aviation thousands ofjobs at this huge site, the company s aviation headquarters, are now at risk. and that will send are now at risk. and that will send a ripple effect through this community. it is huge. and to lay offa community. it is huge. and to lay off a lot of those people will be devastating for the area. rolls royce is the backbone of derby, really, as far as wages and cost of living goes. it employs people from generations. it is a big hit for every family in a derby. unfortunately, it lot of people have lost theirjobs and businesses, a sign of the times. demand for the aircraft and engines that rolls royce makes has slumped, so it is cutting a fifth of its global workforce. the covid 19 pandemic has grounded planes across the globe, and it could take several years for passenger numbers to recover.m and it could take several years for passenger numbers to recover. it is a very difficult day for our employees all around the world, but we need to get on and do this now, because it is about creating a sustainable business for the future so that ultimately, we can protect thejobs so that ultimately, we can protect the jobs that we will have left as a result of this. the rolls-royce workshops have derby have been producing engines for almost 20 years. rolls-royce has a 116 year history in derby, and is one of the uk s world leading manufacturers, it has created highly skilled, sought afterjobs. the car parks here are virtually empty, because rolls royce has furloughed thousands of staff. managers, though, know that that scheme cannot and will not last, and have described this as a deep crisis. and while the bulk ofjob losses are expected to be here in derby, the company has sites at 30 other locations across the uk. the scale of these job cuts has raised fears of factory closures, as the company plans to save £1.3 billion. we are not oblivious to what is going on out there. we absolutely see the difficulties and challenges that employers and businesses face. but that should not mean that the workers pay the price for that. everyjob workers pay the price for that. every job lost that workers pay the price for that. everyjob lost that rolls royce is fourjobs everyjob lost that rolls royce is four jobs lost everyjob lost that rolls royce is fourjobs lost in the supply chain industry, so it is massive. this is another sign of that big business has accepted there will be no immediate bounce back, and the economic recovery will be slow and painful. 0ur economics editor, faisal islam, joins me now. terrible news for rolls royce were coaxed, but no doubt there will be more of this to come. rolls royce workers. aviation is an industry when it is difficult to see how you get a rapid bounce back from coronavirus. things have changed fundamentally, people are not buying airline tickets for holidays or business travel, so airlines are not buying aeroplanes, in a are not buying aeroplanes, in a are not buying engines, and so on. one worker in the sector said they had done all their orders for engines for this year, and they have no idea if anything will be ordered in 2021. so you can see that you re not good to get a rapid bounce back. andrew bailey, the governor of the bank of england, saying that he fears that, until we know for certain what is happening with the shutdowns, that he cannot predict exactly where the economy is going to go. some room for manoeuvre for the bank of england, though, because inflation has fallen pretty sharply, the sharpest fall for nearly 12 years, so it means that the bank and might be able to do something next year. but it is too late for these workers from rolls royce. the government says it will listen to the concerns of parents and teachers about plans to re open some primary schools in england at the beginning ofjune. now the bbc has learnt that more than 35 councils have warned that not all their schools will be ready in time with some expressing opposition to opening any amid safety concerns. 0ur education editor branwenjeffreys reports from bury in greater manchester, one of the towns which has said it won t be re opening schools next month. bury streets, empty of children on a sunny day. at home, waiting to go back to school. here, the council says it s too soon. parents and teachers, still too fearful. we have the second highest rate of covid 19 in greater manchester. this is playing quite heavily on our parents and carers minds. also, more regionally, the north west is the second hardest hit region in the country in terms of infection rates. are you playing politics with this? absolutely not. and i m so sorry that some people have labelled this against bury council. taking precautions already. this is what a five year old would see on arrival. no shared toys, no soft play areas. wow, this is your library? yes, this is our library. the head teacher, showing me what they have to do. normally, you would see groups of children, three or four groups of children working here. we re a small school. all of the books taped off? all the books taped off, because we can t have them touching them. she tells me they wanted to get year six back soon. but primary schools in bury aren t ready yet for the youngest. it was when reception and year0ne yeargroups were added on to the year six, that is when the shift in feeling came. because there was a great deal and i use the word fear advisedly there was a great deal of fear for the children and the parents, and the staff in the schools. it will be one child at a time to the toilet. every risk has to be considered. so, who decides? well, it s the head teacher and the school governors. but it would be a very brave primary school that decided to go against the advice of its local council. and even in areas where councils are saying it s up to schools, it s very clear that any reopening of schools is going to be very patchy. if, for some reason, the school did want to continue to open when the local authority was advising not to, it would need to be very clear about its reasons for that decision. why had they come to a different decision from the local authority? the longer these classrooms stay empty, the harder it is for parents to get back to work. it s about what risks, and when to take them. branwenjeffreys, bbc news, bury. the deaths of another 363 people have been reported across the uk in the past 2a hours, bringing the official death toll to 35,704. the prime minister and labour leader have clashed in the commons over the government s preparations for a trace and testing system to control outbreaks of coronavirus. borisjohnson said he was confident that it would be operational from the 1st ofjune. but doubts have been raised by some. sophie hutchinson reports. every day, thousands of new coronavirus infections are still being reported in the uk. tracking the virus down and isolating the infected is widely believed to be the best way to control the pandemic. but today in parliament, the labour leader questioned why there had been such a delay in the setting up a track and trace system. in the united kingdom, despite 2 million tests having been carried out, there has been no effective tracing in place since march 12 when it tracing was abandoned. that is nearly ten weeks in a critical period without effective test track tracing. that is a huge hole in our defences. we will have a test, track and trace operation that will be world beating, and yes, it will be in place, it will be in place by june at first. there will be 25,000 trackers, and they will be able to cope with 10,000 new cases per day. june cope with 10,000 new cases per day. june first. cope with 10,000 new cases per day. june first. we spoke to a newly recruited tracker, a graduate. he asked to remain anonymous. he started work three days ago, but described a chaotic system with barely any training for this online job. i had one a day in a classroom. that was 90 people in one group with one teacher. whenever we asked questions, he would try, but the main answer was, wait for the coming days, you will get an e mail or something. right now, i am just sitting strolling through netflix. people say we cannot complain, we are getting paid, which is very true, but at the same time, why would they set us up doing this if we arejust would they set us up doing this if we are just sat around waiting? it is not very productive at all. but evenif is not very productive at all. but even if the government does get the 25,000 new tracking recruits up and running in” 25,000 new tracking recruits up and running in 11 days, there are still questions about whether this app, intended to trace the contacts of those infected, will be ready anytime soon. 0ur political editor, laura kuenssberg, joins us from westminster. so, the government wants track and trace to be up and running before schools go back, but it s all very complicated? yes, and it is something that ministers and government scientists have said they want to be in place in order to be more possible for children in years one and two and year six to be able to join the kids of key workers who have already been back at school, and some vulnerable children as well, who have been at primary school in england throughout this. but when the prime minister announced that was his ambition a few weeks ago, at the desk in downing street, while some parents might have been cheering, others might have been cheering, others might have been cheering, others might have thought it might not be safe enough of the outbreak still continuing. and since then, day by day, whether it is parents, teachers, unions, or councils, there has been a lot of head scratching and a lot of hard work to figure out how it will actually come into place. now, inside government, there is maybe a bit of frustration that they have tried to answer lots of they have tried to answer lots of the questions that people have. for example, many people might wonder, how do you keep a bunch of wriggling five year olds at least two metres apart from each other? the government says, according to the guidance, as long as children are keeping in smaller groups of no more than 15, the actually can be closer to each other than the rest of us are advised to be. but i think the truth of it is this is simply fiendishly complicated. you have got 150 local councils, hundreds and hundreds of schools, central government here in westminster only looking to schools in england at the moment, then you have teachers and pa rents moment, then you have teachers and parents and everybody with their own concerns. and from a political point, this next phase of gradually moving out of the lockdown is absolutely abundantly clearly going to be much harder than going into it. because in truth, nobody really knows what the new normal is going to look like, so it is a bit as if the government is trying to do a jig without a picture on the box. but the final decision on moving into this next phase will be taken by central government on the 28th of may, and then after that, we will have to see what schools make of it themselves. trying to do a jigsaw without a picture on the box. as the rate slows, hospitals across the country are now planning for the next challenge, trying to get back to normal. but the boss of ipswich hospital is warning that the implications of social distancing together with the possibility that covid i9 could be here for years means they are having to find new ways of working, including one way systems and fewer beds. 0ur health editor, hugh pym, reports. the eyes behind the mask. staff at ipswich hospital in a covid i9 ward at the height of the crisis, captured by one of their own colleagues. it s much easier to stop services than it is to start them. and this is the hospital now. we were given access as senior staff planned for a new future and restarting other services. it talks about the different phases of recovery, and obviously we are in phase two now. here, they are following national guidelines in england for bringing back nonurgent work. so, we are doing it very carefully. i think it would be wrong to start a lot of services and then realise we had to close them down again because we didn t have the capacity, the staff or the ppe. but i think there is also an important message, that we are open for business. we talked about what we would be using this ward for, going forward. as you know, we previously had our covid patients in here. this area was for dementia patients, then it was converted into a covid i9 ward. we filmed only in areas where there are currently no overnight patients. now they re working out how to get back to its use. so, we are now challenged to look at how we can socially distance our patients within the bay. so, we are looking at whether we put screens up, clear perspex screens, so we can still see the patients. we do have to think about the safety of our patients, as well. so, drawing the curtains is not a simple answer. before the lockdown, waiting lists for routine surgery were increasing. then came a raft of cancellations as hospitals focused on covid i9 patients. now there s a backlog to be cleared, as well as getting to grips with those original waiting lists. a huge task in this new climate. meet rob, who s a lifeguard at a local swimming pool. he has a heart problem, and needed an operation. but it was postponed because of coronavirus. you do end up thinking, what if i never get there? you know? what if the next step i take is my last step? but the hospital did manage to treat him after all. in late april, he was called in for his operation. miracle workers. literally everyday heroes. the fact they can deal with the crisis and still do what would be seen as the mundane stuff. obviously not mundane to me. how s it going? yeah, not too bad. as for a&e, they re working out how best it can be run at this new stage. it really is going to be a challenge for us. often, when we have visitors and patients at the numbers we usually have, it s a very crowded environment. so, we are really having to look at how we see people, and how we see people differently, in order to allow social distancing to occur. are you having to plan long term for covid i9 being present? this isn t temporary. we re going to have to assume that we are going to have social distancing and some of our elective plans in place for some time. so, certainly, this isn t one or two years we are thinking about, it could be several years. the shadow of the virus lingers. though hospitals are planning and hoping for calmer times. hugh pym, bbc news, ipswich. greece has said it plans to start its tourist season onjune the 15th, with international flights operating from the 1st ofjuly. the foreign office here still advises against all but essential overseas travel but all the major european destinations are now gradually relaxing their lockdowns. france currently allows only essential travel from abroad. it hasn t said when its foreign tourist ban will be lifted. but many beaches are now open with sunbathing still banned. spain has started loosening its restrictions on a region by region basis. italy will reopen to tourists in a fortnight, with airports running from the 1st ofjune. but as mark lowen reports that s evoking mixed emotions among locals. perfection isn t shared. at least not for now. the jewel of lake como glitters in the stillness. but italy hopes to lure tourists back from two weeks today, when it lifts restrictions to visitors from europe and drops its quarantine. the tranquillity is breathtaking. but the economy is starved. lake como was set for a record year. george clooney‘s villa here, helping to pull tourists. but then the virus hit this region, lombardi, the ha rd est hit this region, lombardi, the hardest in italy. tourism luca leoni because watched as all bookings in august have been cancelled here. now they are trying to extend the season to save it. that means he will keep his hotel open right through until january, hoping the rooms fill up as confidence returns. the british tourists, the first one is arrived at lake como in the 18th century. we are ready to welcome them again, like we have always been in the past. for us, it s not a question of working with them, but it is to share our feelings with them, our soul and heart with them. because they started the tourism for us and we wa nt they started the tourism for us and we want them to be back. as soon as possible. local businesses need them badly. italy is expecting a recession this year of almost 10%. having imposed a national lockdown before any other country, italy is now unlocking fast, bringing forward the lifting of some measures, desperate to salvage its tourism season and the economy. but the balance between welcoming visitors back here and the risk of a second wave is what italy, and every other country, is now trying to strike. at the local market, restarting today, there is little to keep them busy. traders want the custom back, but not the possible side effect. translation: i don t think the tourists will come back quickly. they, and way, are scared of the infections rise again. translation: the italian government is making a mistake. we in the north were worst affected by the virus. the south wasn t. so why not open their first, where they are not afraid? lake como exceeds anything i ever beheld in beauty, wrote shelley. this place is poetry, but it wants an audience. the government has confirmed there will be some new checks on goods coming into northern ireland from the rest of the uk as part of the brexit deal. ministers are stressing that controls will be kept to a minimum. 0ur ireland correspondent, emma vardy, is at belfast port. what will it all mean? well, this has been the most agonised part of brexit. because goods that enter the eu, well, they need to be checked. so this plan came about to avoid the need for those checks taking place on the irish land border between northern ireland and the republic of ireland. because keeping that board are invisible has been a key part of the peace process here for many yea rs. the peace process here for many years. so, instead, the border has effectively been moved here, to northern ireland s ports. what it s going to mean is that goods from great britain and drink northern ireland here will be subject to new checks, it will mean more paperwork for great british businesses to fill out if they are exporting goods here. the new checks will mostly be on food and animal products. northern ireland will also have to keep abiding on eu rules on manufactured goods. all of this is supposed to be operational here by january. it is an arrangement which the democratic unionists in northern ireland have been deeply uncomfortable with. they don t like the idea of northern ireland having to stick by eu rules, and under eu processes after the uk has left the eu. the uk government and the eu still don t see eye to eye on a few elements of this, too. there is concern from the eu that it won t be enough to prevent northern ireland from being used as some sort of back door. still a few things be ironed out between now and january when it all kicks in. london has been harder hit by coronavirus than anywhere else in the uk. almost 6,000 people have died in hospitals in the capital since the beginning of march. newham in east london has been particularly badly affected. 0ur social affairs correspondent michael buchanan s report contains some flashing images. this is not an equalising virus, this is a virus that has a disproportionate effect on those poorer communities here in newham. busy. yeah, we ve almost done, i think, about 30 bodies within the last couple of weeks. the past few weeks have been really, i would say, depressing, really difficult. covid 19 has preyed on newham like nowhere else, a mixture of deprivation and ethnicity allowing the disease to exploit the area s mainly black and asian population. at the jamia mosque, they have seen for themselves the cruel reach of the virus. some members volunteer to prepare the dead for burial after, they say, a backlog of corpses built up. the stock of coffins has now diminished. over a ten day period last month, they cleansed and prayed for 32 people. i think we did six or seven bodies in one day. we cannot forget our deceased. we cannotjust leave them to be buried without the ritual washing, we couldn tjust stand back and watch them be buried in mass graves. first couple that i did do, i was thinking about them, but then as it got more regular, ijust thought, you know what? i m doing this for the community, i m doing it for the family. among the victims have been key workers gp yusuf patel, teacher dr louisa rajakumari, and several taxi drivers have died. it is a really difficult time for everyone. labour councillor ayesha chowdhury knows about 15 people who ve died recently, many of them bangladeshi. when they passed away, the community could not even participate in the funeral, they cannot go and visit the family, so everything is completely shocking. some in newham were accused of not taking the virus seriously, at least initially, but the area was at greater risk anyway. many residents work in jobs that can t be done from home. and the mayor also highlights high levels of both overcrowding and underlying health conditions. if we want to avoid a second wave, if we want to minimise the deaths, if we want to stop the risk, we have got to be given the resources, the flexibility at a local level. command control top down will not work in light of what the evidence is showing us. the same community that has lived through this crisis is now charged with rebuilding newham. many teachers at this school had the virus, pupils have lost relatives, and a staff member is caring for two children who lost both parents. bringing hope here means restoring normality. being serious about the education we offer actually gives them a way of seeing a future for themselves. we can t obviously turn things back to a different situation, but the fact that they can see a future is the best thing that we can give them. this covid crisis reflects the nation s long standing health inequalities, and leaves the poor to feel that, once more, they re being left behind. michael buchanan, bbc news, newham in east london. a gp who spent more than a month on a ventilator fighting for his life has been describing what happened to him. mike hare was a fit and healthy man in his 50s, with no underlying health conditions. he fell ill before lockdown and spent seven weeks in hospital. 0ur health correspondent, catherine burns, has been speaking to him and his daughter, imogen. mike hare is a gp, butjokes that his nickname should be mr fit. he s run a marathon, skis and loves to sail. but in march he got coronavirus. he soon became very ill and spent seven weeks in intensive care. he barely remembers anything, but for his family it was all too real. we actually received a facetime off him on tuesday morning, just before he was put on a ventilator. with him saying this is what s happening, this might be the last time that, you know, we speak. which was absolutely heartbreaking, really. because we thought that was it. so, it was pretty horrible. i think it must have been pretty hard for you. when people usually go on to a ventilator, they go on for a few days, just to give them a bit of rest. but that then turned into a week, and then it turns into three weeks, it turns into five weeks. we weren t able to see him. we asked if we could come in and hold his hands, none of that was possible. when he was less heavily sedated, nurses helped the family video call him. it was the first time imogen had seen her dad for weeks. you don t know this, but later on, around week four or five, he was going, where are you, why aren t you here? and for him, you became ill the week before lockdown even started. so he had no acknowledgement or realisation of what the whole country was going through. do you have any memories of that at all? no. you know, i had the you ve been asleep for six weeks whisper in my ears. and then i woke up and i was in a bed. i think the patient has the lucky run, to be honest with you. and my thoughts would go to anybody who is on a ventilator at the moment. but particularly their relatives. tell me about the care you got. they were fantastic. it s a testament to the hard work of colchester hospital. the attention, the sense of love, and they would do anything for me. how has this changed you, physically? i won t be doing any more marathons. as i sit here now, i m a bit breathless. i ve been out for a week, and it s bloody hard work to get moving. and it hurts at night time. there is a plus side to this. i ve had more time with my family. i think we ve got closer. we ve reflected, to see what life would have been like without me being around. what was that first hug like? oh, you give yourself goals. and my goal was to get home. just to get home. you re here. yeah, yeah. but recovery from a trauma like this isn t straightforward. and since we filmed this, mike has had to go back into hospital. he s optimistic that he ll be home with his family soon, though. catherine burns, bbc news. today is the hottest day of the year so far. temperatures in some parts of the country have reached 28 degrees. sarah campbell has spent the day on brighton beach where people have been trying to sunbathe and social distance at the same time. it s been busy? yes, it has. people are still coming to the area to make the most of the beautiful evening sunshine. most of the people i have seen through the day have been trying to keep this to meet a safe distance. but when there are so many people out and about, trying to avoid all close contact is difficult. sun, sea and social distancing. it s not easy to find an isolated spot on the beach when so many other people have the same idea. for businesses, too, there is a