this is bbc news, the headlines... israel intensifies its operation in the south of gaza — as the world health organization warns the situation is getting "worse by the hour". the uk home secretary — signs a treaty with rwanda 7 as they try again to fulfil its promise — to send asylum seekers to the country. armed police are searching for a suspect after a woman was stabbed in aberfan, south wales. schools nearby are in lockdown as a precaution. time to act on watch thefts — tens of millions of pounds worth of luxury watches snatched from victims every year. time for a look at the business news now with tadhg enright. we are talking about china first of all. china has had its credit outlook downgraded by the ratings agency moody's — it's gone from stable to negative because of concerns about rising debt held by companies

in the country's faltering property sector. that means that china's credit rating is at risk of a downgrade. the government in beijing is rumoured to be considering providing more financial support for property developers — including evergrande and country garden — which are both billions of dollars in debt. earlier i spoke to janet mui, head of market analysis at rbc brewin dolphin. i asked her whether this suggests things are getting worse for the world's second largest economy? this is a reminder of what investors already know which is a slowing economy and a downturn in the property sector, and the government is going back to the old way, they want to reduce debt in this estimate but it is proving to be very difficult, so the stimulus measures

are what is worrying moody's. they think it will raise the debt level in the economy. so, it isjust a reminder. it does not change too much what investors already think about china. a lot of people said beijing should have done more to stimulate its economy and insulate its property developers and maybe this is why it was reluctant. can you shed any light on that? the chinese government is well aware of the debt problem. currently the debt—to—gdp ratio is 280% according to some estimates, so sky—high, so that is why they have tried to de—risk the economy starting in 2017 and that is what led to the real estate downturn because property developers were having trouble with accessing liquidity. but given the slowdown of the economy, there is no other way to get around, but to stimulate the sector again. so it is a reminder of how difficult

it is for china to shift away from this old way of managing its economy, which is by borrowing for infrastructure and development. the companies mentioned are in dire straits. what would happen, remind us of the consequences if they were allowed to implode completely, companies like evergrande? these two developers were bankrupt. they are important players within the chinese property sector, that is why the sentiment in the sector has been negatively impacted and that is why buyers are not confident in buying because if you have a top property developer in china under these kind of circumstances, then people are concerned. the chinese government is well aware of that and that is why they are doing all they can to stimulate housing demand,

including reducing the down payment ratio for households, and a number of measures. the chinese government is proposing state owned banks to lend to these troubled developers in order to stop further contagion into the financial system, for example. so i think the credit downgrade is not going to stop the chinese government from continuing to push on the economy. staying on the subject of china and its economic problems, the bbc has been to visit forest city, a £100 billion dollar property project by the developer country garden in southern malaysia. it was a part of china's massive international investment programme, the belt and road initiative and was designed to become home to almost a million people. eight years after forest city was launched, it's virtually empty. 0ur asia business correspondent nick marsh spent a night in the place its few residents describe as a ghost town.

music: ghost town by the specials we're injohor, right on the tip of southern malaysia, and there's something strange on the horizon. locals call it ghost city. and on first impressions, you can see why. ok, this is forest city. it's a bit dark. i think someone has forgotten to turn the lights on. it's hard to believe that anyone actually lives here. 0h, here they are. even in mid—afternoon, forest city feels more like a haunted house than a happy home. do you feel like it's a ghost town? from what i've seen so far, yes, i would have to agree. maybe you should try after 12.

we may be 3,000 miles from beijing, but residents likejoanne are trying to weather a storm in china's property sector. she wants to get out of forest city. and as night started to fall, i met someone who already had. i feel freedom, to be honest. i feel free. i finally escaped this multi—billion project. it's supposed to be good. it's supposed to meet expectations, but it's frustrating. the property developer country garden sold this place as a thriving eco—friendly community, with beaches, bars, restaurants. it was a chance for chinese investors to own a second home abroad and then rent it out to locals. but as we've already seen all over china, ambition didn't match reality. chinese government controls on how much companies could borrow and how much chinese citizens could spend on foreign property have left forest city in disarray.

this place was supposed to be a restaurant. i think behind me, judging by the looks of things, it was supposed to be the kitchen. country garden's slogan for this whole place was, "a prime vision for future cities". but if you just take a look around, it doesn't seem that way. country garden insists that the project will be finished. but with the company facing debts of nearly $200 billion, it's hard to see how. forest city was supposed to house a million people. right now, it's 1% occupied. like so many chinese property developments, this place seems to be going nowhere. bbc news contacted country garden group in china and received no response. its malaysian operation did

respond and said that... to hollywood now where actors who are members of the screen actors guild a deadline of today to ratify their union s hard fought deal with studios over pay and conditions. the guild has strongly urged members to back last month s agreement, saying it is a lucrative and innovative package. their grievances led to a 16 week strike that cost the industry billions. let's speak now to our north america business correspondent erin delmore. are there any indications of how this vote will go? do. when you say the phrase watching the drama, it plays in a couple of different ways because this has been an ongoing saga about over 100 days, and now the ratification vote.

relating to —— when the tentative road was agreed, the union talked about a higher minimum pay and better funding about a higher minimum pay and betterfunding for about a higher minimum pay and better funding for health care and better funding for health care and better conditions on certain protections around the use of artificial intelligence but it is the last one which has become a sticking point is we get closer to the erratic vacation vote and when the erratic vacation vote and when the initial agreement was out, there was a summary of what the contract included but now members have access to 129 page contract and they have passed a few issues related to ai. 0ne passed a few issues related to ai. one is a run consent from actors and another is around synthetic performers which are digital actors that are created by ai based on the human attributes of specific human actors. another is about al being used to be trained on performances that are done by union members, so some actors are letting their opinions be known on social media under the hashtag vote no but others

have spoken out publicly and in 0&a sessions. the national director of the union says they are competent members will vote to ratify but it is worth noting that when it went to a vote amongst national board members who were deciding if the contract should be passed on, to all members for ratification, did not passed unanimously and it was 86% of support. so there was dissent early on and now we have seen it bubbling up on and now we have seen it bubbling up on social media. but it would still be unusual for actors not to ratify the agreement which will hold for the next two and a half years but the concerns persist about how quickly the ai technology is developing especially when we look at the two and a half year timeframe.— at the two and a half year timeframe. . ,. ., . , timeframe. fascinating. we will be watchinu timeframe. fascinating. we will be watching to — timeframe. fascinating. we will be watching to see — timeframe. fascinating. we will be watching to see if _ timeframe. fascinating. we will be watching to see if there's - timeframe. fascinating. we will be watching to see if there's another i watching to see if there's another twist in the plot. thanks for joining us. in other news... here in the uk the embattled business group the confederation of british industry have approved the nomination of rupert soames as their next president. mr soames — the grandson of sir winston churchill — is set to start the job

in the new year. the cbi has been hit by a series of scandals this year which saw a number of high profile organisations leave the group. on the london stock exchange today. a technical glitch has twice affected the trading of some shares on the london stock exchange today. investors were temporarily unable to buy or sell shares in smaller companies including deliveroo and asos but companies on the major ftse100 and 250 indices were unaffected. after initially saying the problem had been fixed, the lse suffered the same problem all over again. we've been told that it's fixed again. there have been two other glitches on the lse in recent months. around the world and across the uk. this is bbc news. this is the latest tactic in the fight against crime. these officers are already advanced motorcyclists.

now they've had extra training to prepare them for all off road conditions. much lighter than our road bikes. it's a smaller engine. it's more manoeuvrable off road as well. tyres are knobbly tyres, a lot more grippy off road. give a lot more traction on grass and gravel off. 0ffroad bikes are already used by some forces but this is a first for the thames valley. it'll give officers the ability to disrupt anti—social behaviour in hard to reach areas. so the new bikes are capable of going off road both in urban environments, footpaths, parks, roadways, but also going into rural areas such as bridleways, farm tracks. rural crime is big business. £4 million of stolen equipment has been seized in the last 18 months, but it's in urban areas that this tactic could prove most useful. the bikes have already been deployed in reading to stop drug dealers and illegal vehicles being driven off road. you're live with bbc news.

more on our top story now — the war betweeen israel and hamas. the world health organisation says the humanitarian situation in gaza is "getting worse by the hour", as israeli forces continue their attacks in the south of the gaza strip. tha un has warned that it's no longer possible to create safe zones there for civilians. juliette touma, director of communications at unwra, the un relief agency for palestine refugees, is injordan and told us about the conditions her colleagues are facing in gaza. it's getting worse by the minute, it is safe to say. we are getting nonstop sos calls from our colleagues and friends who work for unrwa. i think we've hit rock bottom, and it is a turning point in this war. we're also hearing that the jabalia refugee camp, which is in the north, has been encircled. now, i don't know if you

particularly have any recent data, but do you have any sort of estimation about how many people we're actually talking that are still in that refugee camp? we don't have the exact figures. however, if you recall, matthew, during the pause, the recent pause, our teams were able to make it to the north of the gaza strip, and they have confirmed that there are indeed people who continue to stay in our shelters and that our teams are working there. however, the bombardment has intensified over the past 2a hours in the south, especially in khan younis and tens of thousands of people have been forced to flee only to unrwa's shelters alone, which are very overcrowded. we have had 60,000 people coming only in the past few hours and notjust overcrowded. you tweeted earlier about some facilities being damaged by the bombardment. tell me more about that.

and also evacuation orders that you are talking about for 69 of your shelters? yes. so we have recorded since the war began 100 hits on our facilities. the vast majority of them were, in fact, shelters where families were taking refuge under the un flag. but in this war, even united nations facilities have not been spared. and just as of this morning, we were able to sadly confirm additional colleagues of ours who were killed. 130 colleagues in total have been killed in gaza during the war. and people continue to come to our shelters wherever they are across the gaza strip. but people are very, very fearful of what's coming next, especially given the intensification of the bombardment in the south. final quick question. what do you make of these so called safe zones?

i know that you are anxious about running out of tents. just how low are your supplies? there is no such thing as a safe zone in gaza. the whole of the gaza strip has become one of the most dangerous places to live in right now. there's no safe zone. there's no safe place. no place is safe. no place is spared. and the situation with your tents? we had a very limited number of tents, you know what we used them for? we used them in our own shelters to give people some privacy and to shield them and protect them from the rain. but it's not like we plan to open this mega camp that some reports are referring to. let's turn now to dubai where ministers from more than 60 countries have been meeting at the cop28 climate summit. and disagreements are emerging in the talks over a new climate change agreement, with saudi arabia indicating it

won't accept a deal proposing cuts in the use of fossil fuels. environment campaigners say a record number of delegates from the coal, gas and oil industries are attending the summit. earlier i spoke with nazanine moshiri, crisis group's senior analyst for climate, environment & conflict, africa. we are heading for the world's hottest year on record and we have half of the countries in the world experiencing conflict also experiencing climate fragility as well, and just look at the horn of africa, unprecedented drought. look at the flooding in libya and south sudan. look at somalia and afghanistan which have had both flooding and drought. the fact is, those countries are receiving about a third of the financing that goes to countries at peace.

so, yes, it is intertwined and we are not saying that putting more climate money will solve the peace problems, and make everything more peaceful, but it will prevent things from getting worse. what are you hoping for in concrete terms? well, here at cop28 for the first time ever, there was a peace day, a thematic day around the issues i just talked about. more than 100 countries signed a declaration, it is not legally binding, but it's a start to try to get this on the agenda. but what we do need is more money. climate financing countries, especially adaptation money, to help them deal with these climate shocks like flooding and drought in these conflict settings. and unfortunately, it is looking like developing countries are not going to get enough money and the conflict countries are not going to get their fair share either. so many people there and it has been described as a talking shop

but there are between a0 and 70,000 people at the summit. in terms of what is encouraging you and what is disappointing you, give me your assessment. these have been very, very difficult talks, really quite contentious, i have to say. i have been covering this for quite a while. partly because we have multiple wars going on and economic crises, but also because the problems we are dealing with are so great. the uae has been doing its best to galvanise support around some of the key issues like phasing out fossil fuels and climate financing but the needs are so great. we are talking about trillions of dollars, not billions, and also talking about a lot of the promises that were made years ago in 2015 in paris, still not being made at this cop.

i am hopeful in terms of getting global conflict on the agenda and getting some money towards those conflict affected countries, possibly for the loss of damage fund that was agreed on the first day but i still think so much more has to be done. perhaps it will be done away from the summit on the sidelines in the negotiations and in the talks and beyond cop, looking ahead over the next couple of years. south wales police have just said that a 28—year—old man from merthyr has been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder — after a woman was stabbed in a village in the valleys of south wales. police had been called to aberfan, after the 29—year—old woman was attacked in the street this morning. she was taken to hospital in cardiff. people were asked to avoid the area, and nearby schools went into lockdown. now you've heard of crime

watch, but what about watch crime? it is, it seems, a growing and often terrifying problem. last year, more than £50 million worth of watches were stolen in london alone — many of them luxury items snatched violently from the wrists of victims in the street. 0ur reporter tir dhondy has been exploring the issue for a bbc three documentary, in which she met some of the victims — and the criminals. london, the watch theft capital of the uk. thieves like these ruthlessly steal watches worth thousands of pounds. and you can see the size of the blade. i met andrew dinsmore, a conservative councillor who last year was robbed by moped thieves wielding an 18 inch machete. we were on our way to the cinema, sort of broad daylight. and as we turned down a residential road, a man got off the back of a moped, charged towards me screaming, "give me your watch, give me your effing watch, give me your watch." my wife thought it was a terrorist attack. you can see here she actually

just, like, collapses. oh, gosh. andrew's attackers are now in prison. and how do you think the watch was spotted? at the time, i was wearing a long—sleeved jumper. there's basically no way you could have seen it from the road and the way that they approached us — very directly, straight to me — that's why i think it was definitely that they wanted the watch, and the only time it would have been visible was when we were in the restaurant, you know, when i pulled myjumper up and we were eating. our investigation heard how thieves are known to stalk victims and plan their attacks. 0ne surprising turn was when the teenager who stole a £17,000 watch from welsh singer aled jones contacted me directly. i met him a month before his trial, where he was handed a two—year sentence. ijust felt like i had to get money so i would walk around in this area where i knew that i would see something. due to his age, he cannot be legally identified

moments after the attack, he was captured on cctv carrying the blade. and what are the consequences? 0k. during the interview, we noticed that he was carrying a large machete. we decided we couldn't press him for answers and kept our interview short. we contacted aled jones, but he did not wish to comment.

the watch thieves i met see it as a crime with rich pickings, but those who get caught face hefty prison sentences. tir dhondy, bbc news. you can watch the full documentary — hunting the rolex rippers — on bbc iplayer. one more story. it seems even father christmas can fall foul of planning laws. a grotto in somerset — which cost thousands of pounds — has been built without permission and might now have to be taken down. the decision is in the hands of somerset council's planning committee which will vote on the issue tonight. ross pollard reports. twas the night before a council meeting where it will be decided whether this christmas grotto in frome is naughty or nice. it's a family run operation, and it's pretty impressive. and once you're inside the grotto, you come through this secret tunnel and there's a cabin door

at the other side, and knock on the cabin door... see who's inside. ho—ho—ho—ho! merry christmas! merry christmas. come on in, take a seat. hello, my lovelies. everything here is basically handmade. it's an experience that the children will take through their, you know, their growing up years and hopefully, if we're still here, we'll be seeing their children. and that's all part of it for us. look at these beautiful letters. but it's currently running without planning permission. the organisers didn't know they needed it. it's cost us tens of thousands of pounds to put this all together. it would be a shame to see it go. if we get refused again, then our only option is to go to appeal. and again, that appeal is going to cost. appeals can take a long time. the scary side of it, in the end, we get an order against us and we'd have to take all this down, and i think that would finish us then. the council offices say

because of its rural setting with no public transport links, that this application should be refused. these visitors are glad it's on their doorstep. it was brilliant. kids really loved it. it's the first time they'd gone to see father christmas. there's not a lot around, actually. so if this place wasn't here, we'd have to go a lot further, like bath. i think it's probably one of the best grottoes i've been to, and so having an experience like this so close is really nice. even if councillors reject planning permission for this grotto, it will still be open this december. today's meeting will decide if it's santa and his friends' last christmas here. ross pollard, bbc news. iam being i am being told they have been granted planning permission. the second planning application has been approved so a bit of an early christmas present in somerset there. now it's time

for a look at the weather with tomasz schafernaker. hello. skies will be clearing across much of the country through the evening and overnight, and that will lead to and overnight, and that will lead to a widespread frost and also fog forming, especially in more southern parts of the uk. let me show you the satellite picture from earlier. it was a cloudy day across the bulk of england and wales, and drizzly, but in the north—west we had a clear skies and quite a cold day, and this is where the temperatures will be lowest overnight. the winds will be light across the uk and that will help the fog form and we are thinking about parts of the midlands into wales, central and southern england and into the south—east, as well, quite dense in places. temperatures will be below freezing, evenin temperatures will be below freezing, even in bigger towns and cities, as low as —7 in the sheltered glans, but a milderfor you in the low as —7 in the sheltered glans, but a milder for you in the far west of the uk, —— mild feel. the fog

will stick around into the afternoon in a few locations and where it does it will be quite a raw day so in some places temperatures during the afternoon could be barely above freezing but that is not going to be the case for most and many will have a bright if not sunny day but a chilly one so 4 degrees in edinburgh and newcastle and around six in norwich but out to the west, the weather front is advancing, southerly wind, so wind and rain will spread across the uk during the course of wednesday night and into thursday. ahead of it temporarily, some wintry weather across the pennines and the scottish hills and mountains and on thursday it is a wet day, at least a spell of rain on the way for many before it turns a bit clearer later in the day out towards the west. you can see the temperature is rising, 13 in plymouth and about six in the east and north—east and the pattern continues into friday, and the

weekend, with a succession of low pressures and weather fronts coming our way, so basically it is what we call a westerly regime, fronts coming out of the west bringing much milder conditions and this is the outlook from thursday onwards and even into next week. double figures. it has been below average for some time but now it will be above. live from london. this is bbc news. the uk home secretary signs a treaty with rwanda as they try again to fulfil the promise to send asylum seekers to the country.

rwanda seekers to the country. is helping the uk in our fight rwanda is helping the uk in our fight against illegal migration and people smugglers. fist fight against illegal migration and peeple smugglers-_ fight against illegal migration and people smugglers. at the bbc verify, we have been — people smugglers. at the bbc verify, we have been looking _ people smugglers. at the bbc verify, we have been looking at _ people smugglers. at the bbc verify, we have been looking at the - people smugglers. at the bbc verify, j we have been looking at the numbers behind _ we have been looking at the numbers behind the _ we have been looking at the numbers behind the government's plans to reduce _ behind the government's plans to reduce migration. what stacks up and what doesn't? israel intensifies its operation in the south of gaza — as the world health organization warns the situation is getting "worse by the hour". tens of thousands are told to evacuate parts of khan younis — is anywhere safe, what are civilians being told, and how many are actually leaving? junior doctors in england are to stage the longest strike in nhs history after talks between their union and the government broke down. hello, i'm matthew amroliwala, welcome to verified live,

britain and rwanda have signed a new treaty aimed at getting the uk