aore than 100 people are reported to be arrested at navalny memorials across russia. coating murderer was being projected on buildings —— putin murderer. the ukrainian president says his forces had to abandon the eastern town of avdiivka because they'd been outgunned. now on bbc news, world questions: poland. i'm jonny dymond and welcome to world questions from the royal castle in the polish capital warsaw. the new government has been making sweeping changes as it seeks to roll back the reforms of the last administration. the audience here will put their questions to a panel of senior politicians. applause.

welcome to the ballroom of the royal castle in warsaw. this former royal palace is where the first constitution of poland was signed and in poland today, constitutional issues — who runs the country and how — are top of the bill. the new prime minister has sacked the heads of state—owned media, dismissed the protests of the courts, and clashed over and over again with the president, an ally of the last government. the prime minister says he is re—establishing democracy and de—politicising the state. the president says the new government is violating the constitution and promoting anarchy. this country is right next to ukraine and was the first to offer aid. how strong is that commitment, two years on? with me to answer questions put to them directly by our audience is our panel. mateusz morawiecki mp, was, until only a few weeks ago, the prime minister of poland.

he is vice president of peace, the law and justice party. it's the largest party, but its coalition failed to get enough seats for him to hold onto power after the election last year. agnieszka pomaska mp is a senior member of civic platform, the new prime minister's party and the vice chair of the european affairs committee of the same, the lower house of the polish parliament. senator magdelena biejat is co—leader of razem, a left—wing party, which hasn't joined the governing coalition, but will support it on key votes. she is a deputy marshal or speaker of the senate. krzysztof bosak mp, is a deputy marshal or speaker of the seine and is co—leader of the right—wing confederation party. applause. let's go straight to our first question and it comes from john. i was at tvp when polish officers, dozens of them, went in. - how do you justify such drastic-

measures and how is that democratic? a little bit of background, late december last year, police went into the state broadcaster, tvp, after the government dismissed the head of the station along with the heads of polish radio and the polish press agency, civic platform, the main party in the governing coalition have long complained that the previous government had turned tvp into a propaganda channel. agnieszka pomaska from civic platform, how do you justify such drastic measures, how is it democratic? first of all, thank you for the invitation and your question. to answer it, we have to look back and described the situation that we had during the last eight years in the polish public media, financed from the state budget. it was not public media in a sense we got used to it, like bbc, for example. the media during the last eight years were used to spread propaganda,

to accuse opposition and to fight with the opposition. this situation must be cleaned up. that's why there is a new board of the public tv and the same radio. and all those who were using public money to spread propaganda, to abuse the power, they simply shouldn't work any more in public tv or public radio. of course, everything must be done under the polish law and with the constitution. the question presses you particularly... applause. the question presses you particularly about sending police officers into the public broadcaster to enforce your will. there were people who were illegally inside, including politicians who were blocking the building

of the media and they were against changes that were legally done by the new government. so it's normal that the police had to react. 0k, former prime minister, mateusz morawiecki, what did you make of it? thank you, thank you very much for inviting me. imagine that a minister of his majesty's government illegally dismissing the board of bbc. then imagine that the same minister is actually replacing all the fired people with his own people. and then the news channel is actually closed down. for the first time sees the martial law in 1981. and this is what has been happening in poland for last couple of weeks. actually, people were not illegally there because all the politicians, all the members of parliament have their right, according

to polish law, to intervene, to go to different public buildings, and to make any kind of supervision, intervention, and so on. so, all what has happened happened completely illegally. because there is a law in this country which says about what you can do about public television, what you cannot do about public television. and, by the way, i can guarantee you, while i was prime minister, all poles could see three different tv channels and three different sets of opinions... laughter. booing. 0k... let's stay on this particular issue. booing. because now you can have... ..one tv and another tv public,

which is almost the same. is this democracy? i doubt it. applause. i think democracy requires freedom of speech. 0k, 0k. booing. 0k. please. thank you very much indeed. krzysztof bosak from the right—wing confederation party, what do you make of the police raid that was made on a tv station? we are quite critical— towards the propaganda that we had in public media during law and justice government. . in fact, we were not- invited because we were political competitors to law and justice party. _ but we are also critical towards this decision i of new government to take media by force, not by law. _ it should be proposing - new bill about public media. then voting in parliament. then sending to- president to sign it. if president do not sign, l

negotiating with president or waiting for presidential elections next year. - and then changing the board. not first changing the board by force then starting - discussing about new bill. thank you very much. magdelena biejat from left—wing razem party, i mean, the question refers to drastic measures, dozens of police officers, a breach in democracy, perhaps? yes, it does. i wanted to say that mr morawiecki was... compared the public media during the rule of law and justice to bbc and i would say that it's very unkind to our host to do such an impression. applause. because the scale of the propaganda was extremely bad. and i'm not referring even to the political... political opponents of the ruling party, but more to the normal people

who were protesting the government. i myself was very involved in many protests of lgbtq community, of women's rights activists. and we've had terrible, terrible dehumanising narrative towards those people in the public media. something that should never be possible in the democratic country that's part of the european union. having said that, i am absolutely against letting any police raid any institutions. i think that itjust doesn't look well and it doesn't help, when we talk about changing the atmosphere. i don't agree with mr bosak when he says we should have waited, because it's not easy to wait while one of the most important... the public television, the one that's being funded

by all of us here in poland, was so much... concentrated on promoting very harmful propaganda. and that was something that should have been stopped but i think there were better ways to do it and i think that the problem now is that, and here i will agree with mr bosak, which happens rarely, that we need a new bill and there is no trace of it yet. thanks, magdalena, thanks very much. applause. let's get to my next question, comes from a couple, alexander and kuba. hi, my name's alexander and i'm here with my boyfriend, kuba, and we would like to ask the following question. as a gay couple, we want to know how polish politicians will act to tear down the rainbow curtain dividing our country from the rest of the western world. thank you. thank you very much indeed. applause. a little context, for those people who don't know it. in contrast with some european countries, and other countries

around the world, there is no same sex marriage here, there is no law against hate crime, there is no civil partnership, and there is no gay adoption. magdelena biejat, from razem, the left wing party, what do you think about the rainbow curtain? in particular, i suppose, gay marriage. well, i am a strong supporter of lgbtq rights and i believe that we are ready in poland much more than the politicians themselves, i must say, to introduce same—sex marriage, including the adoption, of course, for the same—sex couples. the sad thing is that it seems that we won't be able to go through with the same—sex marriage bill during this term because of the constitution of the polish same and it's still very conservative. the good news is that there has been information that the ruling coalition will go ahead with the civic unions.

and that's a great, great news because that's a huge step forward. and that they will also address the hate crime. and i'm very happy with that because this is something really important. you know, we have to be able to protect all our citizens, regardless their belief, who they love, and where they live. and i do hope that this will go through. applause. thank you, mateusz morawiecki, the former prime minister, the rainbow curtain and gay marriage? it's very important to say that in poland we do not have any major problem with crime towards this community compared... you don't have a problem with hate crime? comparing to the other countries, which the statistics which i saw. and then all the rights,

which the same sex couple needs, according to our different laws can be also executed. and this is why we didn't see any reason that any new regulation needs to be adopted. but they say, why are they... why do they not have the right to marry? because the... in polish constitution, the marriage is reserved for women and men. but things do change, don't they? constitutions change, as well. true. in our constitution, the marriage is reserved only for men and women. and that is what you believe it is for? this is not true. forgive me, you say the constitution... no, it's not true. it's... i mean, you have to read the constitution. 0k, 0k. applause. it's not... mateusz. .. i don't. .. we will...

we will come to you, if we may, after we've let the panel have their say. thank you very much for your contributions. let's move on. agnieszka pomaska from the governing civic platform party. is gay marriage a step too far for your party? we don't have... personally, i'm in favour of what mrs biejat said, but i'm afraid we are far from that. according to the majority, we don't have for that in the present parliament. the problem is bigger. we just talked about public tv. hate speech was spread against lgbtq using public money in the public media, and that's something that should be stopped and will never happen again. and that's why we need changes. applause. and, of course, if we speak

about the law, it's something we can done. and i think we have majority in the parliament to include hate speech against lgbt into the law to...to make it easier to fight with that. 0k. thank you very much indeed. krzysztof bosak from the confederation party. we are a conservative party, some of us are even we canl say traditionalists, . so we do not support such legislation. in fact, we don't support all this lgbt agenda. - we believe that it's a part- of a left...left—wing programme, a part of so—called - progressivism or wokeism, and we reject all that stuff. we believe that everyl citizen should be safe, should be secured by the state i institutions, every citizen should have the same rights and freedom. but under polish constitution, it's completely clear-

that the marriage is a union of men and women. - of course, leftists try to revert - or subvert this constitutional norm. this is what they always do. but, in my opinion, it's false. we support safety for everybody, i but also we don't want any hate i speech law because we know that it is restricting - freedom of speech and it| means leftist censorship. thank you very much indeed, krzysztof, thank you. look, i want to hear from the audience, if i could. i know there's a wide range of views here. i'm going to start with you, madam, overthere. thank you. hello. i was ten years old when communism ended, so i sort of remember the transition period. i spent ten years in the uk. i came back to poland two years ago. as a woman, as a girl, i felt more liberated in communism in terms of empowerment of women and girls.

i think there was a lot more forward looking in that sense and i think, yes, i've seen a lot of polarisation and a lot of hate speech. so i think it's a little bit of poland that i don't recognise. 0k. thank you very much indeed. sir, overthere. thank you, sir. our morality doesn't change. the world might change, but morality need to stay the same. one man, one woman for a lifetime is the best thing that god has given us and it needs to be preserved. thank you very much, sir. any other thoughts from the audience who were very noisy earlier? madam. i also have pretty conservative views and i'm against gay or lesbian marriages. but still, i believe some compromise is needed just to protect people's rights. so, i believe same sex civil unions would be a good compromise that would ensure that people's rights for...for instance, for the information about their partner's health,

that those rights may be ensured. thank you. thank you very much, madam. thank you. and sir, thank you. yes, thank you. we appreciate to hear compromises being said, right. i just want to say that traditionalism is always an effort to maintain what was was happening in the past — but we are living in a world that constantly evolves. and, you know, it's ok not to believe in us, but we're still here. thank you very much. iheard... i heard a lot of cheering and a lot of some booing during the questions. we have one more thought. i'll go back to the question of perhaps the partner of the questioner if you'd like to have your last word, sir. thank you. just to comment on what mr morawiecki was saying, - the lgbtq hate crimes are not being registered in poland - as a separate type of hate crime. this is why the statistics doesn't show them. - it's not only hate crime, _ it's also the general mental health and well—being of lgbtq people,

especially the youth _ and the government led - by mr morawiecki in the last eight years fought very hard to make it very difficult for young people - to come out and to live in poland. thank you very much indeed. thank you. applause. thank you to our audience for your thoughts there. let's go on to our next question. it comes from malgorzata. thank you. hello. my name is malgorzata and i'd like to move on to russia and ukraine. as we see the war developing and the third year starting, what's the end game? what are your thoughts on this major humanitarian crisis? former prime minister mateusz morawiecki. i'm cautiously pessimistic, because the fact of the matter is that russia has vast natural resources, vast human resources, and they have patience, which democratic systems do not have to such an extent.

what we need right now is a very... solidarity based type of approach from all the nato countries to support ukraine with new yet another wave of weapon and ammunition, because this is what they need. and for the first time in our history, last 300 years, somebody else is defending us from the arch enemy. and we should be doing as much as we can strategically and tactically to...to support ukrainian troops in their fight towards the russian aggression. agnieszka pomaska from the civic platform party, the question is, what is an end game? i believe that we have all we can do

to help ukraine to win the war. it's not yet our war directly, but we are on the border. it's difficult to imagine what will be the consequences of the... if the ukraine will lose the war. but, of course, i'm very much worried about the situation in the us and decision they will make there. thank you. krzysztof bosak from the confederation party. it's very hard to predict the future, especially l in such a situation. but, in fact, i'm also rather- pessimistic because we can see that poland did everything and even maybe more than our country _ was possible to do and other western nations did less. . in my opinion, the level- of support from united states was too small and too slow. and so we have, in my opinion, unfortunately, the possibility. that it will become - another frozen conflict.

and if this war will be, uh, without any clear result, . especially bad result for russia, it is possible that russia - will start something - new and will challenge nato countries very seriously. thank you very much indeed. magdelena biejat, from the left—wing party. well, this is probably the first moment during the debate that you've heard all of us agree. it is so important that we restore our relations with the eu countries, that we restore good relations with our neighbours, that not only the ones from the eastern europe, but also the ones from the baltic sea region, because this is where our geopolitical interests are very aligned. but of course, as mr morawiecki said, we fight against a very powerful enemy, which is russia, and we have to use all

the resources we have and to be able to confront it. thank you very much. i want to hear from the audience, if i could, on this immensely serious topic. what is the end game is one question. how do we end the war, i guess is another, and i'd love to hear your statements briefly if we could. i've got a gentleman over at the edge, there. that's right, sir. my name is scott, hi. hi, scott. i'm an american and i've lived in warsaw for almost 20 years. great. and it's difficult to not take a tiny bit of offence to the comment that the united states hasn't done enough to help poland. there is at least 10,000 american troops in this country as we speak, ready to defend this country's border. 0ur countries have a long history of helping each other out and supporting each other, and i hope that continues. poland is one of the leaders in europe for a defence budget, and i'd love to see poland put aside some of its polarised and partisan

politics to unite and become the leader in the eu that it can and should be. thank you very much indeed, sir. applause. and then we've got a gentleman there, sir. my name is kazimierz. i'm a polishjournalist. i have been personally. to nato's bases in poland and i've seen first—hand - what the americans are doing. and i want to thank you, - because i think that they are doing ia lot and they are helping a loti and they are doing what they can to make sure that we are safe. and i feel all of us in poland feel safe because of nato _ and because of what america and the uk is doing and all. the other countries. thank you very much. applause. thoughts of the madame over there. what i think about when i when it comes to poland is that we have welcomed millions of ukrainians, women and children. and i think it's important to remember that as you all agree on helping ukraine, we should also agree on helping polish people continue to help ukrainians, but also to have the international community remembering and aiding us as attention is diverted to other conflicts. thank you.

sir, gentleman in the red tie there. hello. hello, my name is ugo marcus, i'm from portugal. regarding the end of the ukrainian war with russian, i believe this is the time we start listening and try to create some diplomatic corridors. also with the russian federation, it will be impossible we defend the end of the war, supporting only one side and the listening only one side. is there sympathy for that view that we need to open up diplomatic channels with russia, that there is some kind of deal to be done with russia? there are. gentleman over here has had his hand up for a bit. thank you. we are polish people. we fighting with russians for over 1,000 years. and we will fight for another thousand if it's necessary. thank you very much, sir. thank you very much indeed for all your contributions. and that is all we have time

for with world questions in poland. a big thank you to this month's panel. thanks also to our audience here in poland and our audience around the world. i'mjonny dymond. goodbye. applause. hello. after a dry and mild start to the day, the afternoon for most of us isn't looking too bad, but clouds will be thickening through the afternoon, and out towards the west it will already be raining by early afternoon, i think, and if you look at the satellite picture you can see a weather front sweeping towards the uk, and that clearer weatherjust ahead of it, so i think some brightness along the east coast,

maybe around the midlands, the south—east, too. this is around four o'clock in the afternoon, but out in the west you can see it's wet. on top of that, it's going to be quite windy, as well. where you see the green splodges, that is where the rain is heavier, for example, around the lake district, south—western scotland, through northern ireland and into the western isles, but notice that around the north—east of scotland, actually, it's still relatively bright on saturday. and those temperatures in the north about 10, but in the south, it's closer to around 1a or 15 degrees. now, all of us are in for some rain tonight. it will be quite heavy, and particularly heavy i think in the south of the country through the early hours of sunday morning, and it's going to be a mild night. in scotland, in aberdeen, around 7 degrees, 10 expected in liverpool, that's the morning temperature on sunday, and 12 in the south. now, we are a little uncertain as to how soon this rain is going to clear from east anglia and the south—east, so, yes,

a wet start for many of us, for sure, but that weather front could drag its heels around this corner of the country. i think that by the time we get to around early afternoon we should be all in mostly sunny weather, and certainly the further north and west you are. temperatures 12 in glasgow, 13 in birmingham, in plymouth it will also be about 13 — add a degree on top of that, i think, in the south—east. now, monday, a weak weather front will sweep across the country, and then this high pressure will build. here is that weak weather front in the morning. that will produce some rain, some showers for a time, then i think the skies will clear a little bit later on in the day. temperatures about what we have been used to, maybe a shade lower, say 9 in stornoway, about 10 in liverpool and 13 or so in london. and if you're planning the week, it is looking unsettled. it's going to be often wet, windy at times, temperatures still into double figures and then at the end of the week ahead, it could turn a little bit colder. bye— bye.

0gan live from london, this is bbc news. the family of the late russian opposition figure, alexei navalny, say they've been unable to collect his body. his spokesperson tells the bbc the authorities are hiding it. we know that the law has never been applied to alexei. and so we have no doubt that they will try to hide his body as long as possible. human rights activists say police arrest more than 100 people at navalny memorials across russia. the ukrainian president says his forces had to abandon the town of avdiivka because they'd been outgunned. it's russia's most significant military success since may.

and keeping up the fight for compensation — hundreds of sub—postmasters forced into bankruptcy are still demanding redress. hello, i'm samantha simmonds. we start with the latest on the death of alexei navalny, one of president putin's most prominent critics. his family say mr navalny�*s mother has tried and failed to collect her son's body from a morgue in the arctic circle. a spokesperson claimed it is purposely being withheld by russian authorities so they can "cover traces". demonstrations and vigils have taken place near russian embassies in many countries to express outrage at his death in prison. more than a—hundred protesters are reported to have been detained for attending memorials in russia. our first report this hour is from our eastern europe correspondent sarah rainsford. this was a walk towards the news

that navalny�*s mother didn't want to hear.