the newjersey is a museum ship now, in drydock for maintenance. but for the 81—year—old president, the toughest battle is yet to come. well, obviously, it's a big hurdle. i mean, i think if this were a normal election, i, by the way, i think if this were a normal election, biden wouldn't be running. i think he already would have stepped back. i think he's running because he believes he's the only plausible candidate. and i don't think he's unaware of his weaknesses as a candidate either. but he is the only plausible candidate right now. you know, i think that biden is a weak candidate, but he's facing, this is an existential crisis for the country. it used to be a cast iron rule of washington politics that being the incumbent was an advantage. with inflation and tough economic times, that's far less clear. add to the calculations that unique trump effect where his own base blame all of his failures in office

on other people while denying the biden administration any of its achievements, and it's clear that the stage is set for a most unusual election. during the coming months, both sides will go all out to mobilise their voters. and for biden supporters, there's the nagging worry that they've not yet done enough to hold on to the white house. mark there, produced by newsnight�*s max deveson and filmed by liam weir. so let's take a look at some of the front pages. beginning with the daily mail. stormy daniels, if i have made up my story about six with trump i would have written it a lot better. in the story of the worst whooping cough outbreak in decades. moving on to an exclusive, dominic cummings, boris and i saved thousands from covid but

we want to talk again. his first major interview since leaving number ten. and then the guardian, fear and trepidation as hundreds of thousands of people leave rafah. and dwp have heads in their hands over carer payment crisis. that's all from us tonight. mark's here tomorrow. till then, goodnight.

it'll cost 500 billion us dollars, and is being built by dozens of western companies. but the uk foreign secretary, lord cameron, says he'll be looking into allegations the saudi government is using lethal force to clear ground to build the new city. it comes after bbc verify and a bbc eye investigation, found the authorities encouraged the use of violence, to evict villagers. here's merlyn thomas. promo video: this is neom. neom — saudi arabia's grand plan to transform the country and its image. a project almost the size of belgium, built by companies from all over the world, including more than a dozen from the uk. at its heart — the line. a city carved from the desert, envisaged to be 100 mile straight line, but only 1.5 miles will reportedly be built by 2030. neom's driving force is the country's leader, mohammed bin salman. so since we have empty place and we want to have a place for 10 million people,

then let's think from scratch. but it wasn't empty. near the line, thousands of people lived in these three villages. for years, they objected to being moved, but still the project went on. these satellite images show one of the villages where they lived. homes, schools, hospitals, have been wiped off the map. this former saudi intelligence officer has been living in fear since he went into exile in the uk last year. he told us he was ordered to clear one of the villages near neom in 2020 and that security forces were permitted to kill those who refused eviction. translation: the order said whoever continues l to resist should be killed, so it licensed the use of lethal force against whoever stayed in their home. he says he dodged the mission, which went ahead without him. this is the aftermath — walls littered with bullet holes. this man, abdul rahim al—huwaiti,

refused to leave his home. saudi forces shot him dead. the saudi government says he was an armed terrorist who opened fire on security forces, but the un and human rights groups say he was killed for refusing eviction. neom's grand plan also includes trojena, a ski resort built in the desert. andy wirth became ceo shortly after the shooting. he repeatedly asked about the killing of abdul rahim al—huwaiti. he resigned after less than a year. it was clearly unnecessary. it was clearly murder. you don't accelerate human progress at the detriment of other humans. you don't step on their throats with your boot heels so you can advance. that's not human progress. the saudi government and neom both declined to comment, but critics say the project has cost some saudis their freedom

and their lives. merlyn thomas, bbc news. around the world and across the uk. this is bbc news.

president putin has marked russia's annual victory day celebration, commemorating the defeat of nazi germany, with a warning that he won't tolerate threats from the west. in a speech in red square, he acknowledged his country was going through a difficult period, because of the war in ukraine. fewer soldiers took part in the parade than usual, and only one tank. from red square, here's steve rosenberg. 0n red square... ..they were celebrating victory. military band plays it was the annual parade to mark the defeat of nazi germany and to remember the 27 million soviet citizens killed in world war two.

among the troops here, soldiers who've been fighting in a very different war — russia's war in ukraine. each and from the kremlin leader, who'd ordered the invasion, a warning to ukraine's western backers — "don't push russia." translation: russia will do everything to avoid a global l confrontation, but at the same time, we will not allow anyone to threaten us. our strategic forces are always on combat alert. minutes later, out came the intercontinental ballistic missiles, capable of delivering multiple nuclear warheads. a less than subtle hint that russia has no intention of being defeated. victory day isn't just about the past. it's very much about russia now, because if this country today has

anything approaching a national idea, that idea is victory. russians are constantly being told that russia was, is and always will be unbeatable. mournful music plays and yet russia is paying a heavy price for its war in ukraine and it's becoming difficult to hide. in a town near moscow we saw the funeral of a soldier who'd taken part in the "special military operation." same day, different town. more soldiers killed in ukraine. russia's military hasn't made public the official death toll there, but already in 2022, the kremlin was admitting to significant losses. and so, in many russian towns, new war memorials are being put up. valeria's husband was killed fighting in ukraine.

the russian state calls him a hero, and she's willing to accept that. "he's a hero with a capital h," she says. as for the president, he's predicting victory for russia, even though his invasion of ukraine didn't go at all to plan. vladimir putin isn't only waging war against russia's neighbor. he's taking on the west. steve rosenberg, bbc news, moscow. ukrainian president volodymyr zelensky has fired the head of the department responsible for his personal protection. it comes after two of its officers were detained this week over an alleged assassination plot. the announcement did not state a reason for his dismissal or name a replacement. in the uk, more than 30 major criminals have beenjailed after a million pounds worth of cocaine was stolen from a violent organised crime group. the crime bosses wanted to murder the men they thought

were responsible — but police had cracked their encrypted phone app and could see what they were planning. thousands of messages reveal how the so called huyton firm was trafficking huge quantities of drugs around the uk from its merseyside base. bronagh munro reports three masked men arrive outside a drug stash house in liverpool. a fourth is pretending to deliver a parcel. four minutes later, they escape with the huyton firm's cocaine. hello. two men in the house have been attacked with a machete and an axe. what injuries have you got, mate? just sit yourself down. you all right there, mate? yeah. a trail of blood leads to a manhole cover where the cocaine was hidden. are you in dispute with anyone? have you upset anyone lately or has anybody got a bit of beef with you?

any information's better than nothing. no—one from the huyton firm talks. but this time the police have a secret weapon. the encryption system the criminals use, called encrochat, has been cracked. detectives can see the messages they're sending each other. the group they're talking about is the stolen cocaine. 30 kilos are gone. that's £1,000,000 worth. it's clear from the messages i've seen that this is a very effective criminal business, high, industrialscale trafficking of drugs, with tentacles across the uk and internationally and obviously willing to resort to severe violence. this will place them, for me, in the upper tiers of organised crime in the uk. crime boss vincent coggins thinks he's identified some of the cocaine robbers and he wants revenge.

his enforcer, paul woodford, asks how many he wants killed. coggins replies, "four dead men walking." they do business with violence. it is a world where a bullet in the head isjust literally another way of doing business, and that's the brutality of it. it's a world where there are no laws other than essentially what you could call the laws of the jungle. vincent coggins and paul woodford were arrested before they could carry out their threats. coggins has been jailed for 28 years for drug trafficking and blackmail. woodford got 2a years and six months. in total, more than 30 serious criminals linked to the cocaine heist have been convicted. they've been sentenced to over 350 years. bronagh munro, bbc news.

an 18—month—old girl, who was born deaf, has become the first person in the world to have their hearing restored as part of a new medical trial. 0pal sandy, from 0xfordshire, was given an infusion into her ear which replaced the dna which caused her inherited deafness. it was replaced shortly before her first birthday. six months on, her hearing has improved and she is starting to talk. 0pal�*s mother, jo, said the results of the treatment have been mind—blowing. i think we'd been given a really unique opportunity with no real evidence that any harm or adverse effects was likely to come to her and i think a lot of parents, regardless of the difficulties their children face, to be given an opportunity to potentially make obstacles easier for her to overcome was a risk definitely worth taking. that's all for now —

stay with bbc news. hello there. 0ur settled week of weather is set to continue. in fact, thursday, it was warmest day of the year so far. we reached a high of 24.6 celsius in stjames's park, london. when you round that up to 25, that is 77 fahrenheit. we could see similar values over the next couple of days with high pressure staying with us, but this weak weather front will continue to bring some showery outbreaks of rain and a cooler feel across the northern isles. it'll be a relatively mild start to our friday morning. double digits, some early morning mist and fog quickly melting away, a lot of sunshine coming through. we'll get a little bit of fair weather cloud developing into the afternoon,

but on the whole, a promising day. more sunshine as well for scotland in comparison to thursday. top temperatures here of 20 to 22 degrees. we could see 2a further south. into the start of the weekend, we continue with this warm, sunny theme. however, the risk of some sharp showers will start to increase. now, as we go through the early hours of saturday morning, we could see some fog coming in off the north sea, anywhere from the vale of york down into lincolnshire, over into the south—east. again, double figures to greet us first thing on saturday morning. so, could be a pretty murky start across eastern england, but we'll expect that sunshine to get to work quite strong at this time of year. a lot of sunshine coming through. risk of a few scattered showers anywhere north of manchester, up to the scottish borders, but top temperatures generally at around 23 or 2a celsius once again. now, as we move into sunday, we've got this weather front which will enhance the risk of some sharp, thundery downpours and some showers moving up from the near continent. now, if we get some sunshine across east anglia and south—east england, we could see temperatures as high as 26 degrees. a lot of uncertainty about the detail for sunday,

but at the moment, there's a greater chance of seeing some sharp thundery, downpours developing. and so out to the west, not quite as warm. then into monday, an atlantic influence is set to return, low pressure will start to push in from the west as the high drifts away, and that means that it will turn wetter and windier. and that is going to stay with us throughout the week, so it looks likely to see showers or longer spells of rain returning.

this is bbc news. we'll have the headlines at the top of the hour, as newsday continues straight after hardtalk. welcome to hardtalk. i'm stephen sackur. vladimir putin is again flexing his nuclear muscle in a warning to ukraine's backers in the west. russian troops have been ordered to run drills with tactical nukes. why now? well, the kremlin has clearly been irked by america's belated decision to commit $60 billion worth of assistance to kyiv and by president macron's refusal to rule out sending troops to ukraine. my guest is lithuania's foreign minister, gabrielius landsbergis, one of europe's most ardent

supporters of kyiv. he says he's truly worried about 202a. why? gabrielius landsbergis, welcome to hardtalk. thank you. pleasure being here. you were very candid, expressing your deep concern about 202a. why are you so worried? well, i think that there is not enough, i'd say, understanding as to what's at stake if ukraine is unable to push russia out of its country.

we see russia mobilising, continuously mobilising, even though