hello and welcome. we start this hour with news that the world health organization has declared the mpox outbreak in parts of africa a public health emergency, of international concern. the disease, formerly known as monkey pox, has spread rapidly since the beginning of the year. an initual outbreak in the democratic republic of congo has spread across parts of central and east africa. in the drc, there have been 15,600 cases since the start of the year — — and more than 500 deaths. health officials say the new strain of mpox may be the most deadly yet. it's transmitted through close contact including sexual contact — it causes flu—like symptoms and skin lesions. dr sarah pitt is a virologist at the university of brighton, i asked her how this mpox outbreak is different

from the one in 2022. and the difference with this one is that it's a slightly different strain of the pox virus. a slightly different strain of the mpox virus. it's the one which is normally found in central africa, which is a more deadly strain. you're more likely to develop serious disease and there are greater risk of people dying from them. although i stress — it is a low risk. most people still get mild disease and recover without any medical intervention. but this is nasty and has actually, um, changed the, this strain of the virus, even though it's the one, the version that's normally found in central africa, it's also slightly changed. so it is a little bit nastier than the one that we even normally see in central africa

and that's why it's a concern. and what causes a strain to become more fatal? well, i mean, it'sjust that viruses change, don't they? over time, we saw that quite a lot. we've got used to talking about that during the covid pandemic, that this virus is spreading around really quite rapidly in the cases where it normally circulates. so in this case, it's central africa and particularly the democratic republic of congo. and the more times the virus spreads from person to person, the more opportunities there are for it to change. and some of those changes will be an advantage to the virus, and they will carry on. the slightly changed version of the virus will then pass on to other people. and so the more cases there are, the more chances of that to happen. and that is what seems to have happened here. well, the head of the africa centers for disease control and prevention has warned that the disease could spiral out of control if immediate steps are not taken to control it. what sort of steps are we talking about? well, what we really need to do is increase the availability of the vaccine.

there are i think there are three different versions of the vaccine available in the world, but the global stocks of vaccine are very low. and what really needs to happen is that the vaccine manufacturers need to ramp up the production and the world, the global sort of, uh, community really needs to put in the resources in order to make it the vaccine available to the people who are really most at risk of getting mpox so that they can actually receive the vaccine, which will stop the spread in the countries where the most number of cases are. and that would also allow us to vaccinate people in where there have been outbreaks in countries where it's not usually seen. other parts of africa for example, so that people who have been in contact with somebody, then those people could be vaccinated, which will then

protect those people, but also stop the spread of the virus further. ukraine says its troops have pushed even further into russia and captured more than a hundred russian servicemen. it's the biggest foreign incursion into russia since the second world war. ukraine's offensive into the kursk region began just over a week ago. president zelensky insists it's a temporary move — aimed at easing pressure in the conflict with russia. as for president putin, it's still not clear what his response will be. in a moment we'll hear from our russia editor, steve rosenberg, about how dangerous a moment this is for president putin. but first our ukraine correspondent, james waterhouse, reports from the sumy region on the border with russia. no border checkpoint on this crossing to russia. just a burnt out russian tank. a different assignment for ukrainian war reporter natalia nahorna. "this is a historic moment," she tells the camera in the city of sudzha. such a claim might be premature, but ukraine is talking up this land grab while it can. it's providing humanitarian aid and organising evacuations. there are even plans to set up military offices. but on the battlefield, success always comes at a cost, as this

injured soldier attests. translation: fear, adrenaline. you realise when you enter theirterritory, how much we have suffered, how much our women and children have suffered, but now it's their turn. the head of ukraine's armed forces is having even more regular meetings with the president. translation: since i the beginning of today, troops have advanced around i to 2km in some directions. after the body blow of losing territory, russia is now moving resources to try and take it back. as fighter bombers drop glide bombs on ukrainian forces on its own soil, kyiv today claimed to have shot one of them down.

the su—sas are thought to be £30 million each. kyiv is trying to change the politics of this war by shaking up the fighting itself. it's certainly done the latter. james waterhouse, bbc news, sumy region. it feels like ukraine's incursion is changing the equation. and putting the kremlin under pressure. a brief appearance today by president putin but no comment on the ukrainian assault, which his troops are struggling to repel. the russian military released these images, claiming to show it targeting ukrainian troops in kursk region. moscow blames the west, too, for the incursion. when it started in the united states, the main rule was don't poke the bear. what the west is doing today, they are poking the bear. the public sense of shock is growing. "i feel incredible anxiety," yulia says. "as if my hands are tied because there is nothing

i can do about this." "it's frightening to see the images of people panicking , " tatiana says. "people being evacuated." for some here, what is happening in southern russia is a wake—up call. over the last two and a half years, many russians have tried not to notice what is happening, to get on with their lives, to pretend that there is no war, but with what is happening now in southern russia, not noticing is no longer an option. especially here in kursk. "it is the air raid sirens," she says. "get inside, fast!" ukrainian soldiers haven't reached this city but no one here knows what lies ahead. tens of thousands of russians have fled the fighting in the border area. some have taken refuge in kursk.

viera left home in such a rush, she had no time to pack. "i have nothing but the clothes on my back," she says. "i am looking for something warm." the kremlin insists it will achieve its aims in this war. russians are wondering when. steve rosenberg, bbc news, moscow. let's take a look at some other stories in the headlines. thousands of people are marching in india to call for an end to violence against women. the demonstrations follow the rape and murder of a female doctor at a hospital in kolkata. the case has caused outrage and lead to nationwide protests and strike action by medical workers demanding better security in hospitals. talks aimed at ending sudan's devastating civil conflict have begun in switzerland — but the army didn't show up for the negotiations. fighting between the army and the paramilitary rapid support forces has killed thousands of people, and driven around ten million from their homes.

german state prosecutors have reportedly isued an arrest warrant for a ukrainian man suspected of blowing up the nord stream gas pipelines in the baltic sea nearly two years ago. there is no public evidence, so far, linking it to the ukrainian or russian state or for that matter any other country or individual group. a woman from cheshire in the uk has been jailed for 15 months after suggesting on social media that a mosque "should be blown up with the adults inside". 53—year—old julie sweeney made the comments on facebook after the violence that followed the southport stabbings. a fresh round of talks on a gaza ceasefire deal are due to begin in qatar later on thursday with israel confirming that it will send negotiators. but hamas — the group which runs gaza — has said it won't attend the talks. there are fears that tensions across the middle east could escalate — as iran vows to avenge the assassination of

the hamas leader in tehran. 0ur correspondent, lucy williams, reports from jerusalem. in gaza, peace is for the dead, not the living — not for faras and his five siblings, laying theirfather to rest today in khan younis. majid baraka was killed in israeli artillery strikes, they said, as he went to help the wounded. "we were just sitting around," faras said, "he was playing with us. "when the first strike happened, he went to rescue people. in the second strike, he was killed." but this push for a ceasefire is being driven by events outside gaza, by israel's growing conflict with hezbollah in lebanon, by threats of iranian retaliation for the assassination of key hamas and hezbollah leaders. a ceasefire in gaza could prevent regional war. the deal would also help enable a diplomatic resolution here in lebanon, and that would prevent an outbreak

of a wider war. we have to take advantage of this window for diplomatic action and diplomatic solutions. that time is now. since the last ceasefire negotiations, the stakes involved in a deal have grown, but so have the sticking points. benjamin netanyahu says the wrong deal would harm israel's security. his critics say it would also harm his governing coalition and that mr netanyahu is protecting himself. the prime minister wants israeli troops to keep control of gaza's southern border and to filter unarmed civilians moving back to the north. hamas says these are new demands and that the time for negotiation is over. there are also disputes over israeli hostages and palestinian prisoners and over conditions for resuming the war. a former israeli negotiator says outsiders are driving this deal.

it seems that the mediators, the united states, egypt and qatar, have decided that they need to change the rules of the game, put an ultimatum on the table, put a bridging proposal on the table and tell hamas and israel that they have to do it. it is obvious that the mediators want the agreement more than the parties do, and that is a big part of the problem. these talks have been billed as the last chance for a deal. the price of failure will be paid by the hostages, by the region, by teenagers like faras. success may depend on the leaders of israel and hamas risking their own political survival. lucy williamson, bbc news, jerusalem. donald trump has been out on the campaign trail in the last couple of hours. the former president has been speaking in the swing state of north carolina. after a few weeks in which his rival kamala harris has stolen the limelight, mr trump stayed focused on his key messages —

well most of the time anyway. and he had this to say on the economy. are you better off now with harris and biden than you were with a person named, president donaldj trump, do you know him he's a nice gentleman. with four more years of harris your finances will never recover. they will never recover. our country will never recover, frankly, more importantly. it will be unrecoverable. vote trump and your incomes will soar, your savings will grow, young people will be able to afford a home and we will bring back the american dream, bigger, better and stronger than ever before. the bbc�*s catriona perry was at that rally in north carolina. he spoke at the beginning of these remarks about how he was going to make intellectual comments about the economy, that this wasn't a rally where he would talk about every issue, but he would focus on the economy. but inevitably, he spoke for about an hour and 15, 20 minutes.

he touched on almost every issue during that time. he didn't unveil any new economic policies. he spoke again about his plans to cut taxes, to get rid of tax on social security for seniors, and to get rid of tax on tips. and he also said in some of the firmest language that we've heard to date, that he would keep the 0bama era affordable care act. he said it wasn't great and he'd like to fix it. but until he had something better, he would keep hold of that. but there weren't any new policies unveiled, and as i say, he touched on many other issues besides. yes, and i'm sure kamala harris got quite a mention as well. we heard him in that sound bite just then, talking about what an economy under her leadership would mean. how else did he address her? he addressed her quite frequently, and it was interesting to see an effort at a reset in his speeches, because there have been criticisms of him in the past couple of weeks that he didn't, you know, his campaign was listing a little bit. it lacked focus because of course, for so long he thought

he was running againstjoe biden. and just a matter of weeks ago, there was this switch out on the democratic ticket. so we heard a lot about how he was directing his ire towards kamala harris rather thanjoe biden. he spoke about harris policies, kamala policies or harris—biden policies. we heard a new term from him, kamalanomics instead of bidenomics, which we usually hear from him, and he really sought to put everything that he sees wrong with the biden administration squarely at her feet. and just quickly, what happens next on the campaign trail? well, kamala harris herself is coming here to north carolina on friday. this, of course, one of the battleground states. and we had that new polling today from the cook political report, which shows that that slide of voters and support away from donald trump is going towards kamala harris. and she is now ahead by one percentage point in that one poll here in north carolina. so the race as tight as ever, steve. around the world and across the uk.

this is bbc news.

in the us, a police officer has appeared in court charged with the murder of a pregnant woman in ohio. bodycam video of last year's fatal encounter showed police approaching 21—year—old ta'kiya young in her car and attempting to stop her from driving away, so they could question her about alleged shoplifting. 0ur north america correspondent john sudworth has more. out of the car. for what? out of the car. for what? they said you stole stuff, do not leave. while one officer speaks to ta'kiya young through her car window, the other stands in front with his gun drawn and she begins to drive slowly forward. get out of the bleep car. gunshot get out of the car! shots fired! stop the goddamn car! the car, now out of control, drifts on, the bullet has pierced the windscreen and the driver's chest,

leaving her and her unborn child dying inside. almost one year on, amid heightened scrutiny of police violence against black people in america, the officer who fired the fatal shot, connor grubb, has appeared in court to be formally charged with murder. he pleaded not guilty. footage from inside a nearby store taken shortly before the shooting shows ta'kiya young, allegedly shoplifting bottles of alcohol. a minor crime that's prompted public anger over what protesters and her family see as a vastly disproportionate police response. do you want connor grubb to go to prison for the rest of his life? yes, she doesn't have any life and her baby doesn't have any life. so, yeah, that would be justice for me and our family and her boy. but at the scene of the shooting, connor grubb could be heard on his body camera. she tried to run me over. saying he thought his life was in danger. and his police union has called

the case against him politically motivated. he has been granted bail while ta'kiya young leaves two surviving sons. more lives changed forever in a litany of such cases. and while charges against the police are rare, convictions are even rarer. john sudworth, bbc news. thailand has been plunged into deeper political and economic uncertainty, with the country's constitutional court dismissing the prime minister, srettha thavisin. the court in bangkok ruled that he'd violated the constitution by appointing a minister who'd served time injail for contempt of court. he's been in office less than a year. amazon has been chosen for a uk trial to deliver parcels using drones. parcels from the prime air service can be delivered within an hour of being ordered. the service is already running in parts of the us

as emily brown reports. well, it's been a decade since amazon founderjeff bezos announced drone deliveries. we did know that it would be a possibility when amazon said last year that it would start using drones in the uk, but we just didn't know when that would be. amazon is one of six organisations selected by the civil aviation authority to trial beyond visual line of sight drone flights. that means operators won't maintain physical sight of the drones. the prime air service is expected to launch in the uk by the end of the year. small packages will be delivered in less than an hour of an order being placed. amazon has already been offering drone deliveries in the us, in california and in texas, and this isn't the first time drone delivery services have been used in the uk. the uk's first service was launched by royal mail and skyports. drone service in 0rkney, which initially ran for three months with the civil aviation authority spokesperson, said these innovative trials mark a significant step forward

in integrating drone safely into uk airspace. new analysis shows that the huge six tonne altar stone at the heart of stonehenge came from the far north east of scotland rather than wales as previously thought. the discovery suggests that neolithic britain was far more connected than was thought. here's our science correspondent, pallab ghosh. it's one of the most famous prehistoric monuments in the world, and also one of the most mysterious. why was stonehenge built in south—west england 5,000 years ago, and what was it used for? what we do know is that the giant outer stones are probably sourced locally from england. the inner blue stones are from wales, and we now know that the central altar stone is from north—eastern scotland and not from wales, as once thought. the irony is that the discovery was made by a young welshman. he still remembers being brought to the site as a one—year—old in 1992.

i remember coming with my dad and being on his shoulders and looking over at the stones, so it's nice to kind of come full circle and make this discovery at somewhere so special to me. how do you think it'll go down in wales? i'm not sure they'll ever talk to me again! it's a loss for wales, no doubt. but wales has contributed so many rocks to this monument, i'm sure scotland can have one. anthony analysed the rock and discovered it had a unique date and composition. in thejournal nature, he said it could only have come from the far north of scotland, here in the 0rcadian basin, which includes caithness, 0rkney and moray firth. so this is the altar stone, the heart of stonehenge, now partially buried. it's one of the larger stones here, at around six tonnes. the big question is how on earth it was transported from north—east scotland, and why the people back then thought it was so important to bring it all this way. what does this say about neolithic society in britain? well, it certainly implies

great social connections and sophistication. and i think we've got to remember that these people were just like us, in a wax _ you know, they were just as clever, but they had different technologies. but to bring a stone of this size all the distance from what we now call scotland was really quite something. the new discovery has changed the story of stonehenge and those that built it. the tale is now of a people across great britain who were more interconnected and advanced than previously thought. pallab ghosh, bbc news, stonehenge. nasa says two american astronauts — stranded on the international space station — may have to stay there for at least eight months. sunita williams and barry wilmore have already spent two months in space after a planned eight day mission ran into technical problems. here's reeta chakrabarti. they were meant to be back on earth for the olympics, but had to get into the spirit on the international space

station without knowing when they will be back. we've had an absolute blast pretending to be olympic athletes. three, two, one. they launched in june on a test to see how the spacecraft performs. it was meant to last eight days, but issues with the thrusters on their boeing starliner mean they are now stuck. the question is, can they return safely on that same spacecraft, or come back on a rocket owned by rival company spacex, planned for february? that is not without risk. their spacesuits are not fit for spacex flights and they would have to return unsuited. let's go forward into starliner. a decision is expected at the end of the month and in the meantime, nasa says both astronauts are doing great and,

as veterans of space are well prepared for unexpected scenarios. that's all for now — stay with bbc news. hello there! wednesday was a cloudier and fresher feel for most of us, but east anglia still clung on to some sunshine and some heat. 26 celsius was the high on wednesday afternoon in parts of suffolk. but the story will continue to change for thursday. under this influence of low pressure, some wet and windy weather will move its way into scotland and northern ireland. that will gradually sink its way south and east. as it bumps into high pressure, the rain will weaken somewhat. so first thing on thursday morning, we'll have a slightly brighter story northwest of the great glen.

the rain turning showery from aberdeen down to glasgow and into northern ireland. heavier bursts of rain through the scottish borders into northwest england, and there will be a fair amount of cloud through northern england, the midlands, wales and southwest england. so if we draw a line from hull down to southampton, anywhere south and east of that should start the morning off dry with some sunshine. but the cloud will tend to build up as we go through the day. 0ur weather front continues to sink its way south and east, weakening all the time, but a band of showery rain will push its way across wales and into the midlands. but we mightjust cling on to some sunshine. 26 celsius in east anglia, once again, fresher for most. now, that weather front will continue to push its way through the south and east during the overnight period

thursday into the early hours of friday morning. it's the dividing line between fresher conditions to the far northwest. here we'll start friday morning in single figures, but still a relatively warm night for sleeping 17—18 celsius in the southeast corner. early morning cloud and rain will ease away. high pressure then builds once again. a few scattered showers into the far north and west, but on friday, a good deal of dry, settled and sunny weather for most of us. we've lost that humidity. that fresher feel will still continue 14—21 degrees for most in the north, 20—25 across much of england and wales. now into the weekend, high pressure will continue to build in from the west and continue to quieten things down. so not a bad weekend in prospect for pretty much most of us, really. a few scattered showers from time to time in the northwest, but on the whole, dry, settled and sunny with highs once again peaking at 25 celsius, 77 fahrenheit. enjoy.

japan's prime minister fumio kishida will step down next month, amid corruption scandals and economic strain in the country. plus — we take stock of how the chinese consumer is doing, ahead of retail sales data due today. hello and welcome to business today. i'm steve lai. let's start injapan — the country is releasing second quarter growth figures in the next hour. on wednesday, prime minister, fumio kishida, made a surprising announcement to step down next month. he had a good record in foreign policy — but it was the party's corruption scandal,

and the economy that affected his popularity. economic columnist william pesek explains how the ldp will navigate the upcoming leadership change. we've seen the interesting period in the last 12 years when the liberal democratic party has been in power and promising big reforms. the prime minister took power in 2012, pledging to become japan's version of margaret thatcher and ronald reagan for the was a very little structural change the yen falling 30%, we did not see enough forform in falling 30%, we did not see enough for form in terms of shaking up markets in terms of increasing elevation and empowering women. the next leaders to going to have to figure out how to reinvigorate the process for them at a moment when china is slowing, the us labour market is showing signs of strain and it's not really clear what it will establish here injapan as an appetite for big risk, if you will. ., ., ., ., will. two women have thrown their hats _

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