gildart, this year. cronulla ended their wait for the title last season and they fought on, attempting a comeback. the gap was too wide, even more so when burgess got a hat—trick. what an afternoon for him. four time world club champions. in rugby union, the premiership leaders wasps lost for only the third time this season. on a day of hat—tricks, denny solomona crossed over three times in the first half for sale they remain 10th in the table despite the 34—28 win. wasps are 6 points clear at the top. in today's other match newcastle beat northampton to jump above them into seventh spot. scrum—half sonatane takulua scored three tries in the 46—31 win at kingston park. dan vickerman has died. he played

for northampton saints in 2009 and represented australia in 63 tests. he passed away at his family home in sydney. northampton said, our thoughts are with the family and friends, rest in peace. the welsh open snooker final is under way and we can go live to cardiff and blood of the pictures. bingham started strongly earlier. he raced to a 4—0 lead. by the close of the afternoon session, trump fought back to 5—3. they are now in the evening session. it is a set a piece so evening session. it is a set a piece so far. 6—4 to bingham. it is the first 294 victory. bingham is looking for his first ranking title since winning a world championship two years ago. way off. can he do it? we will see.

hopes of a first medal for a british man at an alpine world championships ended in disappointment for dave ryding in the slalom in st moritz. the 30—year—old was well placed in fourth after his opening run, but he was more than two seconds slower on his second. his 11th placed finish was still the best performance by a male british skier for 32 years. that is all from sportsday. you can follow that snooker on bbc two in wales and on the red button. more sport through the evening, but next it is meet the author. christopher de bellaigue wants to challenge our understanding or our misunderstanding of islam. who is to say that that is not one of the most important questions of our time? the islamic enlightenment,

the modern struggle of faith and reason is his book. he presents the other side of the story of faith. he charts the progress of intellectual and scientific ideas and presents a picture of the real struggle that is going on. welcome. your account of enlightenment in the islamic world through the 19th century and into the 20th, will be to many people unknown. why? the reason why it is unknown is partly because people will think islamic enlightenment,

is that a contradiction in terms? the idea of a movement towards enlightenment values in the islamic world has not been included in the west because of natural ignorance in the west. but partly because of a more cynical reason. we have been so involved in the islamic world that we have needed a kind ofjustification for being there. one of those is that the islamic world has not got its act together and we need to be there. let's go back to the beginning of your story. you take this to a period just after the napoleonic war. you argue that there was an interaction between what we might call the west, just for sake of shorthand, and the islamic world that was profound and its effect. what was the effect that happened intellectually, scientifically and so on? is started with the militarily. everybody wanted a strong military and technology and ideas entered through instructors that were sent

out from western countries in order to instruct new armies of the middle east. it very quickly spread because you cannot quarantine ideas of that kind. spread into society, it spread into the nature of the relationship between the ruler and the ruled, democratic ideas began to bubble up. science began to evolve, theatres of anatomy were opened, the novel entered the consciousness of the middle east. all sorts of ideas, along with technologies, were telescoped into a matter of a few decades and suddenly by the end of the 19th century, the middle east looked radically different from how it had looked at the beginning. many people looking at this would say that is all very good and well, but we look to the middle east now and what we see in some places is autocracy that looks suspiciously medieval, they will argue about the activities of the islamic state as being barbaric and they will say if all this is true in the 19th century, what went wrong?

what happened is that the high watermark of liberalism and what i would consider enlightenment values in the middle east really was about the beginning of the first world war. there had been revolutions in turkey, and iran to introduce limits to the monarch's rule and his prerogatives. a move towards democracy and representative government and a lot of other things that we would link with that. the autonomy of the individual. after the world war, the region was obliterated. the whole map changed. that's right. the french and the british could not stop themselves from coming in and carving it up. in other parts of the world, the movement towards independence and self—determination was extremely strong. in the middle east, the

movement was in the other direction. there was bound to be a reaction. the reaction took two forms. the first was what we would call islamist and the other was a kind of emulation of the west, but in its almost fascist form. this is the struggle that is still going on today. it is the essence of your argument. it can be boiled down to the struggle between a man in a uniform supported by the west who is keeping the country in some ways secular, in some ways preserving the outward appearances of western modernity against various forms of islamist government, islamists movements from the authoritarian to the much more anarchic and we see this conflict playing out right now. you know the countries that you talk about very well. you lived in iran for quite a long period in your own life.

what you are describing as your account has it is really a tragedy of civilisation. when a coloniser comes in, it doesn't matter how good the idea he brings in is, the fact that he is a coloniser and he is holding a knife at your neck means that you are naturally going to be resistant. from your perspective, how do you think people should go about trying to heal that divide? people in the middle age now have experienced many interactions with the east and the west. the first was the invasion of iraq and afghanistan which essentially tried to export an ideology, an idea of liberal democracy and in some ways was optimistic because it argued that you can share ideas and that ideas don't belong with you or me, they are the common heritage of humanity. from that stage, that was a disaster, we are now at a position

where there is a clash. they are making the most amount of noise and wielding power. what about leadership in the islamic world? why, if you are right, had there not been figures who have emerged in very powerful positions who have said, look, we can find a way through this. we can cross this divide. i have seen many leaders rise in the islamic world and come down. turkey, an example of someone who at one stage had that potential. the potential to act as a bridge between one culture and civilisation and another. for various reasons, the relationship with the west has soured. he has been in powerfor too long and has become authoritarian. that hopeful mission he appeared to be on has fallen to dust. you are saying that what we are in,

in the early 19th century has been reversed and that now in the 21st—century with all the technical and intellectual advances that we have, we are set on a backward path. do you think there is any alternative to that as you look into the next two or three decades? the first thing is that i would concur that a lot has been reversed. it is one of the extraordinary facts that i have been confronted with,that at the turn of the 20th century, it was easier to express irreligious and sceptical views in cairo for example then it is today. that is an extraordinary thing if you think about a view of history that involves steps and progression. the alternative? it is simply for people like me and other people who think like me on all sides to continue to make our voices heard. at the moment, we are going into a position where we are becoming a minority. those who call for accommodation, those who call for dialogue,

those who insist that people can meet. we are falling into a minority and we need to make sure that our voices will be heard. there will be a return to that way of thinking and we need to be there to catch it. christopher de bellaigue, author of the islamic enlightenment thank you very much. hasn't felt much like winter this weekend, with temperatures of 40 degrees and a little sunshine, it was pleasant for some, but not for all. in contrast, we had a lot of cloud for many parts of the country because we are bathed in atlantic air. that is coming straight into the cornwall coast, giving us a lot of mist and murk. you can see the slow creeping in the cloud, the brightness disappearing in eastern areas. it remained bright at least if it were not sunny. 0vernight, the weather front will usher in a bit of patchy rain and drizzle.

all of the low cloud, lowering onto the hills and the coast. we will have heavy rain for a time for parts of scotland in the northern isles in particular, as it meanders its way south, as it tends to peter out. it gives us a lot of cloud, a fairly brisk wind and more rain coming into the north—west later. it will be a mild night. these temperatures are higher than our daytime averages at this time of year. so, as we move into monday morning, it is going to be quite great. it is going to be quite grey. 0pening opening the curtains, some hill fog, coastal fog, through the opening the curtains, some hill fog, coastalfog, through the bristol channel, english channel, cardigan bay. not much brightness on the first thing. as well as the low cloud, a fairly brisk wind blowing across parts of northern england and north—east scotland. there could be gusts of 40 or 50 mph. parts of northern ireland and scotland, heavy rain. as the day wears on, the gusty

wind will tend to use. notable for the a-i, wind will tend to use. notable for the a—i, the rain easing southwards. brighter weather returns to the far north of scotland. it will be slightly fresher air here. for most of us it is still atlantic air. ten oi’ of us it is still atlantic air. ten or ii of us it is still atlantic air. ten or 11 even where we have the rain. the potential is there for 16 in some sunshine. that is because we have really very mild atlantic air across the uk. tropical maritime air across the uk. tropical maritime air across us. across the uk. tropical maritime air across us. cold air is not far away. we will see that across scotland, a bit of frost first thing. more rain later in the day. still, a week whether from further south keeping things greyer than monday. if there is brightness we will see temperatures leaping up again. later in the week we will lose the milder and inherit blustery wind. this is bbc news. i'm martine croxall. the headlines at eight. iraqi forces seize several villages on the first day of their renewed offensive to re—take mosul from so—

called islamic state. it's iraq's last city held by the islamic state, but the assault on that last redoubt of the islamic state is now underway. the american company, kraft heinz, withdraws its proposed takeover of anglo—dutch rival unilever. thousands of prison officers in london and the south east of england are to get a pay increase of up to five thousand pounds. also coming up — donald trump renews his attack on the media. but the president prompts a storm of confusion — after apparently referring to a security incident in sweden that hadn't happened.