hello and welcome to bbc news, broadcasting to viewers in north america and around the globe. my name is gavin our top stories: venezuela swears in a controversial new assembly, despite widespread opposition at home and abroad. cracking down: the us attorney general charges four people over leaks of classified government information. we will investigate, and seek to bring criminals to justice. we will not allow criminals with security clearances to sell out our country. a british computer expert appears in a us court on charges of creating software to steal bank details. heatwave health warnings: parts of europe experience the most extreme temperatures in more than a decade. and the world's most expensive footballer signs for paris saint—germain — but a hitch. the paperwork isn't ready

which means neymar can't make his debut on saturday. hello and welcome to the programme. a controversial new assembly that has the power to rewrite venezuela's constitution has held its first session, despite fierce criticism from many quarters. a close ally of president nicolas maduro was sworn in as head of the new body — a move denounced by the opposition. katy watson reports from caracas. outside the parliament building, you'd never guess this was a country in crisis. hugo chavez's face and influence is neverfar away, but today it was about his successor. president maduro, who has remained defiant despite the criticism heaped upon him about what many have called a fraudulent election. "criticism has always been here",

this woman told me. "that the people have been on the street 18 years, first supporting hugo chavez and now president maduro, who was legitimately elected by us." this new assembly will have the powers to rewrite the constitution. there's little detail as to what that means in practice. but the new president gave a hint of what was to come. "we've not come to destroy the constitution," she said, adding they wanted to remove obstacles from the government's path. the assembly has been justified as the only way to bring peace to the country after months of often violent protest, but earlier on friday the pope warned it would only encourage a climate of tension, not reconciliation. on the other side of town, it was another world. no government supporters here. instead, several opposition rallies bringing people together to protest

what they say is an undemocratic government. i don't want to live in a dictatorship and we are in a dictatorship. my work is travelling all over the country and i can see how this country has been destroyed by this government. protesters called for a new venezuela, for unity. while there's a feeling of deflated opposition, they say they aren't giving up. translation: defeated? that isn't in my vocabulary. i was a political prisoner for a year without having committed a crime. i've seen with my own eyes how people are killed in venezuela. human beings who all they dreamed of was a different country. the feeling here today is different

to what we saw last week with roadblocks, confrontations between police and protesters, but what people here are saying today is they will continue to protest peacefully and what is needed most is patience. katy watson, bbc news, in caracas. a little later in the programme, we will be talking to an assistant professor of utah state university, who has done work on hugo chavez, but also on different powers regime is in latin america. —— different power regimes. you can find more information on all of this on our website. just had to bbc .com. —— just head to bbc.com/news. the united states has officially confirmed that it will pull out of the paris climate agreement by informing the united nations.

but the state department said the us would continue to participate in climate change meetings until the withdrawal process was completed. us vice president mike pence made the announcement. this president's been putting america first, like when he announced the united states of america officially today notified the united nations that we are withdrawing from the paris climate accord. applause mike pence, there. let's take a look at some of the other stories making the news: the un security council will vote on a new draft resolution on saturday proposing tougher sanctions on north korea. it follows pyongyang's two intercontinental ballistic missile tests in july. the resolution, drafted by the united states, aims to impact the country's exports. of the security council, including russia and china. the electoral commission in rwanda has announced that president paul kagame has won a third term in office with a landslide. the commission said partial results of friday's election gave mr kagame

98% of the votes. supporters say he's brought stability after the horrors of the 1994 genocide, but his critics say he has ruled through fear. rescuers and one of russia's largest diamond mines have been searching for nine miners, still unaccounted for after water link into an underground shaft. —— leaked. to miners were injured in the accident. power failure has been miners were injured in the accident. powerfailure has been blamed. an earthquake with a magnitude of 5.8 has struck the philippines. the epicentre was 3a kilometers east of the city of general santos, —— the epicentre was 3a kilometers east of the city of general santos, on south midano island, which has a population of almost 600 thousand people. there are conflicting reports over the depth of the quake. the us attorney general, jeff sessions, has announced a major drive against what he called

an "explosive" increase in leaks of classified government information under president trump. four people have already been charged and mr sessions said he would not hesitate to order more prosecutions. here's our north america donald j trump! donald trump is never happier than when he's out of washington. this is where he belongs. an adoring crowd in west virginia, the problems of russia, collusion, special counsels and grand juries a long way from these country roads. have you seen any russians in west virginia or ohio or pennsylvania? are there any russians here tonight? any russians? the russia story is a totalfabrication. it's just an excuse for the greatest loss in the history of american politics, that's all it is.

he didn't mention the special counsel by name but had him in this sights when he said this. i just hope the final determination is a truly honest one. a grand jury is made up of members of the public meeting behind closed doors to consider the evidence that has been gathered. they can force people to testify or to hand over evidence. they'll decide whether the material is strong enough to proceed to a criminal trial. but crucially, they don't decide if a potential defendant is innocent or guilty. that's done by a conventionaljury. of course, it may be that the grand jury meeting at this courthouse will come to the conclusion that the evidence doesn't add up to much and there's no need forfurther action.

but the fact that a grand jury has been called is a sign that this investigation is intensifying and will last a good deal longer yet. and the other worry for the trump entourage is that the scope of the inquiry will spread as well. that's a source of fury. another is the endless damaging and revealing leaks from within the administration. and today the attorney general announced a new crackdown. this nation must end this culture of lea ks. we will investigate and seek to bring criminals tojustice. we will not allow rogue anonymous sources with security clearances to sell out our country. he's been under tremendous pressure. the president last week humiliated his attorney general, calling him very weak. this was much more muscular, with an attack on the media too. we respect the important role that the press plays and we'll give them respect,

but it is not unlimited. they cannot place lives at risk with impunity. the president today visited fema, the federal emergency centre, to look at plans for dealing with hurricanes. it's hurricane season. and then he was off on his holidays, two weeks at one of his golf resorts in newjersey and hoping that does not barrel down on him. jon sopel, bbc news, washington. a british computer expert has appeared before a judge in las vegas, charged with creating software to steal bank details. prosecutors said 23—year—old marcus hutchins had admitted writing and selling the malware code, but his lawyer said his client denied all the charges against him. our correspondent james cook was in court in las vegas. this was supposed to be a relatively brief procedural hearing, but it went on for a reasonable amount of time as both sides, the government side and the defence lawyer, they debated and discussed with thejudge whether or not marcus hutchins should be released on bail, albeit on some pretty stringent conditions. the government lawyer said

he could propose a risk to the public and a flight risk. that was dismissed by thejudge, she did not seem particularly impressed with the idea that he posed a risk to the public. she agreed that he could be released on bail, pending a number of conditions, among them that he surrender his british passport and subject himself to gps monitoring. there was also a bail of 30,000 us dollars bond to have him released. unfortunately for him, there was a big scramble at the end of the day on friday, and he did not manage to get the money posted in time. so he will have to spend the weekend in custody, injail, and the earliest he can be released, now, is monday. he was regarded and perhaps still is regarded by some people as something of a hero.

he likes to surf, they called him the surfer who saved the world, because he had cracked, perhaps inadvertently, suddenly set out to stop or investigate this bug that was causing problems in the british national health service, and that also spread to about 150 other countries in the world. and he managed, basically, to stop the spread of the virus for people to putting countermeasures. the damage was not nearly as serious as it could have been. it is possible he actually saved lives. so for many people, he is something of a folk hero, particularly in the cybersecurity industry. he was attending a cyber security conference in las vegas and a lot of his colleagues there said they are not realistic chargers, they are not convinced that the fbi understands the nature of what he was doing. they think that this will jeopardise co—operation between hackers and the government, and they say that is necessary to secure the internet. as for the state's position, the united states, their position

is that he has broken the law and that he should be tried in wisconsin for doing so. james cooks therefrom las vegas, a little earlier. —— cook, there, from. stay with us on bbc world news, still to come: we meet the baker with a lot at stake — can he pull it off and win the marathon at this year's world athletics championships? the question was whether we wanted to save our people, and the japanese as well, and win the war, or whether we wanted to take a chance on being able to win the war by killing all our young men. invasion began at 2am this morning. mr bush, like most other people, was clearly caught by surprise. and we call for the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of all the iraqi forces. 100 years old, and still full of vigor, vitality and enjoyment of life. no other king or queen in british history has lived so long, and the queen mother is said to be quietly very pleased indeed that she has achieved this

landmark anniversary. this is a pivotal moment for the church as an international movement. the question now is whether the american vote will lead to a split in the anglican community. this is bbc news. the latest headlines: venezuela has sworn in a new constituent assembly, despite widespread opposition at home and abroad. and america's attorney general has begun a crackdown on leaks of classified information from the white house. four people have been arrested so far. more now on events in venezuela. for more on this laura gamboa, assistant professor at utah state university's political

science departmentjoins us now. i know you've do a lot of work on hugo chavez in venezuela and latin american regime change. from what you are seeing and hearing, what you make of this new assembly? thank you for having me. i think this assembly is what we call authoritarian constitution making. these are effo rts constitution making. these are efforts that authoritarian regimes make in order to increase their powers and control the opposition. pretty much the way this works is you create... your call for a national constitution assembly. he systematically exclude people from the assembly and then you just create rules that we legitimise the operation. nicolas maduro the president says he wants peace, stability and that's why he is doing it. is that something that other

world leaders used as reasoning before, for similar moves such as this? yes. the military drinkers in brazil, and other examples in the soviet union as well. —— juntas.. pa rt soviet union as well. —— juntas.. part from the assembly being very early days, we don't know what they will be doing, what do you expect of those who will constitute that assembly and what do you expect to happen next one begins work properly? i would expect for sure that they are going to close the current congress, the national assembly. i don't expect them to respect the current congressmen, they will just close respect the current congressmen, they willjust close it up and perhaps call for elections again. i expect them to purge certain state institutions, like the public ministry, the general attorneys

office, because the general attorney has turned against the regime and the constituent assembly will certainly use this as a mechanism to purge this offers. we must leave it there. thank you. health warnings have been issued across europe as the dangerous heatwave continues. in parts of italy, spain and the balkans, temperatures have soared into the high forties. some regions are still contending with drought and forest fires. sarah corker reports. large swathes of southern europe are sweltering in this heat wave, known as lucifer. the beaches may be packed, but this extreme heat has triggered health warnings in at least ten countries. in albania, massive forest fires have raged for weeks. the government has now asked

for help from the eu. and this is northern spain. flames are turning the skies red and shutting highways. on the french island of corsica, planes continue to douse the flames below. translation: we have more than seven kilometres of forest ages, many spots remain inaccessible which are likely to start again. but it's italy and the balkans that have been most severely affected. one man died in romania and 80 people are in hospital due to the extreme weather. plumes of heat are pushing temperatures above a0 celsius, stretching from albania and moving west as far as portugal. this is the most extreme and widespread heatwave for 1h years. and it's notjust people suffering. at budapest zoo, they've found some innovative ways

of keeping the animals cool. even at altitudes of 3,000 metres, glaciers in the austrian alps are melting. and holidaymakers have been sharing their heatwave experiences. another wrote: in madrid: and, as temperatures hit 44 degrees, the safety advice is, wear a hat, drink plenty of water and find some shade. it's not expected to cool off until next week. let's round up some of the other stories. latest figures show the us economy has been strong and seen strong jobs growth in july, economy has been strong and seen strong jobs growth injuly, mainly in the hospitality sector. 209th out onjobs were in the hospitality sector. 209th out on jobs were created, more than expected. president trump welcomed

the news. a former executive of volkswagen has appeared ina a former executive of volkswagen has appeared in a detroit court to pleaded guilty to conspiring to mislead us regulators about diesel emissions. oliver schmidt faces up to seven years in jail. he emissions. oliver schmidt faces up to seven years injail. he is emissions. oliver schmidt faces up to seven years in jail. he is the second former vw employee to admit his role in the scam. and airlines are warning passengers of delays at eu border controls. tighter security has been introduced within the passport free schengen zone following terror attacks in belgium and france. travellers are being urged to arrive at airports at least three hours before their flight. neymar has begun the most —— has become the most expensive footballer in the history of the game. he has completed his record $263 million tra nsfer completed his record $263 million transfer deal with paris saint—germain. he told the bbc his move from barcelona was for a new and did a challenge and not for the money. neymar, finally in paris with a ball and the world at his feet. at £200 million, his

transfer from barcelona is a world record deal. and when his wages are included, the final bill will be close to £500 million. the brazilian star told me, though, he's followed his heart, not his wallet. lots of people are saying that perhaps you are doing this for the money, that that is your motivation. what do you say to that? translation: i didn't come over here for the money. i came here for the motivation of the challenge and the challenges. on the champs—elysees this morning, fans were happy to part with their cash. hundreds queued for hours to buy the new neymar shirt. the club is backed by the country of qatar's vast wealth. but its president thinks he has bagged a bargain. i would love to see, you know, in one year, and then, unannounced

visitors much or not. today, until now, just in five hours, we sold already merchandise, like half a million euros, and this is just for a couple of hours. nice little bit of skill from neymar! neymar has been a star for both club and country from a young age but critics of this megadeal point to the vast sums involved and there are questions, too, over whether he is merely a pawn in qatar's efforts to spread its influence across the globe. the man at the centre of it all, though, insists he's simply here to win. what will be success to you at this club? a champions league? a ballon d'or, the fifa best award? how would you say, "i have made it here, i have delivered"? translation: i want everything. the titles. that's. . .i came over here to make history. psg want neymar to spark a new sporting revolution for them. and, leaving the stadium, he was greeted by fans

as their new king. mo farah has won a gold medal in the 10,000 metres at the start of the world athletics championships in london. the 34—year—old completed the race in 26 minutes, 119.51 seconds. he'll defend his 5,000 metres title next week, before making the switch to road racing. mo farah and usain bolt aren't the only ones bowing out this week. 39—year—old anurada cooray is competing in his third world games, but holding down a full time job in a bakery shop and being a single parent is proving too much. brennan nicholls has been to meet him. it is not where you are likely to find the likes of usain bolt or mo farah after training. but sri lankan marathon runner anurda cooray has no choice. he has to do a0 hours

a week running around greg's the bakers. i wish if i canjust training and marathon training, but life is like that. i have to work hard to look after my family. the 39—year—old is also a single parent to six—year—old twins. as a three—time olympian, he qualified for these world championships in london, thanks to his results at the rio games last year. like bolt and farah, he seems set to call time on his career. i have done everything i want, three olympics, and this is my third championship, the same, i did the asian games three times and the south asian games, i have won gold medals, things like that. and i want my very end, i am just happy to end like this. cooray is packing his bags for what he believes will be the last time in a sri lankan vest.

after london 2012, greg sponsored him through the olympic games and if he can find that kind of support again he could make it through to the 2020 olympics. 100 miles a week, i am running, 120 miles a week, i am running, i am training. i don't have the strength any more in my legs, and if i go one year through training properly, i can run really good times, same time, i can qualify for tokyo. four laps around london is his last outing, calling time on a distinguished international career. good luck to him. this is bbc news. hello, once again. whatever you have in mind this particular weekend,

be it some rest or some play or, for some, just more work, you are going to have to keep a close eye on the weather front, because there is quite a mix on offer. it's not a write—off, many will see some sunshine at some point, but in that mix come heavy showers and longer spells of rain and it will feel disappointingly cooler. though the weekend is not starting on a cold note, temperatures in double figures in many areas. but from the word go we will have some heavy showers and thunderstorms initially in wales, and then by around the middle of the day off towards the midlands, and then they push towards east anglia and the south—east. just about missing the south—west i would have thought, further north you have your own lot of heavy showers across the south—eastern quarter of scotland and into the borders, and the eastern side of northern ireland too. elsewhere, variable amounts of cloud. having had that rather tempestuous start to the day, things will settle down, with one or two showers as you see

through the midlands and into wales, all the while i think the southern counties, particularly in the south—west, get away with fewer showers, but they'll be there to be had, especially as that pulse of heavy showers moves on through the south—east, they could well affect world championships. the evening events more likely to be dry. this ridge of high pressure comes through during the course of the night and into the first part of sunday, underneath that the showers quit the scene for the most part and the sky is clear and ends up being really rather chilly, especially in the countryside for the time of year. but for many that equates to a really dry, bright start, certainly in central and eastern areas. but more of this towards the west, another area of cloud, wind and rain. gradually working its way through northern ireland and pushing across the north channel into central and western parts of scotland and there will be the odd bit into the western side of wales, maybe a showery burst towards the west midlands. all of which is quite a long way

away from the community shield, arsenal taking on chelsea, that should be fine and dry. increasingly cloudy and fine and dry for the most part. what news of the start of next week? low pressure yet again as was the case this week, into tuesday, we see these weather fronts just working their way down across the country, and the isobars running from the south, no heat wave, and if you are looking for settled weather for the holidays, look away now. this is bbc news, the headlines: the government of venezuela has inaugurated a controversial constituent assembly despite fierce criticism at home and abroad. in several cities crowds gathered to protest against what that say is a creeping dictatorship that's stifling the voice of opposition parties. the us attorney general, jeff sessions, has announced a major drive against what he called, an explosive increase in leaks of classified government information under president trump. four people have already been charged and mr sessions said

he would not hesitate to order more prosecutions. a british computer expert has appeared in court in the united states, charged with creating software to steal bank details. lawyers representing mark hutchins say he denies all the charges against him. prosecutors insist he has admitted writing and selling malware code. now on bbc newsjohn simpson tells the remarkable story of waheed arian, the doctor from chester whose life has been defined by war in afghanistan.