welcome to bbc news, broadcasting to viewers in north america and around the globe. my name's mike embley. our top stories: hurricane irma causes chaos in the caribbean — now puerto rico braces itself for one of the atlantic's worst ever storms. the full force of hurricane irma is still hours away and you can already feel its effects. myanmar denies accusations its armed forces are targeting rohingya muslims, as thousands continue to flee the violence. did russia use facebook to interfere with last year's us presidential election? new evidence emerges. and lights, catwalk, curves — the nigerian fashion show celebrating the african woman's body. it's one of the most powerful

atlantic storms on record. hurricane irma, a category five storm, is bringing with it gusts up to 320 kilometres an hour — 200 miles an hour. the hurricane has already battered several of the leeward islands. the prime minister of antigua and barbuda has told the bbc 90% of buildings on barbuda have been demolished — he said the island, home to about 1800 people, is now just rubble. a two—year—old child is believed to have died. and six people are reported dead on saint martin and the neighbouring french territory of st barts. the eye of the hurricane has passed over the british virgin islands — president trump has declared a state of emergency on the us virgin islands and puerto rico as the storm approaches. our correspondent laura bicker reports from the capital, san juan. this is what it sounds like to be at the heart of one of the strongest

storms recorded in the atlantic. the winds, like a jet engine, roared through the eastern caribbean. the category 5 hurricane ripped roofs off homes and devastated parts of the french territories of st barts and st martin. translation: i want, firstly, to say a few words to express our profound compassion and solidarity to our fellow citizens who today were affected by hurricane irma on st martin and in st barts. these pilots flew into the eye of the storm, a unique view of the sheer scale of this hurricane and, at its core, are those catastrophic 185 mile an hour winds, and that is what they fear on the island of puerto rico. the aim is to try to save as much as possible. neighbours are handing out wood boarding and supplies. this shop owner describes them as angels. we're a strong island. you know, we've been through this before, so... you know, it's a lot

of emotions going on, you know. the governor has been inspecting one of the shelters set up for the thousands who are expected to evacuate low—lying areas. we are hopeful that it'll skid off somewhere north—east of puerto rico, but we're prepared for the worst as well. we can't leave anything to chance, and our priority right now is to make sure that the people of puerto rico are safe. these families hope they will be safe here. the full force of hurricane irma is still several hours away and already you can see and feel its effect. the preparations have been made over the last few days and the governor says that could be the difference between lives lost and lives saved. in florida, they're taking no chances, evacuations are already under way. the storm could hit the sunshine state this weekend. president trump has declared a state of emergency, freeing up relief funding for florida and puerto rico. we have a lot to discuss, including the fact that there's

a new and, seems to be, record—breaking hurricane heading ight toward florida and puerto rico, and other places. we'll see what happens. we'll know in a very short period of time, but it looks like it could be something that will be not good. believe me, not good. hurricane irma has proved to be a terrifying, unstoppable force. all those in her path can do is hunker down and hope. laura bicker, bbc news, puerto rico. i spoke just now to the prime minister of antigua and barbuda gaston browne. barbuda was devastated. antigua just got a little brush, and is actually open for business. flights will open tomorrow morning from 6am. and electricity has been restored.

so antigua is fine. the problem is barbuda. barbuda sustained winds of up to 225 mph. and, as a result of that, the country's infrastructure, all of the homes are practically decimated. up to 90% of homes are damaged. it is a really terrible situation there. and we are trying to bring some early relief to the people of barbuda and then hopefully start the rebuilding process shortly afterwards. do you have any realistic figures at the moment on casualties? we have been told so far there has been one fatality. we understand we don't have a lot of people have suffered injuries. we have had one fatality so far, a toddler, a two—year—old. it would appear as though the property in which the toddler and her mother were staying

in was devastated. it seems as though the child suffered an injury and died. for people who don't know about barbuda, could you describe it a little more. i think there were 1600 people living there. it is very flat. there wasn't anywhere for people to go from the winds and the storm surge as well. absolutely. it is an extremely flat island. and only about 1800 inhabitants. that is one of the issue is why the devastation would have been so bad. to the wind. there were no hills and so on to serve as a break to the wind. so clearly the wind would have literally destroyed everything in its path. the prime minister of antigua there. the government in myanmar has rejected accusations that the armed forces are conducting a campaign of indiscriminate violence against rohingya muslims. so far, more than 140,000 rohingyas have fled into neighbouring bangladesh. bangladesh has acussed myanmar of laying landmines along their border to stop people returning to their villages — an allegation denied

by officials in myanmar. the united nations says it expects the number of rohingya refugees seeking safety in bangladesh to more than double. 0ur correspondent sanjoy majumder sent this report from the border. these are myanmar‘s boat people, dazed, confused after an exhausting trip over the choppy bay of bengal. stepping on shore with their possessions, whatever they could grab in a hasty escape. this boat carrying rohingya refugees has just arrived on the south—eastern coast of bangladesh. you can see what a dangerous voyage it has been for them, the boat is listing dangerously on its side. but it's the only way they could have made their way here. they've been frightened, running for their lives. 0n the beach they collapse

in a heap, many of them severely dehydrated and sea sick after an eight—hour voyage. some can scarcely believe they're alive, others let their loved ones know they made it. a brother and sister united after days, separated after their village was attacked, unsure if they would ever seen each again. but some, like dilbar, continue to relive the horror of a village being attacked? translation: it has taken us 20 days to come here. 0ur village was attacked by the army and buddhist mobs. they burned our house and my aunt was killed. her grandson was shot, his injured arm now encased in homemade splint. when my village was attacked i tried to run, he says. the soldiers fired indiscriminately. translation: it has taken us

20 days to come here. 0ur village was attacked by the army and buddhist mobs. they burned our house and my aunt was killed. it's hard to independently verifying what's happening inside myannmar, access is severely restricted. but this unverified video, shot by one of the escaping rohingyas, appears to show thousands of others waiting to leave, fleeing what they allege are targeted killings. and many of those who do make it across to bangladesh bare the scars of violence. this teenager shows us what he says are gunshot wounds. when my village was attacked i tried to run, he says. the soldiers fired indiscriminately. many people died. they are sometimes described as the world's most persecuted minority, driven from their homes, the rohingyas now have to find a way to rebuild their lives. let's take a look at some of the other stories

making the news. un human rights investigators say the syrian air force did carry out a chemical weapons attack on a rebel—held town in april. at least 83 people died when a bomb filled with the nerve agent sarin was dropped on khan sheikhoun in idlib, a report says. the syrian regime insists the incident was faked and denies using chemical weapons. excited crowds have greeted pope francis on the first papal visit to colombia in three decades. in places his car was forced to a halt as the throngs surged forward, cheering and shouting his name. pope francis has said his visit is a plea for lasting peace following last year's accord between the government and farc rebels. the installation of four thaad missile launchers at a site in south korea has prompted clashes between protesters and police. the controversial us anti—missile system is designed to protect the country against mounting threats from the north. the us treasury secretary, steve mnuchin, says he's prepared an executive order to impose

sanctions against countries trading with north korea, after the recent missile test. facebook says it has discovered that a russian—funded campaign promoted divisive messages on the website during last year's american presidential election campaign. it says adverts were posted that directed users towards nearly 500 bogus accounts spreading false information. the company said it was co—operating with a us investigation into the affair. i spoke with our silicon valley reporter, dave lee, and asked whether we were at all surprised by this facebook announcement. that is the view of many people, especially after the us election. we have seen fake news, the famous phrase, flying around facebook. that is one of the main places for that. what we have discovered now after facebook‘s own investigation is apparently there was a co—ordinated effort by a group known as the internet research agency based in petersburg in russia, giving pro—kremlin information. the suspicion, that facebook has,

though we haven't been able to confirm this. but this group was undertaking co—ordinated attempt to spread misinformation on facebook by buying advertising, $100,000 worth of advertising, and pushing information to many users over a two—year period ending in may of this year. what is to be done about it? you know perfectly well. facebook denies responsibility for what is on facebook and responsibility for curating material. in a perfect world for facebook, they would like to think their algorithm is clear enough to spot these advertisements and purchases before it goes live. i think that is very, very difficult. one of the tactics they used to discover this particular scheme

was they were looking at accounts buying advertisements the display to us users, but the users buying the advertisements were using the russian language version of facebook. that was a clue they should look at it. that is manual work and it is expensive. that is very difficult. but i am sure mark zuckerberg, as well as wanting to deal with misinformation, wanted to put his best engineers to work to figure out how to automate that checking process. dave lee reporting there for us. stay with us on bbc news. still to come: the not—so—great escape. find out what happened after this alleged shoplfiter managed to break free from her handcuffs. freedom itself was attacked this morning, and freedom will be defended. the united states will hunt down and punish those responsible. bishop tutu now becomes spiritual leader of 100,000 anglicans here —

of the blacks in soweto township, as well as the whites, in their rich suburbs. we say to you today, in a loud and a clear voice, enough of blood and tears — enough! translation: the difficult decision we reached together was one that required great and exceptional courage. it's an exodus of up to 60,000 people, caused by the uneven pace of political change in eastern europe. iam free! this is bbc news. the latest headlines.

hurricane irma is causing chaos across the caribbean. there's been widespread damage. it is now threatening the us territory of puerto rico. earlier, michaeljoseph, the president of the red cross in antigua and barbuda, told me about the recovery effort now in place to help those who have been devastated by irma. antigua seems to have escaped. how hard is it on barbuda? the first report came from the prime minister today when he took his first trip as telecommunications went down. he said 90% of the island is damaged or destroyed. the devastation is not like we have never seen before. we are talking about the entire population of barbuda being significantly destroyed. it seems they faced absolutely ferocious winds and a very high storm surge. what can you do to help quickly? the first thing we need to do is to get the damage assessment done. resources will be going over to barbuda tomorrow to get a picture

of what the immediate and long—term needs are. we will start the relief effort based on that. we have met with the government. we just came out of a meeting with cabinet to identify what kind of resources we need to make relief efforts available. relief aid will start pouring in tomorrow. water is a major priority and health concerns. that is what the focus is on in the next 2a hours. unfortunately you get a lot of storms. have you ever had it before on this scale were virtually the entire population needs help? never.

the last major hurricane that was even close was 1985. we had significant devastation in antigua and we did rebuild. but what you are seeing in barbuda, it is something we never thought would never happen, which is where you see the entire population pretty much desolated before your eyes. this is something that is difficult for people to deal with. especially the fact we had one fatality, such a young individual. it is a lot to deal with in the barbuda community. several major french—owned fashion labels, including christian dior and yves saint—laurent, have promised to ban ultra—thin models from their advertising and runway shows. two of the industry's biggest holding companies, lvmh and kering, have unveiled a well—being charter, banning the hiring of size zero models.

there's been much criticism of course that the industry encourages anorexia. well, nigeria is for the first time ever hosting a fashion week dedicated to the plus—sized industry. the idea was born out of the need to stop the stigmatiza?tion and body shaming of the plus—sized woman. didi akinyelure reports from lagos. lights, catwalk, curves. a fashion event with a difference. poised to celebrate the african woman's body. while africa's fashion industry is said to be worth billions of dollars, the plus—size scene is largely neglected. but it could present an opportunity. i feel like it is time for the plus—sized woman to be celebrated in a unique way. there is a market for the plus—sized

woman in nigeria and in africa as a whole so we should cater to that. why wouldn't we want to cater to a large part of the people? still, many designers see the plus—sized segment high—risk and expensive. to keep the cost low, designers on this runway events tend to use the same models to show off their work. sizes are kept small, meaning many of the women he struggled to get work. but some fashion designers are willing to take the risk. i respect the bigger size. it makes sense. most of my clients come asking for it. that is why we started doing it. we want to cater to both. some critics say the industry sends out the wrong message. the world health organization estimates 40% of the women in the world are overweight or obese. the plus—size industry could be seen as glamorising health issues.

but for young models like this one who has just won a one—year contract in london, it is the start of a promising career. at the start, plus—sized women were not appreciated. thanks to this, it brought all of them out and made them proud of their body to show they are beautiful in their own way. a positive message that proves that beauty comes in all shapes and sizes. didi akinye—lure, bbc news, lagos. the actress, jennifer lawrence, has been speaking about the gender pay gap in hollywood. the 27—year—old oscar winner has been critical of the industry in the past after finding out that she'd been paid less than her male co—stars.

the premiere of her new film, a psychological thriller called mother, has brought her to london, and she's been sharing her views with our arts editor, will gompertz. we spend all our time here. i want to make a paradise. jennifer lawrence is the film's eponymous mother, houseproud and devoted to her husband — a much older literary man played by javier ba rdem. what do they want? but their domestic bliss turns into a living nightmare in a metaphor—rich, effects—laden horror movie which the critics have been slamming and lauding in equal measure. i'm so sorry. get out of my house! there will be no "meh" with anybody who sees the movie. it's not enjoyable while you are watching it. it's hard to watch. it's an assault. if i was writing a review while i was watching it, i would be like, "argh! argh! don't go! argh!" if you sit with it a little bit and give yourself 30 minutes, 45 minutes when you get home and sit with it, then you realise how important it is. he's a stranger, we're just gone to let him sleep in our house? hello.

did you know he had a wife? what was in it that was important? for me, it was what would happen if we treated our planet with care, with humanity? you're insane! what would happen if we stopped raping and pillaging our only home and we actually cared about where our children are going to live in the future? until we start politically making changes, there's not much we can do. pulling out of the paris climate deal was not a good step. the actress has spoken out about gender pay inequality in hollywood, citing information gleaned from the 2014 sony pictures hack which revealed she was paid considerably less than her male co—stars for appearing in the film american hustle. can me and the man talk about business here? do you think it's still

deeply unfair, the game is rigged in hollywood? ido, yeah. i think there's still a lot of unfairness. we are making changes. the gap is very slowly closing, but there is still work to be done. did you make sure, for instance, that you got paid the same amount, or even more than javier bardem in this movie? i didn't, i didn't look at what javier was getting. ijust knew what i deserved and i fought for that. and if you found out he was being paid more? there would be a phone call. you would have a word? let's head to texas now. a police operation didn't quite go to plan. officers were carrying out a routine arrest and seemed to have the situation perfectly under control. but then things got a little out of hand, as the bbc‘s tim allman explains. the woman on the ground, toscha sponsler, was arrested

by officers after they were called out to a possible shoplifting at a beauty parlour. 0nce suitably restrained, she was placed in the backseat of a police car. but it seems ms toscha was not terribly happy about this turn of events. somehow she managed to slip out of her handcuffs. then, after a quick look around to see if anyone was watching, she slid into the front of the car. all of this coming as something of a surprise to the officers who, at the time, were examining her bag. thus began a car chase that lasted over 20 minutes and at times reached 100 mph. you can see the fugitive vehicle

avoiding a stinger as it sped along the highway. police eventually forced her off the road. she lost control of the vehicle. toscha sponsler was back in custody, apparently unhurt, but now facing various charges including aggravated assault and unauthorised use of a vehicle. local police are now fitting new security measures to all their cars. tim allman, bbc news. and you can get in touch with me and most of the team on twitter. i'm @bbcmikeembley. more on that and all of the news on the website. thank you for watching. good morning.

there is wind and rain in the forecast for the british isles over the next few days but nothing like the wet and windy weather that is being brought in the caribbean by hurricane irma. a huge, lumbering storm system with the eye showing up on our earlier satellite. during the day ahead the storm will move away from puerto rico, just clipping the north of the dominican republic and haiti and moving towards the eastern side of cuba late in the day. back home we have our own area of low pressure, a far less potent one, obviously. isobars beginning to squeeze together, showing that the wind will be picking up as the day goes on. we will also see some outbreaks of rain. central and eastern areas particularly it could be a fairly dry and bright start but further north and west, cloud will thicken and outbreaks of rain slide across northern ireland, scotland and northern england with increasingly blustery winds. at four o'clock in the afternoon, a lot of cloud for the likes of belfast, temperatures around 16 degrees. the rain turning heavier across western areas of scotland and even some outbreaks of rain across eastern scotland and temperatures in aberdeen just 13 degrees.

that rain stretching across northern england from newcastle to manchester and down into the midlands. we will see cloud and showers into the afternoon. similar weather for wales, cloudy weather with showery rain at times. 17 degrees in cardiff. a grey afternoon in prospect in the south—west of england. again, with showers coming and going at times and the wind increasing building here. even here cloud thickens up with a couple of showers into the afternoon. as we go on through the night we will see bands of rain progressing erratically southwards and eastwards, getting stuck across southern areas by the end of the night. temperatures dropped to 10 degrees in aberdeen and 15 in plymouth. during friday, this band of rain will get stuck across southern areas and some rain could be quite heavy. there will be blustery wind around as well but the further north and west you are, the better the chance of seeing some sunshine albeit with some very thundery downpours mixed in. as we go into the weekend, things look decidedly unsettled

and dare i say autumnal. cool windy weather with some rain at times. the rain on saturday coming in the form of showers. some of these could be heavy, fairly breezy, the wind not coming from a warm direction at all so the temperature just 16—18 degrees. a bright start on sunday towards the south—east, heavy rain pushing in from the north—west and late in the day western areas particularly will turn very windy indeed. this is bbc news. the headlines: hurricane irma has absolutely devastated the tiny caribbean island of barbuda. the prime minister of antigua and barbuda has told the bbc a 2—year—old child died in the storm and almost every building was demolished. six people are reported dead on saint martin and the neighbouring french territory of st barts.

bangladesh has lodged a strong protest with myanmar over the violence that has sent at least 140,000 rohingya muslims fleeing across the border. myanmar denies its troops are committing abuses, and accuses rohingya militants of burning villages to force civilians to flee. facebook says it's discovered a russian—funded campaign to promote divisive social and political messages during last year's us presidential election. it says $100,000 was spent on around 3,000 ads over a two—year period, ending in may. now on bbc news, it's hardtalk.