this is bbc news. the latest headlines: a seaplane has crashed into a river north of sydney, killing all six people on board. police say the aircraft was on a sightseeing flight ahead of new year celebrations at sydney harbour when it came down. there are reports that four of the victims may be british. the department for work and pensions says it plans to use artificial intelligence to detect criminal gangs claiming benefits underfalse identities. computer algorithms have been developed to identify large—scale benefit fraud. iran's revolutionary guards have threatened anti—government protesters with an "iron fist" if days of political unrest continue. the warning came after protests intensified in the capital, tehran. thousands of rail travellers face disruption, as workers from crosscountry and south western rail services stage 24—hour strikes. next on bbc news, dateline london looks forward to 2018.

hello, and welcome to dateline london, i'mjane hill. we're taking time today to look ahead to the world in 2018, in britain, the rest of europe, the us and around the world. with me is the british commentator and columnist for the sunday telegraph, janet daley, the writer on arab affairs, abdel bari atwan, from germany's die welt, stephanie bolzen, and from the us, stryker mcguire from bloomberg. a warm welcome to you all. thank you forjoining us. we begin in europe.

january is a time for talks — phase two of the brexit negotiations will finally get underway between the uk and eu, while in germany angela merkel has to resume discussions about forming a government, after her attempts to do so failed in the wake of september's election. janet, it took a very long time to get through phase one of the brexit talks. how optimistic are you going into the next round? yes, optimistic ultimately, but it is going to be messy and bloody. it is all every stage of this will follow the trajectory of the preliminary stage, so it looks like a my asthma off chaos and recrimination, and tell five minutes until midnight when suddenly it will the be resolved and that is because economic reality has to take royalty over political vanity. the extent of the recriminations and poisonous atmosphere is correlated to the need

to find a solution to the bitterness that european capitals feel about the uk leaving. but ultimately, there will be a kind of good news, which most of the media will regard as a surprise, even though it was inevitable and somehow or other it will come right in terms of presentation. what that will actually mean, your guess is as good as mine because of all the recrimination and chaos, which will miraculously dissolve in everybody congratulating everybody else, will actually strengthen the position of theresa may, so she personally will be stronger this year than last year. and that is so interesting, domestically. ijust can't believe there won't be recrimination. but there will be.

this group hug will be really small. in the last period, they were all calling each other names, all costing each other out of the garden, and then suddenly, theresa may was praised. absolutely, it was all wonderful and happy. mutual regard, that will happen at least half a dozen times in the next year. i think that the true believers are never going to be satisfied with what she gets. that is true. but they are a smaller and smaller number. she deserves the praise, to be honest. many people predicted that she would not be up to the job, so she managed to handle... she would not even be there. yes, exactly. many people had a huge doubt about her capabilities to actually negotiate these tough issues, and to be fair to her, they managed

to at least first achieved the border problem with northern ireland. also the british expats in europe, and european expat in britain. in a short time, it is a huge achievement. the next phase will be difficult, butjudging by the first phase, i am optimistic. we are very much here to look forward to the year ahead. here in this city we are rightly or wrongly obsessed with brexit. germany has its own issues to confront, and we sometimes forget that germany is technically does not have its formal government yet. yes, there were elections in september, then coalition talks with two smaller parties, these broke down and now onjanuary

7 there will be the next round with the social democrats, which may mean we will see a third round of coalition between the two big parties. what does that mean? i am trying not to put brexit in my next sentence! but what will it mean for the negotiations? not much. angela merkel is seen as the rock at the heart of this. whatever the government is in germany, it will not make a difference towards brexit. some people say if it is a coalition with the social democrats which would mean that martin schultz will be vice chancellor, whatever he might be, it might mean a harder time for britain because he is a european, but it won't change much. it is not only germany negotiating with britain, do not forget this.

i attended the last summit in brussels and i had not been there for a long time. when you live in britain, it is brexit all day and all night, but there, hardly anybody talks about brexit, they talk about their own organs. it is massive in europe —— their own problems. europe is pretty much in 2018 looking at itself, not so much britain. much of the rest of the world looks at angela merkel as a kind of rock, and they yearn for her continuance. not in germany though. i know! is the rest of the world wrong to have this much faith? tomorrow, it is the 13th time she will hold the new year speech. it is a very solid institution at the end

of the year, to have an outlook towards the next year, and it is her 13th time. the germans are tired of her. as you rightly say, she sees herself as a rock. you have donald trump, brexit, wards, so she sees a duty of serving the country as her mandate. you have mentioned the tramp, excellent. —— you have mentioned trump. let's turn to the us where analysts are already speculating about the possible results of the mid—term elections and could an upset be on the cards for trump? particularly in the lower house of representatives, where all 435 seats are up for grabs? but that, of course, isn't until november — much could happen before then in the unpredictable white house. stryker, rather than thinking about elections, should we perhaps be focusing on robert mueller‘s russia investigation? well, we can think about robert mueller, and clearly that is hugely important.

however, there is this almost sort of incredibly narrow view of the trump administration in terms of its troubled as being robert mueller and russia, and i don't think that is a terminal problem, frankly. for trump himself? yes. you think he will survive? i do think he will survive, yes. i do, however, ithink it is a distraction. but i feel like it has been more of a distraction in the past than it will be in the future. in the future, because of the elections that will occur in november, and also because he is hugely unpopular. in percentage terms, he is historically unpopular at this stage in his presidency. the lowest approval since records

began. therefore, having spent his first year being forced to be pretty much a traditional conservative republican in his policies, not in his actions, but in his policies. with the tax cuts? absolutely. you have not seen trump unchained, and that is trade war. trump unchained is even more a change of social policy in the united states. he has made huge changes in the judiciary, which hardly any of us talk about, but hundreds and hundreds ofjudges coming in who represent a very, very different point of view to the one that has prevailed in the last decade or so. i think that because he may see the next election as a kind of deadline, he may see that these ten, 11 months are super important in terms of making things happen that he wants to happen... you say we have not seen him unchained.

that is a striking phase. is he going to be? he has been surrounded by people, he has been hemmed in by the people around him. i think we put too much credence into his tweets, too much weight into his tweets. you have to look at what he has actually done, and it has not been very much. one reason is because he is really blockaded by a kind of establishment, but i'm not sure that that establishment can hold. when we look at his foreign policy, it is provocative and a disaster, we don't know how he is going to handle north korea. he promised to change the regime, or bomb north korea, to put an end to

these nuclear tests, it could not do so completely. when it comes to the middle east, in syria he was defeated. russia, they now have the upper hand, so when we talk about his latest move to move the american embassy from tel aviv to jerusalem, it has created huge problems in the middle east. the american image is very, very damaged. internally, maybe he improves the economy and implement rates, but outside as a superpower, it is losing a lot. i think that is true, even though i am jewish and a supporter of israel, i thought that was a gratuitous gesture, the idea of moving the amnesty tojerusalem, especially as it cannot happen for a couple of years. i thought, what on earth is the point of that?

it is just to do with the political strategy over iraq. iran is the chief sponsor of hezbollah and hamas, and i think that he was trying to show that iran is not the powerful player that it pretends to be in the region, so if there was any logic to that move, that is what it was. but i actually think that his foreign policy is so ultimately isolationist and protectionist that what he is doing is claiming to be removing america from the world stage. 0n the other hand, he makes these very aggressive moves about north korea. the secretary of state seems to be running a completely separate foreign policy, though it is difficult to tell what their intentions are. internally, he has accomplished very little. the tax bill was the first legislative success. but the justice area is very important and that could change the social policy of the country. he is trying to con iran. he is

trying to besiege iran. but he is helping it. enhancing the role of iran in the region. enhancing the russian role in the middle east also. but barack 0bama paved the way for that. that was the most appalling foreign policy mistake in living memory, and having inherited that situation, you cannot blame the trump white house all that much. we are talking so much about foreign policy, and your point about world reputation and so on, but ultimately, people in other countries are not voting for him. no, his policies seem to be based, because there is no coherence really, but they seem to be based on two things. his own instincts, the way

he has always operated. and also, the base, this group of people. that translates in arabic into al-qaeda. it is all about the base and what he promised them will stop that is the jerusalem think he promised it during the campaign. it does have something to do with the power play with iran. there was a kind of logic. that is interesting, it takes us on to broadening our discussion. even as we go to air in the last few days, there have been striking scenes in iran, with thousands of people taking part in anti—government protests. where could that lead ? where could that lead? there are other pressure points in the world. north korea, of course. let's talk

about iran. is it all about the economy? what is driving that? actually it is more than the economy. the economic situation is very difficult in iran, definitely the prices are going up dramatically, iran under punishment by the united states, by europe, but i believe also people would like to have more important moves to improve that standard of living in iran itself. you have opposition. the protest happened again five years ago, so we don't know yet whether this will be a huge uprising, a huge protest, whether they will succeed to change that ruling elite in iran. we don't know yet. but now we have two kind of protests. the opposition of the government who are saying we don't want to be involved

in lebanon, we don't want to be involved in palestine, we don't want to be involved in syria, we want to concentrate on iran itself. but you also have a counter protest, which is supporting the government. this is the problem. now, are we going to see clashes between the two sides, and is it going to last longer than many people anticipated is not until now? there is no blank cheque. but what happened in syria, for example, or iraq or egypt or yemen, until now, you know, there are about 50 people arrested, and this proved to the iranian regime know if there are

protest they would not be able to control it. iran will be the major player in the coming year. they will be there. there will be in lebanon, in west bank and gaza, in syria. they are a key player in the middle east. how do you think the balance of power between saudi arabia and iran willshape up? a few days ago there was a report on israeli television saying that trump and netanyahu struck a deal. this was in order to launch a huge campaign against iran, to deprive it of nuclear progress and deprive it from ballistic missiles. and they have a secret deal. the coming year will be crucial. the saudis are in

the american camp. and they are in the american camp. and they are in the israeli camp in order to fight the israeli camp in order to fight the iranians. the saudi says iran is a very dangerous enemy because they are shia. they look at things from that angle. i believe iran, look at iran in the coming year. it will be a very major player. they managed to win in syria. they have a huge influence in iraq. they are also having a huge influence by proxy in yemen. they are a major player. and the us administration's role in that? its role at this point seems to be very much on the side of the saudis, and tend towards foreign policy seems to be motivated, among other things, that anything that barack 0bama did, he will not do —— donald trump.

he is very anti—iran. steve bannon, who is no longer in the white house, has always had this thing for iran. iran has been the main sponsor of terrorism in the area. there is a justification for being critical of the iranian regime and particularly of not wanting them to get nuclear arms. but it is the idea of a huge conflict between iran and saudi. what you want to try to do is to prevent that from happening. but what is the alternative? to go to war against iran? it isa it is a huge country. it is not iraq under saddam hussein. it has a huge arsenal of missiles, also it has military wings like hezbollah in lebanon, so they can actually create a lot of problems. that is why the europeans are very reserved when it comes to iranians policy. there is a nuclear deal, signed after a brutal and

lengthy negotiation. now, trump is then he will not accept this. what is the alternative? there is scepticism about this deal, about whether it would prevent iran from getting nuclear capability. so there is a legitimate and justifiable school of thought that says the iran deal was a mistake, and that was donald trump's premise. but nuclear organisations are monitoring iranians activities and they gave iran a clean sheet. they said they abided with the treaty completely. they did not break the agreement. the europeans supported that point of view, so why donald trump is actually trying to bang the drums of war against iran, this is the problem. it is also a problem for europe, it will be a problem for

them to say they will stick to this deal because this is causing another confrontation between europe and the us. because europe is so divided on many things, it will once again highlight their weakness. i am sorry, i must cut you off. as we approach 2018, we did want to close with a thought from all of you about other matters that we have not touched on. 2017 was striking for so many things, but particularly for the #metoo campaign. everything that we saw in lots of different countries. helpful to women in so many ways, all the accusations around harvey weinstein. you could possibly argue that sparked the renewed interest in all of this. i am interested in your different perspectives. where does #metoo go in 2018? does it continue to gather steam, does it help women in some countries more than others? it has been such a seismic shift this year.

whether or not it continues with the sort of fervour that it has had, i honestly don't know, it is hard to say. but it is clearly such a powerful force. this means a lot for trump. this could be, even if it does not persist as a huge force for the next several years, by the time we reach the next election in the united states, i think the american woman voter quickly determine trump's pre—election, or not. for him, it is such a powerful thing that i think it will emerge again all kinds of different ways, including at election time. that is really interesting. we all remember what he said on that tape, and still got elected. yes, what is important about everything to do with the sexual harassment scandal is awareness. women are more aware that they should not accept things that some men who are in of power might

do to them, and that is important. but it does come in waves. this is not the first time. we had this in germany five or six years ago. in brussels there were scandal. it comes and goes. the question is on the ground, how much does it really change? i am not so optimistic about it, especially because of trump. how was somebody elected who is such a misogynist? and now you say this could haunt him. i am not sure this will happen. women in america have voted for him, despite his attitudes towards women. i don't get it. i will give you the example of tunisia. i was told by the president of tunisia, i was elected by women. without women votes, i would not be president. they are very strong and they managed to counter radical islamic groups. they are a power of change. i believe this is a good example.

i think any women power should also look at the middle east, look at the third world and try to help. women can be very effective as a tool of change in these parts of our world. i tool of change in these parts of our world. lam tool of change in these parts of our world. i am optimistic. tool of change in these parts of our world. lam optimistic. i tool of change in these parts of our world. i am optimistic. i think they will achieve more. janet, are you optimistic? about what?! gender change? i would agree that it comes in waves. in the history of gender politics in the lifetime, it is difficult to translate it into politics. hillary clinton is the best possible example of that. women do not vote as women, they vote as wives, partners, mothers, you know, grandmothers. they vote for their families. if they are working class women, they are more concerned to the hitting food on the table than breaking the glass ceiling.

—— with putting food on the table. there is class distinction between highly educated women and less privileged women. i don't think this will translate into electoral consequences, though it may have very different social consequences. thank you very much. happy new year to all of you and to everybody watching. that's it for dateline london for now. bye— bye. hello there. the strong winds from storm dylan may have peaked in

northern ireland earlier in the day, we still have an amber warning in parts of southern scotland. be prepared for some travel disruption and some damaging wind. the core of storm dylan is working his way eastwards a cross storm dylan is working his way eastwards across scotland. the strongest of the winds is on the southern flank. central scotland could see winds 70 to 80 mph to take us could see winds 70 to 80 mph to take us towards lunchtime. then those winds will gradually ease. lots of heavy rain and also some sleet and snow on the hills of central scotland. elsewhere, a blustery day. windy in northern england. lots of sunshine around. bright in the afternoon for east anglia and the south—east. the showers get going in the west. some could be heavy and sundry. frequent in the south west. temperatures drop through the day. feeling cooler than yesterday. this evening, if you are heading out, be prepared for some showers macro in england and wales in particular. it

isa england and wales in particular. it is a different story if you're heading out in eastern scotland and north—east england. you could get through the entire evening in aberdeen, edinburgh and newcastle with dry and clear conditions. the winds will ease. still the chance of some showers in northern ireland. still a few across the midlands and eastern england. further west, clearer conditions for many. showers into the channel islands, part of devon, cornwall and south west wales. still blustery. the winds will have died down. into new year's day itself, keep an eye on this. a storm system affecting france. it gets close to us. wet and windy weather for the channel islands. there is a chance we could see what and windy conditions through the morning in southern counties of england. lots of sunshine around on new year's day. showers in western scotla nd new year's day. showers in western scotland in the morning. northern

ireland, northern england and north wales wintry. a cold night follows. a frosty night —— started tuesday. be prepared for wet weather on tuesday. windy as well. snow over the northern hills. this is bbc news. the headlines at midday. six people have been killed after a seaplane crashed into a river north of sydney — it's thought four of the victims may be british. police are at the scene. we have forensic police on their way here to carry out identification. we have investigators from marine area command, who are on their way to our location. criminal gangs who claim benefits underfalse identities are to be targeted by the government using artificial intelligence. after three days of political protests — iran's revolutionary guards warn demonstrators they face the nation's "iron fist". political leaders reflect

on the past twelve months in their new year's messages — theresa may says 2017 was a "year of progress" for the uk.