it's being seen as a test of a peace deal between the government and the former guerrillas of the farc — now a left—wing political party. conservative parties — bitterly opposed to the peace agreement — hope to win an absolute majority. satellite photographs released by the human rights group amnesty international suggest the myanmar military has been building bases in villages where rohingya muslims have been forced off their land. amnesty called it a ‘massive land grab‘. myanmar‘s government has not yet responded to the report. the veteran british entertainer sir ken dodd has died at the age of 90. his stage debut was in 1954 and he continued to perform until last year. he was famous for his ability to reel offjokes for shows regularly lasting as long as four hours. he had been ill and married his long—term partner on friday. now on bbc news, here's shaun ley with dateline london. hello and welcome.

this is dateline london, the programme that brings together international correspondents based here, with people who write about the world beyond britain. cold war powers seemed to be flexing their muscles this week. donald trump, trade warrior and peacemaker. was someone in russia responsible for the poisoning of a double agent on an english street? and after another drubbing to the political mainstream from italy, can the europeans fight back? with me now we have a political commentator, a french journalist, stephanie, a usjournalist writing for bloomberg and a columnist with the mail on sunday. thank you to all. the news that donald trump is to meet with kim jong—un,

the north korean leader, to discuss reducing nuclear threat surprised many. hours earlier, he had been posing as a warrior, at least in trade terms, signing into law tariffs for steel and aluminium. he tweeted that trade wars were easy to win. six months ago he warned he would fire and fury on pyongyang. perhaps thsi summit with kim jong—un suggests that this is a war that trump cannot win. is this evidence that his method of threats and mockery is delivering? the optimistic hope is that two mavericks may make a deal. i think that is unlikely. the truth is that donald trump has a habit of being boastful

and underneath it, very different things are happening. he has gone out on a limb already and made promises, he has given away one of his cards. the truth is they are talking about different things. donald trump wants to see nuclear weapons removed from pyongyang. pyongyang will not do that because it is a failed state run by an elite that steal and take everything and they depend on those weapons for safety. and you have been there. i spent time early last year there and i heard that during the sunshine policy, they were actually ramping up behind the scenes. they were ramping up ideas for attacking cities in the south, using and building up biological and nuclear weapons. they are looking at different things. north korea wants, through south korea, they are talking about things such as demilitarisation, denuclearisation of the korean peninsula and removal of the threat. but what they say is they do not want america on the peninsula and they do not want american weapons on the peninsula. people always want to hear that there will be talks and people are getting around a table together but no—one ever comes up with a deal.

there is no deal because pyongyang will never remove its weaponry and cannot be trusted and we could not give anything, we, the world, cannot help. is kimjong—un playing donald trump? that is the fear. sceptics say he could be walking into a trap. and donald trump, because he is confident and thinks this is a sales job and he can market his way out of it and it is consistent with the reality tv show format of this presidency that he loves to surprise, he loves the unconventional. he likes to be the first to do something, such as being the first sitting us president meeting with the north korean leader. there has been speculation in the us that this was an attempt to distract from more damaging stories such as the payoff, the alleged hush

money paid to a porn star. those headlines were dominating and this was a way to tamp those down. an actress who claims she had a relationship with trump and he denies. yes. his lawyers paid her off before the election. that has led to some people saying that if he can not do an airtight deal with a port star, how can he do one with north korea? especially considering the state of not only the white house, which has suffered unprecedented departures and turnover and the state department which is not at full capacity. we do not have an ambassador to south korea. there is no assistant secretary of state for east asia. the point person on north korea stepped down in frustration. the secretary of state, rex tillerson, was blindsided and not consulted about this. if you are going to do

a deal with north korea, you do need to prepare. and of course diplomacy is better than these schoolyard taunts on twitter but this is a high risk gamble that may not pay off. jasmin, what about that point about mavericks? the mavericks can remake the rules? we have two gorillas, really, they are shaping up for a final fight. i disagree with what ianjust said. for over 60 years, korean peninsula has been in this situation. what was moving was to see how the people on both sides came together or wanted to come together over the winter olympics. and i think that one has to think of a way to demilitarise the entire zone. the us has no business being there. japan, now, has to rethink its own policies on defence. i certainly think that this does not come out of anything sensible like that. it comes out of these two men who are possibly, arguably, the least rational and most macho men on the planet. so he's not being invited around for tea then?

you say that the north korean leader is irrational. i think he is rational and ruthless. i do not think he is the rocket man, small man and ridiculous. i don't find him ridiculous at all. the idea comes from him. for the first time, like his father and grandfather, he will be treated as an equal. the korean war has not officially ended so, of course, i agree with you when you say there is room for massive misunderstanding because i think the sanctions are now beginning to bite and this is the reason why kim wants to have some time.

but it has happened previously with madeline albright, withjimmy carter, it has been going on for decades. each time north korea makes a few vague promises... not ruthless, i am saying it has nothing to do with him, trump, in that sense that they are playing games with each other. they want to be whatever they think they can be. you are right about the first... always the star of my own drama. what goes on in north korea is so shocking. we do not know half of it, really. so i do not defend the country. but i think the people of these two koreas need a break. but then we don't talk about china and japan because china does not want to see the us have more say than china. however china has been retreating.

usually they were the first with the north korea. so this is really... the asian countries, how will they react? they have something to play there. do not fall for the north korean pr. it is a tightly restricted country. you have to be part of the elite to even live in pyongyang. any paperwork to go anywhere in the country. the only people allowed to come out were members of the elite who are doing quite well. the rest of society are being crushed. and this society, at the core of everything is the world's worst regime. that is not hype, that is not propaganda. this country runs death camps that have been accused by the un of breaking all sorts of rights. but the people on both sides are desperate. divided countries help nobody in the end. said the long—term, 100 years from now, one wishes to see a united korea. perhaps a little sooner.

i must be ruthless now and move on. one week ago a man and his daughter collapsed on the bench in an english cathedral city. sergei skripal was a russian former double agent, jailed by moscow and then freed in a spy swap. the use of a nerve agent sponsored suspicion of a state—sponsored poisoning, not discouraged by the presenter on state television who warned russian traitors to not go to england because something is not right there. what is wrong? this is not a surprise. i keep hearing that we do not have the full facts. i don't know if we ever will have the kind of evidence that people need to prove where it came from or who did what. we still do not really know what happened to another russian

spy, a man killed in 2006. yes. he died because of polonium but nobody can say who killed him. the son of the man who has just been killed died in mysterious circumstances last year in saint petersburg. we do not know. by what we do know is that vladimir putin asked for the law to be changed at one point so that traitors who had fled abroad could be cut down. so i see connections between those kinds of ambitions and what we see. why did they move to salisbury? this is a question. it is near... it is near the research establishment for chemical and biological weapons. britain is really a map for spy stories. it is something in the british psyche. that is another programme. what is striking is that you would have thought that this man was safe. he was a double agent, he had been sentenced, he had been pardoned, officially and been the object of a swap. everything is fine. and now they dig up his wife's tomb and his son. people wandering around

in hazmat suit, just in case there is contamination. and whoever did it, although they are pretty right, imean... it is extremely frightening. we are like lambs. they say we can pounce straight where and when we want, whoever we want, and there is nothing you can do. i have the feeling that if in 2006, 12 years ago, the other case, had the british parliament reacted more strongly they would think twice before doing what they are doing now. that it will take another ten years. we are starting a major and long—lasting enquiry. we will know more in ten years time. we could just shut down their bank accounts.

this is the point. london, the uk actually has more power than many western countries because of the amount of russian money that flows through london. and so if they want to make the russians pay, they have the ability. the local mp, he is also in the british treasury, he put something on social media on friday saying that there are financial measures. that is one of the weapons that could be used. absolutely. and they approved the magnitsky law which would allow them to blacklist certain russian individuals with ties to human rights violations or ties to nefarious activities. they could push ahead with that and they need to. if they do narrow down the cause of and who was responsible there should be a much stronger response. the response to the previous spy was not strong enough. they should consider a boycott of the world cup which is in incredibly important... due to open this summer in russia. it is an incredibly important event for vladimir putin.

it is the moment on the international stage and it is a way to make him pay. and one of the government ministers was saying on saturday morning that someone has come onto our soil, brazenly committed a nasty crime with a nerve agent prohibited by international law and put many people at risk. if you can identify something, you must act. there are three certain certainties. vladimir putin whittles away and find a crack in western society to push his right wing malevolent creed. don't forget what he is doing in syria. let's not forget that he kills many of his enemies.

second certainty is that britain will continue to talk tough and do nothing. we did nothing over the ukraine except for a few sanctions here and there. the third thing is that britain is the capital of dirty money in the world. all the dirty money is washed here by british lawyers and estate agents. by the british bankers and sanctioned by british politicians. we could take very tough action now instead of registering state—controlled mafia, basically companies operating here instead of allowing all of this money to wash through here. britain will do nothing and carry on taking the money. it is to our shame that we do this. all we are about is money. italy's national election may not have delivered a government yet, but the clear winner was populism. 69% of voters supported parties challenging the political mainstream. it isn't just italy. from germany to greece

to the netherlands to hungary, a consensus which held since the collapse of the eastern bloc almost 30 years ago appears to be breaking up. angela merkel, now that germany has a government again, albeit one from a shrunken political centre, says she will roll up her sleeves to begin the reform of the european union. france's emmanuel macron, a rare mainstream winnerfrom last year, even suggested post—brexit britain would soon be hammering on the eu's door hoping to be let back is that hubris? can i pick apart that narrative of doom and gloom can i pick apart that narrative of doom and gloom and populism engulfing europe, which i see mainly in the british media? i'm not saying it doesn't exist. but since brexit, since britain shot itself in the foot, there has been this element of schadenfreude. they want, a certain part of the british media, they want everybody else to act unreasonably. remember, not a day passed without an article before the french presidential elections saying that

marine le pen was going to win. she didn't. and she was never going to be elected. then angela merkel formed that coalition, and there were all these articles about how germany was unstable, germany was finished. angela merkel was not going anywhere. it was going to be difficult but she did it. as expected. as for the italian elections, i wouldn't say it's 70% that voted for populism. they voted for the five star movement and the northern league. the northern league was actually pro—eu until recently, when they thought that tactically it was a good thing. you have to look at the electoral system in italy. it has been like this ever since the second world war. i am not surprised at all by what is happening.

it is not going to make much difference. matteo renzi was elected with 40% only a few years back. 0nly got 19% this time. yes, things change in italy. emmanuel macron was elected, angela merkel is there. there is an impetus for more integration, emmanuel macron is very pro—european union. and like most young europeans and young british people, they want more integration, it's going to happen. i think, it doesn't mean that, you know, the complacency and lack of democracy in the european institutions shouldn't be addressed. i think there is recognition of that. brexit was a shock. i think it will be addressed. i think there is a real question over this french and german plan for closer integration now, as a result of this election. more than 50% of italian voters voted for anti—european parties. italy is now dominated

by politicians who have promised deep tax cuts, lavish spending programmes, and who are anti—eu. look at the plan to have a banking union in europe. you really think german banks are going to sign up to a banking union when italy is dominated by politicians which have decided to blow budget spending? you are taking a longer view... right, in the broader context, we have seen this collapse of the centre—left across europe. which is really down to the social democratic parties not defending the welfare state as they had previously, and they squeezed it to pay for the outcome of the 2008 financial crisis. they have allowed these populist parties to come up with a similar platform, you know, we are going to give you a social spending programme which harks back to a decade ago, even though we can't afford it. look at italy.

it has the second—highest debt to gdp ratio in the eurozone. 130% to gdp. well, they have to have another election. and i'm so pleased you said what you did. i really needed somebody to say that. because i am sick and tired — i mean, ukip, this institution, where is ukip today? if we are talking about those continental results, picking up on what stephanie said, we saw the collapse of the greek left. lots of people thought that was down to corruption and knowing true statistics and all the rest of it. dutch labour has fallen to less than 6%, it used to be the main

party of the left. the french socialists, 7.5%. but the german sdp, the worst result in 70 years. something is going on. there is a crisis. in part, the brexit thing has kicked up a dust storm. but actually, in the end, good sense will prevail. i think the european commission, the european parliaments, need more power. i mean, a parliament without any power is part of the problem. reform is absolutely needed. i think the european project is much bigger than these individual, kind of rather spoiled people reactions. the narrative we need to change, when this crash happened, we needed people to say it is these bankers, these capitalists, the worst kinds of capitalists who brought us here. instead, the populist people blamed the immigrants, blamed the eu, and we didn't capture the narrative.

i'm pleased you've captured the narrative. i think you are both being very complacent. i agree about the narrative, i think all the wrong people were blamed and i don't disagree with that at all. but let's look at europe. look at eastern europe as well, look at poland and hungary. you can look at italy and spain. you say that france was fine because the far right didn't win, but they were the second choice. and they're in disarray now. you say that ukip has disappeared. of course it has — it has achieved its aims and the tory party has shifted hard to the right. all these ideas, that populism has disappeared, we're living in interesting times. i know this is breaking the rule, but none of us really have a clue where it is going. it could be going in any direction. we cannot be fatalistic.

i'm not fatalistic, i'm fighting for what i believe in, which is for tolerance and for borders which are more fluid and for sharing and for the eu. but the idea that populism is not a threat — the truth is, we are in turbulent times. there is such disgust of institutions and politicians and banks and the church, so many illusions are being shattered, and that is why this is so interesting and i think a scary time. we need to fight back. but we can't be complacent. this rolling over before populism, with the history of europe, we can't afford that. why, then, are the institutions apparently not able to grasp that, and what is it that, however you want to describe this, that broad set of politicians from the christian democrats to the social democrats in so many continental european countries, have appeared to be supine, weak, or unable to come up with answers in the way that stephanie was talking about? i think it is partly to do with... i don't think they have been supine or complacent. i think, you know, when you go

around the world, people say to you, i've just been in africa, in india, and they say, isn't it extraordinary, what has been achieved by the eu? thousands of years of war, put to bed. and tough though it is, how nationalism and pan—nationalism play out, this is admired. in africa, they admire it. we are a bit spoiled. because we do not get the kind of revolutions that we have seen. i've been to 60 countries in the past five years and i've never once heard anybody say they wish they had the eu. they may like a lot of things about europe and about democracy, and we are so sceptical of democracy, at a time when people are fighting and dying for it around the world, and trump is actually also being so cavalier with it and backing autocrats and everything, which is part of the problem. we don't realise how precious democracy is. the complacency point is interesting.

and the generational point. are you optimistic about younger people being pro—european and wanting more integration? there is lots of evidence, especially from the pew studies, saying something like 29% of the people they had surveyed approved of governments in which a strong leader could make decisions without interference from parliament or the courts. that is quite worrying. have we become too complacent? yes. there is a dissatisfaction within young people. 0n the other hand, they didn't bother to go and vote about brexit. therefore they bothered to vote in favour ofjeremy corbyn just to sort of... they did vote. a lot more voted than didn't. i will give you another statistic. i will give you another pew statistic. you look at the happiest places in the world, and the least happy places

are europe and north america. the happiest country in the world is nigeria, which shows the optimism, the ideas, which you see appearing in unlikely places. there is optimism in lots of other parts of the world but in europe and north america we are struggling to see it. at the same time that we have things others are fighting for. thank you all very much, as always, for your contribution. and thank you for being with us. that is dateline london for this week. we will be back at the same time in one week. you can tweet us your comments on the programme. from all of us, goodbye. well, southern parts of the uk were fairly unsettled for the second

part of the weekend. the best of the dry and brighter weather was further north. but even across the south—west, despite the showers and increasing rain, there were spells of sunshine which broke through. as we head into monday, this area of low pressure will be in control of the weather across england and wales. further north, it should be drier with clear spells. as we head through the course of the night into the early hours of monday, the rain will pep up to become quite heavy across much of england and wales. just nudging into southern parts of scotland. although for northern ireland and scotland, it should be a dry start to monday. quite chilly with mist and fog around but less cold because of the cloud and rain and the wind across england and wales. it looks like a messy morning commute for england and wales, outbreaks of rain, some quite heavy and turning windy across the south—west of england,

towards the channel islands in the afternoon. gusts of 40—50 mph. some sunny spells for northern ireland and western scotland. 0n into tuesday, a ridge of high pressure builds in before this area of low pressure makes inroads for wednesday and thursday to bring a succession of fronts with outbreaks of rain. for tuesday, we will start to lose the low pressure system from the south—east through the morning. and then conditions brighten up. the winds fall lighter and the sun is strong this time of year so it should feel quite decent in the sunny spells although temperatures will still be in single figures for a few. we could see 10 or 11 degrees in a few spots, maybe the odd shower. a ridge of high—pressure breaks down as we head towards wednesday. notice the squeeze isobars become tightly packed together. winds coming up from the south, always a mild direction. we start off on a cool note across the eastern side of the country with

the best of the sunshine. further west, wind will be picking up, cloud, outbreaks of rain for northern ireland around irish sea coasts. further east, it should stay largely dry and given some sunshine, and a mild feel, temperatures into the low teens celsius, even ten degrees for glasgow and belfast. for the week ahead, fairly unsettled with a lot of cloud and quite windy. a bit of rain at times and then turning a bit colder, particularly towards the weekend as colder air moves in off the near continent. welcome to bbc news, broadcasting to viewers in north america and around the globe. my name is lewis vaughanjones. our top stories: a test for colombia's historic peace deal — former guerillas face a tough contest in national parliamentary elections. myanmar‘s military is accused of building bases in villages where rohingya muslims were forced off their land. syrian government forces say they've recaptured more than half the rebel enclave of eastern ghouta

outside damascus. and the veteran british entertainer, sir ken dodd, dies at the age of 90.