to wrap up the annual national people's congress. xijinping will make his closing speech at congress as he prepares to begin his second term as president. uber cancels all testing of driverless cars in north america after one of its vehicles strikes and kills a woman in arizona. and this video is trending on bbc.com. this is the car believed to have been used to pick up yulia skripal, the daughter of a former russian spy from heathrow airport. the following day, she and herfather were poisoned with a nerve agent. the british military have taken the car for forensic examination. that's all from me now. stay with us on bbc world news. you can get more of our headlines on oui’ you can get more of our headlines on our website. now on bbc news, it's time for hardtalk. when it comes to seeking justice

for some of the wrongs committed by american forces, the record hasn't always been that good. my guest today flew into the middle of the my lai massacre in vietnam in 1968 and stopped the wholesale slaughter of vietnamese civilians. it was more than 30 years before anybody even bothered to say thank you. has the us military now learned the lessons it should have done from vietnam? hugh thompson, a very warm welcome to the programme. thank you very much. when you hear allegations of brutality by us troops in iraq, failure to respect the geneva conventions,

what goes through your mind? bad leadership. but it shouldn't have happened. no my lais. that's what i heard general schwartzkopf‘s marching orders were to his officers. and that made me feel good because i thought we had learned something and were going forward. and then to get slapped in the face with this is horrendous. do you think there will be

a full investigation? you've been part of investigations in the past. i think there will be a full investigation and i think... no cover—up? it's out now. see, the situation i was involved in wasn't made public till about 18 months later, from when it happened in the united states. this didn't take that long. so it's out there. technology is better and i think there will be an investigation. i think people in the military, their careers are really ruined. i don't think they'll walk scot—free this time, i really don't. when president nixon first commented on the my lai massacre, he said it was an isolated incident. was it? i think it was.

i would have a very difficult time with myself if i thought that i was part of something that was done all the time. i didn't see it. innocent civilians do get killed in wars. i don't care what army, what country... but my lai wasn't that, was it? no, it wasn't. this wasn'tjust one of those awful things that happen in war time. these were murdered. they were lined up, marched down in a ditch, some of them — 170 of them. and hands above their head and executed. that's not war. that's not what a soldier from any country does. these are murders. were you taught about the geneva conventions? yes, sir. and yet in 1971, a soldier goes before a jury and says he couldn't remember a single army class on the geneva convention. his name was rusty calley. the one man who was found guilty of the my lai massacre. he has...i would say if he says

that he has a very short memory. i will not say a lot of emphasis went in those classes. just about everybody who went through basic training had about three 50—minute blocks of instructions. they were code of conduct, geneva conventions and treatment of... i don't remember what it was called. something like treatment of prisoners. but standards were set? mm—hm, i won't say they emphasised them a lot or really delved into it. it was more or less, you know, your ticket had to be punched so you had to go to this class. it wasn't, you know... it wasn't a lot of emphasis being put on it. hugh thompson, march 16th, 1968 — 36 years have gone past. how clear in your mind

are the memories of that day? certain things too clear. other things not clear. what is clear? when you shut your eyes, what do you see? a lot of pain and suffering by a lot of people. i remember the first girl getting killed after i asked help for her. how was she killed? medina walked up and blew her away. this is one of the commanding officers on the ground? commanding officer. he shot her at point—blank range? yes, sir. you saw it in front of your eyes? yes, sir, we asked for help for her. and we werejust kind of in shock because, by that time, we had already questioned what was going on, or what we had seen happen or seen the aftermath of what had actually happened. but when you landed your helicopter,

it started all over again and was still going on? mm—hm. on two different occasions. and then we asked for help and i got a girl killed. and then we asked for help again and we got a bunch of people killed. so it was kind of obvious that asking wasn't getting the mission accomplished like i thought it should have been. so these unarmed civilians were being shot right in front of your eyes and at some point, you said "enough" and you asked your men to turn their guns on the american soldiers who were doing this? yes, sir. we didn't have any choice. we tried to...i wouldn't say be nice and friendly, but we had asked

and we were just kind of like a penned animal in a cage, i guess. it's the only way i could think of to get it to stop. if that's what it would take, that's what we would have to do. were you prepared to open fire on fellow american soldiers? yeah. you were? yes. i remember that day, i thought, well, you're gonna spend the rest of your life injail. i thank god to this day and a lot of days in between that everybody played it cool and nobody started shooting, ‘cause i'd really hate to have that on my conscience. but it was somethin — we didn't volunteer to do, it was the only way out and i felt we had to take it. you said in one of the reports

that a lot of the girls didn't scream too much because they had already had their tongues cut out. a bayonet can kill two real quick if they are pregnant. this is bestiality on an unbelievable scale, isn't it? there was a lot of bad things going on. somebody, i guess, who was actually lucky that day was one who just took a round right through the brain. because there was a lot of evil. how do you carry around the memory of that for 36 years? went for a long time just... didn't say anything. and most of the time, i'm thinking about it now, i'm talking to a class of students and if...if i can reach one person in that class and make them

think to do the right thing, it'll be worth it. do you have any explanation for why presumably previously normal people could have butchered their way through over 500 unarmed civilians on that day? i blame the number one cause is bad leadership. negative leadership, bad leadership. but these people killed with their hands, didn't they? some of them did. they killed with their bare hands and bayonets and they raped and murdered. how do you explain soldiers doing that? i think the leadership that allows them to do it, negative peer pressure, prejudice, fear. not everybody on the ground

that day took part in it. we put, i think, somewhere around 190 people on the ground. 0nly somewhere between 13 and 18, i've been told, actually took part in what was going on. the others didn't do anything to stop it, just kind of turned the other way. they knew what was going on. you could follow where the squads went. this part over here isjust a normal village and this part over here looks pretty bad. when you got it to stop, when you threatened your fellow us soldiers and you got it to stop, you called in assistance, you called in a gunship, you managed to get some children out and some survivors out. i...civilians, there were children with them.

there was old men, old women. i remember the one little girl, you know, she was hanging onto her mother's knee. she was probably four or six, something like that. got them out. i could only see three. when they started coming out, reality started coming in. "what in the world am i going to do with these people?" i can't leave them here. they're going to die. i can't get them out of there, i don't have the capability of my aircraft. that's when i called a friend of mine in and i said, "hey, do me a favour and get them out of the area." you got them out and when you flew back to headquarters, what did you do then?

i was very mad. you were crying, weren't you? yeah, crying. screaming. and at people who outranked me, you know, and just lost it. totally. you can't make me fly. to show that you are a pilot, you had a set of wings. you wanted to leave? i said i would rip my wings off because i didn't want to take part in this. there was an investigation. i think i thought something had been done. but it was a whitewash because the official army report, the first army report claimed a great victory and said 128 enemy dead, only one american casualty. but they already knew better than that because they had your evidence, didn't they?

yeah. i can't remember... everyone lied, didn't they? all the commanders on the ground lied? that one didn't. there was a report that 20 civilians had been killed inadvertently. that was a straight lie, wasn't it? yes. captain medina lied, as well, and admitted later, in the end, that he had lied. this was the man you had seen shooting a girl. yeah, well, his scenario, when he was in his court martial, they believed his scenario rather than mine, i guess, at the time. you stayed 13 years in the service after that. it wasn't the same, though, was it? as fast as it came up after the court marshalling, it died down. but you were ostracised for a while?

for a while. you'd go somewhere and people would disappear? yeah, when it first broke and people didn't know the facts, they forgot all about it very soon after it happened. but, personally, you paid a heavy price in terms of depression, over the years. a lot of nightmares that you went through. mm—hm. four marriages. well, there's been multiple marriages. it's been hard for you to carry around, hasn't it? no. no? no, it's life, you know? you've gotta do it. you know, life goes on. can you ever forgive the people who did that? no. nope, i can't. i don't think i'm man enough to. ‘cause i know... i know the pain and suffering

that they inflicted for no reason, no reason whatsoever. there was no threat. uh... you know, there was no enemy. now they might have all grown up to be enemy, but that's not what a soldier does, in any country. it's just not. and when you think of those who walked away from it, got on with their lives, had children, set up businesses. they've got to live with themselves. i imagine some of them don't have an easy time. i'm ok with what i did. ijust, you know, know the unnecessary pain and suffering and know how fragile human life is. in 1969, rusty calley, the officer on the ground who was eventually held

responsible, was flown back for an identification parade. you were asked to identify him. mm—hm. what went through your mind when you saw that? uh... you know, just, uh... well, i knew i'd seen him, and i couldn't remember whether it was at the ditch or the bunker. but i knew he was one of ‘em. and, um... i blocked a lot of that out of my mind. i think that's god's way of maintaining sanity. only 25 officers and enlisted men were prosecuted. only a handful ever came to trial. only one man was found guilty, and he served four and a half

months behind bars. no, i think three days. three days? and a little bit of house arrest. oh, yeah, he had a lot of house arrest with conjugal visits. now that's a rough life. this was a farce, wasn't it? mm—hm. armyjustice was a farce? in that case. the army justice system is a good justice system. i do believe that yes, it let us down. i think it let the army down, i think it let the united states down. it let you down as well, didn't it? yeah, mm—hm. not many people said thank you, did they? 0h, nbobody did. you got intimidated, you got dead animals left on your porch, you got threatened by congress. one of the congressmen in the inquiry even suggested that you should be put behind bars. mm—hm. so you didn't get many thanks from a grateful

nation, did you? no, i didn't get any. but it's not the nation's fault. you know, they were... ithink... but you stopped the killing and rusty calley had jimmy carter, who was then governor of georgia, rooting for him, you had flags flying at half mast on tate legislatures, you had this man being proclaimed on radio stations as a hero and you, who stopped the killing, were being ostracised. yeah, it makes you think. uh... yeah, i had a hard time one day going into georgia, because that's where calley was court marshalled. and he's, ithink, originally from florida and i'm a georgian native, and i'm hearing my governor on the radio say, "leave your lights on today to show support for lieutenant calley." what's this world coming to? but the people didn't have the facts, that's what it was. you believe something that a high—ranking congressman says.

it should be true, but low ranking congressmen were standing off to the side and asking one another, "was he in the same room i was in?" because they heard that i said there was a massacre and he says, "i saw nothing to indicate there was any wrongdoing." and it was secret testimony. and i couldn't say anything because, believe me, i was under a gag order and i was scared, that i was gonna go to jail. and, uh... so i wasn't talking to anybody. hugh thompson, you went back to my lai. you went back on the 30th anniversary. there was no official representative from the american government there, was there? not one. uh... i guess i'd be the only representative of the american government there. you met one of the women who survived, several

people who survived. mm—hm. what did they say to you? thanked me. one of them came from out of nowhere, you know, we didn't know she was coming. her interpreter brought her up and says, "i want to meet mr thompson". everybody was kind of shocked. mr wallace said, "well, here's mr thompson". she wanted to know why, and i was very upset. but, you know, i couldn't answer, sorry i couldn't help her. i'd always wondered in my mind, did somebody there know that not all americans were crazy and went mad that day? i wonder if they ever knew somebody was trying to help. and boy, i was real happy when she knew we tried to help. and she thanked me and i told her

i was sorry i couldn't help that day, and then going through the interpreter was real difficult because they only say, like, a half a sentence at a time. and she asked, you know, "why didn't the people that had done the killing come back with us?" and i lost it. you know, i can't — how to you answer this, you know? and i was getting ready to and then she finished the sentence and said, "so we could forgive them". i thought oh my god... it was over with for me right then because itjust tore me up. these people, my enemies, you know, have that much forgiveness in their hearts. and i'm not man enough to forgive my own people, who did it.

i can't do it. it's hard. but you lecture. you've lectured at west point, at the naval academy. i call it talking. i don't lecture. you've counselled, veterans. mm—hm. i still work with veterans every day, trying to help them. and what do you tell them about my lai? i don't have to tell them anything. now some of the ones i work with know about it, well, all of them know about it now, i guess. uh, they tell me things. i have never talked at a military or a veterans function where anybody hadn't agreed with me. because if you get somebody... i'm not... i don't cut down a brigade or soldier. i think a soldier in the army or navy or marine corps

is a very honourable profession. these were not soldiers, these were hoodlums and terrorists, disguised like soldiers. no soldier is taught to do that. if he does something like that, he's no longer a soldier because he's not living by the creed of a soldier. think it's time to remind people of that, given what's been going on in iraq? i think it's very obviously, it's time to remind them again. hugh thompson, it's been good having you on the programme. thank you. yes, sir, thank you very much. i appreciate it. hello there.

0ur weather's showing signs of catching up on the season, going from something that has felt more like winter to something more springlike over the next few days. now over the weekend, london temperatures barely got above freezing. there is a trend to seeing things warm up and by thursday, temperatures should reach double temperatures in the capital. of course the big change has been this area of high pressure, which brought us the beast. that same area of high pressure has now just sunk to the south—west of the uk. that's dragged in colder air. that will continue to be the case over the next couple of days. 0n the satellite picture, we are looking at an area of cloud sinking its way southwards at the moment and that cloud is just thick enough to bring us a few light showers, so for the early risers there is the potential

of catching one or two showers across parts of the midlands, east anglia and south—east england. i won't be surprised to see the odd flake falling from that, given that the temperatures for most of us are at or below freezing. a particularly cold start to the day in scotland, where temperatures down potentially to as low as —8. for tuesday, we will have a cloudy start to the day for most of england. should be fairly sunny across scotland. with this cloud, one or two showers pushing on towards the midlands for a time during the day, but the cloud will tend to shrink and shrivel, with some sunshine as we go on through the afternoon. for many of us, a decent kind of day. temperatures up to nine degrees in london. that was tuesday's weather. as we get towards wednesday, we start to drag in some milder air towards the atlantic, but with that comes the threat of more rain. before that arrives, it's going to be another fairly cold night, particularly across england and wales, the temperatures not as low in scotland and northern ireland, where we'll have that increasingly cloudy look to the weather. with outbreaks of rain skirting into northern ireland. the rain heavy at

times and persistent across the western side of scotland. sunshine probably across central and eastern parts of england. we are looking at highs of around nine degrees in london again, but the temperatures in scotland and northern ireland are reaching double figures. ten or 11 degrees in the warmest spots, and that warming trend continues on into thursday. thursday, potentially a little bit of rain around, getting close to eastern england. it could be quite wet for some. the weather going downhill for the west, as the next band of rain works in. temperatures pretty much across the board will be reaching double figures. that's your latest weather. i'm mariko 0i in singapore, the headlines. all eyes on china's president xi jinping as he wraps up the annual national people's congress and gets set for his second term at the top. devastating wildfires in south—west australia leave hundreds of people unable to return home.

host destroyed and cattle killed. —— homes. i'm sharanjit leyl in london. also in the programme. uber cancels all testing of driverless cars in north america, after one of its vehicles strikes and kills a woman in arizona. and eight years on — has a statue of the virgin mary stopped god—fearing locals in the philippines from destroying the coral reefs?