welcome to bbc news, broadcasting to viewers in north america and around the globe. my name is nkem ifejika. our top stories: all eyes on china's president xi jinping, as he wraps up the annual national people's congress and gets ready for his second term at the top. police in austin, texas hunt a serial bomber for the attacks in their city. four parcel bombs have gone off in recent days. investigators widen their search in the spy poisoning case, as international chemical weapons experts arrive in the uk. china's president xijinping is delivering a speech to close the annual session of

the national people's congress. it's been a significant people's congress with the presidential term limits being lifted, in effect making xijingping ‘president for life', should he choose to. our correspondent stephen mcdonell is following the people's congress for us in beijing. as we began to weeks ago, we have finally reached the end. —— two weeks. absolutely. we have seen this historic congress come to an end, with an already powerful xi jinping in an even stronger position with the abolition of the two term limit on the president. he can now effectively stay on as leader for as long as he chooses. we said before that he could have remained in power as the head of the central military commission and the communist party but he also wants to be the

president and that is why they have made this change to the constitution to enable him to do that. he started off his speech by thanking all of the delegates, nearly 3000 delegates of the congress or putting their trust in him again, for voting for him again there. it is hard to convey the enormous change that has actually taken place here at this congress because we have not seen a political shift like this in decades here. what has the president been saying? he has sat down now and it seems as he is done giving his speech. what was he saying?m seems as he is done giving his speech. what was he saying? it has been an unexpectedly large speech

and to unpack this, we have a guest here that is going to help us do this. if i could introduce doctor lawrence, who has been advising the chinese government for 30 years and has written the book how china's leaders think. he would know better than anyone to explain how significant this is. this speech, we never used to have speeches like this, this was always a day for the premier, rather than the president of china, what has changed? an enormous change, china talks about a new chris read, today it was proved that it was notjust new chris read, today it was proved that it was not just words, new chris read, today it was proved that it was notjust words, it is reality. until now, normally you have the party and the government. big change in the new era, now the party is overarching over the government in a comprehensive way, xijinping

government in a comprehensive way, xi jinping has been like that. it people say he is the most powerful leader, maybe since mao. i would say it from the. if you define the power as the capacity to do work with the rate that you do work, he is more powerful than mao, using that definition. he knows how to use the resources of china, you have seen the government restructuring and streamlining, ministries are no longer overlapping you have two a major national supervision commissions against corruption and sustainability and development. you have seen a really control of the government. very briefly, what about his speech dealt with today? what are some things that he said? his speech dealt with today? what are some things that he said7m his speech dealt with today? what are some things that he said? it was are some things that he said? it was a grand speeches. the grand vision. the valedictory of this whole season

from the party congress until now. it began with chinese history, looking to the future. but sending a message to the world that china will uphold the international order, not undermine it. he also talked about chinese wisdom, chinese solution and chinese wisdom, chinese solution and chinese strength to facilitate all mankind. his vision of a community ofa mankind. his vision of a community of a shared future for all mankind. it isa of a shared future for all mankind. it is a message to china primarily and a message to the world as well. aq and a message to the world as well. a0 very much. we will be expecting to hear very soon from the premier, china's number two leader. —— thank new. pretty soon he will be having his annual press conference and it will be interesting to see if he gets asked about the power that xi jinping has been given. we will breathe bringing more of that to you in the coming hours of. —— we will be bringing. —— in the coming hours. see you in five years time, whether we see if he indeed extends

presidency again. president trump has outlined plans to combat america's opioid epidemic, including introducing the death penalty for drug dealers in certain circumstances. 0ver—prescription of opioid painkillers such as morphine and codeine has created a nationwide addiction crisis, with patients turning to heroin and other street drugs when their prescriptions stop. 0ur north america editor jon sopel reports. during the election campaign, donald trump called new hampshire a drug—infested den. today, he has gone back to the granite state to show his rock solid determination to deal with america's appalling opioid crisis and by using the most draconian measures possible. if we do not get tough on the drug dealers, we're wasting our time. remember that, we are wasting our time. that toughness includes the death penalty. applause. but it is notjust about the criminaljustice system. he wants opioid prescriptions cut

by a third and the drugs companies held more accountable. this crisis is hitting every community, rich and poor, black and white, young and old, urban and rural. the biggest cause of death is drug overdose amongst the under 50s in america. and two thirds of those deaths are caused by opioid abuse. that is $110 right there. america for decades has had a war on drugs and yes, it has resulted in hundreds of thousands of mainly black and latinos men being incarcerated, but it has had zero success in reducing dependency or use of illegal drugs or prescription drugs. thank you, please be seated. this court in buffalo, new york state, looks unremarkable, but has become the first in america to deal with only one type of case, opioid addiction. i will release you today and i need you to report here tomorrow... the judge, himself once an addict, is determined to rethink the way

america handles opioid abuse. i think we made a tremendous mistake in the 1960s and 70s and 80s and 90s of locking people up and we are not going to make that same mistake now, because we have the research and data to show that you cannot lock up an addiction. carly mayor had to be resuscitated three times in one week at the height of her addiction to opioids. when someone cares about you, what your problems are, how we can help you, it remind you that deep inside there is a person, that needs and deserves love. much has been made of how polarised politics has become in the us. on this, though, there is broad agreement that simply locking people up is not enough, but finding the correct policy prescription, to deal with the abuse of prescription drugs is proving elusive. jon sopel, bbc news, washington. police in texas say a serial bomber is on the loose in the city of austin.

three parcel bombs earlier this month killed two african—american men and wounded a hispanic woman. in the latest attack on sunday, a bomb seriously injured two young white men. gary 0'donoghue reports. neighbourhood emerging from a night long lockdown after police were forced to wait the daylight before they can declare this part of the city safe. nothing like that happens around here. that kind of stuff happens someone else, you know? it isa happens someone else, you know? it is a block and a half away, so it is scary. this was the fourth bombing in16 days, at scary. this was the fourth bombing in 16 days, at tax that have a ready killed two african—american men and seriously injured three other people. but this latest attack was different. not parcel bombs like the others, seemingly aimed at specific people, but a device left on the sidewalk and triggered by some sort of tripwire, as two young men walked

by. with this tripwire, this change is in. it is more sophisticated, it is in. it is more sophisticated, it is not targeted to individuals. we are concerned about the tripwire is are concerned about the tripwire is a child could walk down the street and hit something. it is very important that here in austin, if anybody sees any thing suspicious, do not go near that package, immediately call law enforcement so we can get bomb technicians out there to deal with suspect packages. the latest victims have significant injuries but are stable in hospital. police safe so far they have no suspects. we are clearly dealing with what we expect to be a serial bomber at this point, based on similarities on what now is the fourth device and again as we look at this individual and pattern and what we are looking at here, we will have to determine whether we see a specific ideology behind this. have to determine whether we see a specific ideology behind thisfi first two victims were like from prominent african—american families who knew one another, leading to speculation is this could be hate crimes. at the indiscriminate nature

of last night attack, where both victims were white, means the authorities simply don't know what sort of motivation they are dealing with. the ride—hailing company uber has suspended all tests of self—driving cars, after a woman in arizona was killed in a collision. at the time of the accident, the vehicle was running in autonomous mode with an operator at the wheel. it is the first time a pedestrian has died in an accident involving a self—driving car. uber described what happened as "incredibly sad" and said it was fully co—operating with local authorities. our technology correspondent dave lee reports from san francisco. it was late sunday night when, according to police, elaine herzberg was struck by uber‘s self—driving car. the 49—year—old was crossing the road, but not using the pedestrian zone. there was a driver behind the wheel, but uber said the vehicle was in full autonomous mode, meaning it was handling all aspects of the driving. miss herzberg was taken to hospital, but died from her injuries. taking to twitter,

uber‘s chief executive, dara khosrowshahi, said the news from arizona was "incredibly sad", adding: as part of its licensing agreement, uber must keep detailed logs in case of an incident like this. although miss herzberg is the first pedestrian to be killed by an autonomous vehicle, her death comes one year after uber temporarily took its self—driving cars off the road following an accident that left a volvo suv on its side in arizona. the programme was later reinstated. there are so many motor vehicle deaths in the united states, and generally, every year. and the ultimate goal of self—driving cars is to eliminate those entirely. but these are complex systems that are just sort of starting to navigate the roads. arizona has positioned itself as a testing ground for this new technology. but incidents like this will no doubt concerned those who do not believe these systems are yet safe enough to be on our roads. the uk's information commissioner elizabeth denham says she will seek

a warrant to look at the databases and servers used by the data mining company cambridge analytica. a former employee at the firm claims they were handed the personal data of 50 million facebook users which was then used to influence the 2016 us presidential election. facebook‘s shares finished nearly 7% down, after a turbulent day on the new york stock exchange. both cambridge analytica and facebook deny any wrongdoing. stay with us on bbc news, still to come: how a statue of the virgin mary has stopped god—fearing locals in the philippines from destroying coral reefs. today, we have closed the book on apartheid and that chapter. more than 3,000 subway passengers were affected.

nausea, bleeding, headaches and the dimming of vision, all of this caused by an apparently organised attack. the trophy itself was on the pedestal in the middle of the cabinet here. now, this was an international trophy and we understand now that the search for it has become an international search. above all, this was a triumph for the christian democrats of the west, offering reunification as quickly as possible, and that's what the voters wanted. this is bbc news. these are the latest headlines: china's president xijinping has

been making his final speech at the annual national people's congress. here said only socialism can solve china's problems. —— he said. here in the uk, an international team of chemical weapons experts has arrived in salisbury to examine the nerve agent used to poison the former russian spy sergei skripal, and his daughter, yulia. the bbc understands that british investigators have broadened their search to include a car that yulia skripal is believed to have travelled in, as our diplomatic correspondent james landale reports. the focus today shifted to the village of durrington, ten miles north of salisbury, where investigators removed a car that was used to pick up yulia skripal from the airport the day before she and her father sergei were attacked with nerve agent. nearby, at the military research complex at porton down, inspectors from the global chemical weapons watchdog, the 0pcw, were due to start analysing the nerve agent that british experts believe

came from russia. in brussels, the foreign secretary arrived to brief eu counterparts, saying russian denials were increasingly absurd. this is a classic russian strategy of trying to conceal the needle of truth in a haystack of lies and obfuscation. there is scarcely a country round the table here in brussels that has not been affected in recent years by some kind of malign or disruptive russian behaviour. eu foreign ministers issued a statement expressing their unqualified solidarity with the uk, and taking its assessment that russia was to blame extremely seriously. the eu and nato speaking as one. what is absolutely clear is our full solidarity with the united kingdom, and our extreme concern about what has happened. that is really unacceptable. all 29 nato allies stand united.

we stand in solidarity with the united kingdom, and the uk is not alone. but in moscow, as president putin began his fourth term, the defiance continued. his foreign ministry dismissing the eu statement as an anti—russian reflex. as for russia's diplomats in london, well, some of these officials and their families will be heading home tomorrow, 23 in all, with a similar number of british diplomats leaving moscow shortly. tomorrow, the national security council will meet to decide britain's next step. there's a live debate within government — should they retaliate and escalate, or simply do nothing? should they kick yet more russian diplomats out of the embassy here, or should they find new ways of penalising russia ? the risk for britain is that a bilateral confrontation with russia might overshadow attempts to maintain international pressure. back in salisbury, the police

tonight revealed the full scale of the investigation, with 250 counter—terrorism officers examining 4,000 hours of cctv, 800 exhibits and 400 witness statements. detectives said this could last many months. james landale, bbc news. britain and the european union say they've agreed the terms of a transitional period after brexit. the deal covers citizenship and financing the divorce. but there still remains the sticking point of how to avoid a hard border between northern ireland and the irish republic, which is farfrom resolved. in the withdrawal agreement will be the eu's preferred option that northern ireland, part of the uk, remains still under the eu's rules, regulations, customs zone as well, the customs union, if a better solution can't be found. now, the uk still doesn't view that as the preferred option. that still has to be sorted out

in the negotiations, how that would work. and that is the big stumbling block. let's take a look at some of the other stories making the news. a ukrainian military pilot blamed by russia for the downing of malaysian airlines flight mh17 has reportedly taken his own life. vladyslav voloshyn has always denied russian allegations that he was behind the tragedy. dutch investigators concluded that a russian missile fired from the ground destroyed the jet, killing 298 people in 2014. students in miami returning to class after the spring break have held a campus—wide moment of silence for the six victims killed in a bridge collapse. the pedestrian bridge, built on the florida international university campus, came crashing down days after it was built. investigators are still looking into what led the bridge to collapse. doctors have restored the sight of two patients with the most common form of blindness in the uk. more than 600,000 people in the uk

suffer from age—related macular degeneration, and doctors hope the treatment could be widely available within a few years. the team at moorfields eye hospital, here in london, used surgery to insert stem cells at the back of the eye. 0ur medical correspondent fergus walsh has the story. before his pioneering stem cell treatment, douglas waters was com pletely treatment, douglas waters was completely blind in his right eye. now he can see. everyone wanted to go outside when the rain finally stopped. that is perfect, so this is amazing. ijust could not believe it and each morning, i would pick things out in the paper and to look out in the garden. i would do this andi out in the garden. i would do this and i am really chuffed, i suppose you could say. and so is his

surgeon, two patients with age—related macular degeneration had the sight restoring treat at moorfields eye hospital in london. —— treatment. moorfields eye hospital in london. -- treatment. we are able to show that we could take someone who could not read it all, they could not in fa ct not read it all, they could not in fact see the book that they were supposed to be reading from, and taking them to reading around 60 to 80 words a minute without their reading glasses. for us, this is a fantastic result. and it could help those with age—related macular degeneration, who could lose all of their vision. it is the part of the i responsible for vision. age—related macular degeneration is triggered when it caught layer of support sales, seen here in green, die. asa support sales, seen here in green, die. as a result, patients gradually

lose the ability to read or to recognise faces. scientists used stem cells from a human embryo and turned them into the support sales needed. they were put onto a tiny patch like this, which was placed at the back of douglas's five. you can see it here, the stem cell is replaced his vision. —— douglas's eye. i think this is one of the first indications from regenerative medicine that that can be achieved, we can stop people from going blind. douglas, who was 86, says the stem—cell therapy has given him and independence. the hospital says it should be no more expensive than other treatments, and potentially could help save the sight of thousands of patients. absolutely incredible story. eight years ago, a statue of the virgin mary was sunk off the coast of bohol in

the philippines in an attempt to prevent dynamite fishing. the illegal practice causes huge damage to coral reefs. now a group called the sea knights — who helped to put the statue in place — have returned to assess its success. howard johnson reports. dotted across the blue waters of the pacific ocean are the 7000 islands that make up the philippines. many of them are hours away from the mainland, and that makes policing them incredibly difficult. joselito ca ba nsay knows this only too well. for years, he was a dynamite fisherman — an illegal practice that risks life and limb, but rewards with lucrative catches. translation: normal fishing is like earning a minimum wage salary compared to illegal fishing, that produces a large sum of fish. fishermen see it as a jackpot income. in 2010, dynamite fishing was so widespread that the local authorities and a group of faith inspired divers, called the sea knights, decided to take action. they placed a statue

of the virgin mary at a site where most of the explosions took place. it was hoped that the god—fearing fishing community would stop illegal activity in the presence of a religious icon. nearly ten years on, and the sea knights have returned to the statue. aside from paying their respects to the virgin mary today and laying flowers at her feet, biologists within the group will also be looking to assess the health of the coral down there, to see if it has improved since their last visit. as we descended towards the virgin mary, it became clear that the statue's appearance had undergone a dramatic change. it's now entirely covered in coral. after praying, the sea knights cleaned the statue, removing barnacles and limpets. back on the surface, i spoke

to the group's marine biologist. so around the statue, what was the state of the coral? they're also growing. so positive signs today? yeah, that's a positive sign. the local authorities say the virgin mary has reduced the number of dynamite fishers from hundreds to just a handful but, with limited resources, it is unlikely that illegal fishing can be totally eradicated. despite this, the sea knights continue their work in the community to raise awareness about marine conservation. they'll be back in september to celebrate the nativity of the virgin mary. howard johnson, bbc news, bohol, in the philippines. peter and andrew, at the patron saint of fishermen must be smiling. bye— bye. hello there.

0ur weather's showing signs of catching up on the season, going from something that has felt a bit 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 mini beast from the east. that same area of high pressure has now just sunk to the south—west of the uk. and so, we're dragging in some slightly less cold 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 wouldn't be surprised to see an odd flake falling from it, given that the temperatures for most of us are at or below freezing. and a particularly cold start to the day in scotland, where temperatures potentially down as low as —8 in the coldest spots. for tuesday, we'll 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 either side of it as we go on through the afternoon. for many of us, a decent kind of day. those temperatures up to nine degrees in london. that was tuesday's weather. now, as we get towards wednesday, we start to drag in some milder air off 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 quite

persistent across the western side of scotland. a few breaks in the cloud, the best of any 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, well, potentially a little bit of rain around, getting close to eastern england. so it could be quite wet for some. the weather going downhill further 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. this is bbc news — the headlines: president xi jinping wraps up the national people's congress saying only socialism can solve china's problems. during his thirty—five minute address to the 3000 delegates, he spelt out his party's message to self—ruled taiwan that no chinese land will be separated from the mainland. president trump has outlined plans to combat america's opioid epidemic, including introducing the death

penalty for drug dealers in certain circumstances. 0ver—prescription of opioid painkillers such as morphine and codeine has created a nationwide addiction crisis. police in texas say a serial bomber is on the loose in the city of austin. three parcel bombs earlier this month killed two african—american men, and wounded an hispanic woman. in the latest attack on sunday, a bomb seriously injured two white men. now on bbc news, monday in parliament.