to circulate fake news online. first, the local elections in england last week provided an incomplete and complicated picture of electoral support, but the verdict from bbc news seemed pretty clear. a disappointing night for labour in the local elections in england, as the party makes limited gains and doesn't win some of its key councils. jeremy corbyn‘s party took plymouth from the conservatives, but failed to win any of its target councils in london, and lost nuneaton and bedworth. the conservatives celebrated london as the party held onto their flagship boroughs, but lose trafford, their only council in greater manchester. theresa may said overall it was a good night. it's hard to detect trends in local elections, because not all seats are up for grabs, and gains and losses have to be weighed against the last time they were contested, and the state of the parties then.

success or failure also relate of course to expectations, but did bbc news raise or at least amplify expectations for the labour party, and then judge their performance a failure for not living up to them? some viewers certainly thought so, with rose doyle writing... sarah coates said us this sarcastic version of bbc news headlines, as they sounded to her. and ben lawrence e—mailed... well, we put those points to bbc news, and they told us: now, news, and they told us:

now, president trump's announcement on tuesday that the usa was withdrawing from the nuclear agreement signed by barack obama has pushed iran to the top of the news agenda. wednesday's news at ten examined the impact of that decision, with some specialist input. my colleague, rana rahimpour, of bbc persian is with me here in the studio to tell us more about the reaction in tehran. rana? yes, huw.

almost three years ago when the nuclear deal was signed, there were... but rana rahimpourand her colleagues have a problem. for the past nine years bbc persian staff have faced persecution at the hands of the iranian authorities, and that has recently escalated. in march, the bbc made an unprecedented appeal to the united nations to lobby iran to stop harassing its staff, on world press freedom day. the campaign continued with a demonstration outside broadcasting house in london. well, jamie angus, the director of the bbc‘s world service group, is here to tell us more. can you summarise first what has been happening with bbc persian journalists? well, our journalists who broadcast in farsi to iran are all based here in london, and that's primarily because they can't safely return to iran under fear of arrest. that's gone on for many years now, but more worryingly in recent years we've had an escalation of that harassment, which now applies to their wider families back in iran, and in particular to an entirely vexatious national security case, brought by one of the revolutionary

courts in iran, which has seen their families‘ assets, of up to 150 persian service staff, effectively frozen, which has been very, very worrisome for them. what are the bbc doing about the situation? we've been running a series of public campaigns to draw attention to the plight of the persian service staff in this regard, and we've engaged significantly, as you mention, with the united nations, at the un human rights council in geneva, and we'll be continuing that kind of engagement with the un and other bodies during the course of the year. but of course it's important that everyone remembers that these journalists have done nothing wrong, they are engaged under the same editorial terms as all other bbc staff who produce our trusted international news, and the harassment and collective punishment, if you like, of theirfamilies inside iran is a really big and significant and worrying step, and it's one that we are urging publicly the iranian authorities to reverse as soon as possible. now, we are in a situation with rapidly escalating things going on in the middle east over the nuclear deal and with israel. how is the bbc going to be able

to report this all safely? well, of course the persian service, you know, have their own contacts inside iran, and we inform ourselves as to what's happening there, as we've done for a number of years. it is true that some of our english news—gathering colleagues are able to travel to iran on occasion, sometimes in the context of ministerial or other state visits, so lyse doucet and jeremy bowen have travelled to iran in recent years and reported for the english—language output of the bbc. so there has never been a more important time for the kind of understanding of the iranians story, like you just saw in the clip there, that comes from the world service, the funded iranians service, to reach licence fee paying audiences here in the uk, because this is a really crucial time for that story. jamie angus, thank you, and stay with us because we are going to talk about something else now, which is the threat to bbc we re journalism where the danger is not so much to individual employees, as to the integrity and reputation of the corporation itself.

and to the democratic process. we have breaking news of a serious incident between russian and nato forces, near the coast of latvia... this is not a bbc news bulletin, despite the authentic looking studio. but it is a video posted on youtube last month, warning on what's app. warning, on what's app. the bbc made it clear it was fake, but not before it had been widely shared. these are truly extraordinary scenes... russian warships firing directly at us and british forces from nato, in what now surely must represent a state of war... and it's not the first time this has happened. lastjuly, a report appeared on social media imitating the bbc‘s focus on africa programme, and featuring a bogus survey, falsely showing president kenyatta to be well ahead in the polls for the forthcoming kenyan election.

the programme's editor pointed out the discrepancies. now, at first sight it could pass for a clip from this programme. but if you look very carefully you will notice there is a noticeable difference in the programme's branding, focus on africa. this is what the fake news strap looks like, and this is what the focus on africa struck actually looks like. in an increase in news with a survey of india being shed last week. on monday the bbc tweeted that it did not in fact come from bbc news. jamie angus is still with me. there is all kinds of nonsense, we know, would circulate on the internet. what is it about this material that is so worrying for the bbc? one thing i am particularly concerned about is how material is shared on chat apps as it is on a regular website like facebook, twitter, it

is easily searchable, but chat apps are very difficult to search because they are private and the material almost surfaces once it has already been seen potentially by hundreds of thousands, millions of people. what you think the motives are of people posting videos like that one we showed? it is very interesting, the fa ke showed? it is very interesting, the fake nato russia confrontation was a perfectly innocent video, and when it appeared on you tube as part of a corporate training exercise, it was very clearly labelled as fake, it was clear what it was, but once people stripped off and circulate it in chat apps all of that context gets lost. the other examples you quoted, interestingly around elections, something we are noticing more and more were probably more malicious attempts to influence voting decisions, and something to look out for, with big elections in india and nigeria, big sets of national elections, so something we need to look at in world service, when to call these out and when to just ignore them. the bbc office

does sometimes go public to this associate itself with some of the hoax stories we have seen, as with the indian one in the past week. why do you not just the indian one in the past week. why do you notjust ignore it? and what do you notjust ignore it? and what do do you choose what to ignore?‘ difficult balance has to be struck because we very much don't want to draw attention to things which are entirely fictitious and fictitious and bogus and militias and have not acquired a profile. in these three insta nces acquired a profile. in these three instances the reason we did respond is we knew they had circulated really widely, and as you saw from rachel explaining the focus on africa clip, it is not that easy to tell sometimes. they can be quite professionally faked and done, so we are urging audiences, when you cbbc material that does not link directly toa material that does not link directly to a bbc app or come from another trusted third party adviser, take ca re before trusted third party adviser, take care before you share, think about the material before you sure, and have the idea it might not always be what it seems. that is telling viewers what they can do. is there anything else the bbc can do to stop this? we can take legal steps to protect our own brands and copyright

but i think what you're seeing from these examples, the proliferation of malicious fake news can take place very quickly and it is often harderfor code of slow—moving legal process to catch up slow—moving legal process to catch up with that, so that is why as a news organisation we need to take decisions in real—time on whether to couege decisions in real—time on whether to college things when we see them coming up. but with things like the what's app showed footage we wonder if there is a connection with trawling which we have seen. are you worried trust in the bbc brand is being eroded with these incidents? no, actually i think the fake news conversation around the world remains people to double down and go back to their most trusted news providers and we know the bbc news brand globally is the most trusted brand, so we are reasonably confident overall that audiences will come back to the brands they trust the most, but what you're seeing is these individual instances where we have to be really careful

about protecting our brand and our values and challenging it when they are being misused maliciously. jamie angus, thank you. thank you. thank you for all your comments this week. if you want to share your views on current affairs or even appear on the programme, you can call us on the programme, you can call us on the number on screen or e—mail us at newswatch, you can contact us on twitter and keep an eye on the website. next week we won't be appearing on bbc one saturday brea kfast appearing on bbc one saturday breakfast as normal because they will be looking forward to a certain high—profile wedding that way, which you may want to contact us about, but you will be able to watch the programme at 8:45pm on friday evening, an hour later than normal, on the news channel, or catch up with us of course on the iplayer. for now, though, bye—bye. hello, there. weekend forecast on the way in just a moment. today it has been another day of the west— east split in our

weather, brighter, drier and day of the west— east split in our weather, brighter, drierand warmer, sunny conditions in the east of the uk, but later on we have seen cloud increasing. everything coming from the west of course, more cloud around, cooler and also some outbreaks of rain. there are a few showers threatening to come into the south—west in time for the weekend, but firstly we have to move this band of cloud through and it is moving very slowly. because the winds are dropping, the band of cloud and the rain is slowing down as well, and that gives us headaches into the weekend. the rain is tending to peter out, mostly affecting the northern half of the ukfora affecting the northern half of the uk for a while, clearer skies arriving later on. and in northern ireland and into wales, those temperatures would be far away from freezing in the countryside. into the weekend, —— will not be far away from freezing. i think it will brighten up in scotland, some sunshine here and some sunshine for awhile in eastern england. again, looking at the clouds thickening to bring rain from the south—east to travel north. further west across

the uk, some sunshine, but showers for northern ireland, wales and the south—west of england. temperatures a little lower than today, 16 or 17. focusing on this rain here, this is giving us a lot of uncertainty. this rain is travelling northwards, into the midlands, into northern england. how far west it gets, that's where things could get a little tricky. the models are in disagreement. it looks like it'll really be the eastern side of england, then up into the east of scotland that will get the rain overnight. further west, again, largely dry. she is fading away, a little chilly and milder underneath the and rain. —— showers fading away. the first area of rain should work north into scotla nd of rain should work north into scotland but another area of rain arriving quickly in the morning in the south—east wood south—east —— in the south—east wood south—east —— in the south—east, but that means in the south—east, but that means in the west more sunshine but this time we're not seeing the same number of showers we thought we would for northern ireland, wales and the south—west, it should be largely

drive. no doubt the details will still change. wouldn't you just know it? into next week, things calm down, high pressure building, so a lot of dry weather a round, sunny spells and for many it should be warmer. this is bbc news. i'm eleanor garnier. the headlines at eight. the prime minister agrees to two additional panel members for the grenfell tower inquiry — after pressure from campaigners. we want to know why the fire started, how the fire started. the culture of the institutions that were supposed to listen to the concerns of the community. why did this happen? more money for grammar schools in england. the government says it'll mean more choice for parents — labour calls it a vanity project. ireland's prime minister apologises

after more than 200 women were wrongly told that their smear tests were all clear. 17 have since died. it hasn't hit me that i am dying. because i am so worried that people are going to get away with it. also tonight.