at least five people have died, including two children and their great—grandmother, as a huge wildfire sweeps across northern california. 17 people are missing and nearly 40,000 have been forced to flee. firefighters are battling the blaze. they say it's only 5% contained so far. pope francis has accepted the resignation of a prominent us cardinal. the catholic church found that allegations theodore mccarrick had sexually abused a teenager were credible and substantiated. the 88—year—old is the first man to leave the college of cardinals in almost a century. the two main candidates in zimba bwe‘s presidential elections have addressed large crowds of supporters in the capital, harare. president emmerson mnangagwa of the zanu—pf party faces a challenge nelson chamisa of the opposition mdc. it's the first presidential poll since robert mugabe was ousted from power in november, now on bbc news, dateline london.

hello, a warm welcome to dateline london, i'mjane hill, and this week we're discussing the british prime minister's summer charm offensive in europe and asking, what is the new deal in the middle east? we'll discuss syria, iran and the us's approach. my guests this week: the british politicaljournalist steve richards, with us before he heads off to the edinburgh festival with his one—man show; from germany's die welt, stephanie bolzen; the editor of the abu—dhabi—based daily

the nation, mina al 0raibi,' and the american writer and broadcasterjeff mcallister. it's summer — school's out, and so is parliament. but there's no rest for senior members of the british government. theresa may says she has now taken personal control of the brexit negotiations, and she and her ministers are fanning out across europe on a charm offensive, trying to win over leaders to her vision, the chequers vision, of future relations between the uk and the rest of the eu once we've left the bloc. steve, it's been a bumpy few weeks — how many times have we discussed whether the pm is safe? she remains fragile. she remains, i think, in the most extraordinary position of any prime minister for many decades. there she is, promoting, as you say, going around european capitals, her proposition for brexit, very detailed. which has already

triggered two cabinet resignations, several ministerial resignations, there is no evidence at the moment of a majority for it in the house of commons, the reaction of barnier representing the rest of the eu suggests there are huge barriers to overcome from the brussels perspective. it is an extraordinary situation, because on one level certainly her proposition in the white paper will not survive in that form. there might be proximity to it, but it will not survive. the chequers deal as we have come to call it, maybe we should call it a compromise. what it is is her version of brexit, and it

is absolutely identified with her. whether she can become identified with another form of brexit rather than no deal, which i know she would regard as cataclysmic, is a massive question. one of several questions which makes this autumn in british politics and to some extent european politics seismic. no one quite knows what is going to happen but it feels very, very turbulent. stephanie, how do you read the dictat to her ministers — go out, spread the word across europe, do soundings, press the flesh? how is that being viewed from your perspective? you can really recognise a lot of eagerness if not a bit of panic in downing street to create the impression that the prime minister is in control, going out there to the continent, she is now taking over the control of the brexit negotiations. there was this week the demotion almost of the new brexit secretaryjust coming in and a day until after it was said, the prime minister is in charge. the prime minister goes out, she saw the austrian chancellor, the big news this morning is there will be a summit in september and they will talk about brexit, as if this wasn't news there. that was announced in march. there will be a summit in the form of head of state meeting.

apart from theresa may travelling the continent, jeremy hunt was in berlin for the first time. in the new foreign secretary. it didn't go down very well. he was perceived as threatening. he said, if europe is not flexible and has imagination, something we have heard for a long time, there will be no deal. this will be the fault of the europeans. some commentators in berlin said he sounds like donald trump. so it is something that the british government going around making friends is not quite

what for now they have achieved. how do you regard... soundes like donald trump, interesting, how do you feel watching from a us perspective? weakness is strength, i don't know quite how you add all this up. it makes no sense. tony blair's criticism of the chequers deal was actually the most trenchant that has been uttered, the resignation speeches of the departing ministers had no particular new ideas or system. at least blair's criticism, which says this is the worst of all possible worlds, we have to take most of the european regulations and be tied to europe in the same way without any control of what europe does, it is correct. it is a nonstarter. brexit remains... begets an exciting week to week with this meeting, leaked summit, the fundamentals

do tend to get lost. all the exporters say this is a disaster for us. crashing out brexit is a disaster. we have stockpiling food being discussed, possibly, by the departed or the no longer powerful brexit minister, the companies saying, we have no capacity to stockpile food and we haven't been asked. they are talking about stockpiling medicines and things you can stockpile. how you get out of this mess, with this odd combination of referendum which really is not a parliamentary device that makes sense in a parliamentary system, it is stopping of fault. the conservative party is stuck, it is all congealed, mrs may is prime minister because no one else wants to take the brass ring, which has no particular solution. the opposition is not proposing any real opposition. i don't know how you get out of this impasse. some kind of a second referendum

when there is a particular deal to offer is the only way that the politics are going to start aligning with the fundamental economic reality which is that brexit as currently discussed makes no sense for britain. mina, your take on this. time is ticking, people are discussing a referendum, it but we have again this deadline of next spring coming up, so ten months away, less than that, and there is no agreement. i take it different turn on theresa may, i think wed her stepping up and saying, this is my deal, here's what i will try to bridge four, has changed the momentum that we have had where you had people in her own cabinet that no longer believed in collective responsibility, so they were going their own way, at least now whether it feels succeeds you can say that it is clear that this is the vision of the prime minister and she's going to try to fight

for it, even if there is not the image and everyone agrees with, it is different from six months ago when we did not know whether the foreign secretary in private discussions were trying to undermine his own prime minister. we have reflected here a number of times about theresa may's strength or weakness, but if the conservative party changed its leader, it doesn't change the fundamentals. there are still a deadline of march 2019. it changes nothing. newspaper editorials sometimes say we need strong leadership, borisjohnson implies that he could do it and so on. he couldn't. there was still be a hung parliament. there was still be a european union protectors of the purity of the single market and other things. so all of the problems would still be in place if they changed their leader. that doesn't mean they might not contemplate it,

they are contemplating it, but it would solve nothing. her problem is that she has now become associated with this plan. i agree with you on one level, it is like a protective shield, a very battered protective shield. at least she clings to a plan where most others have not even got such a detailed alternative. but it is so battered, no majority in the commons, partially rejected by europe already. it is really difficult to see where he says, which is why there is now more talk of a referendum. she is the key to that, because she has always opposed one. but if you remember, before she called an early election, she said there would be no early election, nature changed our mind. she was genuine, said she did not want an early election that she went walking in wales, saw the opinion polls, giving her a 20 point lead, highly deceptive.

there may be a way through a referendum. s parliamentary allowances. they will be no parliamentary majority bonded deal. jacob rees mogg and others are relaxed about a new deal, there are about 60 of them in the house of commons. the rest are not. i still think no deal is not feasible. you cannot impose no deal without parliamentary backing. it would be historic decision, the less the majority for it. when we say no deal, we are talking about leaving and going at the wto rules. leaving with no agreed proposition between the uk and the rest of the eu. unless something positive can be done. but they cannot even,

the government, managed the public relations element of no deal, because they have now decided they need to start talking up that possibility. in talking up the possibility, she is saying, one minute is all about stockpiling food, that alarms people, then it emerges that they are not talking about that, so itjust preparing the spin or no deal is problematic. imagine managing it in reality. as i said, i don't think they would get parliamentary backing for it. stephanie, in the wider european question, on the other member states, it is not like no deal has no implication of a lot of other member states. there's an impact on both sides. it is almost ironic that the no deal scenario is not only domestic but actually a threat to the. it should put pressure on the europeans, and i would not say they shrug their shoulders, but it will hit many countries very hard.

especially germany. at think there's something that is not... it doesn't have any effect, no politician in germany or beyond has said, the bridges have said there is no deal, we now have to compromise. the german car industry which is always named as the... they look at this and they say, ok, our second biggest market by the usa, but still be had the single market in front of our doors. —— still, we have the single market. they really completely agree for the time being with the german government, which is the integrity of the single market and the rule of the european union, which works very well for german business, we're not going to put this at risk. we want to save theirs. —— save this. and i find this almost ironic that actually, in this country, politics doesn't talk to business. business is almost desperate, saying, please, listen to us, while in germany at least, the government constantly talks the business.

they agreed that if it is coming to the 12 hour and you need to make a decision it is europe and not the uk, they will have two support and not give a special cherry picking solution to the british. the other irony is that brexit has made europe more popular with european public than at any other times as 1983, according to polls. borisjohnson has had this ironic effect of making europe recognise that the eu is a more positive thing for them. even marine le pen says we are staying in the eu, in other ways, and the italians are talking about leaving the eu and that has gone off the table politically. european unity in the face of what they consider to be inefficient and not intelligent operations by uk pence to make britain look more irrelevant. for such a long time, britain has moved, you still hear

the same cake and eat it for two years. when you're on the continent, you have a feeling that the europeans have already moved beyond. if you talk about a second referendum, they will say, no, we're not having that, they are going to leave. that is also a risk for the british government if they say, well, we may be what an extension and have logged in negotiations. but the europeans will say, what carp for another limbo? in fairness to theresa may, any prime minister would be trapped in this situation. the referendum was held and brexit one. but you do? you have a hung parliament, partly down to her for that early election. you have a divided party, and you have a series of obligations which are contradictory. the soft border in ireland, but not wanting to be part of the customs union. her plan, in fairness to it, is an attempt to square all those circles.

because they are not able to be squared, it is a plan that is going to fall by the wayside. but it was an attempt to meet all the contradictory demands, and there's no other equivalent at the moment. the labour party position is different, it would be part of a customs union, it claims it would get alignment with the single market and not being in it, but that raises 20,000 questions. so there is not this summer, start of the summer, clarity, really, about what form this will take. we will see. let's park that for now. the next brexit talks are late august. then there's an eu summit in september. let's see whether here on dateline we get through the summer

without discussing it. is that hollow laughter? we'll leave that for now. there's much more to discuss. let's turn to the middle east, because the recent helsinki summit between donald trump and vladimir putin was overshadowed by those extraordinary comments that the us president was later forced to row back on, but what was actually achieved in terms of policy? no communique was issued, but it appears syria was discussed. is the us now renconciled to bashar al—assad remaining in power? and how does that tie in with the trump adminstration‘s approach to iran? mina, from your vantage point in the gulf, what is your sense of what's going on? it is clear that for the trump administration the priority is to push back around. —— push back iran. and to limit iran's activities,

militant nefarious groupings in the region. that has become the priority for the trump administration, you have had various us officials come out of the gulf and other parts of the middle east to duplicate that. —— communicate that. we recently reported that we were expecting a summit injordan and egypt in the autumn and probably washington, and not clear in the us, to discuss exactly that. to push on the iran issue. in helsinki, we don't know the details of the meeting, but it was discussed, especially the issue of syria. the russians for sure have been the guarantors of that assad regime. the survival of assad has been because of russia and iran. there is the contradiction. if trump feels he can do business with putin, he does not want to be doing business with the iranians and the iranian president who he is threatening with capital letters on his twitter account. there is that contradiction. it seems that the thinking amongst american officials is that we work

with the russians to sort out syria and push back around. the reality on the ground is different. it isn't that clean, it is very messy and ugly. if we put aside the moral question of syria, which is the fact that millions of people have been displaced, have the publishing been displaced, at least 80,000 detainees unaccounted for and only this week we are getting hundreds of death certificates being issued are people who have died from torture and detention. if we try to put that aside and say, security wise, how does this work? the syrians are not calling the shots in their own country. it's the russians and iranians. even if the top administration, the region, the world accepts that the assad regime survives, they are not in control of this country, and to be beholden to militias that are run directly by the iranian revolutionary guard and supported by russian air power, even if the russians pull out, the iranians are not going to give

up the vantage point they have been able to establish and their very strong presence in syria, going into lebanon. the helsinki summit, even if there was a agreement about assad, the other dynamics are left to be answered. what is the us administration's answer to that? who knows? i think, fundamentally, it is hard to understand what the us administration is any more. because there is the present's tweets and his fulminations, and there's the bureaucracy that works for him and they often are at loggerheads. 0n iran, it appears that the fulminations are more policy than they were with russia. john bolton said bad things about iran, at the same time the tweets went out, and the secretary of state did too.

but these dynamics exist. there is another sideshow with israel having an excellent relationship with russia, concerned with pulling back the militias from the israeli border. maybe for trump's own internal purposes, getting some degree of cooperation, enough to satisfy israel, would feel like progress that he can show that he has gotten with putin, who will be pushing the iranians to take his ball back from the israeli border. there is no real israeli border. the occupied golan heights. sorry, i agree. the fundamentals, there still is a desire in washington to bring down the mullahs and pull out of the nuclear deal, which has caused the real to drop in value and is making life difficult for iranians

and creating dissent. there is no endgame that makes any sense. the iranians have cyber attacks and the straits of hormuz and they could do a lot of things to make life tough for donald trump if they want to, but he is gambling that they will be scared of him, there are american soldiers in syria that the iranian militias can start taking potshots at. i think he wants to look like he is being tough on iran. no good american strategy, i don't think anything is well developed out of iran. listing to nikki haley, she reminds russia, we expect russia to use its influence here inside syria. is she overestimating the influence? no, russia has great influence. assad knows that he is beholden to the russians. they had been instrumental in making sure that his regime and army control the country.

they are over estimating how much russia can influence around. -- iran. the russians are getting ready to step right in with american sanctions getting slapped on, the russians have not taken a pledge to actually consider these sanctions, neither have the europeans are chinese. —— or chinese. they are thinking, we can at strengthen our ties to and make iran beholden as at a time when are being squeezed. that is unclear. the russians also want a more stabilised arab world in the middle east. regardless of whether we agree or disagree with their strategies. they do not want the iranians are doing, destabilising syria and iraq, yemen, it is not working in the long—term benefit of the russians. they could try to pressurise iran, then iran is getting pressurise more and the tools they are using are going to get hardened.

rather than thinking, how can we negotiate with american administration and so forth? the fear is that we will see more bloodshed when they think they have nothing to lose. what a desperate situation we are in that we sit here and you quite rightly say, for the sake of this discussion you have to park the moral argument, we have to forget about the millions of people who have been killed displaced, and that... but we shouldn't, because, yes, it will have security imperatives. there are millions of people have lost their homes, young, predominantly men who are unemployed have lost everything, cousins, brothers, killed in detention. eventually someone has to give them that money and arms sloshing around in syria. and then what happens? and it has had a knock—on in terms of refugees, which speaks to european issues that we have discussed for many months. very much so. what you've been discussing puts the question, where is europe? europe has been standing at the side and watching for a long time. this week there was a secret meeting

in berlin, angela merkel, and the german foreign minister met the russian foreign minister. it came out, the german government did not comment, but the russian foreign ministry did, an excellent meeting, they were also talking about refugees. there is some information, and i think this is part of the whole dynamic that is now happening, that europe now will come in and help build up syria, and this is part of the russian plan. so russia does not have the money to build up syria again, and the europeans are keen to build up syria. they want safety and security, but they want the refugees to go back to syria. the moral argument is part, if you remember, there was a time when the allied forces talked about allying themselves with assad to remove isis, and then they were talking about working with the rebels to remove assad, so this is a constantly moving moral set of dilemmas.

the whole iran deal that trump reneged on originated from the eu. jack straw was foreign secretary at the time, and with britain, germany, france and others they got that enron deal going. it is such a decline in the european union in recent years that such a initiative would now be impossible in the current state of chaos. the problem with the deal was that only dealt with nuclear, and nothing else. that is the weakness of the europeans. that's it for dateline london for this week. we're back next week at the same time. goodbye. dipping through the atlantic and circulating over the uk, developing areas of low pressure and bringing in cool a rat from the north atlantic. two such little centres through that area of low pressure as we go into sunday, both will be focused on some very strong winds.

also heavy rain, particularly across the north—west highlands and islands of scotland first thing, developing quite widely across england and wales as well. we will see winds gusting as they have done for a while, 40 miles an hour or 50 miles an hour. persistent rain western areas, heavy on the hills in the 50 litres of rain, dry and parts of eastern england first thing. some rain to the east of northern ireland but generally a dry day he compare to saturday. turning wet across the south. much of central and northern scotland will be dry and after a windy and website for the hebrides for the early rises, it will be getting better, winds gradually easing. the range should ease as well. turning wet across a good part of scotland through the day. persistent rain spreading east across england and wales and turning into sunshine and showers in the afternoon. we could see a shower or two in the east of northern ireland. a much dry day in prospect. note that temperatures, much lower than they have been lately. for many of you, lower than they should if this time of year, around 16— 22. sunday

night, showers fading for a time but in cloud increasing across the west into the morning. still got a south—westerly breeze so it will not bea south—westerly breeze so it will not be a desperately chilly night. temperatures on the mild side in the south, still in the midteens and may be down to single figures in rural areas across the north were we start with the best of the monday morning sunshine. low pressure still driving things in the north atlantic. another breezy day. not as windy sunday. not as wet either. sporadic bursts of rain spreading across the country in the morning. sunshine, heavy thunder showers in the afternoon, mainly in northern areas. should the largely dry with only one alternate showers in the south, and alternate showers in the south, and a bit more sunshine around service ofa a bit more sunshine around service of a breeze. should feel a touch warmer. into tuesday, a touch warmer across southern areas, fewer showers and a forecast across the north and the west. really, it is a story of starting fresh at the beginning of the week, then some returns later oi'i. the week, then some returns later on. goodbye. —— summer. welcome to bbc news. i'm nkem ifejika.

five people have died after huge wildfires sweep through northern california. almost 40,000 people have already left their homes in the city of redding. officials say gale—force winds are creating fire tornados. our correspondent james cook reports from los angeles. even by the wild standards of rural california, this fire is exceptional. driven by galeforce winds, the blaze was so intense it created tornadoes of flame, uprooting trees and hurling cars aside. that's a home i believe, some kind of structure completely