welcome to bbc news, broadcasting to viewers in north america and around the globe. i'm reged ahmad. our top stories: the death toll from the wildfires raging in california surges to at least 23 as more bodies are found north of the state capital. a moment of rememberance as the leaders of france and germany mark 100 years since the end of the first world war. too close to call in florida, officials announce a recount in the mid—term elections for the senate and state governor. the shopping frenzy that makes black friday seem more like a wet sunday, the shopaholics singles day bonanza. we start with some breaking news.

in the last few minutes, a county official told the media that m additional bodies have been found in the area devastated by the so—called camp fire in northern california. that brings the total number of people known to have died as a result of wildfires to at least 23. tests are under way to identify the remains and return them to theirfamilies. the camp fire is the most destructive in the state's history. residents fled for their lives as more than 6,700 homes and businesses were destroyed. fire crews are using a short window of calmer weather to increase efforts to tackle the devastating blazes, which have marched a path of destruction through the us state. peter bowes has the latest from los angeles. the scale of the devastation is overwhelming. this is all that remains of

paradise, a quiet retirement community to the north of sacramento. thousands and thousands of homes reduced to rubble. the charred remnants of household possessions, unrecognisable in the ashes. the roads are strewn with burned—out vehicles, where some people were ove i’co m e vehicles, where some people were ove rco m e by vehicles, where some people were overcome by the flames trying to escape. 0thers made it, but only just. 0h, escape. 0thers made it, but only just. oh, oh my god! 0h escape. 0thers made it, but only just. oh, oh my god! oh my god! i am so just. oh, oh my god! oh my god! i am so scared right now. so terrified! in southern california, many more homes have been destroyed or zed damaged into major fires homes have been destroyed or zed damaged into majorfires close homes have been destroyed or zed damaged into major fires close to thousand oaks, the city where a gunman went on the rampage earlier in the week, killing 12 people in a bar. as all of you know, it's been a brutal, hellish dew days for the

people of thousand oaks. we're still not where we need to be. i know firefighters from various agencies including from ourfire firefighters from various agencies including from our fire department at ventura county have slept in the streets overnight to keep an eye on buyers, embers, making sure there are no additional homes burning or any other property. the authorities are still trying to assess how many homes have been destroyed here. some people have been allowed to return to their neighbourhoods, often not prepared for what they're going to find. there's a house they took all the motorcycles out but that has made it. i was coming up the street to see my neighbours, and i did realise my house's gone too! -- didn't realise. the city of malibu, popular with celebrities, has also been badly hit. it's completely evacuated now and authorities are saying they're having to deal with looters attempting to steal valuables from

abandoned homes. there's been a lull in the strong winds that have been fanning the flames, but their forecast to pick up speed again and may last until tuesday. this statewide emergency is far from over. peter bowes, bbc news, los angeles. we can now speak tojeremy kriss who had to escape from the city of chico. his wife works as a school administartor in paradise, that school has been completely destroyed. hejoins me from petaluma in northern california. jeremy, thank you for your time. given your wife's workplace has been destroyed, you've been very much affected by these fires? yes, we we re affected by these fires? yes, we were actually evacuated from our home. ratherfrightening were actually evacuated from our home. rather frightening situation to have the chico police department pound on your door with the words, get out now. have you ever experienced anything like this

before? the fires and the viciousness of the flames? u nfortu nately, viciousness of the flames? unfortunately, as californians, we're getting used to this now. most people say zafira season is 12 months, now it is all year —— fire season. months, now it is all year —— fire season. last summer, a community and oui’ season. last summer, a community and ourand a half season. last summer, a community and our and a half north of last, redding in northern california, we know many families and lots of friends up there and they had a fire and we know people who lost loved ones and lost their homes. u nfortu nately, yes, ones and lost their homes. unfortunately, yes, we are aware and we are... we know that this is the reality. i believe you've been evacuated a couple of times now, you've had to move as the danger has followed you. what is it like you actually have to leave your home? what kind of things did you think you might need to take given you had such a short space of time? so, i

had thought that i would be ready just in case, and those of us in chico didn't think it would come down the buttes to town, so all i really gra b down the buttes to town, so all i really grab was the family photo albums and i threw those in my car andi albums and i threw those in my car and i called a family friend and i asked her, isaid i'm being evacuated, i have to run right now and she said, come here right now. you've moved on petaluma, some miles away, i believe the smoke is still quite bad, have you heard anything about your neighbourhood in terms of how things are going? once we knew oui’ how things are going? once we knew our home was ok, at that point we wa nted our home was ok, at that point we wanted to get west and we thought we could get out of the smoke, it is beyond unhealthy levels. we're

actually 145 miles due west, and we're over by san francisco and the smoke is almost as bad here. schools have been cancelled here. all we've heard from our neighbourhood is that the fire has changed course, changed direction and now it's heading down towards vaudeville, which is where i actually work for butte county. i'm concerned now for my friends that live there. i believe there have been some people who have been trying to volunteer to get involved and have in fact, my understanding is, you've been concerned about potential looting, so you've tried to work with the community about that? our butte county sheriff actually, in his press conference, he said that arriving through the

shell, which is all that's really left of paradise, that he saw evidence of looting at least one business. so i kind of not really snapped back but i was able to get back to my neighbourhood, and it was a ghost town and there were two other neighbours there. so we kind of drove around a little bit to make sure no one was creeping around the neighbourhood. then we joined with most of our other community members and we were all going to grocery stores and buying supplies to take to the shelters, because there's obviously people a lot worse off than i am. jeremy kriss, we're glad you're safe and we do wish you well. jeremy kriss, evacuated from chico from those terrible fires. to remind you, that death toll has increased to 23 with 14 additional bodies being found. in other news:

events continue to take place across the globe to mark 100 years since the signing of the armistice which ended the first world war. the french president, emmanuel macron, and the german chancellor, angela merkel, marked the centenary with a gesture of reconciliation, as james landale reports. —— first world war. 100 years ago, their nations were still at war. today, under a damp, grey sky, president macron of france and chancellor merkel of germany came to a forest clearing north of paris where the great war finally came to an end. it was here, in a secluded train carriage, that the armistice was agreed, ending hostilities across europe. in a replica of that carriage, the two leaders sat where the allied and german delegations had negotiated the agreement, committing their nations

once again to peace. these images are all the more poignant because the last german chancellor to walk these paths was adolf hitler, who came here to accept the surrender of france in world war ii, hoping to avenge the deal agreed here two decades before. after the armistice was signed, the allied delegation came back here to the elysee palace, and according to one account, theyjoined hands and danced ring a ring o' roses with the french prime minister. it was not quite so cheerful there today. president trump arrived in paris saying it had been insulting of mr macron to say europe needed protecting from the united states. but today, they put on smiles for the cameras and agreed europe should do more to share the burden of its defence. it's unfair to have the european security today being assured just by the united states, and we need a much better burden—sharing. i appreciate what you're saying about burden—sharing. you know what my attitude's been. and we want a strong europe.

it's very important to us to have a strong europe. after leaving the elysee, mr trump pulled out of a visit to a cemetery for american servicemen, and faced criticism when his officials blamed the rain. tonight, world leaders attended a dinner in paris ahead of tomorrow's armistice centenary. president macron wants to use the ceremony notjust to remember the dead but also to shine a light on the dangers that he believes nationalism can pose today. james landale, bbc news, paris. there's plenty more on all the stories we're covering on our website. that's at bbc.com/news. or visit the bbc news app. four days after the us mid—term elections, the state of florida has announced there will be a recount of votes in the race for both the senate, and for governor, with the results too close to call. president trump was quick to react to the news, tweeting his opinion

that it was an attempt to steal the elections, something the florida state authorities deny. republican candidate rick scott has already claimed victory in the senate race. but florida's would—be democratic governor, andrew gillum, said he fully supports the recount. let me say clearly, i am replacing my words of concession with an uncompromised and unapologetic call that we count every single vote. that we count every vote! and i say this recognising that my fate in this may or may not change. what i do know is that every single floridian who took time to go out to cast their vote, to participate in this process, deserve the comfort of knowing that in a democratic society and in this process, every vote will be counted. let's speak now to quentin kidd, who's professor of political science at christopher newport university in virginia. professor kidd, we've seen this

before in florida, the famous bush vs before in florida, the famous bush vs gore recount. is there something about florida that makes this more likely? florida is one of these states that is deadlocked when it comes to partisan politics. they're only slightly more republican than democrat, but yet there are more democratic registered voters. elections are so close and when you have really close elections, what happens is those mail in ballots and absentee votes matter. in a normal elections, collection, one person wins by enough that the absentee and mail in ballots don't make a difference but here you have a situation where it is so close on election day that those mail in and absentee ballots might make a difference, and that's why this is

controversial, because it doesn't happen very often. we've seen president trump talk about fraud happening in florida. governor rick scott... excuse me, senator rick scott has even said he is alluded to some sort of fraud. are they correct? in my mind that's a bunch of politics. what's going on here is florida has this law that some other states have that says that the signature that's on file with your voter registration file has to match the signature on the envelope when you mail in your ballot. 0f the envelope when you mail in your ballot. of course, there's a lot of human error involved in that. the person is looking at those two signatures and trying to determine whether they match. what's happened is democrats are doing with election officials over whether some of those signatures match or not, because if the signature doesn't match, the ballot is set aside and not counted. so there's an argument going on over

whether signatures match or not, and thatis whether signatures match or not, and that is what the current florida governor, the senate candidate, rick scott, is arguing is fraud, and that's what the president was alluding to. but it's really an argument over human decisions over matching signatures. we're now seeing this recount happening, do you think it's going to change the outcome? it very well could. and i say that because the two counties where there are most controversial problems are browa rd county and are most controversial problems are broward county and palm beach county. those are two heavily democratic counties, so if there are a lot of absentee ballads and mail in ballots yet to be candid, if there are signatory disagreements that get decided by counting the ballot, that could mean more democratic ballots than republican ballots, and in both situations, these races have come down tojust a few thousand votes separating the

republican who is leading right now and the democrat, who is behind. it very well could change the outcome is. the state is going to go to an automatic recount because the races are so automatic recount because the races are so close, and in that automatic recount a lot of the bounces, ballots could be recounted and we could have a different outcome —— a lot of the ballots. thank you very much, professor kidd, thank you again. stay with us on bbc world news, still to come: why the plight of the orangutang is too political. a british supermarket is banned from showing a tv ad about the dangers it faces. the bombastic establishment outsider donald trump has defied the pollsters to take the keys to the oval office. i feel great about the election results. i voted for him because i genuinely believe that he cares about the country. it's keeping the countedate's name always in the public eye that counts. success or failure depends not only on public display, but on the local campaign

headquarters, and the heavy, routine work of their women volunteers. berliners from both east and west linked hands and danced round their liberated territory. and with nobody to stop them, it wasn't long before the first attempts were made to destroy the structure itself. yasser arafat, who dominated the palestinian cause for so long, has died. the palestinian authority has declared a state of mourning. after 17 years of discussion, the result was greeted with an outburst ofjoy. women ministers, who'd long felt only grudgingly accepted among the ranks of clergy, suddenly felt welcomed. this is bbc world news. our top story: wildfires in northern california have killed at least 23 people as they burn out of control.

two more have died in a separate blaze in the south of the state. the caravan of central america migrants heading to the united states through mexico has departed the mexican capital to continue its journey north. after five days recovering in mexico city, the group has carried on until queretaro, while smaller numbers have risked a more direct but significantly more dangerous route via the drug cartel—controlled state of tamaulipas. 0ur mexico correspondent will grant reports. at first light, the vast majority of the around 5000 migrants left the sports stadium on the outskirts of the capital where the local authorities had housed them for almost a week. the desire to keep the caravan moving was particularly acute among the younger, fitter men — many of whom had grown tired with waiting for promises of organise transport to materialise. in reality, neither the united nations or any of the ngos supporting the group were likely to be able to provide the buses they needed

to reach the border. as that realisation became clearer, especially following a statement from unhcr, the migrants decided to continue theirjourney under their own steam. translation: i say to trump don't abandon us, support us and you will have lots of people that support you. if you go against all of us, then you will have problems. the truth is that people want to get in whatever they way. —— the way. we want to enter and want him to support us. translation: there have been people with good hearts that we've found along the way. just like now, they've given us a hand to get to our destination, to the border. once there, we won't know what will happen. they still have more than 2500 kilometres to go until tijuana, the point of entry on the us border that most appear to be heading towards. thousands of us troops have been deployed along the border in advance of the caravan's arrival. will grant, bbc news. now, a petition to overturn a ban

on a television advert by a british supermarket has now reached over 0.5 million signatures. the advert for the chain iceland features a cartoon orangutan and highlights the plight of their rainforest habitat. david campa nale reports. there's a rangtan in my bedroom and i don't what to do... iceland's christmas advert features a young orangutan in the bedroom of a girl, casting her belongings aside as it swings about. the orangutan, named rangtan, grasps hold of a bottle of shampoo labelled ‘contains palm oil', and lets out a cry. so i told the naughty rangtan that she had to go away. narrated by actress emma thompson, the advert tells the story of rangtan's journey from forest to the little girl's bedroom, as palm oilfarmers ravage her habitat. there's a human in my forest and i don't know what to do... the images, from greenpeace, are bleak, but grab attention for iceland in a crowded christmas advertising season. they tell the story of how palm oil

demand threatens the habitat of orangutans and iceland's commitment to no longer use palm oil in their own products. environmentalists point out that tv screens at christmas will be filled with adverts for products containing palm oil, such as cosmetics, mince pies and chocolates. palm oil production is a $40 billion global industry and provides employment for thousands of workers and small—scale producers. however, its production has been one of the biggest causes of deforestation in borneo in indonesia, the natural habitat of the orangutan. 0h, rangtan in my bedroom, now i do know what to do. i'll fight to save your home and i'll stop you feeling blue... in promoting the issue, the advert has been banned from television due to its potentially politicised message. iceland's managing director told the bbc he was very disappointed and surprised by the decision. instead, his company elected to share the video via social media,

which is exempt. on twitter, the company says: "we want to share the story with you. will you help us share the story?" since then, it's received hundreds of thousands of views through social media, and arguably won unexpected attention for both its own brand and the fact palm oil is used in half of all goods found on supermarket shelves. david campanale, bbc news. archaeologists in egypt have discovered a network of ancient tombs. the finds date back to well over 4000 years and were made at saqqara, south of cairo, as andy beatt reports. in the shadow of egypt's oldest pyramid, a series of exciting new discoveries. seven tombs, hidden under sand for millennia, only now giving up their secrets. they were able to uncover three small tombs of the new kingdom and four small tombs of the old kingdom. and they found hundreds

of objects, mummified cats, mummified scarabs, mummified crocodiles, funerary equipment, it's only the beginning. over the last six months, archaeologists have been working to catalogue and preserve the extraordinary finds. alongside the animal mummies, used as religious offerings, are statues, masks and jewellery. also, a stone coffin, containing the remains of a royal palace official. rarest of all, these mummified scarab beetles, symbols of ra, the sun god. we have heard about coffins but not mummified scarabs. this is something really amazing. of course, we are going to study this one, we are going to figure out what is upcoming news. the tombs in saqqara are part of a vast burial ground, which served the ancient egyptian capital, memphis, for more than 2000 years.

much of the site is still to be uncovered, raising hopes that many more finds will follow. and the signs are good — as the archaeology team prepared to present these findings to the world, they stumbled on another tomb. its door still sealed and contents thought to be untouched. they plan to open that within weeks. andy beatt, bbc news. singles day has got off to a record—breaking start, with early sales exceeding $1 billion. it was originally a chance for single people to celebrate themselves, then the online giant alibaba saw a bigger opportunity. lebo diseko reports. the countdown is over and the world's biggest shopping event has begun. singles day bought in $1.44 billion in its first two minutes for the chinese e—commerce giant, alibaba, a record opening. what originally began as an anti valentine's day, celebrating the unattached, has turned into a shopping extravaganza,

with bigger sales than black friday and cyber monday put together. so spare a thought for the people who have to deliver the items bought during china's shopping fest. on an average day, this man says he delivers around 80 parcels, racing through the traffic in beijing. but on singles day, his workload is much, much higher. translation: normally i deliver about 80 goods a day. on november 11, it's about 120—130. no pain no gain, more goods to deliver on november 11, more money, but surely i'll be more tired. the job of a delivery man is really hard. there had been fears that a slowdown in the chinese economy would lead to a drop in sales, but that doesn't seem to be the case so far. luckily for the delivery folk, the event lasts for just 24 hours, before things go back to normal. lebo diseko, bbc news. to walk a. —— much more coming up.

hello there. the first half of the weekend was dominated by some really heavy showers. hail and thunder as well, coupled with blue skies. some areas did rather better for blue skies than others, and it will be a very similar picture for the day ahead. we still have this huge area of low pressure driving our weather, so there are more showers forecast for today, which of course is armistice centenary day, and so there are likely to be some potentially very wet conditions for those out and about through the morning hours. now, the showers have been clearing from the north. it's a tad chilly across scotland and the north, with a touch of frost, but look at the showers that have gathered further south and west. as we have gone through the night, they have continued to gather and they will move inland across wales, southern england,

south—east, and the south—east of england as well. some up through western england. if you are heading to the cenotaph through the first part of the morning, there could be quite a downpour, and again, the risk is there of thunder and lightning and some quite squally winds. it looks as though they should clear for 11 o'clock. but they will still be with this across the eastern side of england and again with showers, the devil is in the detail, so please do take something waterproof. similarly, we have those showers for the north—west of england. where we have that chilly start, it looks as if we will see the lion's share of the morning sunshine. many of us will see some sunshine as the day goes on. in fact, those showers clear out into the north sea and we'll continue to see that south—westerly wind blowing more into southern and western coasts, and for the second part of the day more for northern ireland, where during the day on saturday, it escaped largely dry and fine. temperatures very typical, as they were on saturday, just a little bit above average. with that low pressure still close on monday,

further showers in the north and north—west, and possibly a spell of rain very close by to southern and eastern counties of england, most likely kent and essex. so in between, hopefully we'll be afforded some drier weather, but still those showers are with us and the wind is from the south and west. so it's still relatively mild, but there will be some chilly spots around first thing, as we will see this morning with a little bit of mist, patchy frost and fog as well. as for the remainder of this week, that low pressure starts to move away and the high does start to have an influence, not for a while, not through tuesday and wednesday but beyond that, it looks as if that high pressure will settle the weather down. we will see drier days and chillier nights. the big issue may well become foggy mornings. as ever, we will keep you updated. this is bbc news, the headlines: firefighters in california are stepping up efforts to tackle the devastating wildfires during a short window of calmer weather today. the blazes have marched on a path of destruction, killing at least 25 people across the state and forcing

a 250,000 people to flee their homes. the leaders of france and germany have attended a ceremony in northern france to mark the end of the first world war one hundred years ago. the main ceremony at the arc de triomphe on sunday will be attended by world leaders including presidents trump and putin. four days after polls for the us midterm elections closed, the authorities in florida have announced a recount. votes for the senate and state governor positions are neck and neck between the republican and democrat candidates. president trump says it's an attempt to steal the elections. the former transport minister, jojohnson, who's resigned from the cabinet over theresa may's brexit plans,