this is bbc world news, the headlines: theresa may is in brussels for last—minute talks with european commission presidentjean—claude juncker ahead of sunday's brexit summit which is expected to formally sign off the agreement. police in paris have clashed with protesters demanding president macron drop his plan for fuel tax rises. the cost of diesel has risen significantly over the past 12 months, as part of the president's drive against pollution. the start of one of the biggest football matches in argentina's history has been postponed by an hour after a bus carrying the boca juniors team was attacked by rival fans. the final of the copa libertadores between two buenos aires—based clubs will decide who becomes the next south american champions. and nicolas roeg, the director of films such as the man who fell to earth and don't look now, has died at the age of 90. at ten o'clock, ben brown will be here with a full roundup of the days news. first, our world.

every year, thousands of people come from thailand to work in israel, hoping to build a better life for their families back home. but what they find when they get here can be shocking. for more than a year, we have been investigating the treatment of thai labourers working on israel's farms. their labour helps to produce fruit and vegetables sold across the globe. but they are anxious their work is damaging their health. and many deaths amongst the workers remain uninvestigated.

in this film, we'll be asking, who cares about israel's thai workers? they call it the land of milk and honey. a country rich in history and one of the world's wealthiest nations. despite being half desert, it grows millions of tonnes of fruit and vegetables every year, and exports them to

europe and pressure. a modern miracle of hydro—engineering, and an industry reliant on migrant workers. but everything is not as it seems. i'm issariya praithongyaem and i'm a journalist with bbc‘s thai service in london. just over a year ago, i started to get worrying messages from thai workers in israel. they were telling me that they were being abused and exploited. being from thailand myself, i wanted to find out what was happening. we are starting our investigation in southern israel after a tip—off about a farm not far from gaza. agriculture in israel is organised

into hundreds of gated communities called moshavs. each moshav contains dozens of farms and farmhouses. it actually looks nice here. big trees, colourful flowers, nice houses. this is the home of a well—established farming family on a moshav. the thai workers they employ live just a stone's throw away. 15 workers share these wooden huts. this accommodation isn't temporary, they work here isn't seasonal. these are the only homes these young men and women will know in israel. this man was 29 when we met him.

like most of the workers here, he is from the north—east of thailand. he had left his village three years before because his parents and his wife were often going without food. he has agreed to show me around. many of these labouring jobs used to be done by palestinians but not any more. this man is in israel as part of a government scheme. he is one of 20,000 thai nationals working and living here. this type of accommodation is sadly not unusual. workers here tell me that temperatures inside can reach more than a0 degrees and they are scared that at any point, the whole thing could collapse on top of them. we ask the boss for an interview and he refused but he told us later that since our visit he has made

some improvements to the workers‘ home. investigating the lives of thai workers on israel's farms isn't easy. no answer. there is a climate of fear. few people will talk to us on camera. but over 14 months, we visited more than 50 farms and spoke to hundreds of workers to get to the truth. we are heading to a small moshav in the deep south of the country. there are several cow sheds here. the animals seem well housed. the workers less so. we have called this worker yuri.

he is frightened, so we have agreed to hide his real identity. he has lived here behind the cow shed for a year. yuri, like many of the other workers, told us that if he was bought speaking out, he would be sacked and leftjobless and homeless in a foreign land. the fear is palpable and it wasn't long until i understood why. we have just arrived at this moshav.

we asked the shopkeeper inside to contact one of the farmers that we want to meet. over the phone, we told him that we are making the documentary for the bbc. he told us to leave the moshav immediately, otherwise he would call all his friends to come and break our bones. agriculture in israel is a multi—billion pound industry. it is hard work but for those farmers who make a success of it, the benefits are easy to see. this is the most beautiful moshav we saw and is built on revenue from grapes. we have come to take a closer look at one of the farms. this man has lived

here for 20 years. he says he employs three workers, and he was keen to show me where they live. then something strange happens. can we go to this place? go back? he would let us take our cameras into his warehouse. what he didn't know at this point was that five months ago we had already filmed inside. and this is what we found. a man sleeping in what appeared to be a makeshift bedroom complete with kitchen and it is alljust metres away from the chemical shed.

i did manage to take a look and the man we had seen sleeping there five months earlier was still there. we asked the owner about him. thai workers are allowed to stay in israel are a maximum of five years. during their stay, they are entitled to expect a reasonable level of comfort and safety. according to the workers‘ nandbook, they should be provided with suitable housing, including four metres of sleeping space, personal cupboards, heating, ventilation, everything is laid out in black—and—white. in the dozens of farms we saw, there weren't many examples of good practice but we did see some places

that measured up. these homes are in the central district. they are solid, no rotten walls all leaking ceilings here. the workers are employed by this farmer who has a very different take on the situation. what i see in my place and in other places in israel, the place is very good beginning. after three months, the place is a disaster. this is not the farmer, this is the worker. he needs to care about the place in which he sleeps. he doesn't care. you see the kitchen, i show you. it looks disgusting. this man's staff seem to be safe.

they are paid fairly and bailiff on this idyllic farm but not many of this fortunate. just when i thought i had seen it all, another tip—off, this one about another moshav. these homes became known to us as cardboard city, and it is easy to see why. workers here are sleeping in rooms made out of packing boxes. but right now, that is the least of their problems. the owner of this farm confirmed

to me via his lawyer that he hadn't been able to pay his workers due to financial problems. he refused a request for an interview. a few months later, the workers told me they did eventually get paid but only half of what they were expecting. with very few farmers willing to speak to us, i have come to tel aviv to take our findings to the israeli farmers‘ federation. there are problems but looking at the bigger picture, so more or less, the system is working. in the moment there are problems,

they can call us, they can call the embassy, and we will take care. we showed him ourfootage of cardboard city. i don‘t know where is the place. let‘s say, if those are the conditions they have to complain, it is against the law. nobody will support such kind of conditions. people which are not fulfilling the law have to pay for it. so far, workers have told me they are underpaid, overworked, intimidated, and living in squalor, but the story doesn‘t end there. spraying pesticides without proper

protection seems to be common. we happened upon this worker going about his daily work and his boss had no problem with us filming. israel‘s use of pesticide is amongst the highest in the world. long—term, low—level exposure has been linked to respiratory and neurological illnesses. this is why the rules are so illnesses. this is why the rules are so strict. workers should wear a mask with air filters as well as special boots and clothes. but a

recent online survey of over 150 workers found that fewer than 50% had received protective equipment. i‘ve been sent bdo is on facebook which appear to show thai workers on a number of farms across the three spraying chemicals without safety equipment. these men work on a pomegranate farm, they claim unprotected spraying has made them so unprotected spraying has made them so ill that they have at times been frightened for their lives. from spraying chemicals to living standards and pay, thai workers on israel‘s farms are protected by a range of laws. but from what i have seen, that is little comfort. i went

to meet someone from an end —— an israeli ngo which supports migrant workers in the country. the fact that there is a law doesn‘t say the people follow it. when the inspectors come to check their complaints, they do not come with a translator. the inspector goes to speak with the employer and the employer will, you know, show the way that he wants to be seen. the israeli government had not want to give us an interview but the ministry of labour told us 400 inspections are carried out every year and interpreters are available. more than 1500 investigations have been opened since 2013 in to pay and working hours, we have issued 200

finds totalling more than £3 million. —— 200 finds. a final journey in the north of the country where we made our saddest discovery yet. these friends have gathered to say goodbye to their colleague who had died suddenly a few days before, despite the farmer‘s attempts at resource that asian. monks have arrived to perform a cleansing ceremony. the man was 45 years old, he had been working on a tomato farm for the last two years. 0n the night of the night of october

2017, he went to bed in this room and never woke up. he is not the only worker to have lost his life. since the thai israel agreement began in 2012, there have been more than 170 deaths. and many of those are unexplained. the thai embassy in israel told us medical postmortems are not carried out on thai workers. it took more than a

month for the man‘s body to arrive backin month for the man‘s body to arrive back in thailand. he won‘t be loading the farm he dreamt of all helping his wife gets treatment for cancer. “— helping his wife gets treatment for cancer. —— building the farm. thai workers other act bone of israel‘s agricultural industry but

their existence here is precarious. they rely on their bosses for food, shelter, and work. so is it any wonder they are scared to demand their rights? as i left this country, i was reminded of the old saying, you don‘t bite the hand that feeds you. i think this kind of approach or attitude to the workers themselves, they are being seen as themselves, they are being seen as the farmers —— by the farmers actually as tools, not as people who came here to work, but as tools to provide the work. they are not humans with needs that can be harmed, nobody caring hours. —— nobody cares enough. for a while we happy looking to the

east our weather. it has been benign but that is to change. low pressure is flowing around and about to move in as we go in deeper in the week. the winds get stronger, heavy rain comes in, the temperatures are going to go up but that will be offset by the stronger winds and heavy rain. do that fairly benign weather pattern coming from the east, it continues during sunday, still with a few showers in scotland, northern england, one or two in northern ireland, further west, some of them, some could be heavier compared with saturday. a few showers in the far south—east of england. variable

cloud, temperatures are six to 9 degrees. the weather fronts are gathering in the atlantic, high pressure still blocking them and still with this easterly fro. light breeze, some fog through the south west of britain, slater clear, one 01’ west of britain, slater clear, one or two showers in eastern areas but on the whole, dry weather, chilly weather, some sunny spells. tuesday, low pressure is getting closer, getting more powerful, having a go at breaking down this high—pressure block and there is a first weather front that will try to do that. it is coming in with a stronger breeze, thatis is coming in with a stronger breeze, that is coming in from the south—east, an area of cloud and rain slowly pushing further north and east but it tends to fizzle out and east but it tends to fizzle out a little bit. this first weather front isn‘t going to have a huge amount of success, it is what follows as we go into wednesday that will take rain right across the uk, pick up the winds for all and done

things milder as well. a pretty active looking weather pattern for wednesday. those winds could be disruptive as we see gales or severe gales in places, the gleam in north—west of britain. some snow to the higher hills as well. sunshine follows behind. windier across—the—board, air coming in from the south rather than the east, the last will be significantly higher and temperatures are going up a few degrees as well, more places getting into double figures. there are gaps between weather systems, next one comes in quite quickly, going into thursday, so another spell of what could be heavy rain accompanied by wales but the further west you are, we get is the sunshine following behind. the al addict takes over once again, low pressure in control and next weekend, it is low pressure pushing occasional spells of wind and rain across as are these gaps

between weather systems, allowing the sun to come out, that he‘s —— the sun to come out, that he‘s —— the wind to ease, but what is important is that the jet stream is taking aim at the uk and bringing in a daycare but that tells you how weather is much more unsettled, much more active, and it looks like it could stay that way next weekend and into the following week. when —— wet and windy at times, overall miles, cooler interludes between the weather systems. think the weather weather systems. think the weather we have now and think completely to fred to next week. —— completely different.