welcome to newsday. i'm kasia madera in london. our headlines: the british prime minister sacks her defence secretary after he is accused of leaking security concerns about huawei to the press. more unrest in venezuela, as the opposition leader calls for protests to continue. we report from the capital. both sides have called for a mass mobilisation, as a way of trying to influence the military, and these protesters are targeting an airbase right in the heart of caracas. i'm rico hizon in singapore. the headlines: the us attorney general defends his handling of the mueller report against accusations that he misled congress over its conclusions.

could this be the holy grail of cancer treatment? we will talk to the australian team who have uncovered the unique set of genes that keeps some cancer cells dormant. it is 8:00am in singapore and 1:00am in london, where the controversy about the chinese company huawei's involvement in communications networks has seen a remarkable twist. the british prime minister, theresa may, has sacked her defence secretary, gavin williamson, accusing him of leaking information from a meeting of the national security council. that information — that huawei would have a limited role in the uk's rollout of 56 technology, a move that

mr williamson and some other cabinet ministers are thought to oppose. mr williams denies the accusation, as our political editor laura kuennsberg reports. wasn't me, he said. absolutely not. and then again and again, the defence secretary adamant he had nothing to do with leaking from a secret government committee. i never have leaked anything from the national security council, nor would i ever leak anything from the national security council. do you admit that you're one of the people under suspicion? as i say, never would, never have. but his boss, the prime minister, didn't believe him. furious at a leak from the national security council last week, theresa may wanted gavin williamson out, sacking him in her commons office this afternoon, and writing in a brutal letter tonight...

but gavin williamson is sticking to his story, replying... the now—former defence secretary was one of several ministers who had doubts about allowing the chinese firm huawei to take part in building our 5g network, superfast broadband. we know that it will be disruptive... sir mark sedwell, the cabinet secretary and the national security advisor, normally in the shadows, believes the evidence against mr williamson is compelling. but friends of the departed minister fear the leak inquiry called by number ten was partly an operation to find the evidence after choosing the culprit.

there are calls tonight to bring the police in, to get to the bottom of exactly what took place. he denies it, and he deserves to have his voice heard, and the way to do that is in a criminal inquiry, given that it appears that the law has been broken in this case. confidence in anyone and anything in westminster is limited everywhere. one cabinet career at an end, for now, the government shaky at the helm. also making news today: indian officials have ordered the evacuation of coastal areas as cyclone fani bears down on the country's eastern coast. the storm is currently above the bay of bengal, with winds in excess of 200 km/h. fani is expected to make landfall on friday and is to roll over into neighbouring bangledesh, bringing heavy rainfall to the region. the british parliament has endorsed a motion to declare

a climate change emergency. the measure is symbolic, with no direct policy consequences, but it comes after increasing pressure from the vocal activist group extinction rebellion, which brought parts of london to a standstill recently with non—violent civil disobedience and protests. the un security council has declared the pakistani founder of the islamist group jaish—e—mohammed a global terrorist, after china dropped its objections. pakistan has confirmed it will immediately enforce the sanctions against masood azhar. far—left activists have clashed violently with police during trade unions‘ may day demonstrations in paris. the protestors started fires, broke shop windows, and pelted the police with bottles and stones. at one stage they attacked a school building. the police have responded with tear gas and baton charges. yellow vest activists have also taken part in the protests. more than 200 people

have been arrested. these two seagulls have become an unlikely internet sensation after photo—bombing one of the cameras used to monitor traffic in central london. nicknamed graham and steve, they have taken up residence on one of the key routes into the central financial district. it is the approach to the blackwall tunnel, renonwed for heavy traffic, not that they seem to mind. they look good. ijust love they look good. i just love that story so much. let's get more on our top story: britain's defence secretary, gavin williamson, has been sacked after being accused of leaking details from a national security council meeting about whether the chinese firm huawei should be allowed to take part in building britain's 5g mobile network. earlier i caught up with our political correspondent chris mason, and began by asking him

to tell us more about what the national security council were discussing. they were discussing whether or not huawei should have a role, a limited role, in the infrastructure surrounding the uk's forthcoming 5g network. and the prime minister's view, as reported in the daily telegraph here in the uk last week, shortly after this meeting, was that she was in favour of huawei having a role. but five cabinet ministers, gavin williamson amongst them, had expressed their reservations on the grounds of security, the fear that this information may end up in the hands of the chinese state. now, huawei has always denied that that is a connection, or indeed that that should be a concern. but the prime minister was livid that this detail had emerged so quickly after a meeting that is governed by the official secrets act, where people are not meant to talk about the contents

of the discussion, that this account had emerged in a newspaper so quickly, so a leak inquiry began. quite frankly, the convention here at westminster, and i bought into this last friday, is that like most leak inquiries it would come to nothing. it would be noble in intention, but empty in outcome. well, yet another convention at westminster broken, with a very quick conclusion and a very stark one — the sacking of a senior minister. though it is important to stress, chris, that gavin williamson himself, he completely denies this. and the proof — is the proof really there? he does deny it, and that's what's really striking here — that you have a prime minister and until very recently senior member of the government publicly at odds over the chain of events. now, downing street argue that there was compelling evidence that mr williamson was responsible for this leak. mr williamson insists that he didn't do it, and that there isn't compelling evidence. now, it would appear there was a telephone call between mr williamson and the journalist in question,

steven swinford of the daily telegraph, but the existence of the call does not necessarily prove that this information was imparted. but i guess from downing street's perspective, from theresa may's perspective, government and the senior team that you have around you has to be something based on trust, and if the view was that that trust had been breached, and that sufficient evidence had been presented to satisfy the prime minister that that trust had been breached, then obviously it's her prerogative to be able to hire and fire as she chooses. and despite all the evidence, of which there is plenty, that her authority has been very limited by the ongoing, tortuous nature of the brexit negotiations, she's still there and still in power, and the last few hours have ably demonstrated that. political correspondent chris mason speaking earlier. in venezuela, thousands of protestors have taken to the streets again after opposition leaderjuan guaido called for more demonstrations. it comes the day after

president nicolas maduro said he had stopped an attempted coup. the power struggle is playing out on an international stage. the us says military action is possible, but russia says that could lead to dire consequences. our correspondent nick bryant is in caracas. the opposition promised to make this the largest march in venezuelan history, and the country's future could well be determined by whether that prophecy turns out to be true. tens of thousands answered the call to protest — proud patriots, some who looked like caped crusaders, angry their beloved country has become a failed state. "we must stand firm", shouted this man, "with the conviction we'll gain freedom". and demonstrators such as businessman carlos gonzalez vowed they would keep on taking to the streets. we are looking for the freedom of our country.

that is the mission. we've got to do everything we can to get the freedom. that is the most important, today, tomorrow, and forever. in the midst of these crowds, the opposition leader, juan guaido, desperate to keep up the momentum. but his call yesterday for military leaders to switch their allegiance appears so far to have backfired. "we need more military support," he admitted. soon the march became a confrontation, this highway that cuts through the middle of the capital, for a second day, the battlefield. both sides have called for mass mobilisation as a way of trying to influence the military, and these protesters are targeting an air base right in the heart of caracas. the authorities were determined to hold the line, and so far, they haven't been overwhelmed.

what we are witnessing here is a battle for hearts and minds, and there haven't yet been the defections from the military that anti—government protesters were hoping for. on national television, president maduro last night claimed victory, flanked by the military top brass. his hopes of remaining in office depend on keeping them at his side. on international workers‘ day, this socialist president summoned his supporters onto the streets, and for now, at least, most of those in uniform are obeying his commands. you are watching newsday on the bbc. still to come on the programme: we will talk to the australian team which has just pinpointed the secret genes which keep cancer cells dormant. also on the programme: why desperation and despair among india's 800 million farmers could have a decisive effect on the country's general election.

nothing, it seems, was too big to withstand the force of the tornado. the extent of the devastation will lead to renewed calls for government help to build better housing. internationally, there have already been protests. sweden says it received no warning of the accident. indeed, the russians at first denied anything had gone wrong. only when radioactivity levels began to increase outside russia were they forced to admit the accident. for the mujahideen, the mood here is of great celebration. this is the end of a 12—year war for them. they've taken the capital, which they've been fighting for for so long. it was 7 o'clock in the morning, the day when power began to pass from the minority to the majority, when africa, after 300 years, reclaimed its last white colony.

this is newsday on the bbc. i'm rico hizon, in singapore. i'm kasia madera, in london. our top stories: the british prime minister has sacked her defence secretary, after he was accused of leaking security concerns about huawei to the press. there've been more anti—government protests in venezuela. opposition leaderjuan guiado has again called on the military to support him. let's take a look at some front pages from around the world: first we go to the philippine star and they are covering labour day with a great shot of marches in manila. they say president duterte wants to increase worker rights but admitted conditions had not changed much.

in the south china morning post they are focussing on the us—china trade talks. they say beijing is making moves to open up china's banking sector in what is being seen by analysts as a concession to the us. and the international addition of the japan times covers the beginning of emperor naruhito's reign, with all kinds of celebrations taking place. in particular there's been a surge of marriages in tokyo as couples choose to tie the knot at the dawn of the new era. the us attorney general, william barr, has defended his summary of the report by special counsel robert mueller about russia's role in the 2016 presidential election. testifying before a senate committee, mr barr said he'd stuck to the bottom line. democrats have accused him of trying to protect president trump by over—simplifying its conclusions. our washington correspondent chris buckler has more.

it was a testy series of exchanges today. during this senate committee in which bill barr, the us attorney general, was continually criticised by democrats, who seemed to suggest that rather than being america's attorney general, he was behaving as if he was the attorney simply for president trump. and they said that wasn't his role. the key to all of this is the summary that he first gave us after he was given the full report by robert mueller, the special counsel who was looking into the allegations of collusion and whether or not president trump tried to obstructjustice. on the key issue of whether he tried to obstruct justice, there seems to have been some concern from robert mueller‘s team about the way it was presented. because, you will remember of course, that he did not come to a decision. he decided not to hold a view on that and leave it to the us attorney general. but he made clear that he was not exonerating the president. now, in a letter that was sent from robert mueller to bill barr, he said specifically that he felt the attorney general did not capture

the context, nature and substance of the report findings. in response, bill barr said today before that senate committee, that as far as he was concerned, he believes that was written instead by a member of robert mueller‘s staff rather than the special counsel himself. and he said he felt the letter was a bit snitty, meaning a bit agitated or a bit upset. the us attorney general has said he will not testify before the us house of representatives. yeah, because 2a hours later he was expected to appear before the house of representatives in theirjudiciary committee. but now he says he won't do that and at the core of this seems to be a bit of a battle between how this congressional committee would be held. it seems the usjustice department is objecting tonight the idea by democrats, that they would have perhaps skilled lawyers, members of their staff, question mr barr instead of necessarily themselves.

thejustice department has said that that is inappropriate and, as far as they're concerned, they will engage with members of congress and not members of their staff. but at the same time, the head of that congressional committee says as far as he is concerned, he is simply afraid. india is in the middle of its huge and long national election. the majority of indians live in villages, and it's farming families who will determine the result. many have been driven to desperation by crippling debt and tens of thousands have taken their own lives in the past five years. farmers‘ anger could be the biggest threat to prime minister narendra modi's re—election bid, as the bbc‘s yogita limaye reports from the western state of maharashtra. hands that will decide the government's fate. 800 million indians make a living on farms. but rural india is in crisis.

tens of thousands of farmers have killed themselves in the past five years, trapped in a cycle of debt. this man is one of them. this man was one of them. his family says he was expecting his loan to be waived as promised by the administration. in this note he left behind, he blamed the narendra modi government for failing to do so. "i'm facing a very hard time without him. now i have to manage everything alone." his widow tells me. "after the election, no—one cares about farmers, they continue to die." in 2018, the desperation spilled out onto the highways and into the cities. farmers marched, demanding loan waivers, fair prices and better infrastructure. these problems aren't new. but their tolerance is fading fast. in election season, it's the politicians that come to the village.

the ruling party says it will double farmer incomes if it comes to power again. i asked the local mp why they hadn't delivered on promises made so far. translation: these problems have been there for 50 years. we can't fix them in five. it's a long process. during mr modi's tenure, india became one of the fastest—growing major economies in the world. but here, it's very hard to see that. the villages seem stuck in time. farmers hardly use any modern equipment and they're still largely at the mercy of rainfall to irrigate their fields. india's growth story seems to be excluding many here. at this auction in a wholesale market, we saw the biggest challenge farmers face. even though the government sets a minimum rate that must be paid for a farmer's produce,

they hardly ever get it. and that pushes them into debt. translation: i don't want to beg in front of the government for loan waivers. farmers are self—respecting people. we are compelled to do it. farmers are india's largest constituents. their vote will decide the outcome. the quiet despair at the centre of a noisy election. you can get more on this story by logging onto our website which has a section on all aspects of the indian election and if you've raised in yogita's report, been affected by any of the issues raised in yogita's report, the website also has links to organisations offering support and information here in the uk — there may be similar organisations where you are. our next guest heads up a team of scientists that has discovered what keeps some

cancer cells dormant. dormant cells are the ones that are a major cause of cancer returning, sometimes years after a patient has been given the all clear. but professor peter croucher from the garvan institute of medical research says the technology they've just developed could be the holy grail in terms of eradicating some cancers completely. i spoke to him earlier about his findings. what we've really been working on is why cancer cells exist in a dormant state and so we understand that these cells are particularly important in disease relapse. so, why cancers return after what might be initially successful treatments. so could this be the holy grail of cancer treatment? well, we've been able to work out all the genes that control these dormant tumor cells, and what this may mean is that we can use this information now as a pathway to finding new treatments to be able to target these cells and eradicate them.

rather than just treat the primary disease, and be successful in treating that, and then seeing the disease recover years later, we can also treat the dormant cells and prevent them from coming back at a future date. and have you already tried this discovery, professor, on cancer patients? this has not been tried in people yet but what we've done is done these studies in animal models. we've worked out all the genes that control these cells at this particular point. we've started to go into patients in a limited number of individuals, we've been able to go into patients and find rare cells that look very, very similar to the cells that we find in our mouse models, suggesting that what we find in mice is very applicable and relevant to what we see in patients. so if you have used this on a limited basis with some cancer patients, what has been the success? at the moment, we're just trying to find out that these dormant cells exist in cancer patients and we've have taken a disease called multiple myeloma, which is one of the rare blood cancers,

and we've taken a small group of patients and been able to go and look for these cells in their bone marrow. and what is pretty amazing is that we can use this technology to find these cells for the very, very first time. so now, we know that they exist in this particular cohort of patients, but what we are trying to do is to expand the numbers of patients that we're looking at to understand how common this is. we're also going into other disease settings like prostate cancer and breast cancer to understand whether the dormant cells in that setting are the same, whether they also occur in patients in the same way. we are trying to use that information to develop new treatments, some of those treatments might involve keeping the cells dominant long periods of time. so you can live with these dominant cells and not wake them up at a later date. really what the holy grail is, is to use this new knowledge to be

able to pinpoint these cells. and to test the agents that target the dominant cancer cells only and notjust the growing proliferating cancer cells. you have been watching newsday. i'm kasia madera in london. and i'm rico hizon in singapore. stay with us. a slippery slope —— as us sanctions on buying iranian oil are due to kick in, we'll be finding out which countries continue to purchase persian crude. rico's let's end the programme with some food for thought. it's a great story from china where apparently a man failed a breathalyser test after eating too much durian fruit. it wasn't even a bad excuse, the man in question apparently failed a blood test prompting further tests. police found that eating too much of the pungent fruit can lead to false breathalyser test readings. it tastes so good. i have one for

you here, iwill it tastes so good. i have one for you here, i will mail it and send it for you to taste. no expense spared! i love it. hello. we are now over halfway through the working week, for many there is a bank holiday weekend to look forward to. the weather managed to behave itself but more on that in just a moment. yesterday we saw some showers across the uk, if anything, today the showers, more widespread. and some of them are likely to be fairly heavy affairs as well. it all starts off fairly quietly, there will be a few showers across eastern england first thing, some feeding into wales and the north—west of england. but as the morning wears on, and the sun starts to warm up the atmosphere little bit, we will see some towers of cloud building and then the chance of thunderstorms increases come the afternoon. we could see a shower just about anywhere,

really, on thursday. not all places will see them, but if you are caught in the showers, chances are they are going to be quite punchy. the greatest risk of thunder, i think probably across the midlands and northern england. the rain you see across scotland is slightly different, there is more cloud here, this is actually a weather front. and this is quite a big marker for the change in our weather as we end the week and get into the weekend. the showers will clear overnight, thursday into friday, ahead of this front sliding south. not bringing much in the way of rain but the blue triangles give you the clue, it's a cold front coming in behind it, much colder air on friday. the showers coming in on the northerly wind into scotland. wintry across higher ground, that wind will feel bitter as it strengthens down the north sea coast. ahead of the front to the south, not too bad, some sunny spells, there could be the odd shower, but a high of 15 degrees. to the north, factor in the wind and that seven in aberdeen, probably will feel more like freezing. what a difference after temperatures in northern scotland were 20 degrees earlier this week.

the cold air will dig its way all the way south across the uk through the remainder of friday into saturday. it will stay with us through the bank holiday weekend. that nagging northerly wind could feed in a few showers to eastern reaches of the uk, but on a positive note there will be a lot of fine weather around. away from the east coast, a frost possible first thing on saturday, if you are a gardener or a grower, beware. i've certainly got some of my young plants out at the moment, time to dig out the fleece. for saturday daytime we should see some decent sunshine, but temperatures never really recover. bit more cloud around on sunday, monday the wind should ease and that could make quite a big difference. after a couple of pretty chilly days, saturday and sunday, monday you may find things starting to feel closer to average temperatures for the time of year, shall we say.

you are watching bbc news. our top story: the british defence secretary, gavin williamson, has been sacked over information leaked from a national security council meeting. the british prime minister, theresa may, said there was compelling evidence that he was responsible for the disclosures. mr williamson has strenuously denied any involvement. there has been a second day of protests on the streets of venezuela, after president nicholas maduro claimed to have defeated an attempted coup. and this video is trending on bbc.com. these two seagulls have become an unlikely internet sensation after photo—bombing one of the cameras used to monitor traffic in central london. nicknamed graham and steve, they have taken up residence on one of the key routes into the central financial district. that's all. stay with bbc world news.