hello everyone, glad you could join us. this is newsday on the bbc. i'm rico hizon, in singapore. the headlines: preparing for more protests — activists are arriving at hong kong's parliament before the second reading of the controversial extradition bill. at least 19 people have been killed and thousands more left stranded after record rainfall hits southern china. i'm kasia madera, in london. also in the programme: the defeat of islamic state makes the world more peaceful as this yea r‘s the world more peaceful as this year's global index is released.

the us—china tariff war leaves a sour taste for california winemakers as business dries up. live from our studios in singapore and london, this is bbc world news — it's newsday. good morning. it's 8am in singapore, iam in london and also 8 am in hong kong, where thousands of people are gathering for more demonstrations against a controversial extradition law. this is the scene live outside the legislative council in hong kong. pro—democracy activists have assembled close to the parliament where the proposed bill is due for a second round of debate shortly. the bill would allow people to be sent to mainland china for trial. there's a heavy police presence

around the building, and young people have been stopped and searched. hundreds of businesses have said they will go on strike on wednesday, and more mass demonstrations are expected. hong kong's leader, carrie lam, says she won't withdraw the proposal despite the opposition to the bill. our reporter martin yip is outside the legislative council in hong kong. what will basically happen today inside the legislative council? this morning if all goes well, at 11am local time, in around three hours time from now, the legislative council will hold a general meeting and then will resume the second reading of this extradition bell.

the extradition law amendment bill. there are more than 100 amendments put through by the pro—democracy legislators so they will have to debate those through first. if all goes through plan, they will hold meetings from today into next week and hoping for a final motion moved to vote next thursday. after the readings they will be of vote and when could be potentially be seeing this extradition bell becoming law? -- bill. we are yet to see when it will be put into action but we are not sure how practical it is to pass a law that has been suspended given

the controversy. carrie lam, the chief executive, hong kong's leader, has been arguing a few weeks ago that as soon as they can get the bill through, they can see it being used within one particular case which triggered this... inaudible we would like to apologise for experiencing technical issues with oui’ experiencing technical issues with our reporter in hong kong. can you hear me? martin joining our reporter in hong kong. can you hear me? martinjoining us from hong kong and we continued to see live pictures outside of the legislative council as activists continued to oppose this extradition bill. we'll have more on hong kong a little later in the programme. let's take a look at some of the day's other news: a russian journalist has been freed after drug dealing charges against him were dropped.

ivan golunov‘s detention last week provoked an outcry, with many people saying he had been framed because of his investigations into corruption. reporting from moscow, here's jonah fisher. there was, of course, outcry. journalists have been railing. there were demonstrations planned for tomorrow. yesterday we had newspapers putting the story, a show of solidarity, and their front pages. and then today the announcement from the interior minister that they had found no evidence to link, in terms of forensics, ivan golunov to the drugs that were found. there's been a major development in sudan, where much of the country has recently been in a shut down. protest leaders have agreed to suspend widespread strikes and return to the negotiating table. in return, the army, which has been in control since long—time president 0mar al—bashir was ousted in april, has agreed to release political prisoners. us media say donald trump's eldest

son will be interviewed by the senate intelligence committee. donald trump junior will appear behind closed doors and the hearing is expected to cover a range of topics, including what he knew about the trump tower project in moscow. botswana's high court has ruled in favour of decriminalising homsexuality in the country. the court has rejected laws that impose up to seven years in prison for same—sex relationships. three judges came to the decision unanimously with one describing laws that ban gay sex as being "discriminatory". barcelona's lionel messi was the world's highest paid athlete over the last 12 months — that's according to forbes magazine. he earned a cool $127 million over the last year. juventus midfielder cristiano ronaldo was second on the list, with psg's neymar third. last year's highest earner, boxer floyd mayweather, has dropped off the list.

at least 19 people have been killed and thousands more left stranded after record rainfall hit eastern china. and there's more to come, with authorities issuing an alert for continued heavy rain on wednesday. sylvia lennan—spence reports. dramatic scenes in eastern guangxi province as rescue workers managed to reach people trapped over floodwaters and take them to safety. these are scenes being repeated in numerous counties there, after torrential rain which started last week triggered floods. more than two million residents have been affected and 150,000 relocated so far. translation: the emergency management industry has allocated 2,000 tenth, 20,000 quilts, 10,000 beds.

this man is clinging onto a pole to prevent himself from being swept away. rescue workers move in and he is pulled to safety. emergency workers also managed to reach 16 climbers, including two children trapped by flash flooding on a mountain. they use boats and rubber dinghies to rescue the young and old from flooded houses. firefighters were able to reach this woman's103—year—old mother—in—law and take her to safety. translation: i want to thank the firefighters for rescuing my mother, otherwise she would not have made it, she is 103—years—old. more than 20,000 homes are without power and thousands of hectares have in destroyed by the downpours. there is no let—up just yet as rainstorms are expected

to continue and spread until the end of the week. sylvia lennan—spence, bbc news. the world has become more peaceful for the first time in five years but conflicts and dangers remain. that's according to the annual global peace index, produced by the think tank, the institute for economics and peace. the index scores countries according to three factors which include involvement in conflicts at home and abroad, the size of a country's military and internal security, including violent crime and terror. so according to this year's ranking, the improving situation in syria means that afghanistan is now the least peaceful country on earth. of all the world's nations, and despite unrest in the east of the country, ukraine showed the biggest improvement in peacefulness. the country which has showed the largest deterioration due

to the violence there is nicaragua. steve killelea is the founder and executive chairman of the institute for economics and peace. he explained how syria has managed to improve its ranking in this year's report. what has happened with syria basically is isis has been defeated. now, it's still got elements, pockets of the fighters left in different parts of the country, but the overall number of people killed in battlefield deaths has dropped 13% in the last year. whereas for afghanistan, it really has not changed. so syria has become slightly more peaceful but still the second—least peaceful country in the world, and so it's still mired in conflict. has any country, has anything particularly stood out for you in these latest findings? well, it's a number of things which actually stood out. i think the first thing is the actual headline that the world has become slightly more peaceful, and that is the first

improvement in five years and, and that's since 2014. some thing for europe — it's actually become more peaceful, with 22 countries improving this year, out of the 36 countries in europe. now, what happen in 2014, that is when isis first started to gain territory in iraqi which then flowed into syria, and so what we're seeing is, because of the defeat of isis and also boko haram in nigeria, that's actually now improved the situation in many countries. when you've had countries which have had real crisis situations, like myanmar, i'm thinking about the rohingya, the massacres of rohingya people there — how does that impact on a country specifically, how does myanmar figure? well, myanmar has dropped tremendously the last two years but what's interesting, it had been improving for the five years prior to that. they have done a peace deal with a number of the different rebel groups within the country, and the main thing, is if they can get the rohingya situation solved —

that which is not an easy situation to solve — myanmar could actually improve further in peace. what i found also really fascinating is that a country like ukraine has shown the most improvement and yet we know, specifically in the eastern of the country, there is an ongoing conflict there. yes, what you've got to understand, when countries have been mired in conflicts — and it's a bit like syria — some improvement creates quite a good bounce in terms of the rankings and in terms of the score. the main thing driving the ukraine is a lot less deaths through conflict over in the dansk region. and also the level of terrorism or the number of deaths through terrorism, has dropped markedly as well. this has been enough to actually create a bounce but it is still quite low on the global peace index. it is notjust things like terrorism, it's notjust violent crime. climate change, that's had

a big impact as well. with climate change, what we did is we did a study which looked at the countries in the areas of the world which were likely to be most affected by severe climate change affects and what we have found was that there was 103 million people living in countries which have got very, very low levels of peace so any major climatic effect, like let's say what happened in haiti with cyclones there, is likely to lead to very big deteriorations in peace. we're looking at is the fragility in nations and try to better understand what countries need aid. you're watching newsday on the bbc. still to come on the programme: hong kong is braced for another day of protests ahead of a second reading of a controversial extradition bill. we'll look at what's led up to the protests.

also on the programme: how california's wine country is feeling the fallout of america's trade war with china. the day the british liberated the falklands. and by tonight, british troops had begun the task of disarming the enemy. in the heart of the german capital, this was gorby—mania at its height. the crowd packed to see the man who for them, has raised great hopes for an end to the division of europe. michaeljackson was not guilty on all charges. the screams of the crowd, a testament to his popularity and their faith in his innocence. as long as they'll pay to go see me,

i'll get out there and kick 'em down the hill. what does it feel like to be the first man to go across the channel by your own power? it's feels pretty neat. feel marvellous, really. this is newsday on the bbc. i'm rico hizon in singapore. i'm kasia madera in london. our top stories. protesters are gathering in hong kong ahead of a second reading of a controversial extradition bill. and in sport — it wasn't unlucky 13 for the usa as they hammered thailand 13—0 at the women's world cup in france. incredibly — six of those goals were scored in the the last 16 minutes. let's take a look at some front pages from around the world. the japan times leads with the japanese government's decision to retract a controversial report into the country's pension system.

the report had raised serious doubts over the countries ability to support its aging population — but finance minister taro aso has rejected its conclusions. the south china morning post is leading on the ongoing unrest in hong kong over the extradition bill. the story focuses on a police investigation launched over alleged death threats sent to hong kong leader carrie lam. and the gulf news reports on pakistan's emergency budget, as the country attempts to meet the condition of its $6 billion imf bailout. imran khan's government is looking to raise $36 billion in total tax revenue by raising tariffs on gas and electricity. now, what stories are sparking discussions online?

let's go back to hong kong and the live images we are seeing there are protesters continuing to gather. they are gathering outside the legislative council and this is where pro—democracy activists are assembling close to parliament where this proposed extradition bill, this controversial bill that has seen a lot of anger in hong kong is being debated for a second round imminently. the bill would allow people to be sent to mainland china for trial. this is something that people in hong kong are very concerned about. they do not want any powers seceded to china, they wa nt to any powers seceded to china, they want to continue their separateness from mainland china. so there is increasing numbers of protesters — by joining. increasing numbers of protesters — byjoining. we have been watching this for a few hours now there were a handful overnight but now seeing a strong amount of people.

hong kong isjust had one of its biggest ever protests in history. 0rganisers say biggest ever protests in history. organisers say over biggest ever protests in history. 0rganisers say over 1 biggest ever protests in history. 0rganisers say over1 million people took to the streets, one in seven of the population, which she simply huge. people are worried about a proposed law that would allow extradition to mainland china. critics have pointed out that business people and expats in hong kong, or even tourists going through their could potentially, in theory, be extradited to mainline china. the law is complicated but let me break it down to the law would allow hong kong to extradite people to other countries it does not have agreements with including china. the government say they are safeguarded so government say they are safeguarded so only people accused of serious and criminal offences will be extradited. people of political —— convicted of political or religious cases would not be extradited. some judges have spoken out against the laws and say there are concerns that would affect independence. hong kong

is no stranger to protest. we had the umbrella protests in 2014 and there are often pro—democracy protest. but it has become less common recently and people think thatis common recently and people think that is because the beijing government has taken a harder stance. the protests are not led by any particular one person. a number of pro—democracy and human rights group have been organising protest. the chinese government has been issuing statements telling western countries not to get involved, saying mind your own business, essentially. it also said that fears are overblown. carrie lamb, the chief executive of hong kong people think she is competent but ultimately she answers to beijing. there have been protests in 29 different cities including london against the treaty and a chinese artist showed up to them saying he wa nted artist showed up to them saying he wanted to support the people of hong kong who had spoken out for him when

he had been detained in china. he was detained on tax related offences. the main slogan from these protests has been this phrase. they say the phrase is apt because many people argue that this means the death of hong kong. we heard from claudio mo, a legislator and democracy advocate, earlier. i asked her will the government back down? it is going to be most unlikely, i'm afraid. carrie lam has been conducting her business rather like a little puppet of the beijing government. she just does what beijing tells her to do. it is a very sad scenario. she is really approaching this governance crisis in hong kong and she has completely

lost any credibility amongst the people here. she seems to fail to understand people's profound distrust of this lack of rule of law in china. if she will not back down, what's going to happen next? they have already changed rules and things at the local legislature to try to speed up the procedures to have this very controversial bill passed by next week, by next thursday at the latest, thursday week. and she is really pushing hong kong people to the brink of a precipice and ijust don't know how hong kong could deteriorate further... but if the government introduces, going forward, some safeguards

to the bill, wouldn't that appease you and the opposition? we don't want any safeguards because they can't be real safeguards. we have been telling this hong kong government that, please, just scrap this bill for the time being, and listen to the people because the exclusion of china from hong kong's extradition arrangements was done purposefully, we are continuing to monitor as those protesters build up in hong kong. donald trump has threatened to slap more tariffs on chinese exports to the united states if xijinping doesn't meet him at this month's g20 summit injapan. the trump administration says it's using tariffs to balance the trade deficit and fight what it calls beijing's "unfair" practices. some of china's retaliatory tariffs are already hitting us businesses — including american wine exports. sophie long has been to see

some of those affected. the lush landscape of california's wine country. across this fertile land, concern is growing, as family businesses feel the impact of the tension between the world's two biggest economies. right here you guys will see a sauvignon blanc block planted in 1999. ijoined an eco tour at honig's vineyard. customers learn about their sustainable winemaking. it's a crucial source of income for the third generation producers. their business with china has collapsed completely. 0ur china business has gone to zero. the top year was 1,000 cases, and now we're back down to zero. so in ten, a little over ten years, it's gone up and then down. a bottle that used to cost $100 on the shelf at retail in china now costs $200 and that's not for any fault, anything different that we are doing. we've gone to china, we see the market is interested in our wine, and then you get one more round of these stupid tariffs, they're just impacting us for no reason.

china is the fastest—growing and will likely soon become the largest wine market in the world. meanwhile, sales at home are declining, which is starting to rattle nerves. the older wine—loving generation are retiring. millennials seem to prefer spirits or recently legalised marijuana. another layer of tariffs is another unwelcome challenge. the first time, it's like, oh, my god, what are we going to do? and the second time, i think we've been here. the third time, you know, it'sjust piling on. you can't get any deeper than that. you think the point that the chinese market is at, you've got a growing middle—class, people who are going to be buying wine who wouldn't have been before, that's the time you need to be there, right? exactly, now is the time we want to be there and be able to develop that and so, you know, i'll be going this fall and continue to bang the drum about california wines. the great hope here is that an agreement will be reached that

will erase the tariffs that existed in the first place. then wine producers could end up the winners in this trade war. the wine institute says as californians, they think big and they're confident that will carry them through. it's just part of our nature to dream big, to be freethinkers. we apply that to wine growing and winemaking, and what comes out of it is this incredibly rich and exciting wine industry. we rise to that challenge. and that's part of what keeps us going forward. president nixon helped put napa wine on the world map when he raised a glass of it in a toast to peace with china. those who work in the valley‘s vineyards hope that president trump will do similar, and soon. you have been watching newsday. i'm kasia madera n london. and i'm rico hizon

in singapore. stay with us. these are live images from hong kong where protesters continue to assemble, to protest against extradition laws. some really miserable weather out there at the moment, pouring with rain across the north, but it's notjust here in the uk where we're getting the really unsettled weather. in fact, much of western europe, all the way down to spain and portugal are experiencing below average temperatures and quite changeable weather. now there's a big low pressure is stuck across northern france, around the channel here, and as long as there is low pressure here things aren't going to change. it will remain very, very unsettled. winds coming in across the north of europe but the winds will have to swing back around again. and they are blowing out of the south around central and eastern parts of the continent. that's the yin and yang of weather. one side of europe is hot and sunny

and the other side is paying for it and it is cool and very, very wet. so here's the rain, early hours of wednesday morning. the low pressure, we've already established that, it's parked across this part of europe. so you can see spells of unsettled weather there across parts of germany as well. also we'll see thunderstorms drifting out of the south and they will affect southern portions of the uk. notice a bit of a lull in the intensity in the rain over in the north, but that will get heavier later on wednesday. these blobs here, these are showers. thunderstorms developing almost anywhere across the southern portion of the uk. there could be some really nasty downpours. notice how this rain gets heavier as we go into the afternoon, quite menacing, threatening rain clouds. all of that is going to come in and bring a real deluge to parts of northern england, reaching parts of scotland and north—eastern england as well.

a wet wednesday on the way. here's a look at thursday. the winds are blowing around like so, that low pressure's parked itself across the uk. the south, a few sunny spells, yes, but some thunderstorms. the temperatures 14—16 degrees, that's closer to the end of april, sort of may temperatures, really. so the low will wobble around the uk, bringing us again spells of rain and showers as we head towards the end of the week. improving a little bit acorss europe. on balance, unsettled, as we head into the weekend. later there is a sign of things warming up, but not just yet.

i'm kasia madera with bbc news. our top story: hong kong's preparing for another day of protests as crowds begin building near parliament. it comes ahead of the second reading of a controversial extradition bill, which would allow people to be sent to mainland china for trial. hundreds of businesses have said they will go on strike on wednesday. reports in the us say that the murdered half—brother of kim jong—un was an informant for the us spy agency, the cia. kim jong—nam was poisoned in malaysia two years ago. and this story is doing well on bbc.com... an ethiopian woman gave birth and just half an hour later sat important exams. almaz derese had hoped to sit the tests before her baby was born, but they were were postponed because of ramadan. congratulations to her. that's all.