this is bbc world news. the headlines: iran announces it will roll back its commitments from the nuclear deal even further following the us attack that killed general qasem soleimani in baghdad on friday. the us state department says it deeply regrets the decision by the iraqi parliament to vote to remove all foreign troops from iraq following the death of the iranian general. in iran, huge crowds have followed the coffin of general soleimani as the funeral procession makes its way across the country. there were so many people on the streets, part of the planned route had to be postponed. harrowing stories of devastation and heartbreak as firefighters continue the fight against australia's worst bushfires in history. in victoria, emergency warnings are still in force with lives and homes at risk.

those are the headlines on bbc world news. at 10 o'clock, mishal husain will be here with a full round—up of the day's news. first, it's time for our world: fighting for lapland. lapland is europe's great last wilderness. last great wilderness. it stretches across norway, sweden, finland and russia, way above the arctic circle. the far north of finland is the home of the sami, europe's only indigenous people, who still live off the land. but the life of the sami people is changing. climate change is affecting the arctic more than any other part of the earth.

you can't rely on that you know how nature acts or how animals act because everything seems to be changing. the melting ice is opening up opportunities for shipping routes and there is talk of a new railway. it's the worst nightmare we are facing at the moment. which could threaten the sami people's way of life. how can you put a price tag for a culture? we have come to lapland to talk to sami women about the challenges they face. nature gives if we give back. we can't just take.

anna comes from a family of sami reindeer herders who still make a living off the land. it's the start of the calving season and anna is checking up on the reindeer with eero, a finnish relative. the reindeer are about to give birth. these are extra feed pellets needed for the mother reindeer so that they are in good condition.

eero is the herder of this fence here. he's the husband of my niece. female reindeer have antlers during the winter and during the spring so that they can chase away the male ones from good food places, places where the reindeer moss is growing. these reindeer are female and they are about to give birth — some in a couple of days, some in a couple of weeks. they are so beautiful. reindeer herds roam free in lapland. but when it's calving time, anna's family fences them in to make sure the reindeer get enough food before the calves are born.

over the centuries, sami people have made a living from reindeer herding. it's still a key part of their culture. but now, fewer than 10% of them are involved in it. he calls reindeer herding is getting much harder. normally, there would be a lot more snow on the ground in the forest at this time of the year. but the climate is changing and it's threatening the family's herd. usually, winter came in the end of october and now it can be in december. during the winter, there can be really warm periods that get the snow to melt. winter should be approximately nine months of the year and now it's maybe six months.

temperatures in the winter fluctuate a lot more than they did in the past, which is making it more difficult for reindeer to find food. usually, reindeer can dig through any amount of snow. so whether it's 2 metres, it can smell the reindeer moss and find itand dig it. but when the snow melts, then this food, the basic best food of reindeer, this reindeer moss, freezes, the reindeer can't dig it. they can't even smell it through the ice. that's starvation then. and starvation means that the reindeer herder has to take extra food. and, of course, then it affects the income of reindeer herder. the number of reindeer herders

is decreasing in finland. over the last 20 years, it's declined by almost half. now there are fewer than 5,000. many find it difficult to cope with the huge amount of unpredictability in reindeer herding caused by the changing climate. you can't rely on what you used to know about winter, how winters are. you can't rely on that you know how nature acts or how animals are, because everything seems to be changing. people that live from the nature, sami people over here, have adapted and adapted over decades, almost over centuries, i'd say. life here has always changed. but then we are reaching the point

where these changes are not such things that you can add up to. people don't feel safe any more and that starts to affect their mental health. 100km from anna's reindeer, in the far north—eastern corner of finland, close to the russian border, heini lives in a very remote house. the nearest supermarket is 90km away. most sami people in northern lapland live in places like this and they are very much connected to their natural environment. we built this house ourselves and i think a log house itself is eco—friendly. we heat the house with wood, but we do have running

water and electricity, like in any other house. we are no eco—warriors, we are just ordinary people who want to do our best. in early spring, heini and herfamily drink birchjuice. she usually starts tapping the trees in may. but this year, for the first time, the juice was ready in april. we get winter very late. it can be december that we get permanent snow. for instance, this february, spring comes very early so we have shorter winters. here are photos of my family. here are my grandmothers.

and here is my great—grandfather. he is ice fishing here. he's doing traditional ice fishing. heini is an artisan. she makes a living by teaching traditional sami handicrafts. what i'm making here is a saamcic. it's a married women's hat. when women get married, it gets... she will have this crown for herself. it is as a crown. the saamcic is the most difficult handicraft that i ever tried, and this is truly, truly very difficult handicraft. traditionally, every woman did handicrafts, but not this one, because this was special.

only some handicraft masters were doing this. heini uses reindeer skin to make shoes. but more rain in the summer has affected her ability to produce them. here are my latest. ijust made this ready, these we were waiting for years in our shed for me to make these ready. this, i made these for myself. they're a little more fancy. the reindeerfur shoes. and these are already too small for my children. here is how we do it. we just... we skin the reindeer legs, and then we just put them to dry like this. and this is how it should be. but here, we can see moulded ones.

it tells us that the summers are more wet than they used to be. five hours‘ drive to the west, close to the norwegian and swedish borders, ellen is a northern sami handicraft master. she is 84 years old. she's visiting her niece to make traditional sami clothes with her.

climate change is damaging traditional sami livelihoods. but that's not the only threat. as temperatures rise and the sea ice melts, there's now the opportunity for a shipping route to open through the arctic. and plans are being developed for a railway to be built across lapland, threatening to cut through reindeer—herding territory. finland's ministry of transport favours the route from rovaniemi, the capital of finnish lapland, along the shore of lake inari and

terminating in kirkenes, in norway. supporters say the railway will boost lapland's economy, but the finnish government says no decision has been made on the construction of the railway, or its routeing. but the sami parliament is fiercely opposed to the plans. the arctic railway through rovaniemi to kirkenes, through our very heartlands of three different sami language groups in finland, would be such infrastructure which will be the end to the sami culture. we live from the nature, and it will cut the reindeer grazing areas into two. there will be more forest logging, for example. it will be transporting oil and gas products from norway and russia. it will bring the mining

industry to the sami homeland area in finland. it's the worst nightmare we are facing at the moment, a concrete one. of course, climate change is another one. but it's not as concrete as the arctic railway. heini, the handicrafter, who lives close to the russian border, has found out that a proposal for the arctic railway has been included in the development plan for finnish lapland. those plans, i have seen. so, it seems like it would go straight through our house. and my opinion is that it will be a genocide. if the plans for the railway are approved, it's likely that heini would be forced to move.

it's a painful reminder of the past. heini is a skolt sami. many of her people were forced to leave their ancestral homes in russia and resettle in finland, “11944. all these kind of mining plans are our big nightmare here. yeah, we are very afraid of those. that was why skolt samis had to move after the second world war. nazis did want to have this nickel mining in petsamo. we are only few. in finland, skolt samis are around 600. and everyone has kind of tried to work to maintain the culture, keep the language alive. and if we have to fight against this kind of international greed,

it takes too much of our time and energy away. everything is only measured by money. but how can you put a price tag for our culture? back in inari, anna is getting ready to go ice fishing. we are trying to put the last hooks in. anna does fishing all year round. and she takes great pride in supplying her family and friends with fresh fish. now the bait is in the hook.

so, the weight takes the bait down there in a good depth and this is how it stays. the stick stays there because this is holding however big pike there will be. and then, well, tomorrow morning, i will come and check if there is movement in there. 20 years ago, the lake would freeze over by the end of october. last year, anna had to wait until the middle of december before she could go on the ice. and the ice starts melting earlier than it used to in the spring, making it increasingly dangerous to fish. the new conditions, of course, the people need to learn again, to get to know them.

so, some people drown when learning. and that's, of course, a tragedy every time when it happens. sami people are the people of winter. if the winter disappears, it would be really strange, really hard to continue on the cycle of the year that doesn't have the real cycle. if the fishermen will adapt, then maybe the fish won't adapt to warming waters. so, my biggest fear is that fish will disappear. one fall, one winter, the nets will start being empty. anna believes that reindeer herding and fishing wouldn't survive

if the arctic railway is built and new mines open up in the area. what is the reason for these building plans? it is the greed of people. big companies want to give more profits to their shareholders. we need to be, and we have to be active, in this fight to save our world, to save our reindeers, to save our clean drinking water and where the fish can live, and this... itisa... it's a trade of, like, both ways. nature gives, if we give back.

we can't just take. will climate change destroy the forests and the lakes in europe's last great wilderness? willa new industrial railway wipe out sami culture, or will it bring jobs and an economic boom to northern lapland ? we don't know. for now, the questions remain unanswered.

hello there. after a weekend that's brought us some relatively quiet, innocuous weather, things are about to step up a gear. through this week, we will see some heavy rain at times, gales too, particularly in the north of the uk. generally, it will feel mild for the time of year. signs of something a little bit drier turning up as we get on towards friday. but as far as monday is concerned, it's all about this frontal system, this cold front pushing in from the west. it's going to bring some outbreaks of heavy rain, accompanied by some brisk winds. ahead of the fronts, a lot of cloud, some mist, murk and drizzle. behind the front, things will start to brighten up. we'll see some spells of sunshine, there will be some showers returning to scotland and northern ireland. some of these showers wintry over high ground in scotland. temperatures generally between eight and 11 degrees. now, as we move into tuesday, this area of low pressure becomes the dominant feature, passing to the north—west of the british isles. lots of white lines on this chart,

lots of isobars squashing together. that shows that it will be windy. there'll be severe gales in places. but those winds drawing some very, very mild air northwards, across the british isles. so, for tuesday, the further south and east you are, a decent amount of dry weather, some brightness. further north and west, some outbreaks of heavy rain, and those very strong winds gusting to 70 or 75 mph across parts of scotland. also very gusty, i think, to the eastern side of the pennines, but have a look at the temperatures. 13, 14, 15 degrees, maybe 16 degrees — very unusual for this point in early january. now, some of that mild air will be swept away as we move into wednesday, this cold front sinking south—eastwards introduces something colder, particularly across northern and central parts, down towards the south, where that mild air will linger. but actually, wednesday not a bad day weather—wise. it's a largely dry day, with some spells of sunshine. showers blowing into scotland, wintry over high ground, windy in northern scotland, and a colder day here. but further south, notice

those temperatures — 11,12 or 13 degrees. now, as we go into into thursday, there's some uncertainty about the detail. yes, it looks like low pressure will push in from the west, but the exact shape of that low is still open to some degree of question. so, that means it's hard to predict exactly where the wettest weather will be and exactly how windy it will be. certainly, there will be some wet and blustery weather around, still mild in the south, cold further north, cold for some snow over high ground in scotland. but whatever the shape of that low, it should clear off as we get into friday, and notice this bump in the isobars, this ridge of high pressure toppling in. that means some dry weather to start friday. it's probably the coldest morning of the week. there could well be a frost in places. but after that chilly start, we're going to see largely dry conditions and some spells of sunshine. the chance for things to turn a little cloudier and breezier up to the north—west later in the day. and those temperatures down a little bit by this stage, 6—10d, although that's still very

respectable for this time of year. now, into next weekend and, in fact, the following week — high pressure will always be trying to establish itself down towards the south—east of the british isles, and certainly across continental europe. so that means that while frontal systems will approach from the west, the further south and east you are, actually, you can expect a decent amount of dry weather close to those areas of high pressure. this kind of weather setup will bring us a south—westerly wind and that will tend to draw mild air in our direction. so, through next weekend and beyond, it does look largely mild. more wind and rain at times, but the driest of the conditions will always be found towards the south and the east of the uk. that's all from me. bye for now.

iran takes another step back from the international deal on its nuclear programme after the us assassination