this is bbc news. the headlines: the death toll from the coronavirus rises to 41, with authorities in china struggling to contain the outbreak, as millions travel for the lunar new year. there are now known cases of the virus in france and australia, and a state of emergency has been declared in hong kong. we have a command centre so that we can get the views from experts and they can come up with strategies and initiatives. lawyers representing president donald trump, are due to begin their defence of the us leader, in his impeachment trial. a royal marine recruit has died following a training exercise on a beach in cornwall earlier this week. a charity offering mental health support to military veterans,

says it can't take on new cases because of a funding crisis. at least 22 people have been killed, and more than 1000 injured, in a powerful earthquake in eastern turkey. england take on early south african wickets after posting 400 runs in their first wickets after posting 400 runs in theirfirst innings in wickets after posting 400 runs in their first innings in johannesburg. good afternoon. lawyers for president trump are about to begin his defence in his impeachment trial in the us senate. they will be hoping to show that he is innocent

of the charges put before them. those are abusing his power, and obstructing investigations. this is the scene live in congress right now. president trump, of course, who isa now. president trump, of course, who is a republican, strongly denying any wrongdoing. he is accused of pressurising ukraine, essentially to dig up damaging information on one of his main democratic challengers for presidency this year, joe biden, and his son. at the time, hunter worked for a ukrainian company. and also, obstruction of this said trial, the investigation into the alleged scheme. with me now is michael goldfarb who is an american author, journalist and broadcaster. just bring us up to speed. where are we with this impeachment trial. this

isa we with this impeachment trial. this is a saturday session. it is entirely possible it'll end up being abbreviated. during the course of the week, the democrats presented their initial evidence about these charges that you have just read out. the senate meets on saturday in times of crisis, like impeachment hearings, and what is likely is the two lead lawyers on the trump defence team, a massive defence team, you know, they will begin to present their case. there is a certain amount of mystery. the democrats did it, they were led out by the chair of the intelligence committee. he spoke for 2.5 hours. it is not entirely clear that either man will do that today. they may say they are presenting this as an outline and we look forward to coming back on monday to present details. it is also possible because they thrive on surprise, remember

they thrive on surprise, remember the trump team emulates that whole thing of being a reality tv host, and they might just thing of being a reality tv host, and they mightjust decide to surprise everyone and go full bore, but as of now, reports coming out of washington is that it will be a short session today with the heavyweight stuff coming on monday. how does this reality tv thing work at this level of government?m keeps people interested. it keeps people talking about it, and the ball is now in their court. they are going to be setting out a case. we we re going to be setting out a case. we were just talking about it. president trump is accused of abusing power. he is hoping to turn it around and say actually, no. hunter, the son ofjoe biden, vice president, was abusing power by using his father ‘s name to get a job on this ukrainian company, which isa job on this ukrainian company, which is a corrupt company, and they are going to try to change the

conversation over to joe biden. going to try to change the conversation over tojoe biden. the democrats case is, you were trying to get dirt onjoe biden because you we re to get dirt onjoe biden because you were afraid he was going to be your opponent. it sounds mad, but the thing, as we watch and talk about it, and everyone watching with us should remember, is that whatever people were watching and agreeing with on wednesday, and new orleans will be tuning in today to watch and agree with the president's defenders, up to 42% of americans who voted for him, who still support him, they cannot be swayed, and they wa nt him, they cannot be swayed, and they want their team to go into bat and defend the president. obviously coming from the president and his legal team today, he has got white house lawyers, personal lawyers, it isa house lawyers, personal lawyers, it is a huge team, it is all going to be about deflection, butjust remind british viewers why this matters, this whole impeachment trial. what is it about, what are the consequences? first of all, it is a bit of theatre. the conclusions are foregone. donald trump will be

exonerated, two thirds of the senate has to vote to convict him to remove him from office. so, what is the purpose? 0ne him from office. so, what is the purpose? one is if you as the democrats have laid out, and i think a lot of people, there's nobody left america who is impartial, but power was abused, congress was obstructed. subpoenas was ignored. but there is more to it than the theatre. if these things happen, and if you don't at least make a stand, then another president might take these abuses of power further. plus, there is november, when donald trump will be upfor is november, when donald trump will be up for election. the democrats wa nt be up for election. the democrats want this to go on for as long as possible so people will remember, they will remember in november... not the 5th of november! but they

will remember in november when they go to the ballot box. just looking at these pictures, the chief justice. chiefjustice of the courts, john roberts, is calling the session together. that is patrick malone, the lead defence attorney for donald trump. i thank you for your attention. i want to set out a short plan for today. we are going to be very respectful of your time. we anticipate going about 2—3 hours at most, and to be out of here by 1pm at the latest. we are going to focus today on two points. you heard the house manager speak for nearly 24 hours over three days. we don't anticipate using that much time. we don't believe that they have come

anywhere close to meeting their burden for what they are asking you to do. we believe, when you hear the facts, and that is what we intend to cover today, the facts, that you will find that the president did absolutely nothing wrong. what we intend to do it today and we will have more presentations in greater detail on monday, but today we intend to go through the record they established in the house. we intend to show you some of the evidence that they produced in the house, that they produced in the house, that they produced in the house, that they decided over there three days and 24 hours, that they did not have enough time, or made a decision not to show you, and every time you see one of these pieces of evidence,

ask yourself, why didn't i see that in the first three days? they had it it came out of their process. why didn't they show that to the senate? and i think that is an important question. as house managers, really, their goal should be to give you all of the facts. they are asking you to do something very, very consequential, and i would submit to you to use a word that has been used a lot, very, very dangerous. and thatis a lot, very, very dangerous. and that is the second point that i would ask you to keep in mind today. they are asking you not only to overturn the results of the last election, but as i have said before, they are asking you to remove president trump from the ballot in

an election that is occurring in approximately nine months. they are asking you to tear up all of the ballots across this country on your owfi ballots across this country on your own initiative, take that decision away from the american people, and i don't think they spent one minute of their24 don't think they spent one minute of their 24 hours talking to you about their 24 hours talking to you about the consequences of that for our country. not one minute. they didn't tell you what that would mean for out tell you what that would mean for our country today, this year, and for ever into our future, they are asking you to do something that no senate has ever done. they are asking you to do it with no evidence. and that is wrong, and i ask you to keep that in mind. so,

what i would do is point out one piece of evidence, and then i am going to turn it over to my colleagues and they will walk you through my record and they will show you things that they didn't show you. now, they didn't talk a lot about the transcript of the call, which i would submit is the best evidence of what happened on the call. and they said things over and overagain call. and they said things over and over again that are simply not true. 0ne over again that are simply not true. one of them was, "there is no evidence of president trump 's interest in burden sharing". that wasn't the real reason. but they didn't tell you that burden sharing was discussed in the call, in the transcript of the call. they did not tell you that. why? let me read it to you. here is the president, and

we will go through the entire transcript, i am we will go through the entire transcript, lam not we will go through the entire transcript, i am not going to read the entire transcript, we will make it available so you can have it. the president said, and they read this line, "i will say that we do a lot for ukraine. we spent a lot of effort and a lot of time. " but they stop there, they didn't read the following. "much more than european countries are doing, and they should be helping more than they are. germany does almost nothing for you. all they do is talk. and i think it is something that you should really ask them about. when i was speaking to angela merkel, she talks ukraine, but she doesn't do anything. a lot of the european countries are the same way. so i think it is something you want to look at, but the united

states has been very, very good to ukraine." that's where they picked up ukraine." that's where they picked up again with the quote. but they left out the entire discussion of burden sharing. now, what does presidents lenski say? does he disagree? no. he agrees. they didn't tell you this. didn't have time in 24 hours to tell you this. "yes, you are absolutely right. not only 100%, but actually 100%, and i can tell you the following, i did talk to angela merkel, and i did meet with her, and! angela merkel, and i did meet with her, and i also met with mccrone, andl her, and i also met with mccrone, and i told them that they are not doing quite as much as they need to be doing on the issues with the sanctions. they are not enforcing the sanctions, they are not working

as much as they should work for ukraine. it turns out that even though logically the european union should be our biggest partner, but technically, the united states is a much bigger partner than the european union, and i am very grateful to you for that because the united states is doing quite a lot for ukraine, much more than the european union, especially when we we re european union, especially when we were talking about sanctions against the russian federation. " were talking about sanctions against the russian federation." you heard a lot about the importance of confronting russia, and we will talk about that. and you will hear that president trump has a strong record on confronting russia. you will hear that president trump has a strong re cord that president trump has a strong record of support for ukraine. you will hear that from the witnesses in

their record, that they did not tell you about. so that is one very important example. they come here to the senate, and they ask you, remove a president, tear up the ballot in all of your states, and they don't bother to read the key evidence of the discussion of burden sharing thatis the discussion of burden sharing that is in the court itself. that is emblematic of the entire presentation. i am going to turn the presentation. i am going to turn the presentation over to my colleague and he is going to walk you through many more examples of this. with

each example, ask yourself, why am i just hearing about this now? it's been 24 hours of sitting through arguments. why? and the reason is, we can talk about the process, we will talk about the law, but today we are going to confront them on the merits of their argument. they have burden of proof, and they have not come close to meeting it. i want to ask you to think about one issue regarding process, beyond process, if you were really interested in finding out the truth, why would you runa finding out the truth, why would you run a process the way they run it? if you were really confident in your position on the facts, why would you lock everybody out of it? from the

president's side. why would you do that? we'll talk about the process arguments, the process arguments also are compelling evidence on the merits because it is evident that they themselves don't believe in the facts of their case. and the fact that they came here for 24 hours and hid evidence from you is further evidence that they don't really believe in the facts of their case, that this is, for all their talk about election interference, that they are here to perpetrate the most massive interference in an election in american history, and we can't allow that to happen. it would violate our constitution, it would violate our constitution, it would violate our constitution, it would violate our history, it would violate our history, it would violate our history, it would

violate our obligations to the future, and most importantly, it would violate the sacred trust that the american people have placed in you, and have placed in them. the american people decide elections. they have one coming up in nine months, so we will be very efficient, we will begin our presentation today, we will show you a lot of evidence that they should have showed you, and we will finish efficiently and quickly so that we can all go have an election. thank you, and! can all go have an election. thank you, and i yield to my colleague. mr chiefjustice. members of the

senate. good morning. iserved as deputy counsel to the president. it is my honour and privilege to appear before you today on behalf of president donald trump. and what is the presidents response? it reads like a classic organised crime shakedown, this is the essence of what the president communicates. we have been very good to your country, very good. no other country has done as much as we have. but do you know what? i don't see much reciprocity here. i hear what you want, i have a favour that i want from you though, and i am going to say this only seven times, so you better listen good. i want you to make up dirt on my political

opponent, lots of it, on this and on that. i'm going to put you in touch with people, notjust any people, the attorney general of the united states. he has got the whole weight of the american law enforcement behind him, and i'm going to put you in touch with rudy, you will love him, trust me. you know what i'm asking, and so i will only say this isa asking, and so i will only say this is a few more times. in a few more ways. by the way, don't call me again, iwill ways. by the way, don't call me again, i will call you when you have done what i asked. this is in summary done what i asked. this is in summary what the president was trying to communicate. that is fake. that is not the real call. that is not the evidence here. that is not the transcript that was just reference by my colleague. and we can shrug it off and say we were making light, or a joke,

can shrug it off and say we were making light, orajoke, but can shrug it off and say we were making light, or a joke, but that was ina making light, or a joke, but that was in a hearing in the united states house of representatives, discussing the removal of the president of the united states from office. there are very few things, if any, that can be as grave and as serious. let's stick with the evidence, and let's talk about the fa cts evidence, and let's talk about the facts and the evidence in this case. the most important piece of evidence we have in the case, and before you, is the one we began with nearly four months ago. the actual transcript of thejuly 25 2019 months ago. the actual transcript of the july 25 2019 telephone call between president trump and the president of ukraine. the real transcript. if that were the only evidence we had, it would be enough to show that the democrats entire theory is completely unfounded. but theory is completely unfounded. but the transcript is far from the only

evidence, demonstrating that the president did nothing wrong. 0nce you sweep away all of the bluster and innuendo, the selective leaks, the closed door examinations, of the democrats hand witnesses, the stage public hearings, what we are left with are six key facts that have not and will not change. first, the transcript shows that the president did not condition either security assistance or a meeting on anything. the paused security assistant funds are not even mentioned on the call. secondly, elensky has repeatedly

said there was no pressure on them to do anything. third, zelensky and other high—ranking ukrainian officials did not even know the security assistance was paused until the end of august, over a month before the july the 25th call. fourth, not a single witness testified that the president himself said that there was any connection between any investigations in security assistance, a presidential meeting, or anything else. security assistance, a presidential meeting, oranything else. fifth, the security assistance glowed on september 11. a presidential meeting took place on september 25 without the ukrainian government announcing any investigations. finally, the democrats blind drive to impeach the president does not and cannot change the fact, as attested to by the democrats own witnesses, that

president trump has been a better friend and a stronger supporter of ukraine than his predecessor. those are the facts. we plan to address some of them today, and some of them next week. each one of these six fa cts next week. each one of these six facts standing alone is enough to sink the democrats case. combined, they establish what we have known since the beginning. the president did absolutely nothing wrong. the democrats allegation that the president engage in a quid pro quo is unfounded and contrary to the fa cts . is unfounded and contrary to the facts. the truth is simple and it is right before our eyes. the president was at all times acting in our national interest in pursuant to his oath of office. before i dive in and speak further about the facts, let me mention something that my collea g u es me mention something that my colleagues will discuss in greater detail. the fact that i am about to

discuss today are the democrats fa cts . discuss today are the democrats facts. this is important because the house manager spoke to you for a very long time, over 21 hours. they have repeatedly claimed to you that their case is and their evidence is, overwhelming and uncontested. it is not. i am going to share a number of fa cts not. i am going to share a number of facts with you this morning that the house managers did not. they had 21 hours. i will ask you there when you hear me say something that the house managers did not present to you, ask yourself, why didn't they tell me that? is that something i would have liked to have known? why am i hearing it for the first time from the presidents lawyers? it is not because they didn't have enough time, that's for sure. they only showed you a very selective part of the record. their record. and they,

remember this, they have the very heavy burden of proof. the president is forced to mount a defence in this chamber against a record that the democrats developed. the record that we have to go on today is based entirely on house democratic facts cleared in a basement bunker, not mostly, entirely. yet, even those fa cts mostly, entirely. yet, even those facts absolutely exonerate the president. let's start with the transcript. the president did not link security assistance to any investigations on thejuly link security assistance to any investigations on the july 25 link security assistance to any investigations on thejuly 25 call. let's step back. on investigations on thejuly 25 call. let's step back. 0njuly 25, president trump called president zelensky. this was their second phone call. both were congratulatory. 0n phone call. both were congratulatory. on april 21, president trump called to

congratulate president zelensky on winning the election. 0njuly 25, the president called because president zelensky ‘s party had just w011 president zelensky ‘s party had just won a large number of seats in parliament. 0n won a large number of seats in parliament. on september 24, won a large number of seats in parliament. 0n september24, before the speaker had any idea what president trump and president zele ns ky president trump and president zelensky actually said on thejuly the 25th call, she called for an impeachment enquiry on president trump. in the interests of full transparency and to show that he had done nothing wrong, president trump took the unprecedented step of decalcifying the call transcript so that the american people could see for themselves exactly what the two presidents discussed. so, what did president trump say to president zele ns ky president trump say to president zelensky onjuly president trump say to president zelensky on july 25? president trump say to president zelensky onjuly 25? president trump raised two issues. i am going to speak about those two issues a fair amount this morning. they are the two issues that go to the core of

how president trump approaches foreign aid. when it comes to sending us taxpayer money overseas, the president is focused on burden sharing and corruption. first, the president, rightly, had real concerns about whether european and other countries work and repeating theirfair other countries work and repeating their fair share other countries work and repeating theirfair share to other countries work and repeating their fair share to ensuring other countries work and repeating theirfair share to ensuring ukraine ‘s security. secondly, corruption. since the fall of the soviet union, ukraine has suffered from one of the worst environments for corruption in the world. a parade of witnesses testified in the house about the pervasive corruption in ukraine, and how it is in america ‘s foreign policy and national security interests to help ukraine combat corruption. president trump mentioned burden sharing to present zelensky. president trump told president zelensky that germany does almost nothing for you, and a lot of european countries are the same way.

president trump specifically mentioned speaking to angela merkel of germany, whom he said "talks ukraine, but she doesn't do anything". president zelensky agreed, "you are absolutely right." he said he spoke with the leaders of germany and france and told them he we re germany and france and told them he were “— germany and france and told them he were —— they were not doing quite as much as they need to be doing, so right at the beginning of the call, president trump was talking about burden sharing. trump then turned to corruption in the form of foreign interference in 2016 presidential election. there is absolutely nothing wrong with asking a foreign leader to help get to the bottom of all forms of foreign interference in an american presidential election. you will hear more about that later from a colleague. what else did the president say? the president also warned president zelensky that he appeared to be surrounding himself with some of the same people as his predecessor, and suggested that a very fair predecessor, and suggested that a veryfairand predecessor, and suggested that a very fair and very good prosecutor was shut down by some very bad people. again, one of my colleagues

will speak more about that. the content will speak more about that. the co nte nt of will speak more about that. the content of the july 25 corps was will speak more about that. the content of thejuly 25 corps was in line with the trump administration ‘s legitimate concerns about corruption and reflected the hope that president zelensky, who campaigned ona that president zelensky, who campaigned on a platform of reform, would finally clean up ukraine. what wasn't discussed on thejuly 25 call? there was no discussion of the paused security assistance on the july 25 call. house democrats keep pointing to the statement that i would like to thank you for your great support in the area of defence. but he wasn't talking there, about the paused security assistance. he tells news the next sentence what he was talking about. javelin missiles. we already he

continues,