i'm rico hizon, in singapore. the headlines: the world health organisation says china's drastic measures to contain the coronavirus have given the rest of the world the chance to stop it from spreading. first partial results from the democratic party caucus in iowa give pete buttigieg a narrow lead over bernie sanders. with joe biden back in fourth place. i'm kasia madera, in london. also in the programme: president trump gets ready for his state of the union address, with the economy set to dominate his speech.

and in a special bbc report, we meet the children no—one wants, the sons and daughters taken by their parents to join the islamic state. what happened to your brothers and sisters and to your mum and dad? translation: they were killed. live from our studios in singapore and london, this is bbc world news — it's newsday. glad you could join us. it is midnight in london. it's 8am here in singapore. and iam in geneva, where the world health organisation says the coronavirus, is not a global pandemic. the director—general also said there was a window of oppurtunity to reduce the spread of the disease but that travel and trade restrictions cause unnecessary fear and stigma. more than 20,000 people

are thought to have been infected across 23 countries, and the death toll has risen to at least 480. and the death toll has risen to at least 492. john sudworth reports from beijing. in wuhan, they've turned a stadium into a hospital. state media using images like these to reinforce a message. china's getting things under control. but the deserted airports and cancelled flights show it's fear that seems to be winning. now the uk, along with germany, france, and new zealand, are advising those who can to leave. it has prompted some to try to bring their flights forward. the british government advice has not really been that helpful because you can't just take a flight out. if the flights are not there, they aren't available, so, yes. lydia, did it add to your sense of worry when you heard

lydia, did it add to your sense of worry when you hear governments telling people to get out if they can? a little bit. the biggest worry was that the city would get locked down because we were in the second worst province after hubei, chongqing. so there have been cities in the province that have been quarantined and when you are quarantined, you're stuck. this is more than 500 miles from wuhan, residents kept indoors, transport shutdown. these scenes are driving fears in foreign capitals that the virus may not be contained. the advice to 30,000 britons in china to head to the airport is extraordinary. the world's second largest economy, deeply integrated into global supply chains and transport networks, now essentially deemed too risky. but it's not easy for all brits to leave. little baby atlas doesn't

yet have a passport. it seems to be that the news is saying that the elderly and the young are the most vulnerable to viruses generally, so we're a little bit anxious about that. and danny's wife, viola, is a chinese national without a valid visa. but the uk government's announced that should not matter. i've spoken to the chinese foreign minister and received reassurances that no families that want to return with a uk national will find themselves divided on the basis of dual nationality. china's fighting on, but with so much still unknown about this virus the international community is not taking any chances. john sudworth, bbc news, beijing. much more on the coronavirus coming up later. in the past two hours the democratic party in the us state of

iowa has reported 62% of the initial results of the state caucus after a day of chaos and delay caused by a technical glitch. these show the candidate pete buttigieg in front, closely followed by bernie sanders. joe biden is in fourth place. elizabeth warren is in third place. the caucus represented the first leg of the race to choose a democratic candidate for november's presidential election. the chair of the democratic party in iowa promised a thorough and transparent investigation would take place into why the vote on monday night had failed to produce a winner. the reporting of the results and circumstances surrounding the 2020 iowa democratic caucuses were unacceptable. as chairman of the party i apologise deeply for this. last night, we were faced with

multiple reporting challenges and decided, out of an abundance of caution, to protect the result by taking the necessary steps to review and confirm the data. pete buttigieg has also been speaking. he hailed what could end up being a crucial victory for his campaign. this is what he had to say. the campaign that some said should have no business even making this attempt has taken its place at the front of this race to replace the current president... cheering and applause. these are initial results, 62% counted. our correspondent nick bryant is in des moines. i asked him what he made of the results so far from the caucus. it is obviously a terrific result, elder result for pete

buttigieg, mad pete, as he is known in iowa, the first openly 93v known in iowa, the first openly gay presidential candidate trying to become the first occu pa nt of trying to become the first occupant of the white house. very good return for him. the youngest candidate in the race. the other candidate, bernie sanders, 78 years old, had a heart attack in october but he has managed to energise the young, in particular in the iowa caucus. the bad news is forjoe biden, former vice president. sold himself in the ability to beat donald trump. he is in fourth place at the moment and that is a very dismal result for him. in third place, of course, senator elizabeth warren, and other candidate from the left of the party. of course, this is 62%

of the precincts reporting so it could slightly change but when it comes to white we did not get result on the night, what were the reasons given? well, there was a malfunction, not with the voting but with how they collated the votes and reported them here at the headquarters of the iowa democratic party. that was the problem. one of the other problems in this caucus is we did not see a huge turnout. there was a feeling beforehand that, in the search for a candidate to beat donald trump, it would have a mobilising and galvanising effect but that was not really the case. we did not see a turnout nearly as big as in 2008 when barack obama went up in 2008 when barack obama went up against hillary clinton and john edwards. iowa is the fourth brightest state in the country. joe biden will move to states more diverse, especially

places like south carolina and he is very popular with the black voters. joe biden delivered a halting and often stumbling speed. people wonder whether he has the message, the energy to mobilise enough supporters and whether here we may have seenjoe biden has done his dash. also making news today: iran has sentenced a man to death for trying to pass information about iran's nuclear programme to the americans. a spokesman for iran's judiciary said amir rahimpour was a cia spy who had received high wages. the spokesman said two charity workers were also convicted of spying for the cia. the wife of the prime minister of lesotho, the wife of the prime minister of lesotho is to be charged with murdering his previous wife. prime minister thomas thabane has also been questioned

about the killing. his estranged wife, lipolelo tha bane, was shot dead outside her home in the capital maseru, two days before his inauguration in 2017. twitter has announced it will introduce measures next month to stop the spread of doctored content, including so—called "deepfakes". the twitter safety account posted a series of tweets in the last few hours saying it will label tweets that include manipulated images or video, and remove those thought to be potentially harmful. let's get more on our top story — the coronavirus outbreak. 490 deaths have now been confirmed, almost all of them in china, where the country's top leadership on monday admitted shortcomings and deficiencies in their handling or the situation. some say officials initially put secrecy and order ahead of openly dealing with it. vivienne shue is a professor of contemporary chinese studies at the university of

oxford china centre. she has described the chinese government's handling of coronavirus "impressive". most of the reports i have seen so most of the reports i have seen so farare most of the reports i have seen so far are certainly indicating that the central government, onceit that the central government, once it became aware of the outbreak, has moved very quickly. i think it is quite impressive in fact how quickly they were able to analyse the dna from this particular new virus and get the necessary codes out and into the hands of people around the country and beyond the borders of china. professor, if they responded quickly and received good marks so quickly and received good marks so far, was they really need to apologise for shortcomings and inefficiencies? the shortcomings and deficiencies that took place occurred, i

think, they would argue, from beijing, not at the central level. it is very important when talking about officials in china to distinguish between those at the centre and those at various levels down what is very steep and layered system of administration. what they are saying deficiencies and shortcomings occurred, clearly inside wuhan, where it is crystallising now the information is becoming quite clear that there were delays, complicated delays and the reasons for those subject of a widespread speculation. reasons for those subject of a widespread speculationm there is a gap between the central and at the local government levels, what challenges does and authoritarian state such as signer phase in handling a crisis of this magnitude. —— as china face in handling. it can

have certain advantages. they can act proactively. they can gather information and formulate policies and drive those down to basic levels and evade problems emerging that they might see in advance, whereas in a democratic system, it is normally necessary for problems and needs to be first voiced by the people and to be expressed as the will of the people before a state government can address those problems and if this is one advantage that the chinese system has demonstrated that it has had in the past. but it can be let down if it does not get its information from below accurately or in time. you're watching newsday on the bbc. still to come on the programme: our special bbc report on the children left behind

bars after their parents took them when theyjoined the islamic state group. and also on the programme: donald trump is preparing for his state of the union address. he'll become only the second president ever to make one while undergoing an impeachment trial. this is the moment that millions in iran had been waiting for. after his long years in exile, the first hesitant steps of ayatollah khomeini on iranian soil. south africa's white government has offered its black opponents concessions unparalleled in the history of apartheid. the ban on the african national congress is lifted immediately, and the anc leader, nelson mandela, is to be set free unconditionally. ..four, three, two, one... a countdown to a critical moment. the world's most powerful rocket ignited all 27 of its engines at once. and apart from its power, its this recycling of the rocket, slashing the cost of a launch, that makes this a breakthrough

in the business of space travel. two americans have become the first humans to walk in space without any lifeline to their spaceship. one of them called it a piece of cake. thousands of people have given the yachtswoman ellen macarthur a spectacular homecoming in the cornish port of falmouth after she smashed the world record for sailing solo around the world non—stop. this is newsday on the bbc. i'm rico hizon in singapore. and i'm kasia madera in london. our top stories: the biggestjump so far as the death toll from the new coronavirus rises to 492. the world health organization says there is still a chance to reduce its spread. first partial results from the democratic party caucus in iowa give pete buttigieg a narrow lead over bernie sanders with joe biden back in fourth place.

let's take a look at some front pages from around the world. an opinion poll in the irish times reveals ireland might be on the brink of a general election shock on saturday. it shows that sinn fein, the left—wing republican party, has shot into the lead. and prime minister leo varadkar from fine gael could lose hisjob. the philippine star reports on president duterte's decision to terminate the philippines‘ visiting forces agreement or vfa with the united states. the vfa sets conditions for us personnel in the philippines. senators filed a resolution saying abandoning the vfa will be bad for security and the economy. the japan times front page has a piece of good news to tackle the country's rapidly ageing population. prime minister shinzo abe's cabinet has approved bills to call on businesses to let their employees to work until the age of 70.

many thanks. you up—to—date with the papers. we are going to go back to us politics. we are awaiting the results from ior. in the meantime... —— iowa. lawmakers in the us will gather in washington where in the next few hours president donald trump will deliver his annual state of union speech. it's the opportunity for the president to highlight his achievements and set the tone for his agenda in 2020. it's thought he'll deliver an optimistic message, buoyed by his expected aquittal by senators in his impeachment trial, and the chaos seen during the iowa democratic caucus. joining me now here in the studio isjoseph sternberg. he's a member of the wall streetjournal‘s editorial board. when it comes to the state of the union address, does he have to mention the impeachment?

ultimately it is the elephant in the room surely. i don't think he does. if he is smart, but he is going to do is focus ona but he is going to do is focus on a positive and a agenda, focus a lot on the economy, which is a big source of strength for him heading into the general election later in autumn. and try to ignore impeachment as much as possible. it is already unpopular, it doesn't seem to be denting his popularity ratings which will be going up even as this impeachment proceeding has dragged on. so focus on good news. you talk about the economy. your paper did a poll with nbc and it showed that those people were positive about the economy, but his popularity should be higher given how positive people are feeling about the economy. absolutely. he has a bizarre ability to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory on a lot of theseissues the jaws of victory on a lot of these issues and his popularity should be very high given the economic performance. people don't like the surface aspect.

they focus again on the economy thatis they focus again on the economy that is a winner for him. talking about iowa, bernie sanders is speaking. they are looking at the next part of their progress into becoming a candidate. what kind of opportunity is this for the president given the chaos that we can see in iowa? a key factor of the state of the union address and that is his opportunity to do a very piece set. try to be very positive in contrast to a lot of the doom mongering you are getting on the democratic presidential trail right now. it is going to be an interesting contrast when one of the themes the democrats thought they would pursue this year is governing incompetence. the timing is probably worked out better for the timing is probably worked out betterfor president

the timing is probably worked out better for president trump in this case than he could have planned it himself. as we watch bernie sanders, went comes to who challenges the president in the presidential election, who do you think he wants it to be? who do you think has really got a chance of winning against donald trump? i think trump himself probably wants to run against a candidate like bernie sanders on the theory that sanders on the theory that sanders would just be too radical, american voters would look at the joys and think they should stick with the devil they know. if these early results that we have from iowa hold up in democrats have favoured pete buttigieg, that isa favoured pete buttigieg, that is a signal that may be the democrats think they should be putting up a more moderate candidate who won't be so scary on some of the ideological fringes, and might seem like a fat safe competent alternative to trump. thank you so much. monitoring the feed, bernie sanders on his feet. we are also waiting forjoe biden. for

the time being, thank you so much. we have the state of the union address coming up in the next hour. it took years of fighting to defeat the islamic state group. but the international community remains undecided about what to do with the 70,000 is followers, including 10,000 children, currently detained in the region. quentin sommerville and cameraman darren conway travelled to north—eastern syria to hear their stories. the detention camps of the islamic state group aren'tjust a stain on syria... ..they‘re a black mark on the conscience of the world. in this desert of good and evil, there are the guilty... ..and the innocent. few countries have bothered to sift and separate what is left behind. nada fedulla is being punished for the sins of her father. along with her grandmother, he brought the family

here in 2015. there's one person that's responsible for bringing you all the way here, for taking you out of school, from stopping you becoming a doctor. it's your father. yeah. can you forgive your father? yeah, because he's a human being, you know? every human being can make a mistake. but he's already apologised to me about what he did. he apologised to me and tried to make everything better, but he can't do anything because he's in prison. it's the craziest thing in my life, that i bring all my family to syria. now in prison, nada's father says he's full of regret. and then, in the beginning,

everything is running so clear. you must have seen the videos that the islamic state put out. there were videos notjust of a paradise and a great place to live if you're a muslim, but there were videos of beheadings, of murder, of enslavement, of terrible cruelty. you would have known when you left indonesia that this was no ordinary country you were moving to. yeah, we know that. but everybody made a mistake, right? maybe you made a mistake in your life. you made a mistake in your life, everybody made a mistake in their lives, and this is a big mistake in my life. syria was never a safe place to lock up dangerous men. amid these hard—core is supporters, children are packed in in prison uniforms too big for them. 10,000 kids from 80 countries cling on here,

betrayed by their parents and their governments don't seem to care either. it's the orphans who have truly been abandoned by humanity. here, we met farouk, youssef and nasser. translation: rocket attacks happened and i don't know. iran away and i didn't see anyone from my family. translation: the aircraft bombed and then everyone went missing. then i found faruq. what happened to your brothers and sisters and to your mum and dad? translation: they were killed. youssef, when you leave here, where do you want to go, what do you want to do? translation: where can i go? i would stay here.

these children are blameless, yet there are no plans to return them to indonesia. and what do you say to people in indonesia, do you want to go home? yeah. because i'm really tired in here. so...we're thankful if there's people who want to... forgive you? yeah. ..and for receiving us back, we're thankful for it. and wejust hope we can get out from here and come back to our country. they travel to north—eastern syria to hear those children positive stories.

—— children's stories. you have been watching newsday. i'm kasia madera in london. and i'm rico hizon in singapore. stay with us. we will be looking at how the coronavirus outbreak is having a huge impact on trade and causing uncertainty for chinese businesses. thank you for watching newsday. goodbye. hello. from start to finish, this week almost couldn't be more different. high—pressure means a lot of unsettled weather currently, but it is very much the calm before storm when light wins dry conditions and sunshine, end of the week and sunshine, end of the week and that picture will change dramatically. today, high pressure a cross dramatically. today, high pressure across the uk, barely a breath of trees for most of us. a breath of trees for most of us. the high picking up a bit more moisture on its western flank next to the breeze coming in off the atlantic. that gets fed into the northern half of the uk and that moisture will ta ke the uk and that moisture will take the form of cloud for the day—to—day basically. sunshine

hazy, little overcast and a few showers possible for the far north and west of scotland. could be some early fog across eastern wales through into the midlands that will lift through the day. i is around six to eight degrees. overnight wednesday and into thursday, the highs stays with us, the wednesdays light in the cloud lifting a little further south across the uk. mild towards the north—west with that feed off the amount to, the core of the frost likely across wales into the midlands. again, frost possible just about anywhere as our temperatures particular in rural areas to below freezing. the high still firmly with us on thursday, just drifting a little further east. a chilly start but i find they in prospect, perhaps as the high with the breeze in the west can pick upa with the breeze in the west can pick up a little more and break up pick up a little more and break up the cloud for northern ireland in western scotland through the day. a lot of fine weather. right if not sunny spells are very very similar to today, have a degree also down

in one or two spots, particularly if we get some lingering fog. six or seven degrees. thursday into friday, again, a slow shift eastwards but france started coming to the picture later on in the on friday. isobar starting to squeeze together, the change beginning. the wind will start to strengthen food friday afternoon to the to the west of the uk, maven even gales and the uk, maven even gales and the irish sea coast and for the western isles some showers. some mild air trying to come in as the south—westerly wind kicked in, but my goodness is is set to kick in. basically for the end of the week the jetstrea m for the end of the week the jetstream feeding across the atlantic, which feeds us the system, starts to align itself like a motorway driving system straight across the atlantic towards the uk and this is what the pressure chart. notice the isobar, that hi as long gone. it could get stormy.

i'm kasia madera, with bbc news. our top story: 65 new deaths reported in china's new coronavirus outbreak, taking the total to nearly 500. the world health organization says there is still a window of opportunity of it becoming a global pandemic. a spokesman said the tough measures taken by china had given the rest of the world the opportunity to ensure it was prepared for any potential infections. first partial results from the democratic party caucus in iowa give pete buttigieg a narrow lead over bernie sanders, with elizabeth warren in third place, and joe biden in fourth. and this video is trending on bbc.com. it shows a meteor burning up in the skies above the city of derby in the english midlands. the event was caught on a video doorbell system late on monday evening. the fragments came to earth without causing any damage or injuries. that's all. stay with bbc news.