welcome to newsday on the bbc. i'm mariko oi in singapore. the headlines: counting up the coronavirus cases. worries about the severity of the outbreak grow ever bigger after china revises the number of those affected. chaos in south africa's parliament, as president ramaphosa attempts to give a state of the nation address. hello. i'm nuala mcgovern in london. also on the programme: a shock shake—up in british politics. the chancellor, sajid javid, resigns after he's ordered by borisjohnson to sack his advisors. re—thinking the origins of the solar system. why scientists at nasa now say our beginnings were more gentle than previously thought.

live from our studios in singapore and london, this is bbc world news — it's newsday. good morning. it's midnight in london, 8:00am in singapore and in china, where the world health organization is seeking further clarity from beijing about recent changes in how coronavirus cases are being diagnosed. the number of confirmed cases in china increased by 4,823 and 116 new deaths reported on thursday. there are now over 50,000 cases of coronavirus in the hubei province of china. john sudworth reports from beijing. china's at war with this virus,

flying in extra supplies and a reinforcement of 2,600 extra troops. but there is still deep confusion about the enemy they are fighting, how many it has infected and how many it is killing. until now, only those with a positive lab test were counted as confirmed cases, but lab tests take time. now patients confirmed by much quicker ct scans are being included. it's slightly less reliable, but it means the number of cases has rocketed. what's far more worrying is the big leap in deaths. the sudden increase is made up of those patients who only had ct scans, not counted before. but are those extra deaths added up from across the past three weeks or are they a new daily count, pointing to a hidden number of similar daily deaths? china hasn't told us. it has been focused

on messages of loyalty. these patients had been sworn into a communist committee and it's been settling political scores, removing the boss of the province where the outbreak started. the media are showing hard—working heroes stories, too. it is a driver's wedding anniversary. "come home soon" his sign says. his wife's a nurse looking after virus patients and contact with the outside world is forbidden. from beijing, i ask if china can beat the virus. "of course we will win," he says. even in china's capital, the impact is felt. this shop is keeping a safe distance from its customers. china is now portraying this as a patriotic fight involving the masses, the enforcement of strict quarantine measures, and the mandatory

wearing of face masks. of course, viruses don't listen to propaganda. they are best beaten with good data and an open and transparent public health policy. there's no shortage of fighting spirit, but there's so much we still don't know about how this is going to end. john sudworth, bbc news, beijing. more on the coronavirus coming up. let's take a look at some of the day's other news. there's been a shock resignation from the british prime minister's government, with the chancellor of the exchequer, sajid javid, unexpectedly quitting his job just as boris johnson was reshuffling his cabinet. mrjavid made the decision after rejecting mrjohnson‘s order to fire his entire team of aides. the conditions that were attached was a requirement that i've replaced all my political advisers. you know, these are people who have worked

incredibly hard on behalf of not just the government incredibly hard on behalf of notjust the government but incredibly hard on behalf of not just the government but the whole country, done a fantastic job. why was unable to accept those conditions. don't believe any self—respecting minister would accept such conditions. so therefore i felt the best thing to do to go. also making news today, south africa's parliament was suspended for a short while after disagreements broke out before president cyril ramaphosa's state of the nation address. he has set out the government's objectives for the year, focusing on south africa's struggling economy and promising to host an extraordinary summit of the african union to finalise a continental free trade agreement. president donald trump says that the united states is "very close" to a peace deal with the taliban guerrillas in afghanistan. his comments come as the two sides agreed a 7—day reduction in violence, in what is seen as a step towards the possible withdrawal of american troops. the us secretary of state, mike pompeo called it an important breakthrough but added that talks were still complicated. the united nations says more than 800,000 people have been displaced in north—western syria since december. the government, backed by russia, launched a new offensive on the region around that time, after

donald trump decided to pull his troops out of the country. the us government has filed new charges against the chinese tech giant, huawei, and its chief financial officer, meng wa nzhou who's currently fighting extradition from canada. she is wanted in the us on charges of fraud and sanctions violations. the new charges include plotting to break the law on corruption and racketeering, and to steal trade secrets from six american technology companies. huawei has consistently denied any wrongdoing. locations featured in south korea's oscar—winning movie, parasite, have been enjoying a business boom since its triumph last weekend. the thriller won four 0scars, including best picture, the first non—english language film to win the top prize since the academy awards began in 1929. scientists in the antarctic have registered a temperature above 20 degrees celsius

for the first time in history. it was registered on seymour island and is almost a full degree higher than the previous record on signy island in 1982. the antarctic is the world's biggest reserve of ice, and the scientists, who collect the data every three days from monitoring stations, have described the new record as "incredible and abnormal". let's now go back to our top story on the coronavirus and how the number of cases is being recorded on a daily basis in china. i spoke to professor ben cowling from the university of hong kong about what china's new methodology entails. we know there's limitations on how many people can be lab tested every day, so it makes a lot of sense for the chinese government to go over to reporting the probable cases, patients with symptoms consistent with coronavirus, pneumonia, rather than the

laboratory cases. in terms of the number of infections, we know there are many more infections than just the patients with ammonia, because the majority of people infected with this coronavirus will not develop pneumonia. the predictions that were made by some of my colleagues in hong kong where that there may be hundreds of thousands of infections over a period of time. and that was under the assumption, perhaps, that there was nothing being done by the chinese authorities to slow down transmission. now, in the past two weeks, we have seen a lot of efforts that have been made to slow down transmission as possible. those measures can probably delay some of those infections from occurring while the measures are in place, but if the measures were to be removed, then we could probably expect more infections to occur again. unless of course the virus has disappeared. but it has showed no signs that it is going to disappear. some critics have always said that china may be underreporting the cases. at the same time, the number of deaths outside china

remains relatively low. so why are so many more remains relatively low. so why are so many more people dying within china? this is a slow—moving disease. so the people that have died, the average time they have stayed in hospital is weeks, not days. so we have seen a lot of cases outside of china, some of those are still in severe condition, but maybe we need to wait a little bit longer to have a full picture of severity of angina, actually, the move yesterday to report the probable cases and not only the laboratory confirmed cases is a good move. and that's going to lead to larger numbers being reported and, hopefully, let us track a little bit better what's going on with the epidemic and whether it's reached a peak and how long it might last for. thanks very much to epidemiologist, professor ben cowling, speaking from hong kong. we turn to space. a strangely shaped object spotted by a nasa probe in a far flung corner of the solar system has overturned the long—standing theory about how planets are formed. a new study found the process could have been less violent than scientists originally believed, with matter gently clumping together to form planets.

so rather than a big bang, it was more of a gentle merging. this report by our science correspondent, pallab ghosh. billions of years ago, the planets in our own solar system formed. it was a violent process of rocks crashing together and merging until they became worlds, which included our own earth. or so we thought. today, at a news conference in seattle, nasa scientists said that that theory, held for the best part of 60 years, was completely wrong and that the building blocks of planets slowly merged together. it is a wonderful scientific present and the results that have just been described to you are, in my view, watershed. the sun is right in the middle of the solar system. closest to it are the four small rocky planets, including the earth. then further out are four much larger planets, the most famous of which is saturn.

then at the edge is tiny pluto, three billion miles away. it is just one of thousands of rock and ice in an outer zone called the kuiper belt. these are unused building blocks, left over from the creation of the planets 11.5 billion years ago. nasa's new horizon spacecraft reached one of these objects, named arrokoth, last year. it is only now that scientists have been able to study it in detail. it consists of two boulders fused together. look closely at the join and there is no evidence of a violent impact, no cracks, rather a slow coming together, notjust of these two boulders, but a gradual accumulation of all the ice and rocks that built the planets we know today. objects in the kuiper belt are of great significant to us. they sit a long way from planet earth, but they are significant because these were formed at the very birth of the solar system.

they all sit a long way from the sun, so they aren't corrupted by radiation from the sun. they're like a time capsule of the prevailing theories about how the solar system was formed. this gives us strong evidence that it wasn't a violent collision of various objects, but sort of gently coming together. textbooks about the origin of the solar system will now have to be rewritten. the scientists say, in thejournal science: "instead of the violent start we once imagined, its beginnings were more gentle and tranquil." pallab ghosh, bbc news, seattle. you're watching newsday on the bbc. still to come on the programme: australia's bushfires are now contained for the first time in six months. also on the programme: the growing popularity of online dating in pakistan's conservative society.

there's mr mandela. mr nelson mandela, a free man, taking his first steps into a new south africa. iran's spiritual leader ayatollah khomeini has said he's passed a death sentence on salman rushdie, the british author of a book which many muslims say is blasphemous. the people of haiti have flocked to church to give thanks for the ousting of their former president, 'ba by doc' duvalier. because of his considerable value as a stallion, shergar was kept in a special, secure box in the stud farm's central block. shergar was driven away in a horse box the thieves had brought with them. there stepped down from the plane a figure in mourning. elizabeth ii, queen of this realm and of all her other realms and territories. head of the commonwealth, defender of the faith.

welcome back. this is newsday on the bbc. i'm marika 0i in singapore. i'm nuala mcgovern in london. our top stories: china has confirmed 4,000 new cases of patients with the new coronavirus and 116 new deaths in hubei province. a shake—up in british politics with a cabinet reshuffle. the chancellor, sajid javid, resigns after he's ordered by borisjohnson to sack his advisors. let's take a look at some front pages from around the world. the japan times is leading with our main story — the latest on coronavirus. it's focussing on those quarantined on the cruise ship in yokohama, and japan's new policy to allow passangers — aged 80 or over — to disembark if they've tested negative. staying on coronavirus — the business standard

is looking at how one man's loss is another man's gain. it says india has raised more than $7 billion in bonds since january as china's market has been squeezed by the coronavirus scare. and the new york times has this feature on two brothers in delhi who started a wildlife rescue sanctuary for black kites, a bird common in delhi, and is often injured due to paper kites — a popular pastime in india. germany has been marking the 75th anniversary of the destruction of dresden by british and american bombers during the second world war. between the 13th and 15th of february 1945, thousands of tons of bombs and incendaries were dropped on a city famous for its beauty and architecture. tens of thousands of civilians were killed — many dying in firestorms. jenny hill reports from dresden.

dresden has risen from the ashes, but it's dead are not forgotten. a city still a symbol of the horror unleashed by war. it is 75 years since allied forces dropped a bomb after bomb on the city, an attack which even at the time ignited controversy. underneath their bombardment, civilians suffocated and burned. there city destroyed. ursula was 1a. she recalls a firestorm so intense that she clung a lamp post to avoid being sucked the flames. translation: we stood clinging to the lamp post, then we saw our house collapse. first the facade crashed down and the bricks rolled up to ourfeet, and my mother said, "now we have lost everything. now we are homeless."

commemorations today in a city so famed for its culture and beauty that its people thought no—one would attack it. translation: we recall both the suffering of people in german cities and the suffering that germans inflicted on others. we do not forget it was germans who started this cruel war. this is for germany a highly symbolic day. for many it's about memory, reconciliation. for others though it's about defiance too. the far right is once again making its presence felt in this country, seeking to redefine germany's second world war history. there are few survivors left to tell the tale of dresden, but by honouring its dead the city intends to keep the memory alive. jenny hill, bbc news, dresden. now to australia, fire officials in new south wales have confirmed that all the bushfires in the state

are thought to be contained. this development is partly due to heavy rain over the weekend, which brought flooding in some areas. our correspondent shaimaa khalil is in sydney with the latest. it's one extreme to another. in new south wales, it has been thrashed by record rainfall and floods, more than it is seen for decades. it has been raining constantly in sydney 110w raining constantly in sydney now with massive disruptions to roads, to schools, to transportation and emergency services are warning that there could be more rain and the risk of floods here in the state of new south wales and queensland. now despite all of this, many people have actually been celebrating this change of weather. it has been a hot, long, brittle summer for new south wales that has been the worst affected by the bushfires andi worst affected by the bushfires and i can tell you, no—one is happy about the change of weather, extreme as it is, more than at the firefighters who have been trying for months to contain these fires and now

finally, for the first time, although fires in the states have been a contain. what does that mean contained? to all the fires around ? that mean contained? to all the fires around? no, there are some fires still burning, 2a fires still burning across new south wales. what that means effectively is that firefighters are able to surround these blazes with containment lines, keep control of them and prevent them from expanding and control really has been the key word here or this season and the main challenge. we've seen over the past few months these big fires, they merge into a mega blazes with fronts that go four kilometres wide and firefighters simply tell us they are just absolutely impossible to control. and what they needed was more rain and thatis they needed was more rain and that is what has been happening because of this consistent rainfall, these fires are now under control. it is not to say that there aren't fires and other states as well and here in new south wales but now at a significantly lower level and

110w significantly lower level and now what they have to do is make sure they keep them contained and of course keep an eye on the weather. i'm sure it is so exhausting, for these teams working so long. with turn to the people who have been directly affected. so heartbreaking some of their stories that saw fire engulfed their homes. what is happening, how they people returning? many people have returned to their areas and of course, some people, have had nothing to return to. more than 2000 homes have been destroyed but really, the massive destruction is on so the massive destruction is on so many levels. where talking people's homes, wildlife, bushland and the recovery really is slow going. this is going to cost the government a lot of money, the insurance companies are still battling the best way of how to handle this because of the mere scale of the disaster. what is also done is made australians rethink how they are handling oi’ rethink how they are handling or how they are looking at the

climate debate, putting more pressure on the government. will have to wait and see if that translates into anything in terms of climate policies but people going back to their homes, student starting school, people trying to reopen their businesses, all of that has been really slow going just by the mere scale of the fires only destruction they have caused all of these mums. and just briefly, there was such anger and we saw people outside their homes against the government as you talk about climate policy. do you think thatis climate policy. do you think that is still there? how would you gauge the public mood?|j think you gauge the public mood?” think it is still there. the urgency of its hasn't been the same as when the fires were still going but mind you, again, we going from one extreme to the other matters really if you look at twitter and social media for example. many people are saying that we have left for extreme fires and is now are living for extreme floods, clearly something has to be said about climate, clearly the government can't avoid at any longer. so yes, the debate is still there, the

pressure is still there. whether the government is going to respond with anything that is concrete, remember scott morrison is a big supporter of the coal industry, whether that is going to change... will have to wait and see. it's valentine's day and online dating has become a huge part of our lives. but in the conservative pakistani society, it's a relatively new concept. a matchmaking forum on facebook called ‘skip the rishta or matchmaking aunty‘ has built up nearly 3,000 members in less than a year. and that's where aisha and ahad met after years of matchmaking efforts by theirfamilies. shumaila khan from the bbc urdu service has spoken to the couple.

translation: semi times for matchmakers, people came to meet me and then got up and left. sometimes, they were happy with me but other times, there is a consulting with god, i was not right for them. i was fed up. translation: usually with the girl would come, bring the tm parade in front of you like some sort of cattle. i really don't like it translation: two we met through this online forum, skip the rishta or matchmaking aunty and started talking. first online, then rely. then we arranged a meeting of our families. translation: she was the afl file talk to. our hobbies were similarand many file talk to. our hobbies were similar and many other things just matched. but first, the date,it just matched. but first, the date, it was actually after our

engagement. translation: i wanted to make sure that he came from a good, well educated family. i was a lwa ys well educated family. i was always frank about myself. i love animals. even posted in my profile on facebook but hey would bring my cuts along with me everywhere. translation: the clear advantage of this and similar online groups is that members are able to talk to each other directly on their own. translation: i think that a profile shouldn't be excessively lengthy but it should be reflecting your personality and what kind of personality and what kind of person you. the other details can person you. the other details ca n always person you. the other details can always be exchanged by calling and talking to each other was i'm the only daughter and ahad is also the only child so we and ahad is also the only child so we obviously can't control ourfamilies as so we obviously can't control our families as much as we wanted. we only wanted a simple marriage ceremony but it was a proper one with all of those traditional receptions and other rituals.

a valentine story for you. you have been watching newsday. i'm nuala mcgovern in london. and i'm mariko oi in singapore. stay with us. i'll be back with business news. we will be bring you the latest on us—china trade war as the two countries are set to cut some tariffs on each others goods. and before we go, we'd like to leave you with these pictures. a four—month—old polar bear cub went on its first outdoor outing at vienna's schoenbrunn zoo on thursday, with the animal park's director calling it a fantastic moment. how cute is he? the cub is vienna's first birth of a polar bear in 12 years, and visitors to schoenbrunn zoo have been invited to come up with name proposals. what would you call him? we have to think about that before our next edition of newsday but thatisit

our next edition of newsday but that is it for us. that's all for now — stay with bbc world news. storm dennis on the way this weekend not just with disruptive winds and flooding rain as well. one arena bearing that weather front banks up in front of a looker much rain is going to come from dennis on the weekend. this trailing weather front has a long levels tells of prolonged rain, particularly into parts of england and wales and areas that have seen a lot of rain recently and some flooding. we are going to see some further flooding flooding. we are going to see some furtherflooding in places. the met office has a number ofamber places. the met office has a number of amber warnings in force for the rain and we look at those and other warnings in just a moment. and for friday, another spell of a rain living cell. quickly phenomenon ireland and scotland, coupled with snowmelt in southern scotla nd with snowmelt in southern scotland and a bit of flooding

in some spots. becoming patchy in places further south across england and wales. gusty winds though, particularly towards the north and north—west of scotla nd the north and north—west of scotland with further blustery ‘s showers moving through here. one evening, rang up a bit once it reaches south—east england and east anglia. many overnight on saturday morning, it is the lull before the storm and will, dry weather first thing on saturday but it's not going to last. storm dennis does bring rain in right across the uk over saturday. outbreaks of heavy rain at times and the wind strengthening particularly for the afternoon and into the evening before debating a bit into sunday night in the morning. when gusts and 50 mph around the coast towards the west and south touching 70 mph. perhaps in a few spots, really difficult travelling conditions. on the face of it, mild, but very wet and windy in places. heavy rain continuing across large parts of england and wales into the night on sunday. sally clearings southward on sunday but it looks like the winds will pick up looks like the winds will pick up again this on sunday. i

disguise and if few showers following on behind turning a bit cooler too. looking at the weather warnings, the met office, amber warnings for rain. across a large part of southern and western england and into wales, 20 to a0 millimetres. higher amounts, particularly in these areas and some of the hills of wales and south—west england could end up with over a hundred millimetres of rain so that risk of flooding increasing over the weekend. another amber warning area kicking in on sunday too for further prolonged area kicking in on sunday too forfurther prolonged rain across southern england. in terms of the wind, widely, going to see gusts inland around 50 or so but is the post that will see stronger winds a time, touching 70 mph. storm dennis gets closer to scotland to and sunday and here in northern ireland, we could well see a number sway for potentially damaging winds moving on through. that is your latest about storm dennis.

i'm nuala mcgovern

with bbc world news. our top story. china has announced a,000 new cases of patients with the new coronavirus and 116 new deaths in hubei province. the authorities have introduced a new method of diagnosis. beijing has sacked two of the most senior communist party officials dealing with the crisis. there's been a shock resignation from british prime minister boris johnson's government, with the chancellor of the exchequer, sajid javid, unexpectedly quitting hisjob. he'd been due to deliver his first budget in four weeks' time. and this video is trending on bbc.com. researchers in the antarctic have registered a temperature of nearly 21 celsius for the first time in history. the scientists, who collect the data every three days from monitoring stations, have described the new record as "incredible and abnormal". that's all. stay with bbc world news.