this is bbc news — welcome if you're watching here in the uk or around the globe. i'm aaron safir. our top stories: six million spanish children are allowed outside for the first time in several weeks, as deaths from coronavirus there fall to their lowest level in more than a month. me and all my family are people who like to go out and have fun in the outside. italy, the european country with the highest number of covid—19 deaths, announces plans to ease some of its lockdown restrictions in a week. a million australians register for a contact—tracing app, but critics

question the technology. hello and welcome to audiences in the uk and around the world. coronavirus is continuing its spread across the world, with more than 2.8 million confirmed cases of coronavirus now in 185 countries. globally, the total number of people known to have died from the virus is now more than 206,000 — according to figures collated byjohns hopkins university in the united states. the us has suffered more than a quarter of those total deaths — 54,000. here in the uk, 413 deaths in hospital were announced on sunday. that's a decrease on the few days before — although delays in reporting over the weekend may be understating the true number.

spain, which has had one of the strictest lockdowns in europe, is now allowing children to leave their homes for the first time in six weeks. and the government is hoping to extend the relaxation further, so that everyone can exercise outside. there have been more than 23,000 confirmed virus—related deaths in the country. 288 died in the last twenty four hours — but that's the lowest number in well over a month. damian grammaticas has more from madrid. released... ..after1i2 days cooped up inside. all six members of this family, finally today able to get out of their apartment block. spain's lockdown rules banned children from going outside. so while the boys played cluedo, the six—year—old had

the balcony as her playroom. but today, spain relaxed those rules. eight million children, freed from their confinement. translation: i was bored inside. i don't like it. i want to be outside. now they can, for an hour a day. and this is what the boys have missed most, a kickabout. for them, it was the hardest thing. yeah. playing football, they love it. they... they miss it really much. they couldn't do this in your apartment. no, no, no! they are not allowed to do it. i couldn't go out in these 40 days. well, me and all my family are people who like to go out and have fun in the outside. but this opening up is limited. almost everyone in spain

is still confined, allowed out only for essential tasks. spain has some of the toughest lockdown restrictions of any country in europe. it's why it's still so quiet here. if the rate of infections continues to decline, though, the prime minister says adults may be allowed out to exercise, but only in a week's time. today, though, was the children's day, maria's day. for six weeks, maria and pablo had been stuck with a tantalising view of the park across the road. and that's what she made a beeline for as soon as she was outside. "papa", the four—year—old says, "look at this, look at this! "look what i have for mum." before heading off to pick some more. spain's moves are cautious. more than 23,000 people have died here, and no one wants to take risks. translation: of course it's worrying. a lot of people have been infected and we worry about the older generation. at least paloma can now

catch up with friends from a distance, while maria gets used to life in a mask and the smalljoys of being outside. damian grammaticas, bbc news, madrid. italy's prime minister, giuseppe conte, has announced an easing of his country's coronavirus lockdown measures from next month. he says takeaway food outlets can reopen, and visits to relatives in small numbers can resume. but schools will remain shut, and social distancing will be in force for months. here's our correspondent in rome, mark lowen it's almost seven weeks to the day, tomorrow will be seven weeks since italy became the first country to impose a national lockdown since the coronavirus pandemic began and now giuseppe conte has laid out a roadmap for unlocking italy. 0n the fourth of may, there will be various things

allowed — parks will reopen, funerals will be allowed to resume, albeit with a maximum of 15 people. bars and restaurants will be allowed to offer takeaways again. manufacturing, construction and wholesale business will be able to restart. people will be able to move around again within their own regions, but not beyond, and they will be allowed to visit family members but will have wear face masks and no large social gatherings will be allowed. and individual sport will be allowed, so people will be able to go out running and individual athletes will be able to train behind closed doors. then two weeks later, there will be a further relaxing in which smaller construction companies will be allowed to restart, libraries and museums will reopen and sports teams can practice then behind closed doors. then on the first ofjune, that is the date currently planned for bars, cafes, restaurants, hairdressers and beauty salons to reopen. schools will remain closed until september.

the closed until september. united states has the greatest the united states has the greatest number of cases in the world. a senior doctor on the white house covid—i9 task force says she believes social distancing will be needed throughout the summer. dr deborah birx was responding to remarks by vice president, mike pence, that he thought the epidemic would be mostly over by the end of may. in an interview on nbc‘s meet the press, dr birx said however, that the infection rates in some cities appear to have peaked. it's very much based on detroit, louisiana and other groups, and then looking at seattle, that never really reached a peak and has never really had a large outbreak, and trying to understand what we can do as a people to ensure social distancing will be with us through the summer, to really ensure that we protect one another. new york state remains the epicentre of the outbreak in the us, the virus has

killed nearly 17,000 people there. i've been speaking to bridget mulrooney, a covid—i9 nurse, in harlem, new york city — who's also worked as an emergency responder in west africa during the ebola outbreak. she told me both emergencies required medical teams working together. this is, it's very much different. it's the people that are responding and how giant this epidemic is. for ebola, everybody that went to help, they were mainly humanitarians or disaster response people, and for america response, it's anybody that has hands was willing to go and they need the numbers. everybody‘s just trying to do their best. you see what most people aren't seeing. most people will look

out their windows and see empty streets and closed shops. you're seeing inside hospitals, inside the front lines. i just wonder if you can explain to our viewers what it is that you see day—to—day. absolutely. we are seeing a lot of the elderly population, people with comorbidities. u nfortu nately, most of the people are at the end stages of life because they are in the hospital. if you're healthy enough to stay home, people stay home. what we see is people alone at the bedside, struggling to breathe and over 3—4 day period, drowning in their secretions and dying alone or we also see the other side, the people in their 40s and 50s that come in with cirrhosis or something else and we call them the walkie—talkies because they can get up and move and they're

usually yelling about the tv, and then you go to check on them and they are dead. it is a horrific disease that is taking people's lives and unless it is affecting you personally, people are not taking it serious enough. as you were talking, we were looking at some pictures of you working in the us and in other places wearing personal protective gear. sure. that's your defence, that's your armour against potentially contracting the disease yourself. how much are you concerned for your own safety when you're treating your patients? for me, i don't know if i've had covid or not. i feel like i haven't but i could have been asymptomatic all along, no one knows. i'm very rigorous about wearing my ppe. i have never once contracted anything in any outbreak i've ever been in. when i'm at the bedside, ifeel like i am properly covered and i can stay

at the bedside longer than people that are scared about contracting covid. i do feel quite safe. we've been gifted giant face shields so even when patients are coughing on top of you, it's not getting into any skin that you have showing when you wear goggles. so i feel quite safe all the time. and at the end i understand you do 13—hour shifts and then you get into transport that takes you and your colleagues back to a hotel. i do. the company i'm with is providing transport to and from. i'm working six days a week. well, that makes me wonder how you unwind and how you deal with the kind of things that you're seeing and the stress that you're under, if you're really just shuttling between work and home.

well, it's a great support system with all the other nurses. we laugh and joke about anything that happens that is fun in the day. you have to keep the humour alive. we are no way making fun of covid, but you have to have a positive attitude if you want to bring that to the patients and on my days off it is sweatpants, i lay in bed, i keep my feet up and i do not wear a mask because i am inside and i enjoy every second of it and it goes by really fast. just going to move away from the coronavirus for a moment to reflect on some important developments in the middle east. the saudi—led coalition in yemen has rejected a declaration by separatists of self—rule in the south. the declaration by a group calling itself the southern transitional council has caused a rift between them and government forces — who had been fighting alongside one another in the ongoing civil war with houthi rebels. rich preston has this report. the announcement came early

on sunday morning as troops from the southern transitional council rolled through the port city of aden, saying they were taking over the area, defying a peace deal signed with the government last november. translation: we are now in front of the yemeni central bank in aden after it was taken back by the southern forces led by the southern transitional council, like the other vital infrastructures here. yemen's government called it an act of armed rebellion and warned of catastrophic repercussions. this latest confrontation only adds to yemen's problems. it is already locked in a bitter civil war between government forces backed by saudi arabia and houthi rebels, who are backed by iran, a war lasting five years, that has killed tens of thousands of civilians and pushed millions to the brink of starvation.

the stc claim to have taken control of the southern port the stc had been fighting alongside government forces in the war against the houthis. this act against the government is a blow for the coalition and its saudi backers. the transitional council get their international support from saudi arabia's neighbour, the united arab emirates. the stc believe the south of the country should be an independent state and say their former allies in the government have conspired against them, causing tensions to grow, in what is being called a civil war within a civil war. rich preston, bbc news. stay with us on bbc news, still to come: stay at home heroes. the would—be marathon runners finding another way to raise money for good causes. nothing, it seemed, was too big to withstand the force of the tornado. the extent of the devastation will lead to renewed calls for government help

to build better housing. internationally, there have already been protests. sweden says it received no warning of the accident. indeed, the russians at first denied anything had gone wrong. only when radioactivity levels began to increase outside russia were they forced to admit the accident. for the mujahideen, the mood here is of great celebration. this is the end of a 12—year war for them, they've taken the capital, which they've been fighting for for so long. it was 7:00 in the morning, the day when power began to pass on the minority to the majority, when africa, after 300 years, reclaimed its last white colony.

this is bbc world news. our top story: children in spain have been allowed out for the first time in six weeks after deaths from covid—i9 fell to their lowest level in more than a month. now, while some governments around the world are beginning to ease restrictions where they believe coronavirus infections have peaked, others are onlyjust beginning to impose lockdowns. in a minute, we'll hear from our correspondents in caracas, moscow and nairobi. but first, laura bicker reports from seoul, in south korea. the country used aggressive testing and tracing methods to isolate infected patients. first came a test. within weeks, they had a test kit, and 600 testing stations around the country. anyone could get a test. then came contact tracing. they used a mixture of interviews and technology to find out where infected patients had been. that information was then sent out as emergency alerts. these measures appear to have worked, for now, but health officials say now is not the time to be

complacent, and they still fear a second wave. brazil, with more than 3,500 deaths, is still the worst—hit country in latin america. as the death toll has risen, so has criticism to jair bolsonaro. the brazilian president has continually dismissed and downplayed the risks of the virus. second on the list is ecuador, where the number of confirmed cases doubled this week. but authorities there say this spike was because of an increase in testing. here in venezuela, and indeed across the region, governments are beginning to ease strict lockdowns, and that decision seems largely economic. here, the pandemic has hit the poorest part, the millions who rely on low paid and informal work, and they are demanding to get back to work. well, here in russia, the official number of fatalities from the coronavirus, over 700, is far less than in western europe or america.

but there is concern that not all covid—related deaths have been included in the statistics. also, russian officials are warning that we haven't seen the peak of the epidemic here yet. already, though, the russian health system is feeling the strain. there are reports from around the country of shortages of medical equipment and of protective clothing, and concern, too, in the business community that the russian government's package of aid falls far short of the kind of bailouts on offer in the west. the response in most african countries has been swift and hard. south africa, ghana and nigeria have sent out thousands of health workers into communities under lockdown to carry out mass screening to identify potential cases for testing, and they've been finding many positive cases who are asymptomatic. but on the other end of the spectrum, you have the likes of tanzania where the president has urged people to go to places of worship and pray

covid—i9 away. now, a million australians have downloaded and registered with a new coronavirus contact tracing app in the first few hours of its release. but the technology isn't without controversy, as reged ahmad now reports. contact tracing technology — it's being hailed by some as the way out of lockdown. loudspeaker: new south wales government regulation. we will have to close the beach. in australia, some states are to relax their strict guidelines, as covid—i9 case numbers remain low, and the government hopes to keep it that way by launching a new contact tracing app called covidsafe. it uses bluetooth to log when someone's been close to an infected person. authorities want a 40% take—up to make it effective. covidsafe is based on an app singapore is already using,

and governments around the world are working on developing their own. here in the uk, those behind a soon—to—be—released national health service app say it will be key to getting out of lockdown, but will rely on a high take—up. the app is going to be one of the building blocks of how to get out of the epidemic. and we have sort of two estimates. we found that when we projected over the next three months, for every 1—2 users who download the app and who adhere to the instructions, it will prevent one infection. and we found that, for this intervention alone to stop resurgence of the epidemic, about 60% of the population would have to use the app. and, for many, privacy remains a major concern. australia's app is voluntary, and the government says it has put multiple safeguards in place. but civil liberties groups there and around the world say there are still real questions to be answered about the potential for government surveillance,

and whether personal data can be kept safe. an app may also not be enough on its own. in germany, the government says it is still hiring a large contact tracing team, along with developing its own technology. we think a ratio of roughly a team of five for 20,000 people is roughly what we have to come up with. that's a huge number. proponents of contact tracing apps say it is the best way out of lockdown. by identifying and isolating new cases, a second wave of infections could be avoided. but the challenge may well be winning over a public used to privacy. registered armoured, bbc news.

—— reged ahmad, bbc news. the 40th london marathon, which was due to take place on sunday, has been pushed back to october. so, after months of training, elite athletes have been forced to think of other ways to raise money natalie pirks reports. it's the biggest one—day fundraising event in the world, attracting more than 40,000 runners every year. but this weekend, the capital's iconic sights looked rather different. i am going to do the 2.6 challenge for women's aid. to fill the void, organisers came up with the 2.6 challenge, where people have to do something with the numbers two and six, like sophie, who swam 2.6 km in her back garden, or finn, who has cystic fibrosis. dani watts did challenges like 26 steps for the rfu's injured players foundation. they helped her adapt to life in a wheelchair after she was paralysed playing rugby. most of these challenges i've done in quite a lot of extreme pain. the pain i get is like someone is literallyjabbing a hot poker in you, and just crunching through your bone.

like, i can't explain it any more than that. but this challenge has kind of relit the fire that went out, for the sport, a few years ago. well, it would have been considerably busier than those here in blackheath at the start line of the marathon, and the worry now is that this will make things very quiet for charities. last year's marathon alone raised more than £66 million, and it is estimated the lockdown could cost charities more than £4 billion in lost donations. mind's estimating that we'll lose between £12 million and £20 million in donations this year, partly as a result of our shops be enclosed, but also from the postponement or cancellation of events like the london marathon, and many other community events where people choose to run for us. the 2.6 challenge has already raised more than £4.6 million. britain is showing charity really does begin at home. natalie pirks, bbc news.

now, when the pandemic struck, one group of dutch schoolchildren had a problem. they had been on a sailing expedition around the caribbean but all flights home were cancelled, leaving them stranded. tim allman explains how they got home. it's fair to say school trips don't normally end like this. akin to a conquering hero, the wild swans sailed into port. on board, 25 children, aged between 14 and i7, who had journeyed across the high seas. an extraordinary trip for them and their teachers. i was planning to marry next month, but that's not going to happen. yeah, i don't know. i will see. i think that's what most children learnt here on board, that the plans change all the time, they've got a hat with ‘subject to change' on it. the pupils were taking part in a six—week study programme

on board the ship when the virus hit. their flights from cuba were cancelled, so it was decided they would sail back across the atlantic — a 7,000—kilometre journey that took them five weeks. on board the vessel, they kept up their lessons, made sure everything was shipshape and in bristol fashion. sometimes it's difficult, a boat is a very tiny space and you are with a lot of people, so it is sometimes very difficult and you can get annoyed very easily, orjust — you are very close to each other so, there are a lot of friction and sometimes fights or something but it is very quickly solved because you are in a small space so you have to solve it quickly. after docking, the children were let off, one at a time of course, to be reunited with theirfamilies. life on the high seas is all well and good but there's no place like home. tim allman, bbc news.

there is no place like home. thanks for watching bbc news, we'll see you next time. hello there. we've had weeks of sunshine and dry weather, thanks to high pressure, but that's all about to change. this upcoming week is looking more unsettled, thanks to low pressure. it's going to feel different. it's going to feel cooler than it has done of late. the temperatures returning closer to the seasonal norm, and we'll see a fair amount of rain at times, too, particularly across the south of the country. for monday, we've got low pressure in charge. 0ne weather front bringing a lot of cloud to england and wales, the other side of the weather front bringing further showers and cloud to the north of scotland. further south, we should see some sunshine — northern ireland, southern scotland, the far north of england. you could see some sunshine breaking out as well across the south—east into the afternoon. there will be quite a bit of cloud elsewhere, and one or two showers or longer spells of rain. a cooler day for all, certainly for england

and wales, where we could still make 19 or 20 degrees in one or two places in the south—east of england. but with cool air, more cloud around, a few showers, the tree pollen levels will be lower on monday, so generally for most of us around moderate. now, as we head to monday night, we'll hold onto the showers across the north. some clear spells, but notice rain popping up across the south, as a new area of low pressure moves northwards to southern england and wales, and that rain will be heavy and persistent. but, with all the cloud around, temperatures shouldn't fall much below nine or ten degrees here. but a cold night to come again across the north, a touch of frost in some of the scottish glens. here's the picture for tuesday, then. this area of low pressure will be more significant. it's going to bring some persistent, at times heavy rain across the southern half of the country, whereas further north should be a little bit drier, brighter at times. maybe just one or two showers in the far north of scotland, but most of the rain will be across england and wales, particularly central and southern areas. it will be heavy and persistent in places. could brighten up later in the day across the extreme south, but that might set off

the odd heavy shower. temperature—wise, the low to mid teens celsius, so feeling cooler, certainly, where you have that rain. as we move on into wednesday, there's a legacy of cloud across the country from tuesday's low. you could see a little bit of brightness in places, but then the next frontal system will push up from the south to bring stronger winds and some heavier rain to wales, the south—west of england, and in towards the midlands through the afternoon. but it could brighten up later in the day across the extreme south—west. again, the temperatures reaching highs into the mid teens celsius. it stays pretty unsettled to end the week. there'll be further cloud with a few showers on thursday and friday.

this is bbc news. the headlines: in spain, six million children have been allowed outside for the first time since the middle of last month. under 14s can now have an hour a day outdoors, accompanied by an adult. the coronavirus has killed more than 23,000 people in spain. italy, which has recorded more coronavirus deaths than any other european country, is to begin easing lockdown measures. the prime minister, giuseppe conte, said restaurants and bars will be allowed to serve takeaway food from may 4. parks will also reopen, but schools are to remain closed until september. the saudi—led coalition in yemen has rejected a declaration by separatists of self—rule in the south. a statement on the official saudi news agency said all parties needed to return to the previous status quo.