this is bbc news, the headlines: italy's prime minister has said coronavirus cases could rise, as travel restrictions are set to ease from the beginning ofjune. guiseppe conte said italy must accept the risk otherwise the country will never be able to start again. barrack obama has delivered another attack on the trump administration's handling of the pandemic, saying many officials don't even pretend to be in charge. in an online address to graduating students, mr obama said the crisis had torn back the curtain on the idea that those in charge knew what they were doing. the uk government has defended its plan to reopen schools in england, and warned that the longer they're closed, the more children will miss out. teaching unions say they're not convinced that it's safe for more pupils to return byjune. the uk education secretary has insisted he is following the best scientific advice. shamima begum now on bbc news, dateline london.

this week in the uk, boris johnson changed hello boris johnson changed and hello borisjohnson changed and welcome to the prograr which hello and welcome to the programme, which normally hosts roundtable discussion and argument between leading correspond this and foreign correspondence that file... we have kept the table and two of our guests are imagining their knees jammed under as we speak, we have a portuguese journalist and academic and jeffrey coffman is an emmy award—winning broadcaster with us network abc and he was their man in london and our woman of the world is lyse doucet, the bbc chief international correspondent. welcome. woman of w one. woman of

london she may be but always alert to the world beyond. that week in uk, boris johnson changed to the world beyond. that week in uk, borisjohnson changed the government's coronavirus tune — stay at home is now stay alert. according to pollsters, only one third of people in the uk think they know what it means. the first ministers in scotland and wales say they know what. .. the first ministers in scotland and wales say whatever mrjohnson means, they prefer the old message, thank you very much, and are sticking with it. so, for now at least, it's the disunited kingdom. let me ask, how different has this week been for you? did you notice anything? did it feel different when these restrictions were eased slightly? not really. i am lucky enough to work from home so i stayed in my little haven of north london, and so i might go out a little bit more than i used to, so i am taking two walks when i can, and i continue to see that my tube station is shot, if you people in the streets... a little more in the parks

but my life has changed very little. geoffrey? i don't know if my life has changed but i know that a lot of the life on the streets have changed. construction sites around where i live are coming alive, more people on the streets, fast food outlets are opening for take—out, but i think what's really changed is people don't really know what to do, be mixed messages from the prime minister and government... how do you stay alert to a virus that you do not see? it's not like bombs being left in packages on the tube. i think this confusing message has forced people to make up their own rules. lyse, how has it been for you? as eunice said, she used the word lucky. we are among the privileged and we have food in our fridge and jobs and work to keep us busy.

i think all of us would embrace the slogan "in it together", you think of those who are living in crowded apartments and who desperately need to get back to work. it is wonderful that you have more breath of fresh air. i feel like there was an opera singing outside. you started by saying we are all grounded, i used to travel a lot and now i've become a flenaire, to use the french word, strolling in the streets and all of us are appreciating nature more and i am seeing bits of london home from work that i never saw before. so there is light in the dark but using the lockdown means in easing of the darkness for more people. it is interesting that any city like london, it is safer to look up. you don't necessarily have to do look ahead of you and you realise the history of buildings and as you look further up, you see the age of the buildings, never mind the modern

science, what is up and beyond. what about you ? i have been moving about a bit more. i hope that i might be able to wave at my mum through the window down in devon for the first time this week in weeks. jeffery, you mentioned that mixed message, how do you think the prime minister is doing this week? i think this was a bad week. i think you came out of his owners and there was a huge amount of empathy and he showed some humility in his first words. but the lack of clarity in this slogan is not what people are looking for. to say you can go back to work but you should not take the tube, public transport is now overcrowded, how do i behave at work? this is borisjohnson exposing his weakest side, which is decisiveness and depth.

there is a superficiality coming through and how that slogan "stay alert" got past him... what were his advisers thinking when they came up with it? and when he looked at it, why did you not question it? what exactly does this do to shape behaviour? i think this has been an extremely bad week for him in terms of bringing the country together. people are living... this is really tough for many millions of people in this country are what you are looking for its clarity and leadership and direction. i do not think that there is a sense that we are seeing that and the polling numbers would suggest that the confidence in borisjohnson is slipping. what do you make of the open discord we've seen between the prime minister of the uk and the first ministers in scotland and in wales? is it just ministers in scotland and in wales? is itjust a bit of party politics re—emerging quezword word?

is itjust a bit of party politics re—emerging quezword word ?|j is itjust a bit of party politics re-emerging quezword word? i think it's more than that, i think there are more issues around the way ahead and addressing this crisis. i think in scotland and wales the government 's seem far more worried with the impact of easing the lockdown. let's say that britain has the highest rate of deaths in europe, so the situation isn't completely under control. the letter are numbers are not where they should be. it is far more than ideology, it is party politics, it is worrying about livelihoods and there might be an issue of party politics with this and this government, the government of borisjohnson, has been trying to push forward and approach that allegedly tries to save the economy or prioritise the economy or livelihoods, so there almost this false dichotomy with either opening the lockdown a little bit in order to save the economy or you keep the

restrictive measures for a little longer and you stifle the economy. this is a bit of a false dichotomy because we've seen from the countries that had not imposed lockdowns — sweden, for instance — and the other countries with a more relaxed approach, while their economies have been as badly hit as the economies of spain or italy or france who have imposed really tough lockdowns. it has to do on the one hand there are different ideological approaches. this is a government that does not really believed in the power of the state. it is immensely preoccupied with the economic impact of the lockdown, and it is trying to... it is trying to address the concerns to... it is trying to address the concerns and anxiety of the population, but at the same time, still going to the default position of not believing in the power of the state to do good. the question we are all learning more about science now... yes, the r

number, the infection rate. citizens are sacrificing a lot and by and large observing and making the sacrifices, but there has to be sacrificed and common sense in it and the r rate, the figures released yesterday, the r rate, the reproduction of one infected person giving it to how many other people, it is higher in scotland, it is higher in wales, it is higher in the north—east of england, it is falling in london so there was an emphasis on the four nations approach, we should have common guidance, but if the r rate is different, of course leaders, who have to be responsible to the people, they have to take different decisions about how fast and how far they want to open up. it's very appropriate to talk about the uk and the potential divisions here, because british eurosceptics used to grumble that whenever the european union encountered a new problem, the solution was always said to be more europe. well, if

that was the brussels disease, perhaps the pandemic will cure it. 27 countries have pursued 27 different policies with the closure of borders removing one of the continent's main selling points — borderless trade and borderless travel. covid—i9 has exposed yet againa travel. covid—i9 has exposed yet again a default line that became apparent a decade ago — the wealthier north doesn't want to share the cost of the poorer south. eunice, this is something you've been worried about this week, why? well, very much, because if europe doesn't get its act together, and by this i mean the solidarity, have a european vision on how to address this crisis, the whole european crisis might —— project might as well unravel. we heard a ruling a week ago by the european constitutional court questioning the judgement of the european court of

justice on the bond buying scheme of the ecb, so this is quite technical, but the long and short of this as we have a national constitution report questioning the authority of the european court of justice. questioning the authority of the european court ofjustice. and in the european union, the rulings of the european union, the rulings of the european union, the rulings of the european court ofjustice, they have to be implemented by the member states, the buck stops with that court. the national courts have no say. so the ruling of the german constitutional court can set a really dangerous precedent in european practice. it can lead to, for instance, countries like hungary, which is already in a state of emergency and practically a non—democracy in europe, or poland, or even the countries of greece, the government of greece, italy, portugal, questioning rulings of the ecb on the grounds that they violated the remit of the european

institutions. the ecb being the european central bag? yes, the european central bag? yes, the european central bank. so if you start to have many member states questioning the legitimacy of european institutions, that's pretty much the beginning of the end. on the other point you made about the lack of solidarity between the north and south and so the divisions between the alleged saints of the north and the alleged sinners of the south, this essentially can have profound consequences because so far, the european union has tried to come up with a comprehensive response to the coronavirus, and so the not exactly 27 different solutions, the approaches of each member state, solutions, the approaches of each memberstate, are solutions, the approaches of each member state, are actually extremely similar, but europe will need to come up with a marshall plan for europe because the economic consequences of europe because the economic consequences of covid—19 will be very, very dire. we are going to see the impact, for instance, of the closure of the tourism industry in southern europe. this is going to be completely catastrophic. it's

predicted the doubling of unemployment in europe until the end of the year. this is extremely concerning. so if the european union does not come up with a comprehensive solution, and it is about solidarity, about burden sharing, as opposed to loans, and those loans then have attached to it a lot of austerity measures then it will make the solution even worse, then this will lead to very ugly politics and pretty much the unravelling of the european project. jeffery, are you as worried about this, because unlike saying the financial crisis of a decade also ago, when the northern european countries in part were blaming the southern europeans that their behaviour, as eunice was saying, they were somehow sinners, they won't good europeans, they hadn't saved, they spent, and all the rest of it, the reality of this isn't to do with whether your a good or bad

country, everyone gets this, you are a victim of this virus, and therefore that argument that some of therefore that argument that some of the european countries were using then, that should be a lot weaker this time, shouldn't it? what worries me and what scares me more than the virus itself is the political virus that seems to have taken political virus that seems to have ta ken hold political virus that seems to have taken hold in the world where it makes it impossible... the agendas of different countries, of different leaders, have so divided the world ata time leaders, have so divided the world at a time when the world needs to come together. it's notjust the european union. where is the united nations in this? look at the world health organization 's and look at theissues health organization 's and look at the issues of the politicisation of it by president trump. instead of seeing leaders come together, as we saw after the second world war when the world was obviously ruined and ravaged, we are not seeing that now and as big a threat as the science is, the inability of leaders to come together and say, "we need to work together, we need to pool our scientific knowledge and create

plans to support economies so this doesn't destroy people's lives for a generation and lead to instability and fracture in ways we can only begin to imagine". i globally, do you think at least there is evidence of this fracture? what is really heart—warming is that the scientists keep telling us that we are working together as never before, and we are all now focused as individuals and societies and as the world on this race for a vaccine. once it is found, how will it be produced and you will get it? that will become the political question. there has to be a global response to that, but the fact is that the united nations security council, the premier political body of the world, created out of the ashes of the second world war, has been missing in action and largely because of the tussling between the united states and china over the who and other issues

which are driving an even greater wedge between them. it is really shameful. shameful. the acting president of the security council used that. it is shameful. if there ever was a moment to stand together — two metres apart — it is now. one for one and one for all. we will rise and we will die together. thus far, i haven't seen anyone suggest that the latest anti—trump song doing the rounds on social media, ‘the liar tweets tonight', a skit on the lion sleeps tonight, first covered by the doo—wop group the tokens in the early 60s, is anti—trump propaganda made in china. in what he hopes is his re—election year, mr trump wants quite a bit less of everything made there. so the us president will doubtless approve of the taiwanese manufacturer tsmc, which announced friday plans to build a factory producing computer chips in arizona,

in the usa, hours before the trump administration outlined plans which would require companies supplying the chinese telecom giant huawei, a bogeyman of the us, to get permission from the us department of commerce. huawei relies on tsmc for all its high—end chips. the taiwanese firm wants that to continue, and building in the us gives it a strategic hedge against the deterioratinfg relationship between china and the united states. geoffrey, that is something that we were talking about there. what is happening in the china and us relationship? how bad is that, how much worse is it going to get, and what are the consequences? it is really bad and, the odd thing is, because of the mercurial nature of president trump — it seemed to be getting better a month ago, they were friends, but in his... donald trump's very clear priority is to position himself

for re—election, let us not kid ourselves there. he sees this pandemic through a partisan lens and he is searching for a way to rally his base and he is neutralising his ability to hold those mass rallies. he looks for some kind of enemy to point to. the virus came from china — as he reminds reporters. for him there is an opportunity to vilify china, he says they inflicted it on america, they are america's mortal enemy. what is worrisome is, one, we need to work together. china had this virus first, they have science that is advancing faster than anywhere,

and we need to be pooling resources and not creating animosities. the long—term consequence is that this new form of cold war could break out and undermine a world of global cooperation and this detente that we have lived with for the last couple of generations. there is a lot at stake here, but what is really worrisome when you look at the united states — we have seen it and talked about it around this table before, but it is getting amplified week by week — the injection of partisan politics into everything that happens in the white house. it is undermining the need for a coordinated effort to control and ultimately solve this pandemic middle. china is very particular about the control it exercises aver the messages that are expressed about it. i mentioned taiwan — that is a notorious example and

of something that china insists is a part of china and woe betide any academic institution or country would insist that taiwan is a separate nation. an eu ambassador got into trouble in china a few weeks ago for allowing a statement about the vaccine to be altered at the chinese government's behest. it is a really difficult thing for a lot of countries to deal with, how they handle china? absolutely. in europe there is a lot of concerns about the ambitions, the economic ambitions of china, because over the last decade beijing and many chinese state and chinese companies have been buying quite a lot of imported assets over europe. they are praying on the fragile economies that were battered by the eurozone crisis to buy electricity countries to anything else, and now they are supplying medical equipments to those european countries. we are seeing a much more robust diplomacy coming from beijing,

so there is a bit of a charm offensive but a little bit more showing of the teeth in the links with europe, so there are reasons to be concerned, but going back to the question of donald trump's dealings with china, it is clear that this is done for electoral reasons and it was something that was explored and was a winning formula in 2016. he is doing it again. president trump is worried about what is going to happen in novemberwhen there is a presidential election. he signed a law this week which mentioned the possibility of cancelling the presidential election, which of course the white house cannot cancel, but this statement can be seen as a sign of how worried trump is with the impact of covid—19 over his personal ratings and also the whole effect on the us economy. the last thing that america needs at the moment is a trade war with china.

europe will eventually need to tread carefully, but i do not think we can expect any careful statements coming out over from the united states at the moment. another group in his sights at the moment are inspectors general, the people who oversee the federal government and make sure it is behaving itself. another one got news late on friday evening that he was going to be fired? yes, reports are coming in so far that someone in the state department who initiated an investigation into the secretary of state, mike pompeo, has been removed. president trump says that "he lost our confidence." it is another alarm bell. there is lots of reports in american including editorials,

saying that this is a time when there needs to be a regulatory framework when such eye—watering sums of money are being spent, when the nation is at stake, we need to hold authorities responsible. do not get rid of that oversight, because it helps keep our officials on their toes, so this is yet another example. we have seen it in the navy during this pandemic and in other parts of the us government, so yet again it is a worrying sign. geoffrey, the news was on friday night that steve linnock would be fired and he got 30 days notice. last month we had the removal of the watchdog — he was one of the government's financial relief operations, and they lost the person who was fired from the health general. that was chrissy grimm. the intelligence community inspector general was also fired. michael atkinson. what is his

problem with these people? he does not like to be accountable. the whole principle of the inspectors general is their oversight. they are looking after the taxpayer's interest when it comes to the billions and trillions being spent routinely and hastily. the need for this kind of oversight is massive, and trump does not like to be questioned and we know this. this is one of those characteristics. he hates being challenged and he wants to be able to deal as he wants to deal, whether it is above board or not. we need to know but he doesn't want us to. ithink... i don't want to sound apocalyptic here, but i think that the virus of politics is as menacing to the world right now as the pandemic. the great american experiment of 250 years is really tested

in a way that civil rights and world wars have not tested it. the resilience and independence of its political institutions are being undermined daily by this, and they have consequences. we are not simply get through if people and politicians do not stand up and hold the president and the republicans around him, who are just blindly endorsing him, accountable. this is a really serious challenge of the fundamentals of democracy, and it is ultimately about positioning him to hold onto power for another four years. this is our last few moments. the weather is warming up over the uk this weekend. the beaches of greece have opened. what one thing are you most looking forward to do when the restrictions in england are eased so much more? going to the theatre. that is one of the things i miss the most. seeing friends face—to—face. i am so over staring at a computer

screen to talk to people. i want to see friends face—to—face at a safe distance, just have a good laugh, have a good discussion, and you just feel it through your whole body when you see someone because it reminds you... human contact via skype is not the same thing. thank you, and i look forward to hugging you when it is safe to do so. that's it for dateline london for this week. we're back next week at the same time. goodbye. hello. temperatures are set to climb

over the next few days, peaking around the middle of the week with highs of 26 or 27 degrees in the south. a lot of dry weather as well, but the further north and west you are across the uk, the greater the chance of seeing some outbreaks of rain. that's certainly the case on sunday — this frontal system passing across the northern half of the country, but that front running up against this area of high pressure, which will be keeping things dry down to the south, and the squeeze between that high pressure area and the frontal systems pushing in from the west will drive the air up from the south — an increasingly warm feel over the coming days. so, for sunday, we see some rain across the northern half of the uk. parts of north wales, northern england, just the odd spot of drizzle, which should tend to peter out during the day, and the rain across northern ireland and northern scotland will tend to fizzle around lunchtime but we expect more wet weather from the west into the late afternoon. further south, we'll see some spells of hazy sunshine, light winds here, more of a breeze further north you are and those temperatures,

well, 17 degrees in aberdeen, 20, maybe 21 towards the south—east of england. just nine degrees there in lerwick, but shetland will spend much of the day under sunny skies. now, as we head through sunday night, we'll see these outbreaks of rain once again pushing across northern areas. further south, it stays predominantly dry with some clear spells, and certainly not a cold night — actually quite a mild one, nine to 11 degrees as we begin monday morning. and monday's weather setup is a similar one. high pressure to the south, frontal systems to the north. notice, though, there is a bit of a gap between these two frontal systems, so even across northern areas, there will be a fair amount of dry weather. we see these outbreaks of rain drifting away from mainland scotland and up across the northern isles, then something a little bit drier, still with a fair amount of cloud. similar story for northern ireland, northern england — the odd spot of rain. further south, it's dry with some spells of sunshine and slightly warmer. again, 23 degrees in london. as we go into tuesday, it's another fine, dry, largely sunny day for much of england and wales, but for northern ireland and scotland, again we see cloud, we see some splashes of rain at times but not all the time.

temperatures here, well, between about 14 and 18 degrees, but the further south and east you are, highs of 25 or 26. and we could touch 27 in the south on wednesday. by thursday, the increasing chance that we'll see rain spreading from the west, and it will start to turn a bit cooler.

this is bbc news with the latest headlines for viewers in the uk and around the world. barack obama takes aim at the trump administration over its handling of the pandemic. and all those adults who you used to think were in charge and knew what they were doing, turns out they don't have all the answers. italy's prime minister admits coronavirus cases could rise, as the country is set to ease travel restrictions from early june. the uk education secretary warns the longer england's schools are closed, the more children will miss out, as the government presses on with plans to re—open them. it's game on — germany's bundesliga becomes the first major european football league to restart, playing to an empty stadium. # waterloo couldn't escape if i wanted to...#