this is bbc news with the latest headlines for viewers in the uk and around the world. a former uk conservative minister and current mp is arrested on suspicion of rape, sexual assault and coercive control. classified documents released by the british military raise new questions about whether uk special forces killed unarmed civilians in afghanistan. the australian state of victoria declares a "state of disaster" as the number of new coronavirus cases rises steeply. meanwhile, south africa records more than half a million virus infections — the fifth highest number in the world. and the owners of one of britain's oldest vineyards threatened by lockdown raise a glass to the kindness of strangers.

hello and welcome if you're watching in the uk or around the world and stay with us for the latest news and analysis from here and across the globe. first, a former conservative minister and current mp has been arrested on suspicion of rape. the sunday times says the allegations were made by a former parliamentary employee and include four separate incidents at addresses in london, including in westminster, between july last year and january this year. the metropolitan police said a man in his 50s has now been released on bail. a conservative party spokesman said that all allegations of this nature were taken extremely seriously adding it would be inappropriate

to comment further. let's cross to our political correspondent tony bonsignore who has more on this. tony, what do we know? well, obviously a limited amount we can say at the moment. let me tell you what we know so far. these allegations against a current mp and former minister according to the sunday times, these allegations made bya sunday times, these allegations made by a former parliamentary employee. the paper says she alleges the mp assaulted her, forced her to have sex, and left her so traumatised that she had to go to hospital. she is accused him of rape, sexual assault and coercive control. now, we had a statement from the metropolitan police who say on friday the 31st ofjuly they received allegations relating to macro. at incidents involving allegations of sexual offences and assault and these offences are alleged to have occurred at addresses in westminster, lambeth

and hackney betweenjuly last addresses in westminster, lambeth and hackney between july last year and hackney between july last year and january this year. a man in his 50s was arrested on saturday, the 1st of august, on suspicion of rape and he's been released on bail to return on a date in mid—august. another conservative party saying anything about this? there were reports of the chief whip mark spencer had been aware of allegations and spoke to the victim. sources have told us that mr spencer hadn't known the magnitude of the allegations and a spokesman for the chief whip said he took all allegations of harassment and abuse extremely seriously and he strongly encouraged anybody who had approached him to contact the appropriate authorities. we've also spoken to the conservative party who say they take all allegations of this nature extremely seriously. tony, thank you. the australian state of victoria has declared a state of disaster because of a continuing rise in coronavirus infections. 650 new cases were recorded on saturday.

residents will not be allowed to travel more than five kilometres from their home. australia as a whole has registered a relatively modest 198 deaths from coronavirus, but there are concerns that the current restrictions aren't working. this is what victoria state premier daniel andrews had to say. the stay at home restrictions for metro melbourne will be enhanced. there will be additional limits to the four reasons to leave home. you will no longer be able to leave home or go any further away from your home than a five kilometre radius. you will not be able to be at any point more than five kilometres away from your home for the purposes of shopping for what you need. only one person will be able to go shopping once per day and they will need to secure the goods and services they need within a five kilometre radius. our correspondent in australia phil mercer has more details of the new restrictions.

they are mostly centred around the city of melbourne which is the state capital, home to five million people. in the next couple of hours, these new restrictions will come into force. what they mean is there will be a night—time curfew. people will not be allowed to go beyond five kilometres of their homes as we've been hearing from daniel andrews, the state premier. people will only be allowed to go shopping once per day per household. there will also be restrictions on people exercising, so these are, by far, australia's strictest lockdown measures and they follow the worst week of the pandemic for australia as a whole. each day in recent, certainly in the last week and recent weeks too, victoria has been reporting hundreds of new infections and over the last week, dozens of people have died. now these numbers might not seem large by international standards, but in the australian context,

they are big, they are significant and they have prompted the government in victoria to take these unprecedented measures of declaring a state of disaster. classified documents from within the british military raise fresh concerns about whether uk special forces may have killed unarmed civilians when they were fighting in helmand in afghanistan in 2011. the material was disclosed as part of a court case, following a bbc panorama investigation. the programme highlighted allegations that the sas deliberately targeted fighting aged men even when they didn't pose a threat. the ministry of defence has denied such a policy existed. our defence correspondent jonathan beale reports. this is how elite troops target the taliban. controversial night raids with the aim to kill or capture enemy fighters. this shows afghan commanders on a mission with american support.

but it was the same tactics used by british special forces during their time in helmand. last year, bbc panorama heard allegations the sas had killed unarmed civilians, with testimony from survivors ofa raid in 2011, who said the british shot family members when they posed no threat. we have blurred their faces to protect their identity. translation: they tied his hands in front of me. if you've tied someone's hands how can they fight? lawyers representing one of the afghan families are now challenging the ministry of defence here at the high court. they're trying to find out whether there was a proper investigation or whether there might‘ve been a cover—up, and they've just forced the mod to release these highly sensitive documents which show that there were serious concerns about the raid within the british military.

in heavily redacted e—mails sent soon after the raid, one british officer asks, "is this about latest massacre?" another soldier replies with reports that two of the afghans were shot reaching for weapons. he says, "it's the eighth time it's happened," adding, "you couldn't make it up". while another e—mail highlights the anger of an afghan officer who suggests two men were shot trying to run away, and the other two men were assassinated. one mp says the documents warrant a fresh investigation. it is deeply alarming, it is deeply serious, and the government needs to come clean. if that does not merit some kind of enquiry, because you're talking about war crimes — potential war crimes, than i do not know what does. the british military‘s own report into the raid released to the court says the four men killed were all armed and one was a known taliban commander, who had been targetting coalition forces. in a statement the mod said...

the mod recently closed down the unit investigating allegations of potential war crimes in afghanistan. about its transparency and the secrecy surrounding britain's special forces. jonathan beale, bbc news. india has recorded more than 50,000 new coronavirus cases for the third consecutive day. overall there's been 1.75 million cases and there are now fears the country could overtake the us and brazil to become the country with the highest number of infections. many states are imposing individual lockdowns for 15—day periods to help control the spread, but the indian government is stressing that mortality rates

are low, at roughly 2%. earlier i spoke to dr ramanan laxminarayan. he's director of the centre for disease dynamics, economics & policy in delhi and is advising various indian state governments on their covid response. there are two countries, one which has the epidemic under control and the other is like brazil. mexico, the other is like brazil. mexico, the usa and india don't. in india it first started with states and places like delhi, which had early rise of cases and then it sort of starting to taper off on some of these places but now there is a new set of states which include many in the south. gujarat continues to have an epidemic and states, very large states, the size of brazil as far as population goes, which are now picking up the pace in terms of numbers of cases, and so this is expected to go

on for quite a while yet. well, because the epidemic, , it's not within control partly because of the dense population and movement of people, which really can't be controlled, inadequate socially distancing, again which is a function of poverty. people not being able to do that even if they were asked to do so. and it's now entering places, parts of the country, which really don't have much by the way of public health infrastructure. and so one would expect to see the cases go up in the days to come. that the situation in india meanwhile in south africa the country has registered more than half a million cases of coronavirus making it by far the hardest hit country in africa. it now accounts for more than half of africa's diagnosed infections. the authorities say the rate of infection is increasing rapidly — and it's not expected to peak for another month. paul hawkins has the latest. mourning another life

taken by coronavirus. 8,153 people have died from it in south africa, but it could be much higher. the south african medical research council says the number of people dying from natural causes from may 6 tojune 21 is 60% higher this year compared to the same period in 2019 and 2018. the government says there have been over 500,000 confirmed infections in the country — that is at least half of all the coronavirus cases on the continent — and a third of them are in gauteng province, where hospitals like thelle mogoerane are struggling to cope, as this member of staff explained. the staff is not there. we have a gross shortage of staff. it's chaos, it's crazy. nurses are testing positive as well, and it's a mess. in ourfacilities and in our hospitals, covid—19 cases are all over the place. there is no ward, by the way, that doesn't have a covid—19 person. so how are we coping with the spread of the virus?

we are not. south africa imposed a strict lockdown in april and may that slowed the spread of the virus, but began a gradual reopening in june. despite that, cases have surged, the president pointing out however that... but that is of little consolation to south africans, with some saying the pandemic has exposed shortcomings in its health system. the cracks that have been there, even before coronavirus, are getting bigger every day. our health care system, public health care system, is failing our people, it's failing the entire country. it was not ready for this virus. the country has tested over three million people and brought in an aggressive early lockdown, but that is no guarantee of success against this deadly virus. paul hawkins, bbc news. new homes and hospitals will be granted "automatic" permission to be

built as part of sweeping planning reforms in england. the overhaul, which is being announced by the housing secretary robertjenrick, is the first since the second world war and will help speed up the building process. but the homeless charity shelter has warned against any changes that lead to "bad—quality" housing. tens of millions of americans are set to lose a weekly unemployment benefit after republicans and democrats failed to reach a deal on its extension. they would usually receive $600 a week — the equivalent of £1159. it was part of a wider package adopted in march as the coronavirus pandemic forced businesses to close. the us general manager of tiktok has said the chinese—owned video—sharing app is "here for the long run", after president trump said he would ban it in the us. vanessa pappas told tiktoks more than 80 million us users in a video statement that its staff were building "the safest app"

possible amid us concerns about data protection. jack kilbride reports. we have heard your outpouring of support and we want to say thank you, and we're not planning on going anywhere. fighting words from an application the us president is threatening to ban. tiktok, for millions of young americans, is a fun video—sharing app full of dances and memes, but for donald trump, it is a national security concern. we're looking at tiktok, we may be banning tiktok, we may be doing some other things, there are a couple of options, but a lot of things are happening, so we'll see what happens. the issue for the president is that the application is owned by a chinese company, bytedance, and there is a concern that the data it collects from users will be passed over to beijing. it is a concern that has seen india already ban the app and australia talk of following suit, but not everyone is as worried. there are real national security implications

with our media networks. the question at hand is really is this a good way to go about it? and simply banning tiktok is not going to do anything for national security. bytedance denies the allegation and, according to some reports, have agreed to off—load the us operation of tiktok with microsoft taking over and assuming all responsibility for protecting the data of users, and there are questions about whether a ban would even work. you wouldn't be able to do it. unlike china or iran, where there is only one or two internet service providers, in the us, it is very, very difficult to be able to do that — there are so many telecom service providers. so even if you convince them to be able to do that, there is going to be a lot of loopholes and in all likelihood it will be very, very close to impossible to be able to successfully do that. but whether it happens or not, it is clear that the move is part of a bigger battle between washington and beijing. one that is also not going anywhere.

jack kilbride, bbc news. the headlines on bbc news. a former uk conservative minister and current mp is arrested on suspicion of rape, sexual assault and coercive control. the australian state of victoria declares a "state of disaster" as the number of new coronavirus cases rises steeply. classified documents released by the british military raise new questions about whether uk special forces killed unarmed civilians in afghanistan. russian health authorities are preparing to start a mass vaccination campaign against coronavirus in october, according to the country's health minister. but, some experts are concerned at russia's fast—track approach. on friday, the leading infectious disease expert in the us, dr anthony fauci, said he hoped that russia and china were "actually testing their vaccines" before

administering them to anyone. here's what we know about these vaccines, and others that are being worked on. one russian vaccine is being devised on by the moscow—based gamaleya institute and the second by the vektor state laboratory in siberia. there's no public data proving the vaccines' safety or success. two chinese companies sinovac and sinopharm, have launched final phase three trials. a third vaccine from can—sino biologics is being used to immunise the military. three western coronavirus vaccines are in final phase three trials. one from us biotech firm moderna, another by the university of oxford and britain's astrazeneca, and the last by germany's biontech with us pharmaceutical pfizer. earlier i spoke to professor dale fisher who is an infectious disease consultant at the university of singapore and he is also chair of the world health organisation's

global outbreak and response network. he says it is unlikely any russian vaccine could have gone through the necessary phases of vaccine safety trials. so, phase one is the early first in humans studies, so there has to be a lot of preclinical work obviously first. so phase one might be a first in humans study with less than 100 people where you are reallyjust giving a small dose, may be of a slightly larger dose, and you're just looking for those early safety warning signs if you like. phase two would be some hundreds of people where you again might be looking at antibody responses and things like that, gaining more confidence that this is a safe and effective vaccine. phase three is where you really need more than 10,000 people and some of these studies that you mentioned are looking at 30,000 people and they only started rolling through july. the moderne one only

announced its commencing recruitment last week so it's hard to imagine how any other vaccines have done that level of scrutiny. it's really quite irresponsible i think to not go through a good phase three study and they are all scheduled to be completed by the middle of next year. a record number of migrants reached the uk by boat last month. more than a thousand people made the journey across the channel — while hundreds more were intercepted by french authorities. simonjones reports. risking their lives crossing the busiest shipping lane in the world. this group of migrants paddled across the channel on thursday on the day a record 202 people made the crossing in a single day. their boat dwarfed by passing ships. these pictures show the true scale of the issue. dubbed the migrant boat graveyard, this is a storage facility on the outskirts of dover where the inflatable dinghies intercepted

in the channel are stacked up. more than 1100 people made the crossing last month bringing the total for the year to more than 3500, far higher than the whole of last year. on a recent visit to calais, the home secretary priti patel told her french counterpart that the number of crossings is unacceptably high. the uk has given the french authorities millions of pounds to try to tackle the issue. britain says france must take tougher action to turn the boats back at sea to act as a deterrent, but the french seem reluctant to do this claiming that migrants who don't want to be stopped on theirjourney to the uk are threatening to jump in the water. why have numbers increased? the weather is a big factor and coronavirus too. with fewer lorries carrying goods across the channel, the traditional route of stowing away has been replaced by taking to the water, but it's dangerous. four migrants died last year trying to cross the channel. the warning is that if this continues, they won't be the last. simon jones, bbc news.

the us state of florida is bracing for the arrival of the storm isaias which is expected to hit miami shortly. isaisa has weakened to a tropical storm after lashing the bahamas, but forecasters warn that it could strengthen back to a hurricane before making landfall. florida governor ron desantis has urged people to be prepared. don't be fooled by the downgrade. we do think it will be upgraded back to a hurricane later on this evening. even if it's tropical storm force winds, you can pretty much be assured you are going to see power outages. that's certainly a 70 mile an hour wind, enough to take down trees and limbs that obviously interacts with power lines and so that will happen and people should be prepared for that. the us national hurricane centre says isaias has wind speeds of nearly 70 miles an hour. matt taylor has more.

it's shaping up to be a very active atla ntic it's shaping up to be a very active atlantic storm season. it's our ninth named storm, usually you don't get that until october. it's a rainmaker than particular damaging winds but it could still cause destruction as it in and out of hurricane status during the next 2a hours. this might save blob of clouds whether rainfall is intensifying across the grand bahamas during the last 12 hours. and then that storm could just clip the florida coast as it works its way northwards through the rest of sunday into monday. it may not make la ndfall sunday into monday. it may not make landfall until it hits north carolina and then the storm will push on land across the atlantic states, may be moving across washington and new york. the main issue will be during the next 2a hours, but sickly on the florida coast. here we could still see hurricane force winds and the potential of a one metre storm surge causing widespread flooding. along the florida coast, owned land across

the florida coast, owned land across the carolinas, towards new york, we could see 150 millimetres of rain which could cause flooding inland as well. but by which stage it would be much more of a decayed storm as the wind continues to ease. matt taylor there. a couple who run one of the oldest vineyards in the uk have been stunned by the response to their request for help after their business was hit by the pandemic. they asked for volunteers to look after their ten acres of vines and hundreds of people have volunteered to work for free. duncan kennedy reports. for russ and philippa, their vineyard was their life. ten acres and 11,000 vines, until covid—19 came. they lost staff and income and the two of them alone couldn't cope. it hits you. absolutely nothing we can do. so they had an idea. they put out a plea for help on facebook. 115,000 people read it and this is what happened. horn honks.

morning. thank you all so much. hundreds of people offered to help for free. every day around 20 volunteers are turning up to carry out the work. it's hot and it's hard. why are you doing this? just to put a little bit back into the community, help somebody out. i thought it would be a nice way to give back, help out a local business. clearing leaves to leave grapes cleared takes hours of toil. we worked it out. you lot have got to pick half a million leaves. wow, i didn't know that! really? half a million? it'sjust something to help somebody, isn't it? help a fellow human being to make life a bit easier. and russ and philippa, well, they are almost speechless. it's like a big hug only 100 times better than a big hug. it's absolutely amazing that they've just come out and done this.

i don't know if covid has changed the way that people think. everyone isjust helping everybody and i think maybe nobody has really asked for help and it seems that if you do so many people are just there saying please, we are here. more volunteers are due at the vineyard in the coming days on what is proving to be a vintage year here for kindness. duncan kennedy, bbc news on the isle of wight. now it's time for a look at the weather with matt. hello there. fairly changeable looking skies across many areas this afternoon, sunshine one minute, cloud the next, maybe the odd heavy downpour as well but more sunshine between the showers across scotland, northern and compared to this morning and they could be heavy and sundry. frequent in northern

ireland. western england and wales, much fewer in number which means there will be more towards eastern areas pushing through on the westerly breeze and it will be cool during the cloudier moments, nice enough when the sun is out, 17—23. into single figures away from the city centre tonight with clear skies for money. one or two showers continue in the west, rain close to the channel islands first thing. for most of us, a sunny start but then showers in north and west areas. the second half of the day, very much hit and miss. second half of the day, very much hitand miss. many second half of the day, very much hit and miss. many places staying dry, dry for longer through tomorrow and temperatures a little on the cool side for early august. 17—22. heat will return later in the week after a wet and windy spell midweek. hello this is bbc news. i'm ben brown. the headlines... a former uk conservative minister — and current mp — is arrested on suspicion of rape,

sexual assault and coercive control. classified documents released by the british military raise new questions about whether uk special forces killed unarmed civilians in afghanistan. the australian state of victoria declares a "state of disaster" as the number of new coronavirus cases rises steeply. meanwhile, south africa records more than half a million virus infections — the fifth highest number in the world. now on bbc news, in the wake of the black lives matter movement, tara welsh investigates why black men are more likely to die in police custody than any other ethnic group in england. she meets the families that have lost loved ones and say the criminaljustice system is racially biased. and a warning there are some images in this programme which you may find disturbing.

the death of george floyd under the knee of a white policeman has started a flood of protest around the world. outrage over an american tragedy. and tens of thousands of people in the uk have marched in unison. but what now? is it time for us to face our own ugly truth? get off my neck! in the uk, black people are also struggling to breathe and dying under the knees of the police. people think it's happening in america, it's not happening here. ijust want people to know that it's happening here all the time. my face was on the floor of a cell. half of my shirt is covered with blood and my breathing was cutting off. i didn't think i was going to survive. why are black britons more likely to be the subject of police force, to die in police custody? some officers are treating people as if they are subhuman. they are performing their discriminative behaviour

within the police service and they should be removed. met police was institutionally racist. in some ways, it's got worse than it was 20 odd years ago. can this movement really end the injustice that has scarred generations? they chant: black lives matter! a night of protest in hackney, east london, after rashan charles, a 20—year—old black man, died following contact with the police. he loved football. he was a playful youngster. and then when he got older, he became a problem. and he needed additional guidance. i gave what i could. my father gave a lot of input into him. rashan was a proud father himself, of a daughter who wasn't even two