donald trump is visiting california, where record wildfires continue to burn. he said the fires were the result of poor forest management, not climate change. but his election rival, joe biden, says it's the president's policies that are contributing to natural disasters. new legislation which would allow the british government to override key parts of the brexit withdrawal agreement has passed an early hurdle in the house of commons even though it would break international law. five former prime ministers warn it will damage britain's standing in the world. an international team of astronomers say they've found the strongest evidence yet that life may exist on the planet venus. they've detected traces of a gas in its atmosphere which they believe could be produced by living microbes. but the temperature on the surface of the planet is over 400 degrees celsius.

families of those who lost their lives in the manchester arena bombing have been sharing messages and videos about their loved ones as part of the inquiry into the attack. 22 people died when salman abedi detonated a bomb as fans left a concert at the arena in may 2017. 0ur north of england correspondent judith moritz reports. bagpipes play. my whole world has been shattered into pieces. darling, if you can't have a glass of prosecco on your way to the tube station, then when can you? laughter. martyn hett and eilidh macleod, two of the 22 people murdered in the manchester arena attack. each had their own personal story. today those stories

began to be told. weight, we have news just coming in. martyn is fit. martyn hett had a magnetic personality. i absolutely adore coronation street. those who met him neverforgot him. this video, his family's way of showing his colourful character to the world. this is the way martyn lived his life and we should all be more martyn. the video was played in court with martyn‘s family present. it's been difficult. we've had many difficult days throughout the whole process. but this was one of the nicer ones. we got a great deal of comfort from it. eilidh macleod was from barra in the outer hebrides. her family present video full of the highland music she loved her family's video full of the highland music she loved to play on her bagpipes and messages from the whole island community.

i know personally that i will never forget her. she was a wonderful girl and a wonderful person, and she taught me as a class teacher to be a better person. sorrell leczkowski's mother samantha was with her young daughter when she died. her tribute, read by her lawyer, brought home the enormity of the pain she feels. "i feel that i let her down and i didn't save her. i am beyond devastated. i'm broken. as well as dealing with both me and mum being blown up, i have to deal with seeing sorrell being blown up and die in my arms." the inquiry‘s heard that john atkinson may have survived the bomb if help had come sooner. his family's statement was read by their lawyer. "we as a family are truly devastated with losing john. we can't even explain how much we love and missjohn. it's just not fair.

love you always and forever, john. your heartbroken mum and dad." the experience of paying public tribute is distressing for the families. but it's also considered important so that those who died are placed at the heart of the inquiry. judith moritz, bbc news, manchester. now on bbc news, deforestation has skyrocketed in colombia since the peace deal of 2016. our world joins a team of scientists from the royal botanic gardens. in the forests of colombia, nature is under attack. since the civil war ended in 2016, deforestation has skyrocketed. i'm frank gardner and i am heading into what remains of the virgin tropical rainforest. i traded in my wheelchair for a packhorse and am tested to my limits.

i think this is too dangerous. i don't think i can do this. i am joining a crack team of scientists from the royal botanic gardens, kew. they are on a mission to discover and save unique plant species before they vanish forever. i am going to bear witness on the frontline of rainforest conservation. this is where the journey begins — not in colombia, but in the royal botanic gardens, kew, london. kew is the world leader in developing plant science. the botanists are preparing for their mission to discover new species.

and it is from here that this expedition will be launched. i have come here to see the expedition leader, doctor mauricio de bernardos. he works in a library for lab specimens. this is where we identify new plants. we believe we have more than 200,000 different species here. you are a botanist and a biologist. and a scientist and an explorer in some sense. what are you expecting to get from this mission? the most remote areas are the best preserved and this is going to be our most important expedition. we're going to try to get

into the heart of this area. we do not know what we expect to find. what is at stake with this whole trip that we're doing? why is this so important? we are in a race against time to protect this biodiversity from disappearing. we have rapid deforestation. we see how we are losing this forest very quickly and ourjob is to get an understanding about the diversity of these resources as well as their importance. in 2016, the colombian government signed a peace deal with the farc rebels. for more than half a century, civil war actually slowed the pace of deforestation. but now remote tracts of land have opened up. farmers, loggers, and miners

are scrambling for resources. colombia is now reportedly losing 3,000 square kilometres of forest every year. we are travelling to an area famous for its emerald mines, western boyaca. this is a bittersweet journey for me. this could be the last time that i could see this forest. if i come back in ten years, this forest could be gone. colombia is still an eden. it's the second most biodiverse country in the world, after brazil. i may be the bbc‘s security correspondent, but my passion is for nature. you know, just look around you. there's incredible scenery. it is such a privilege to be here. i love being surrounded by the sounds and smells

of nature. nature has always been something of an antidote to myjob as a security correspondent. in 2004, i was shot and partly paralysed while on the job. i won't deny, i have a certain trepidation about the trip itself because everybody else is walking. i will need to do this on horseback or i will not make it. the team assemble at the edge of the rainforest in las quinchas. it's going to be a beautiful day. yes, it is going to be a beautiful day. this is the first time this area will be explored by scientists. for so many years, conflict and criminality made this area inaccessible to outsiders.

if you see a snake, everybody please freeze, don't move. we are going to carry radios at all times. you, actually, frank, you'll have a radio. so this is going to be your radio. i'm going to be quite busy trying to control the horse. well, yes, maybe we can put this on the horse so you can have something that you can... the horse can do the radio. there is a bit of a risk here. my legs are like honeycomb, the bones. i cannot afford to fall off and break things. at the beginning of the track is a steep descent. the botanists hope to find new species deep inside the forest. but i am unable to hold on with my legs.

guys, i don't think i can do this. i'm going to fall off. i think this is just too dangerous. i mean, it breaks my heart, ijust... i think you will have to carry on without me. but the local guides come up with an idea. well done. 0k. i am so thrilled that, despite my injuries, thanks to the endurance and kindness of these guys, i am able to see this amazing scenery. primary forests are the most

bio—diverse terrestrial ecosystems anywhere on the planet. forests are not only vital in mitigating climate change, the botanists hope to find plants with untold potential. they get to work collecting specimens. we don't know what it is. it could be a philodendron. beautiful. one of the local guides believes that he has chanced on something extraordinary. this, we actually don't know exactly what it is.

it could be something new. we are the first botanists collecting in this area. so basically every single collection is a new report for science in this area. the scientists will take the cuttings to the laboratory for further examination, in kew. beyond the fact that it is scientifically interesting, what does it mean to find new species like this in a remote forest? in a country like this, unusually biodiverse, we still do not know how many species are out there. we are estimating in colombia we have about 30,000 species, but still probably 6,000 new species to be discovered. so you think that there are new species out here in these forests that could actually vanish before they are even discovered?

yes, absolutely. and we still don't know the uses of many species. some of the species could have the properties to cure important diseases for humans. and so as biologists, as botanists, we need to understand as much as possible as quick as possible of this amazing biodiversity. this is like a supermarket, or a pharmacy, and we don't know it, we don't appreciate the forest. 0ur quality of life relies on the preservation of these environments. in the fight to save the forests, the colombian government has extended its protection to millions of acres of land. the army launched 0peracion artemisa in 2019 to combat illegal logging.

colonel hermida has a thousand troops deployed in the area. what effect has this had on deforestation here? but this can't really apply to the whole of colombia, because deforestation is continuing throughout the country — i mean, even here, they are still doing it.

this region, colonel, seems very secure, very peaceful but of course in the past, it wasn't like that. do you worry that if they don't find proper alternatives for people to make a living, that this region will go back to conflict? under colombian law, illegal deforestation carries a sentence of up to 12 years in prison.

but in remote places, the law is hard to enforce. illegal loggers are still at work in these forests.

the loggers say they

have bills to pay. they've chosen their target — an 80—year—old rosewood tree. chainsaw whirrs.

this fallen giant will make the loggers $300. these valleys are populated by miners and loggers. in the town of 0tanche, members of the community have been invited to a workshop organised by the authorities.

they hope ecotourism will be the silver bullet, providing an income for the community while saving the forest. the botanists from kew have been invited to make their case. the fact that there is such a good turnout here — better than expected — shows there is a lot of interest in alternatives to cutting down the forest. but the question is, is it going to give people enough of a livelihood? and that's a big question. the colonel has turned up. sitting next to him is edemildo, who's been a logger all his life. now, though, he is looking for new opportunities.

lidia is one of the pioneers of ecotourism. she set up a butterfly sanctuary to try and entice tourists into the region. it is a natural destination for ecotourism but there is no infrastructure for it at all.

it's going to take years, isn't it? and by then, the forest will be almost gone. are you optimistic or pessimistic? are you going to win this fight to save colombia's natural heritage? for future generations and the environment, time is running out. the need for a solution is urgent. with the botanists — this time on rather

more even ground. wow! oh, my god! it's like... this is incredible! of all the wild, remote places i've been to in the world, i think this is got to be right up there near the top and as a disabled person, as somebody who can't walk, who has to use a wheelchair, it's amazingly liberating that here, amongst all this rare flora and fauna, these beautiful butterflies and rare plants, there's this amazing biodiversity. the scientists from kew remain hopeful of finding hidden treasures, before it's too late. it is a very unusual plant. i have never seen it before. i have no idea what genus it belongs to. the thing about plants, they can be rare and special. they all look the same but it's just when you go back and start comparing them with others,

you find out how important they are. mauricio, do you think you can persuade people to stop cutting down the forest soon enough before the forest is gone? that's very hard to say. that's our hope and that's our mission — that's why we are here. i believe that we can make a change, we just have to do our best to protect the best of this biodiversity. jennifer is a local botanist. she's exploring new areas of her country for the first time. how optimistic or pessimistic are you that you, and others like you, who care about nature, who care about biodiversity, that you can save this forest?

it's great that you're optimistic, but the reality is the area of forest is getting smaller every year. colombia today is a post—conflict nation, but it faces a new battle to protect its natural resources. the biodiversity contained in these forests could prove to be its most precious commodity of all.

hello there. 0ur settled week of september sunshine continues. another warm day for this time of year and it will be largely dry with some decent sunny spells. that said, is going to be a bit more on the way of showery rain

across northern scotland, first thing. that was slowly start to break up and we can as we get into the afternoon. maybe an isolated shower popping up across south—west england, north—west england for the afternoon, but generally speaking across much of england, wales and northern ireland, a good deal of sunshine and a good deal of warmth to go with it. temperatures widely mid to high 20s and may be somewhere in east anglia could see 30 degrees yet again. the story changes somewhat. high—pressure stays with us on wednesday but the wind changed direction to morally north—easterly. noticeably cooler feel particularly if you're north running off the coast where we could see a few showers and some cloudy, misty, murky conditions. the cloud should break up elsewhere, stays perfectly warm in the south with 25 degrees. notably cooler for the north.

welcome to bbc news. as the west coast suffers more devastating wildfires, the rivals for the white house clash over the cause. when you have years of leaves, dried leaves, on the ground, itjust sets it up. it's really a fuel for a fire. if you give a climate arsonist four more years in the white house, why would anyone be surprised if we have more america ablaze? the british parliament gives initial approval to a controversial bill that could override parts of the brexit withdrawal deal with the european union. anger in lebanon — against politicians, corruption, and poverty — brings people onto the streets. lebanon is being eaten by poverty and, in communities like this, it is increasing the tension,