welcome to bbc news i'm mike embley our top stories: tough new restrictions for parts of california as covid—19 cases surge in los angeles county. joe biden announces nominations for top posts in his senior economic team including janet yellen, who could become the first female us treasury secretary. authorities in south australia are preparing to reopen the border with victoria and greater sydney as the state records no new coronavirus cases in 2a hours. as deforestation of the amazon ra i nfo rest as deforestation of the amazon ra i nforest in as deforestation of the amazon rainforest in brazil reaches its highest level in a decade, scientific analysis agree the paris climate agreement girls are within reach. and, why covid—19lockdown measures have seen a surge in tv watching and online

streaming around the world. 0h, oh, my lord, everything has changed. the first of all, we have to be tested every single day. the governor of california, gavin newsom, has said he may impose tougher coronavirus restrictions in the next two days, including a possible stay at home order to counter a surge in cases in the state. the most populous county in the us, los angeles county, which has over ten million people living there has already taken such a step which will last for three weeks. mr newsom said projections show intensive care unit admissions are on track to exceed state—wide capacity by mid december unless people change their habits. let's head to la now and speak with our north america correspondent peter bowes.

it is really a dire situation gci’oss it is really a dire situation across california, but especially in los angeles cou nty especially in los angeles county where the number of coronavirus cases has quadrupled over the last few weeks, the number of people being admitted to hospital, the number of deaths on a daily basis has tripled during the same time period. the governor is taking this action, not only with reference to los angeles county, but state—wide, because the number of beds occupied by patients in intensive care units state—wide, is about 75% at the moment. that is a mixture of regular patients and covid patients but it is moving terror is clearly higher and thatis terror is clearly higher and that is why there is such concern as we move towards christmas. we are just coming out of one american holiday period, where some people decided to travel against the advice they were given and they have just come advice they were given and they havejust come home. there is a strong likelihood some of those people will have been infected by coronavirus on their travels. we are approaching

another holiday period where, again, people tend to move around. people have not been taking notice of the advice they have been given and the number of hospital beds could exceed the demand in the next few days. just briefly, peter, a big picture question, the president's president adviser, scott atlas is standing down, he has taken a lot of criticism, i think he is a radiologist but with no training in epidemiologists, taking fire from doctor anthony faucl taking fire from doctor anthony fauci, the head of the cdc and his colleagues at stamford? yes, he has been widely criticised last week, especially by his colleagues at sta mford especially by his colleagues at stamford where he is a senior fellow, for taking the view is that he has expressed on many occasions as a member of the coronavirus task force. also a familiar speaker on fox news, views that go against medical thinking against coronavirus. not encouraging people to

socially distance, not encouraging people to wear masks. when he was criticised by his own colleagues at sta nford, by his own colleagues at stanford, he responded and said, those media reports, as he put it, were not accurate and he said he had encouraged people to socially distance and to wear masks. that said, he has resigned as one of the president's senior advisers. it is certainly true he was very close to president trump where he had become distant from other members of the coronavirus task force. peter bowes for us there. the first two vaccines against coronavirus could be given to americans before christmas that's according to the us health secretary alex ayzar. it comes, as a second us company, moderna, applied for emergency use approvalfor its coronavirus vaccine in the united states and eu. here's what he had to say. pfizer submitted their application for emergency authorisation and then moderna today is going to be submitting. with pfizer, we at the fda announced an advisory committee for december the 10th and if everything is on track,

everything proves out what it appears to be, we could be looking at approval within days after that. moderna is basically one week behind that and general perna has said from operation warp speed that will ship within 2a hours of fda authorisation. so we could be seeing both of these vaccines out and getting into people's arms before christmas. us president elect, joe biden, has announced his nominations for his senior economic team, with most of the positions going to women. they include the former head of the federal reserve, janet yellen who has officially been nominated us treasury secretary the first time a woman has held the post. an economist worked with her at the federal reserve. janet yellen is absolutely memorable. i worked for her when she was the vice federal chair and when she was the chair. i have worked very closely with her as she was president of the

american economics association. she is the most qualified person to be secretary of the treasury. i am very excited she will be taking on that role. it is true when you are heading the fed, but true in her current job, the fed, but true in her currentjob, it is notjust economics, it is politics. the decisions you take in these jobs can have a big impact on the president? absolutely. janet yellen was the chair of the economic adviser decades ago, so she is not foreign to the political sphere and some may not believe it, but the federal reserve, when they are making big policy decisions, which is exactly what she was overseeing as chair, there is a lot of politics going on with inside the board and a lot of working with congress, testifying and pounding the pavement on the hill. this is absolutely a more political position and she brings experience and skills in this area as well as being amazing at economics. what particular experience, interest and skills? in terms of, no other

individual has led the three major economic policy—making institutions, the council of economic advisers, the federal reserve and now she will be a treasury. that speaks volumes about the skill she has as a policymaker, the good decisions she has made. she is not perfect, she doesn't have a crystal ball, but i know no one who works hard and is more diligent and thoughtful. she wa nts diligent and thoughtful. she wants people to give her ideas, she listens, she thinks hard and she acts. she is very much and she acts. she is very much a leader and one of the things that made it such an honour to work for her at the federal reserve, in additional to learning more policy, she truly inspired her staff, learning more policy, she truly inspired herstaff, including myself, to bring everything they could. the leader cannot do it all but if they have eve ryo ne do it all but if they have everyone working in the same direction, doing the best they can able to accomplish a lot and this administration is

really going to bring its a game. i know she move the policy at the fed away from fighting inflation so much towards maximising employment, what you might call the second of its priorities. she also won a lot of praise for paying attention to disadvantaged groups? it is important to get the context. janet yellen's emphasis on the labour market, on workers and marginalised groups goes all the way back to the beginning of her academic career. she has been working very ha rd career. she has been working very hard and her time as an academic and her many economic policy positions to push the dialogue on, we have to do better for workers. we have to have a labour market that gives eve ryo ne have a labour market that gives everyone an opportunity. it is exciting if you look at her career, to see how much she has moved the policy conversation. this was not an easy task at the federal reserve, thejob is not done and yet she put emotions some real progress

that will mean something for millions of americans. french lawmakers are rewriting a controversial clause in a security bill that would have made it an offence to share pictures of the police online, maliciously. critics say it could have stopped people exposing police brutality. paul hawkins has more. images which have shocked france. a black music producer beaten in his own studio by officers who followed him for not wearing a mask. they are now under investigation after the beating of the man, he was never charged after 48 hours in police custody. he said he was racially abused. after mass demonstrations across france after footage of the incident of the public that was made public. footage that was illegal under a new bill that was about to become law. it is called article 2a and makes it a criminal offence

to publish images of on—duty police officers with intent to harm their physical and psychological integrity. it protects police from harassment and targeting on social media. critics say it stops freedom to film the police and scrutinise alleged police brutality and racism. now, this u—turn from the french government. translation: we propose a complete rewriting of article 24. we know that doubts still persists, we have to extinguish these doubts. when such a lack of understanding continues to intensify and such a fundamental subject, we have a duty to question ourselves collectively. just hours after announcing the u—turn, came this defence of article 2a from the french interior minister. translation: my deep conviction on what the government thinks is that we should absolutely keep what has become the foundation. i believe of the protection of police officers and guardsmen during police operations.

they are not sufficiently protected. i share my total disgust of all acts that could have been an act of discrimination and notable acts of racism. but a small peek into the sociology of the police will show you that it is still an extremely open body. president macron is said to be furious at the way his government has handled the row over the security bill, demanding quick government proposals to rebuild trust between the police and the people. will rewriting article 2a be enough to quell public anger? the devil, as ever, it will be in the detail. the climate action tracker study looks at studies from

china and president elect biden. the climate action tracker study looks at the latest promises from countries including china, as well as the plans of the us president electjoe biden. however this comes at the same time as news that deforestation of the amazon rainforest in brazil has reached its highest level in more than a decade. according to satellite data collected by the country's space agency, more than 11 thousand square kilometres were destroyed in the year tojuly. the area is seen as crucial to slowing climate change because of the huge amounts of carbon dioxide it absorbs. christian poirier is programme director of amazon watch. thank you for your time and good to talk to you. are you surprised by these figures? absolutely not. one needs to observe president bolsonaro from day one to know he has been dismantling environmental protections and human rights to allow this devastation to take place. what is his calculation that frankly the economy is more important than the climate? absolutely, especially the economy of illicit actors, illegal loggers, land grabbers

and speculators is more important than environmental rights and environmental protection at this time, including the protection of our climate. he is unlikely to be changed from that course while he stays in power? it is clear that he is hell—bent on pursuing this disastrous agenda. however, there are ways to force his hand, as it were, especially on a global level when we consume commodities coming from the amazon and are financial constitutions are destroying things there. we have a role among the global community to curb this destructive behaviour. do you get a sense that could be done and is being done? there are signs the financial industry, especially in europe have said it will not continue to bankroll destructive industries in brazil, bad actors. there are large supermarket change and commodity importers will not import from bad actors that

are linked to human rights abuses and deforestation. there are abuses and deforestation. there a re efforts abuses and deforestation. there are efforts to block the treaty that would allow a huge flow of commodities to europe, including the biden administration's efforts to curb this behaviour in brazil by way of economic pressure. could you lay it out for us how important the rainforest is in this whole process? the amazon ra i nfo rest this whole process? the amazon rainforest helps to balance the global climate and dry weather systems. every square mile of forest loss drives us closer to an irreversible tipping point where our climate will no longer be able to sustain us and the will the forest be able to sustain itself. these drastic numbers, more than 11 square kilometres of forest is lost, an area the size of jamaica, it really a 70%jump over a ten year average prior to bolsonaro taking power, are driving us to the precipice collectively. thank you very

much, christian. thanks for being with us, sta ble thanks for being with us, stable is if you can and bbc news. sharon osbourne tells us our tv show is changing in the face of the pandemic? it's quite clear that the worst victims of this disaster are the poor people living in the slums which have sprung up around the factory. i'm feeling so helpless that the children are dying in front of me and i can't do anything. charles manson is the mystical leader of the hippy cult suspected of killing sharon tate and at least six other people in los angeles. at 11:00 this morning,

just half a metre of rock separated britain from continental europe. it took the drills just a few moments to cut through the final obstacle and then a minerfrom calais was shaking hands and exchanging flags with his opposite number from dover. welcome back. the governor california said he may impose coronavirus restrictions to counter a surge in cases. joe biden has announced nominations for top posts, including janet yellen, who could be the first female us treasury secretary. iran says it believes israel and an exiled opposition group used a remote controlled weapon

to shoot dead a top iranian nuclear scientist, mohsen fakhrisadeh. security chief, ali shamkhani says attackers had ‘used electronic equipment‘ when the scientist's car was fired on east of tehran last friday. iran has been attacked before in an effort to stall its nuclear programme. so what methods are being used by hostile states and how far will they go? joining me now from washington is professor paul pillar. he was at the cia for 28 years, the author of many books on espionage and now a senior fellow at georgetown university's center for security studies, and the brookings institution's center for 21st century security and intelligence. professor i know you are at the cia for 28 years, what do you make of around's assertions? this obviously was a very sophisticated operation that probably did involve some remote—controlled aspects to it, at least in the form of a remotely controlled detonated vehicle bomb, which upset the traffic on the road in which the target was moving. but it

also seems to have been involved in an old—fashioned gunfight as well, based on the reports we have gotten. but it involved a lot of people and clearly was planned for a long time. and it was consistent with some of the other operations we know have been conducted by israel, possibly with the help of the cult, this opposition group. tell us more about those other operations if you could? this is not the first nuclear scientist who has been assassinated. about eight or nine years ago there were a whole series of assassinations. about five individuals who are scientists associated with the nuclear programme who were assassinated. mostly some combination of car bombs or getting gunned down. and that is only a fraction of what the israelis have been involved in over the years. not just against iranian targets but against iranian targets but against other targets they consider adverse areas in

operations that have been conducted throughout the middle east. including, it is alleged, the world's first digital weapon? you are referring to the operation which reportedly also had a us involvement as well as israel. this was some yea rs well as israel. this was some years back and was aimed specifically at the iranian, uranium enrichment programme. it appears to have been a cyber attack that managed to take the control away from the iranians, of some of their centrifuges, used to enrich uranium, causing them to spin faster than they we re them to spin faster than they were supposed to. so this was a good example of a cyber attack that actually incurred physical damage, in this case damage to the centrifuges, which did set the centrifuges, which did set the iranians enrichment programme. the iranians deny they are pursuing a nuclear weapon, do you credit that?

yes, all the indications are that they had an active programme working on weapons back before 2003. then, or at least a couple of years after that, certainly by 2007 they had ended the programme. the scientist who was the victim of this most recent attack was alleged to have been one of the key figures in that programme, but we are talking about work that took place more than 15 yea rs that took place more than 15 years ago. since then the iranians made a decision, strategic decision which led to their participation in the multilateral nuclear agreement, thejoint comprehensive multilateral nuclear agreement, the joint comprehensive plan of action, which they had to get rid of a large part of their nuclear programme, they opened the rest of it up to intrusive international monitoring and basically said, we would rather bea basically said, we would rather be a non—nuclear weapon states, free from sanctions and a sanctioned pariah. professor, thank you. you are welcome.

authorities in south australia are preparing to reopen the border with victoria and greater sydney. the state has recorded no new cases of coronavirus in the past 2a hours. our sydney correspondent, phil mercer says the relaxation of internal border restrictions, is an important milestone. the state of queensland is reopening now to the whole of new south wales and the state of victoria. this is the first time in more than 250 days that clea ns time in more than 250 days that cleans lands's borders have been fully open. as you say, other restrictions in other parts of the country are now being lifted. in the last hour or so we have heard from the western australian state government and they are to reopen their borders with a victoria and new south wales in a weak‘s time. many internal borders in this country were closed in an attempt to curb the spread of covid—19. it wasn't universally popular, the federal government said those

state border closures where necessary but state and territory leaders were adamant they need to protect their populations. if you look at australia's numbers, this is a country that has recorded about 28,000 coronavirus cases, just over 900 people have died. we understand they are just over 60 active coronavirus cases across the entire country. so australia is now opening up fragmentation brought by covid—19 is being eased and australia now looking forwards to what is being described here asa to what is being described here as a covid normal christmas. but this is a country that can ill afford to rest on its laurels, the authorities say. the big danger is now apathy and complacency. phil mercer. lockdown measures enforced due to the covid—19 pandemic have brought about a surge in tv watching and online streaming around the world. but how tricky is to feed that appetite for content when the enternatinment indusrty is bound by the same pandemic restrictions?

over the past few months the industry has been formulating protocols and there was a big breakthrough in september when the big entertainment industry unions and producers agreed strict testing agreements, how to change the actual production set. as sharon osbourne was alluding to, there are people there to monitor this and keep it, keep from any outbreak spreading on the set because there had been cases on set, but so far no big outbreak. it is all about keeping the industry open and going. someone died i think, after working on a film set and there has been thousands ofjob losses ? has been thousands ofjob losses? the person that died,

assistant director was on a commercial set, where there aren't that strict restrictions there are on film and television yet. there are talks to bring in restrictions with testing. that did alarm people and got people talking. it is not clear where he picked it up. but the risks are real and as you said, at least 100,000 jobs are thought to have been lost from this industry. more if you think wider. and that is not even when you talk about the corporate jobs that are being lost you know, at disney, via con, cbs, thousands ofjobs potentially gone. so that is what the industry is facing and everybody i speak to that work on film or television, they just want to do what they can to keep the show going, as it were. briefly, we are hearing robots and wearable devices are the new norm onset? yes, i did a story for the la times where

i talk to people about the entrepreneurs coming up with solutions, either robotic cameras so they can send a cameras so they can send a camera somewhere to film someone so that doesn't have to be anybody in their home or on set and nobody has to travel to a stage. and software to keep on top of the testing. it can be thousands and thousands of tests that are projection needs to do. sometimes they have tested three times a week, more sometimes if it is everyday. it isa sometimes if it is everyday. it is a lot to keep on top of and technology is being developed around this production is to keep them going. before we go ho ho with christmas fast approaching. more than 150 santas took to the shores of the nerang river on queensland's gold coast swapping the sleigh forjet skis and breaking a new world record for charity. the parade, which saw hundreds of participants in festive costumes broke the previous record for the most santas on jet skis which sat at 129. the event raised

more than $10,000 for children's charities. thank you for watching. hello there. we've started this week on a relatively quiet note. quite a lot of grey, gloomy weather around. although scotland didn't fare too badly with some sunshine. for the rest of this week, things are set to turn much colder and a lot more u nsettled. as low pressure takes over we'll see some rain, sleet and snow in some places. we've got this ridge of high pressure building in early on tuesday. fairly strong winds down the east coast. a cold front which spreads southward across the country during the overnight period. a chilly start but bright with some very welcome sunshine across many parts of central southern, eastern parts of england, but cloud will be thickening up again. this time against northern and western areas into the afternoon. it's going to be a chilly day pretty much wherever you are. in the warmest spots out west and also in the sunny spot

in the east could make nine or ten degrees. as we head through tuesday night it looks like another front will start to push into northern and western areas. this is a cold front, on it there will be outbreaks of rain. quite a lot of cloud and other clear, chilly night in the southeast. the northwest will turn cooler with some blustery showers. as we head through wednesday, this cold front will slowly migrate southwards and introduce much colder air or north and west of the uk. very windy as well with gales in the northwest of scotland. it will be bright here it was sunshine, blustery showers, heavy across scotland and increasing wintry over the hills. but for england and wales, we'll see quite a bout of cloud with outbreaks of rain. confined to the southeast skies behind it will brighten up here. that cold front clears through as we head on into thursday. low—pressure takes over. it's going to be windy, outbreaks of rain, some of which could be quite heavy through thursday, especially through parts of england and wales. southern england and wales will see the heavy strength of the day for that, could see some gales through the channel as well.

further north a bit brighter spells of sunshine, a few showers there will be wintry. even down to lower levels across scotland as temperatures range from three to around seven degrees, so feeling cold. friday, big area of low pressure spirals across the country. bringing further spells of strong winds and heavy rain. we could see the threat of some sleet and snow across the northern hills, perhaps even down to lower levels at times. there will be a bit of sunshine here and there too. another cold day on the cards for all.

this is bbc news.

the headlines. the governor of california says he may impose tougher to restrictions in the next two days, including a possible stay—at—home order, to counter a surge in cases. gavin newsom says projections show intensive care unit admissions are on track to exceed state—wide capacity by mid december. joe biden has announced nominations for top posts in his senior economic team. many of the positions are going to women. this includes the former head of the federal reserve, janet yellen, who could become the first female us treasury secretary. in the face of widespread protests, french lawmakers are rewriting a controversial clause in a security bill that would have made it an offence to share pictures of the police online, maliciously. there has been concern that it could have stopped people exposing police brutality.