this is bbc news. our top stories. more than 30 countries restrict travel to and from the uk because of the new highly contagious variant of coronavirus. if any lorry is turning up wanting to get across the channel, they are being turned away. it is the same with passenger vehicles too. emergency meetings in london and brussels as officials work out how to protect citizens and get things moving again. so what is this new variant — and is it more dangerous? we'll have the latest medical analysis. vaccinations will begin across the european union next week, after its regulater approves the pfizer/biontech vaccine. two men are found guilty of the manslaughter of 39 migrants found dead in the back of a lorry in essex last year.

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. european officials are meeting right now in brussels to stop the spread — from britain — of a new, more contagious, form of covid—19. france is enforcing a 48—hour blockade of passengers and goods. that's caused long tailbacks of lorries in southeast england. many other countries have suspended flights. more than 30 countries have now banned flights from the united kingdom — the number's been constantly rising. in the last few hours, spain, india, hong kong, swizerland and russia have all suspended flights from the uk. overall, across europe, 16 countries have imposed restrictions, including ireland, germany, france, and belgium. today, eu ambassadors are holding emergency talks to agree

a common strategy. and british prime minister boris johnson is due to chair an emergency meeting later to address the uk's growing isolation. our correspondent simonjones reports from dover. an unprecedented closure of the french borderfelt in dover, banning lorry drivers and passengers from crossing to france from anywhere in the uk for 48 hours with fears about the new strain of coronavirus. some british hauliers abandoned their crossings. i'm lucky enough, i've made it back to the yard and i only live 20 minutes away so i will be able to get home for christmas but a lot of these people sitting on the m20 will not get home for christmas. this is a hugely busy time for the port of dover in the run—up to christmas, normally 10,000 lorries would pass through here each day.

some drivers are turning up trying to get in but are being sent away. for foreign lorry drivers, there was no immediate option to go home and this is set to be the reality of the next two days for them, stuck in operation stack, where part of the m20 becomes a giant lorry park. the french national road haulage federation described the situation is catastrophic, echoed by its uk counterpart. it's critical to understand if this will go on beyond 48 hours, i had that conversation with grant shapps this morning and he is confident of their ability to find a way through this, whether that is some sort of testing of drivers before they go back to europe, i think if it goes beyond 48 hours we will see some significant challenges. although supermarkets stress all products for christmas are already in the country, there could be shortages of lettuce,

cauliflower and some fruit if this goes on but the transport secretary hopes for a quick progress. i was on the phone to my opposite number in france last night, he is keen to see this result as quickly as possible, especially the hauliers aspect, because it is primarily french european goods which are exported, rather than british goods leaving the country, so it's in their interest to get it resolved as quickly as possible and i will be speaking to them again later. in a tweet, the french transport minister said in the coming hours he planned to set up a european—wide mechanism to allow traffic with the uk to resume. that is what the boss of the port of dover is desperate to see. we don't know how long it will go on. we are hearing good indications from both sides, they are looking at what these new protocols will be

so we hope it can be resolved swiftly. but for hauliers, the wait goes on. simonjones, bbc news, dover. let's go to dover and talk to our correspondent damian grammaticus. what is the picture like they're at the moment? well, what we are seeing here is this police operation here is under way. when you get the access to the port here, trucks are still turning up because people, drivers obviously have not heard the news, or are turning up anyway to see if they can try to find a way through, and the only vehicles who come down here and are allowed into the port are unaccompanied freights, so the port are unaccompanied freights, $03 the port are unaccompanied freights, so a few getting through, just a handful, who are allowed in to drop off containers, but most of the rest off containers, but most of the rest of the tracks are all directed away from here, away from the port, where they are going to have to park up. and you see it on the roads around here, the lay—by is and mansfield

airport further up at ramsgate, that has also been noted as a facility which could hold trucks for this 48—hour period but many, many vehicles you see coming in from all sorts of european countries, drivers trying to get that across to the continent. we have seen in the last half an hour ago, polish, czech, spanish, romanian, bulgarian trucks, the list goes on and on, none of them being allowed through by the police here. and is there any help being offered to those drivers who are stuck in their tracks for possibly another 36 hours, 48 in some cases? well, what they are saying is up the coast at mansfield airfield, there is the holding facility there, where the trucks will be able to go and park. there will be able to go and park. there will be able to go and park. there will be some facilities there for drivers. 0therwise, will be some facilities there for drivers. otherwise, they are having to find places on the motorway, or even better than that, the advice is don't come to kent at all, and the advice being put out to truck drivers, don't try and get into kent

if you can't get onto the ferry is out of here, and that is already actually being seen i think. the effect of that advice, although some are turning up, there are many who are turning up, there are many who are not, so the traffic is lighter, the traffic trying to get into the ports is lighter than normal, and thatis ports is lighter than normal, and that is because those trucks are waiting elsewhere or not even setting out on theirjourneys. for the next two days, today and tomorrow at least until the situation becomes clearer, that is the advice to everyone, stay away until you know what's happening. thank you, damian grammaticas in dover. in the past hour, the european medicines agency, the ema, has approved use of the pfizer biontech vaccine, which means it could start rolling out in europe in a week. here's more from our correspondence anna holligan. you could almost hear the continent breathed a collective sigh of relief at this news. the ema director has

just made the announcements. she said it was an historic achievement. it gave the vaccine a firm scientific foundation. they achieved inii scientific foundation. they achieved in 11 weeks, she said, what usually ta kes a in 11 weeks, she said, what usually takes a year or more and really throughout the course of this announcement, which is still going on here at the ema, they have been very determined to focus on safety, and the need to reassure the public as this is rolled out across the continent, she said it would not be a silver bullet and what is crucial is that people actually take the vaccine. so the next step is the european commission has to approve it, and that was expected to take a few days under a fast track. actually in the last few minutes, it seems they will be going ahead with that tonight. so that means the first citizens in eu states on the continent could be vaccinated in before christmas. do we know which countries are likely to start

vaccinating first, and what stockpiles look like, depending on which country? well, there has been a procurement mechanism in place to fairly distribute the vaccines throughout the continent. we know germany is determined to get this process started as quickly as possible, it is the country furthest ahead in terms of the max —— mass vaccination centres. we heard from the german health minister over the last few days a frustration and impatience that vaccine developed in germany was not yet available to germany was not yet available to german citizens, even though it has been rolled out in the uk and the us, and that's partly because of the nature of the way the ema looks at the data from pfizer biontech, and the data from pfizer biontech, and the type of authorisation given, so it isa the type of authorisation given, so it is a conditional marketing authorisation, whereas the uk applied for and was able to get an emergency temporary mechanism that allowed them to go ahead with those vaccines slightly sooner. a look at

some of the day's other top stories. contact tracing across australia's largest city sydney has detected more than 80 venues visited from people from a new cluster of coronavirus cases. the cluster on syd ney‘s coronavirus cases. the cluster on sydney's northern beaches has grown to 83, although the number of new cases has halved in the last 24 hours. it comes after a record 38,000 people were tested in the state of new south wales. a police officer in the philippines has been arrested and charged with the double murder of a mother and son following a dispute over noise. there has been outrage on social media, after a video on social media showing the officer shooting the pair at point—blank range. farmers in india have begun a hunger strike in the later stage of their months long process against agricultural laws. farmers will fast in groups for 20 hours each in delhi. thousands of protesters have camped on the outskirts of the capital, blocking

roads and fruit and vegetable supplies. prime minister nanda mo d rew‘s supplies. prime minister nanda mo drew‘s government is urging the farmers to agree to further talks. —— prime minister modi. in the past two hours, the uk prime minister's office has confirmed cases of the new variant have been found in gibraltar, denmark and australia. dr jennifer rowan is a cell biologist at university college london and joins me now. we are seeing europe shutting down, as far as access to the uk or people coming to the uk goes. are they right to do so? we have already seen as we have seen three countries reporting new cases of this new strain. i think it is wise to be cautious. what we know so far suggests we need to

treat with caution. take us through what we know about this new variant because it was expected this virus could mutate, because all viruses do, so what we know about this one? coronavirus has been mutating quite slowly. there are thousands of mutations out there. what is interesting about this one and what is alarming is it looks as if it has got about 17 new ones all at once, so got about 17 new ones all at once, so it is an unprecedented rate of gaining the mutations and kind of suggests they are there because they are useful to the virus but it is too early to know for sure. so the modelling that has been done that predict it is 70% more infectious, thejury is kind of at on predict it is 70% more infectious, the jury is kind of at on that because they have been the experiment is to back it up yet. because they have been the experiment is to back it up yetm is very difficult, because as you say there is not detailed analysis to know exactly how alarmed or not we should be, but you did use the word alarming, which will worry people, won't it? the alarming thing is that it has a number of mutations that we have seen before individually, so only one at a time for example, there is a mutation that causes the virus to cling more tightly to the h2 receptor, the

thing it uses to get inside cells, there is a known mutation that allows it to get into the cells more easily, there is a mutation known to evade the immune response in some patients. so taken together, this thing seems to be collecting an accumulation of interesting mutations that do cause a little bit of alarm. however we don't really know for sure it is spreading more widely than other mutations. know for sure it is spreading more widely than other mutationsm know for sure it is spreading more widely than other mutations. is that correct? because we have been told by others that it could be spreading up by others that it could be spreading up to 70% faster than the previous variant. so the thing about virus mutations is they will spread sometimesjust by mutations is they will spread sometimes just by chance. so for example in kent or in london, you had a person who was a super spreader, had particularly bad behaviour, and that variant happened to be there, it could have got a foothold that way, without necessarily having a more infectious profile. having said that,

early to say for sure. it is not 100% guaranteed it is more infectious but it is cause for concern. what about how much more dangerous perhaps it could be, could it be causing more harm in people perhaps that are catching this variant? there is no good evidence for that, thank goodness. it looks as though it is not causing any more hospital admissions than the bog stranded strain. another thing to keepin stranded strain. another thing to keep in mind is, yes, it might cause the vaccine not to work as well, because the mutation, one of the mutations might cause it to evade one of the antibodies but it is important to remember that these vaccines are designed to elicit lots and lots of different antibodies, a big complex reaction in the body, and even if one virus could evade, could have the ability to get around one of those, it is very unlikely it would get around all of our defences, so again it is a cause for concern and we need to keep an eye on it, but it is certainly too soon to panic. and how quickly will we know if it can evade any of the new vaccines? it should be fairly

straightforward to test, in culture, in the lab, i'm sure those experiments are under way, but really we just have to watch and wait, we need to test people who are in hospital, we need to know that the people who are having worse outcomes, are they more likely to have the strain? there are a lot of experiments we can do both in the lab and just looking at patients worldwide. these experiments need to done and they will take a bit of time. drjennifer rohn, thank you for your expertise. a reminder, you can find out plenty more about the coronavirus variant on the website, where there is analysis from our health correspondent james gallagher about what we know so far and plenty more detail, all at bbc dot—com forwards news. the welsh government has apologised for the short notice with which it introduced its new level four national lockdown, which came into force yesterday. thomas morgan has more. the situation in wales is the

transmission rate of covid has surged since the firebreak, which ended at the start of november. we are now at around an average of 600 per hundred thousand cases in wales now, and they took the decision on saturday night to enforce a lockdown in wales, which will last, they will look at it every three weeks, that will mean all shops are now closed, people can mix, butjust on christmas day, two and one household. when they talked about the new strain here this afternoon, the new strain here this afternoon, the first minister and the deputy chief medical officer, they said they thought now it was definitely they thought now it was definitely the case that was behind the huge surge of new cases in wales. they said the nhs is stretched to the limit here in wales, with bigger numbers than ever with covid across wales. this is bbc world news. the latest headlines.

more than 30 countries have banned flights to from the united kingdom because of the variant of the coronavirus which may be up to 70% more transmissable. vaccinations will begin across the european union next week after its regulater approves the pfizer/biontech vaccine. after months of wrangling, republicans and democrats in the us congress have reached agreement on a 900 billion dollar coronavirus relief package. the measure includes increased unemployment benefits and stimulus payments for people who lost their jobs because of the pandemic. there was huge pressure to get this done by people, businesses, industries, and i think there was impatience in the parties themselves. the decision was expected to be achieved by friday. it went into the weekend, and just to give you some of the highlights of that deal, as you mentioned, this one—off $600 stimulus check for americans earning under $75,000.

weekly unemployment benefits of about $300. small business loans, there will also be helped to roll out the vaccinations in different states. we have two vaccines now here. also food assistance and emergency rental relief. in reality, both sides knew they had to achieve something soon to help the millions of struggling americans. yeah, but the stimulus package only covers until march, doesn't it, so some are concerned that actually it is not going to be extended until when people really need it. that's right, and it has taken a long time to even get to this point, because both parties had to make huge compromises to get here. you know, the democrats don't agree with the $600 stimulus check. they wanted it to be twice the amount. that was the amount that americans received in the first relief package back in march that

donald trump signed. republicans wa nted donald trump signed. republicans wanted to protect businesses from any pandemic —related lawsuit, and also there was a huge hurdle last night, which they cleared, involving the emergency lending powers of the federal reserve bank. the republicans wanted to curb it moving forward , republicans wanted to curb it moving forward, and the democrats accuse them of trying to make life harder forjoe biden when he becomes president in less than four weeks. he has indicated he will want to have another relief package to help americans and the economy, and he has released a statement praising the bipartisan agreement, he said he was heartened to see parties working together, that has been one of his real objective is to get both parties working more closely together, and he said it was a great working model for the nation, moving forward. two men have been found guilty of the manslaughter of all 39 vietnamese migrants found dead in a lorry trailer in essex

in south east england. they suffocated in the sealed container en route from zeebrugge to purfleet in october last year. 0ur correspondent daniel sandford has more. 0n the phone to the 999 operator, one of the people smugglers revealing the enormity of the tragedy. but mo robinson was lying about the true scale of the horror. the arriving police officers found the bodies of 39 vietnamese people. they had boarded what they had been promised was a vip service, among them a young couple, found holding hands as they died. and two cousins, including an 18—year—old.

in vietnam, the teenager's father still prays for him daily. his mother told us they thought they were paying £10,000 for a safe route to england. translation: nobody knew that the journey to the uk was going to be like that. they all said they would travel in cars. if they had known, nobody would have let their children risk their lives on such a dangerous journey. the older cousin's father thinks he was tricked. translation: i don't know what happened, but something must have changed in their plan. either that, or he was scammed. among the eight women in the trailer was this lady, who died trying repeatedly to call her family. she had only left vietnam a few days earlier, travelling via china. others used countries like russia, germany, hungary, romania, greece and poland. some had taken two years to work their way through europe.

many of them started the last stage of theirjourney in paris that morning. it began as a vip service, with a taxi ride to northern france, but then they were transferred into an airtight trailer, towed by eamonn harrison, a young lorry driver from county down in northern ireland. he took the trailer to zeebrugge, leaving it to be ferried unaccompanied across the north sea. but there were too many migrants in the airtight box, and slowly the oxygen ran out. this man left a message for his wife and children. police found dents on the ceiling of the trailer, left by those inside trying desperately to escape. if you look at the method, the way they transported human beings, we wouldn't transport animals in that way. by the time the ferry sailed up the thames estuary, the people had all died.

the trailer was collected by another lorry driver, mo robinson from county armagh. his boss ronan hughes had sent him an urgent message. but when he opened the doors, there was a puff of vapour, and a trailer full of bodies. the vip service had been a death trap. there is no vip service. these are the lies people are told to be exploited, and finding out at the very last minute and realising, as you die, the vip service was a terrible lie. the gang who killed the 39 were prolific, and there had possibly been an opportunity to stop them. just before the deaths, they had run two almost identical but successful smuggling trips, ending on a country lane in essex. the lorry was unloaded in this muddy lay—by. a couple whose home overlooks the site saw around 15 people getting out of the truck and into a group of waiting cars. they called the police, but the people smuggling gang wasn't identified, until after the 39

deaths, 12 days later. the gang's bosses were a british—romanian from essex and ronan hughes, a haulier from county armagh, who organised the lorry drivers. here george is seen delivering a bag full of money tissues. full of money to hughes. charges are still being considered against another northern irish haulier. he was the boss of christopher kennedy, also from county armagh. the driver who had collected the trailer on the earlier successful smuggling runs. the bodies of the people who died on the fatal third run were flown back to vietnam. and the two cousins were buried side by side. daniel sandford, bbc news.

some breaking news now. according to the reuters news agency, the us justice department is announcing new charges linked to the 1988 downing ofa pan charges linked to the 1988 downing of a pan am flight over lockerbie in scotland. only one person, who died in 2012, has ever been convicted of involvement in that attack, which killed 270 people, most of them american citizens, exactly 32 years ago today. today's charges are against a ago today. today's charges are againsta man ago today. today's charges are against a man alleged to have made the bomb that brought down pan am 103. he is understood to be in custody in libya, serving a sentence for bomb making. we will bring you more on that as we get it. just a reminder of the top story. representatives of the european union have been meeting in brussels to try to coordinate measures to prevent the spread from britain of a more contagious form of coronavirus. france is enforcing a 48 our of blockade of passages and goods from

—— passengers and goods. many other countries have suspended flights or put in travel restrictions. that is all, thanks for watching. a drab start to monday. it will move its way into scotland, where it will lingerfor much of its way into scotland, where it will linger for much of the day. behind it, a real cluster of showers sandwiched into the south but the real contrast with the story today is the mild air pushing on across the south, in comparison to some cold airjust starting to nudge into the far north of scotland. some brisk winds in the south. look at the temperatures.

but look at the temperatures, 13 to 15 degrees quite widely across england and wales. by contrast in scotland and northern ireland, a maximum of seven or 8 degrees was not that cold air starting to push on. northerly winds will drag in cold air through the night, add a few showers will turn wintry to higher ground as we keep those clearer skies in scotland and northern ireland, but we keep quite a lot of cloud over england and wales and here, a relatively mild night, with double figures perhaps into the south—east corner, temperatures in the north hovering close to freezing. we will start the day off with some sparkling sunshine. here, a few scattered showers set to continue through the day, but scotland, northern ireland, along with northern england, should stay dry and relatively sunny. if we draw a line from mid wales down into the midlands, further south of that it stays rather cloudy, dreary, mild, with some drab bits and pieces of rain pushing into the south—west. we will see a more significant area of low pressure on wednesday pushing into the south—west, and that unfortunately could once again bring the potential for some localised flooding, so we will need to keep an eye on that, and weather warnings have been issued by the met office across south—west

england in particular. it's mild here, but drier, brighter but cooler in the north of scotland. now, that area of low pressure should move away first thing on thursday morning, and then we will see this high pressure tending to build for christmas eve. so christmas eve into christmas day, we change gear, in terms of the feel of the weather and the type of weather. things will quieten down and cool down considerably for much of the country. i'm not sure we will see a white christmas, in terms of snow, but certainly we could have a hard frost going into christmas day. take care.

this is bbc world news. the headlines that mac more than 30 countries have banned travel to and from the united kingdom due to the more contagious variant of the coronavirus. european countries are meeting to train degree moves —— rules on movement to and from the uk. there is currently no evidence to suggest the change in the disease's severity. the eu regulator has approved their pfizer biontech vaccine and will be rolled out across the bloc starting next week. two men have been found guilty of the manslaughter of all 39 vietnamese migrants found dead in a lorry trailer in essex in south—east england. in october last year.