this is bbc news, the headlines: the democrat leader in the us senate says president biden�*s multi—billion dollar covid—19 relief plan will be implemented, with or without support from the republican party. the number of coronavirus cases in the us has now exceeded 25 million. the mexican president, andres manuel lopez obrador, who has been criticised for playing down the seriousness of the coronavirus pandemic — has tested positive for the virus. the president — who's resisted pressure to wear masks or introduce tougher covid restrictions — said that he had mild symptoms. riot police in the netherlands have used water cannons to break up protests against coronavirus restrictions. demonstrators in the city of eindhoven had gathered in defiance of a 9pm curfew. some threw fireworks and looted supermarkets. there were similar clashes in amsterdam.

now on bbc news, dateline london. hello, i'm shaun ley. welcome to the programme which brings together leading uk—based commentators, bbc specialists and the foreign correspondents whose stories for audiences back home bear the dateline �*london�*. this week, a new president pledges to put the �*united' back into the united states, the most effective critic of russia's president is jailed but not silenced, and vaccinejustice in a global pandemic. to discuss that, our dateline panel this week — michael goldfarb hosts the frdh podcast, that's the first rough draft of history. tonia samsonova is a blogger and entrepreneur, who's worked

as a foreign correspondent for russian radio. it's herfirst time on the program. very warm welcome to you both. with me in the studio is lyse doucet, the bbc�*s chief international correspondent. always a pleasure to have you here physically in the studio. and to be with you! happy new year. happy new year to you. alexei navalny, the most high profile critic of vladimir putin's presidency, returned to russia last sunday, was promptly arrested and jailed for 30 days. mr navalny doesn't need to be around in person, though, to maintain the presence on social media which has given him influence — and, this week, the ability to land a blow on president putin himself. his team released online an investigation into a vast mansion on a peninsula on the black sea. campaigners have planned demonstrations in 65 cities across the country this weekend. the authorities issued warnings not to hold or take part in illegal mass protests. tonia samsonova, to you first.

it looks like those warnings have been ignored. how extensive, as we sit here at lunchtime in moscow, late morning in the uk, how significant do these protests look to be? hi, thank you for having me on your show. i think it is quite significant. i think the number of people who turned out on the streets today this morning, that is a lot. we do not have numbers and official figures yet, and we will have them by the evening. we know for now that more than 500 people are detained or arrested during the protests. we have to bear in mind that russia and european parts of the country starts later than siberia, for example. so it probably started at 8 or 9am in london time and eastern cities of moscow. despite the weather — because in siberia it is quite cold at the moment,

—30 in some cities, there are lots of people on the streets. to my surprise, police are not that cruel at the moment, and we can see that even in one of the distant cities in russia, police refused to detain those people who turned around and who came into the streets. 0n the other hand, we can see that those restrictions or the attempts to tell people that they should not allow anyone to get on the streets, they work well. we see that the government put school teachers and university and students go out into the street. we can see international companies and businesses ask the managers of those companies to make sure that their employees will not go to the protest meetings and will not publish anything in support of alexei navalny on their social media accounts.

to my surprise, i received a screenshot of an e—mail sent to a mckinsey company office in russia and the manager said to their employees that they should not go today and they cannot publish anything on social media. well, mckinsey is not the largest company in russia, but it gives us an idea of how many people got restrictions. let me bring in lyse at this point. what are the dilemmas for president putin in how he responds to this? the dilemma isjust how to respond. tonia will know there was a time when alexei navalny's name was never mentioned, but they did not want him

mentioned or even have his name known in russia. now everyone knows alexei navalny's name. it's interesting that tonia mentions the schoolchildren. this is the famous putin generation. they have grown up through putin's 21 years in power, and how have they been shaped? well, judging by social media, the 60 million people, a record number, people that have watched the video that alexei navalny organised... this is about putin's palace? he says it is nothing to do with him. i hope michael saw the tiktok videos where they were teaching people how to say things in english. "i'm american". "i left my passport at the hotel!" this is a new, modern generation. this is the first time that alexei navalny has been... alexei navalny has been detained before. 0ur colleague said it is the first time

he has been imprisoned. it is a balancing act. you do not want to make a martyr of him. you don't want more people to side with him. you want to ignore him and that is what the police are doing. the real thing is momentum. this is one weekend. what will happen next weekend? maybe it will be back to —25 degrees. what about the weekend after? can alexei navalny keep it going? that is his rallying cry from detention. we saw on the streets of belarus, protests can be very significant, although in the short—term, things do not change too much. michael, what do you think the thinking will be in the biden white house? in other words, internationally. how will they want to respond to this? they will presumably want to encourage and welcome the flourishing of independent protest, but know that the more they show support for it, foreigners have sent him back

to our country to ferment dissent, like lenin. first of all, it will- take a while, because, as we will talk about with . joe biden's domestic agenda is crowding him, things. like dealing with any kind of unrest in russia, - it isjust not going to be a source of focus yet. what is interesting, both lyse and tonia were referring - to social media. to go on from lyse's point about the kremlin trying l to decide how to deal _ with navalny, who despite being 'novichoked', if that's a word. there is now. oxford dictionary, - you heard it here first. despite being novichoked and surviving, how do - you deal with this? in the past, we have had others — boris nemtsov,j

who was shot in the back as he i walked across the moscow river from the kremlin. and he had been the previous leader of the democratic- movement, suchl as it is, in russia. we can't lose sight of the fact that navalny is arguing - and trying to be a figurehead for a movement for free - and fair elections. not that this actually affects putin's authority as far - as i can see, since - he has already changed the constitution to allow himl to continue to be the de facto ruler of russia well into the future. - tonia can give - the details on that. i think both in washington and inside the kremlin, i how to deal with this is very- much about how much wind can he keep in his sails. i'lljust add one little - anecdote about social media. i posted that we would be i discussing this once you sent the script out, shaun, .

and within five minutes, i had people sending tweets about what a dreadful man i navalny was from people who do not follow me! i how did they find my tweets? i have only got. 2,000 followers! they managed to find me. i think that is how the kremlin will fight, they will fight - on social media, and if he i grows too big for his boots, i wouldn't walk across that i bridge over the moscow river anytime soon. it is interesting that he posted from his cell holdings on his instagram account. so organised! "if you can hear that i died, i assure you that i didn't kill myself." far be it from me to disagree with michael goldfarb, we know that the domestic agenda is overwhelming forjoe biden. but even before he did his confirmation hearings, the nominee for national securityjake sullivan was tweeting about navalny and saying, he must investigate the poisoning, release

him from prison. and i've heard this in the middle east from middle east leaders, they believe thatjoe biden and the europeans will make common calls on human rights. it made just be talk but it will all be in the mix. the last brief word to tonia on this. we have to bear in mind that it is a huge task forjoe biden�*s administration, because he wants to restart a new nuclear agreement with the kremlin, so deciding how to react. they need to condemn what happened to alexei navalny and the cyber attack thatjust happened. they condemned the situation, but ifjoe biden wants to sign the nuclear agreement and restore the cold war security architecture, important for everyone in the world,

it is now, with the crisis of the relationship, very important. he has to be very careful how he reacts to what is going on in russia. i do not expect that the present administration will be very proactive on sanctions. unlike, maybe europeans. let's stay with the question of united states. "my whole soul is in this", said us presidentjoe biden as he assumed office on wednesday. "bringing america together, uniting our people, uniting our nation". he was echoing abraham lincoln's pledge on signing the emancipation proclamation which declared all those held as slaves to be �*forever free�*. it was a promise that president lincoln, in the midst of civil war, could not enforce. the union was fighting a secessionist, slave—owning south. there's no civil war in the usa today but the inaugural show, ordered as it was, had to be held under a security lockdown, in a place thatjust a fortnight earlier had been overrun by violent protest. michael goldfarb, when you look

at wednesday, and when you hear the words that were spoken byjoe biden, just how big a challenge is this, to turn those words into actions? it is enormous. just as we endured world war ii, 40 years of a cold war, . it is not an exaggeration to say that america - is in a cold civil war. the mob that overran - the capitol is only a more fervent expression of that. even as joe biden was being - sworn in and speaking the words of abraham lincoln, i he was facing a country where you can probably put. a rough estimate of 35 million voters thinking he was not| the winner of the election, still, even though - he has been sworn in. he faces an enormous task - and i wrote about it this week.

i can think of no one - who has come into office since franklin d roosevelt who has faced the same . challenges, and, in addition, i joe biden faces the challenges that abraham lincoln faced - when he was sworn in 160 years ago, if i have my. maths right, in 1861. spot on. it is extraordinary. forgive me for going back in history. - a whole year ago, the - frontrunner for the democratic nomination was kamala harris, closely followed by elizabeth i warren and bernie sanders. joe biden was barely polling in the mid one digits - — what happened? the pandemic hit. it was no longer possible - to laugh at what donald trump was doing. his inability to get to grips with the pandemic showed he was not capable of

handling the office. . suddenly, with the help of an african—americanl congressman, jim clyburn, out of nowhere, joe bidenl surged to the front. and within six weeks, he was the nominee. he then conducted what i think is one of the most brilliant- presidential campaigns in my lifetime. - he did nothing. he has been in politics for 50 years, he knows exactly- what to do. when your opponent is digging himself a hole, shut up- and let him keep digging. donald trump never stopped digging untiljanuary sixth, l when he summoned the mob to capitol hill. - joe biden has the job he's been seeking for 38 years _ and what will he do? he needs to get to grips with the pandemic. - we learned over the last twoj days there is literally no plan for rolling out vaccines in the united states. l he has to deal with that. he has to convince the people who did not vote for him - and think he was not-

elected legitimately that, in fact, they have to follow the organisation for this i rollout of vaccines _ because it is coming from him. and then he has to convince . congress to pass a meaningful through these coming months when the normal economy- will not resume. we will be lucky to see it by the end of the year. l and then, lyse, i think. he will start to really pay attention to what is happening overseas and trying to rebuild | american alliances — - like nato, like relations, trying to figure out the new game in the middle east, . lyse, with this new flurry - of relationships between israel and uae and other arab nations. you know, all of that will come, probably, | third in his inbox and - the terrible truth is he has only got weeks and months to do

this because the pandemic is, - in a sense, it'sl beyond politics. it is happening in the natural world and it is affecting - all of us. crosstalk. he is starting so—called foreign policy closer to home — his first phone call was to the canadian prime minister. in traditional ways, back to old tradition. and then to the mexicans — he's starting in the neighbourhood. where else to start? there is no relationship left on the face of the earth - that the previous _ administration did not destroy! just on that, as a little sidebar, the white house is clearly anxious about international responses. this silly spat over winston churchill's bust blew up under 0bama and has done again. they immediately this time have got a handle on it and have a video on the white house website talking warmly about what the brits still like to call the special relationship, and what the american call a special relationship among many special relationships that the americans enjoy. is it enough, though,

forjoe biden to just bejoe biden? to just slowly begin the process of changing perceptions about the office of president again after the combative style of his predecessor? it was interesting in his first speech, the inauguration speech, that was about 20 minutes long and only 15 minutes did he briefly mention the rest of the world. he said to his senate colleagues "the world is watching." he talked about re— engaging with allies in partnership from allies to peace, prosperity. he has sent a message to the world. his tone sends a message to the world. they are waiting for him in the corridors of power of europe. it will be interesting to see if covid—19 allows the hugs in the hallway at the 67 meeting that will take place in cornwall.

that will become his first foreign trip. but in other parts of the world, there are parts of the world who like president trump. there are gulf states that did business with president trump it is interesting, in listening to the conformation hearings, it is clear that he will continue some of the policies in the middle east — what are called the abraham accords, which were deals of normalisation between some arab states and israel. they will build on that, but will look again and take a hard look, in the words of the nominee for secretary of state anthony blinken, at lots of things. can they look at relationship with the kremlin? and those of us remember a decade or more ago when the 0bama administration came in, when hillary clinton

was secretary of state, there was going to be this reset and that all fell apart. do you think there is a desire in the kremlin to engage with this new american administration, or is itjust another american administration? "we have been here for 20 years. the americans, they come and go." i think both administrations — the american and the russian administration — are very busy with their domestic agenda at the moment with covid. and when i look at america, i cannot resist from thinking how it resembles this situation in russia or britain when you are the president ofjust half of the country. so forjoe biden, i think apart from covid and international

relationships and joining the climate agreement and all of the other agreements biden needs to rejoin, the other problem is that we can see that he might — when we saw the inauguration, i kind of can't help thinking that he was a president forjust a part of the nation. we can see that because trump never accepted the invitation, this peaceful transition of power — which the inauguration actually is, it is notjust a happy birthday party, it's a peaceful — it is a symbol of the peaceful transition of power. it never happened. so whenjoe biden was addressing the nation, he was kind of addressed just half of it. and apart from having a problem with covid and all of the domestic

issues — with inequality, he also has to fix this. and we can think, "well, it is not the problem of the democratic president, the problems of his political opponents," but it might become his problem. because if you have this polarised country and polarised nation, when a part of the nation does not accept your presidency and thinks you are not their president — as we can see in russia, for example, part of the nation does not feel that vladimir putin is their president — you have a problem. and at the same time, the whole nation has to all togetherfight against the pandemic and it makes things much harder. when you implement new rules — for example, like wearing masks — like the first thing biden did was say that he wants all government officials to wear masks in government offices and all that stuff, people have to trust you. they have to see that it is not — it is for their own health and you are protecting their best interests. and will they trust biden? that is a big problem.

crosstalk. it's a big question. we will leave that there for now, if we may and talk about something else, all of you, that i think has caused concern. what we may call vaccine parity. the general secretary of the who, tedros ghebreyesus, has said this week that we are on the brink of a catastrophic, historic moralfailure. what is he worried about? shaun, almost since the beginning of this pandemic — and we're marking the first anniversary of the first cases — there has been a mantra, that no—one will be safe until everyone is safe. so in round one, we saw how the race to purchase ppe and ventilators meant countries like afghanistan and yemen, even if they had the money to buy it, there was nothing there to buy. all of the stocks were gone. so now there is a second chance with the vaccine. and there is a whole institutional setup — the gabi vaccine alliance, covax — promising to provide 2 million vaccines to help lower and middle income countries. everyone said they would sign up. 180 countries signed

up for this. britain said last year, "we will give many of our doses to the developing world". but look at the national mood. look even here in britain. journalists are posting on social media, "my mother got the jab. wow, i'm so relieved. my father got the jab. " the vaccine has become such a emotional issue that politicians have to be seen to be taking care of their own people first. but i think that dr tedros is saying, "0k, fine. but it is unfair to vaccinate everyone, including the healthy teenagers, before the rest of the world vaccinate the most vulnerable. let's vaccinate the most vulnerable together." but there are countries in the world now — canada, my own country — has — can vaccinate canadians five times over. britain has more than it needs. some african countries have no vaccines, one country has something like 29 vaccines. and tonia, i want to bring you in here. i mean, there are some

egregious examples of this. south africa, where we know the need is dire because of the impact it is having, hasjust paid 2.5 times more than europe for the same astrazeneca 0xford vaccine because it has to go and buy it from the serum institute in india. this is a really disturbing example of where internationalism does not always meet — when the pressure is on. it is about equality, it is a modern luxury. it is not a fancy bag or expensive car or having a property somewhere. it is access to the vaccine. we can see that there is no other way, unless there will be a cooperation, because there is no way to make sure that people in less successful countries get access. they will not manage it by themselves. the european union tried to spread the union across the whole nation, not by poor country. but there should be a...

crosstalk. ..but it won't work. michael, bring us to a close. first of all, the vaccine l is not rolled out properly anyway in the countries i that we are talking about. the leading country- for the roll—out is israel. i think the third - country is the uae. here in the uk, batches are being called back. l they barely got it into - people's arms in germany and france. i think dr tedros' call- is noble but a few months too early. they have to make sure - the vaccine is produced first and being distributed - properly before we can worry about making sure everyone gets it equitably. _ it is still in process. still in process.

meanwhile, the impact of the virus continues to a very great extent in significant parts of the globe. well, britain is about to discuss whether it will shut its borders, underlining that none of us is safe because the virus knows no borders. until everyone is safe, no—one is going to be safe. you have to begin at home, but once your house is built and half the houses is done, maybe help the others build their houses, too. michael, you mentioned joe biden having to be abraham lincoln and franklin d roosevelt. you could add woodrow wilson with the spanish flu pandemic as well, couldn't you? no! he was a racist! 0k, spare us woodrow wilson. if you wonder why, just looking up in the books. that's it for dateline london for this week. i thanks to the panel here this weekend many thanks as well to all of you. we're back next week at the same time. goodbye.

hello. monday will start with widespread frost and ice after a wintry weekend which, of course, brought some significant snow in places. it won't be the last covid—secure snowman we see sent in to us this winter and, hopefully, sunday's weather did bring a bit of fun at least. but of course, more people have to be out in the morning, and so that does mean some difficult conditions on untreated roads because it will be icy in places with that widespread frost. after further wintry showers overnight and into the morning across parts of scotland, rain and sleet on the coasts, some snow inland and into the hills. maybe the odd shower into northern ireland and northern england but, actually, monday is one of the better weather days of the week. most places will be dry, variable cloud, decent amount of sunshine and it will feel a bit less cold than it did over the weekend. into monday night, still some showers, wintry in nature, particularly to hills, affecting parts of scotland, northern ireland and northern england.

still frosty and icy, although temperatures start to come up across western areas as we see another system and that's going to spread its rain and a bit of hill snow

this is bbc news — welcome if you're watching here in the uk or around the globe. i'm freya cole. our top stories: democrats say they'll implement a huge covid relief package with or without republican support — as the us passes 25 million cases. dozens arrested as riot police clash with protesters demonstrating against new lockdown restrictions in the netherlands. the president of mexico, who has repeatedly played down the severity of the coronavirus pandemic, has tested positive for covid—19. and a new record has been set for the number of satellites launched into space on a single rocket.