this is bbc news. i'm ben boulos. our top stories. president biden urges congress to approve a policing reform bill in memory of george floyd — after meeting his relatives on the first anniversary of his murder. all in all, he just wants the bill to be right and meaningful and that it holds george's legacy intact. the us secretary of state pledges aid to rebuild gaza during his visit to the region but says israelis and palestinians must address the root cause of their conflict. world leaders call for hard hitting sanctions against belarus after a flight was forced to divert to minsk and a dissidentjournalist arrested. and tasmanian devils born in the wild on the australian mainland — for the first time in 3,000 years.

welcome to our viewers on pbs in america and around the globe president biden has urged the us congress to pass a policing reform bill quickly in memory of george floyd. after meeting mr floyd's relatives at the white house — exactly a year after he was killed by a white policeman — mr biden said both accountability and trust were needed in the justice system. 0ur north america correspondent, nick bryant, reports from minneapolis. taking a knee in the place that george floyd was killed — a symbol of what's become a global struggle. an act of remembrance that lasted nine minutes and 29 seconds — the duration of his murder.

chanting: one, two, three, four! _ police violence no more! the march for racial justice must often seem like a never—ending journey, with milestones along the way but no endpoint in sight. chanting: george floyd, george floyd! _ that's certainly how it feels a year on from the murder of george floyd. protesters are angry they haven't seen more change. we are hunted in america just for being black, and that's not good. it's time for a change. i got a black boy, a son, a two—year—old. i shouldn't have to teach him to put his hands up when he sees the police. i'm marching because these are racially—motivated murders that this state and other states, the united states of america has committed against our people, and enough is enough. and i'm marching in solidarity with other families, because their days of hurting our people and these racially—motivated murders are over with. policing is going to change...

at a rally outside the courthouse where his murderer, derek chauvin, was found guilty, the floyd family's lawyer demanded landmark legislation. we must use this opportunity. to get the george floyd justice in policing act passed, i so we can prevent some of these unnecessary, - preventable, unjustifiable, illegal and unconstitutional killings of our people! - tonight, the family met joe biden at the white house, but congress has failed to meet today's presidential deadline for police reform to be enacted. he's not happy about it not being met, but all in all, he just wants the bill to be right and meaningful and that it holds george's legacy intact. let me hear your voice! change! _ change hasn't come fast enough for these modern—day civil—rights protesters. black lives... ..matter! and on the first anniversary of george floyd's murder, the mantra of their movement

sounds still like an anguished cry. black lives... ..matter! claybourne carson is a history professor and founding director of the martin luther king jr research and education institute at stanford university. he gave me his views on what more needs to be done to achieve meaningful police reform. having experienced the 1960s, having experienced i think it will take a lot more protests. i was at the march on washington, 200,000 people showed up. we demanded freedom now and passage of voting rights, civil rights legislation, it took a year to get the civil rights legislation, two years to get the voting rights legislation. and in the meanwhile, the opposition became stronger. and we had the white backlash against the changes. and i see a similar thing happening now in the sense that ten times as many people were out on the streets

after george floyd's murder than were at the march on washington in 1963. but the change has been very slow in coming. and the nation is at least as divided as it has ever been. congress is evenly divided. so the chances of getting the kind of legislation, the kind of lasting change that we need is probably even less than it was then. and i fear that we will be coming back to the same question, the question king asked in his life — where do we go from here? i don't think we've answered it. when we look at the changes that have happened, at least 17 states including minnesota have, since the killing of george floyd, introduced legislation that bans

or restricts the use of choke holds and neck restraints. if individual states can achieve that within a year, why can't that happen at federal level? is it purely down to the sharp divide in congress? i think it's the sharp divide in congress which reflects the divide in the states. some states have acted, other states have not acted and that's the dilemma. some states have actually strengthened their laws so that more people could have guns, so that there would be less oversight of police, so i think it's geographically divided, but certainly, an ideologically divided country. the us secretary of state, antony blinken says america will make tens—of— millions of dollars available to the palestinians as it seeks to consolidate the ceasefire that ended the fighting between israel and hamas. but after talks with palestinian leaders in the west bank, mr blinken said the hamas militants in gaza shouldn't benefit from aid going to the territory.

i've heard a shared recognition from all sides that steps need to be taken, work needs to be done to address the underlying conditions that helped fuel this latest conflict. the ceasefire creates space to begin to take those steps. attending to the urgent humanitarian needs of palestinians in gaza and helping rebuild is a key starting point. the united states is committed to rallying international support to that effort and doing our part. that's why we announced additional assistance for the palestinian people today. but we all know that is not enough. as president biden has said, we believe that palestinians and israelis equally deserve to live safely and securely. antony blinken is on a three day trip to the middle east — where he'll also visit jordan and egypt. his trip started injerusalem. where he met israel's prime minister.

the secretary of state reaffirmed that the us supports israel's right to defend itself. and benjamin netanuyahu's message was this. if hamas breaks the calm and attacks israel, our response will be very powerful. and we have discussed ways of how to work together to prevent hamas rearmament with the weapons and means of aggression. antony blinken then travelled to the west bank — to meet the palestinian president. here he is with mahmoud abbas in ramallah. he leads the palestinian authority which runs the west bank. his rival hamas controls gaza. here's mr abbas. translation: we also thank the us administration - for its commitment to a two—state solution i and the maintenance - of the status quo injerusalem and to keep the residents ofjerusalem and sheikhl jarrah in their homes. and also we thank the us - administration for its position vis—a—vis the expansion -

of settlements and the actions ta ken by settlers. palestinians have been continuing to return to damaged homes in gaza. more than 240 palestinians, and 12 people in israel were killed during the recent fighting and many of the civilian deaths from israeli airstrikes happened on a single street — as our middle east correspondent tom bateman reports from gaza. in gaza, the car radio has stopped playing pop songs. now they are singing about people lost, about the land and jerusalem. just being alive this week means to have survived. i'm going to meet anas al—yaziji. tell me about your fiancee. what was she like?

shaima was dreaming of becoming a dentist, anas tells me. she studied hard — i would call and she would say, not now, i have a test, he says. shaima and anas were due to marry straight after the eid holiday last week. in the run—up to the wedding, on the sixth night of bombing raids in gaza, she was at home with herfamily on al—wehda street. she told me that her heart was beating, says anas. she said she felt something bad was going to happen. then, minutes before the incident happened, i messaged her saying, where are you? she replied, i'm here. and then, bang, bang, bang, it started. i messaged shaima, saying, hide. but it didn't go through. then i heard that her family's building was hit.

israel's warplanes had struck the street, bringing down three apartment blocks. there was chaos, with entire families trapped in the rubble. rescue started as shelling continued, say locals. the israeli military says its aircraft had targeted a tunnel system used by hamas, and that this caused buildings above it to collapse. 0ne building had been sliced in half. the front door to sami's apartment now opened to a 50—foot drop. trapped with his wife and children, he posted a video to facebook, desperately calling for their rescue. meanwhile, anas had rushed to al—wehda street to join in the search, clearing rubble with his bare hands to try to find his fiancee.

we started to pull people out from under the rubble, says anas — some dead, some alive. we rescued maram, her sister, the little girl, and ahmed, and then we got her sister rawan, who was alive but badly injured. she died after a couple of hours in the hospital. and then we pulled out the body of shaima. i visit al—wehda street as music plays from a mourning tent. the buildings contained large extended families. shaima was a cousin to the wife of sami, the man who was trapped in the building sliced in half. civil defence crews brought his family down on a ladder. sami tells me it's been devastating. translation: shaima's elder sister survived, but the two i middle children died. what is really hurting me now, as much as the loss of my mother's family member and my neighbours, is that my memories are here.

now they are buried under this building. 43 people were killed in al—wehda street, including ten children. anas says the last time he saw shaima alive, they were talking about the house they planned to live in. for his late fiancee's remaining family, there is no home to go back to. and for him now, there is no permanent future, only the almost certain knowledge of further conflict. let s get some of the day s other news. the washington post is reporting that manhattan's district attorney has convened the grand jury that is expected to decide whether to indict former president donald trump, should prosecutors present the panel with criminal charges. it says the panel was convened recently and will sit for several months. hong kong has warned it could have to throw away vast stores of coronavirus vaccines because of people's reluctance to have a jab.

the slow take—up rate has been blamed on a relatively low number of infections and distrust of the government. the american wrestler—turned—actor, john cena has apologised to china for calling taiwan a country. the controversy began when the fast and furious film star said taiwan would be the first "country" to be able to watch fast and furious 9 in an interview. beijing opposes the suggestion taiwan is an independent state. stay with us on bbc news, still to come: we'll show you the tasmanian devils born in the wild — on the australian mainland for the first time in 3,000 years.

this is bbc world news, the latest headlines... president biden has urged the us congress to pass a policing reform bill quickly, in memory of george floyd. the president met family members exactly a year after mr floyd was killed by a white policeman. the us secretary of state has pledged aid to rebuild gaza during his visit to the region — but said israelis and palestinians, must address the root cause of their conflict. the exiled belarusian opposition leader has joined calls for further, hard hitting sanctions to isolate the regime of president lukashenko. it follows the international outcry after the arrest of the opposition journalist roman protasevich when a passenger plane was forced to land in belarus. he had been travelling with his girlfriend, sofia sapega, who was also detained. in the last few hours, she has appeared in a confession video where she appears to be speaking under duress. at the white house earlier, the us press secretary outlined how the biden administration plans to address the situation.

i will say that the president has asked his team to develop appropriate options in close coordination with the european union, our allies and other international organisations to help hold the lukashenko regime to account, including sanctions. 0ur correspondent sarah rainsford is in minsk, the capital of belarus, and explained what impact the international reaction is having. well, it's having one direct effect. we flew in from moscow, and that's now one of the few ways to get here, in fact. as you were mentioning there, eu airlines are cancelling flights here. the belarusian airline belavia is no longer flying to europe, and the airspace over this country is now pretty much closed, off—limits to european airlines, too. so, that's one direct change. but in terms of the political reaction here to what's happening, well, there's been so far a pretty big shrug. belarus, the belarusian government is presenting itself essentially as a country that stepped in to save the day with that ryanair flight. they're saying that there was

a real security threat on board and that the belarusian authorities offered a safe landing here in minsk. so, they're saying the fact that a very prominent wanted man, a very vocal critic of alexander lukashenko was on board that flight and then detained, well, as far as the belarusians are concerned here, that was pure coincidence. the most vocal critics, the most vocal opposition to the government here and to president alexander lukashenko is now outside the country, or if not, they're behind bars. ithink, you know, one of the really kind of clear things that i'm getting, and i've only been on the ground here again for a few hours this evening, but from people i'm speaking to already, you really get a sense, a fear here, people are nervous like they've never been before in all my visits to this country. so, it's really changed here, the atmosphere has changed. people are telling us that they don't know who could be next. a protestor has been shot dead during clashes with police

in the iraqi capital, baghdad. many hundreds had gathered to demand justice for dozens of activists killed since pro—democracy demonstrations began in iraq in 2019. the authorities have so far failed to identify and punish the killers. mark lobel reports. hundreds vent theirfury in baghdad's tahrir square at the rise of targeted assassinations in the country. translation: we returned to protest to demand - the dismissal of the central government because our previous demands to reveal the killers of our protesters have been ignored. under the banner "who killed me?" citizens hold up photographs of some of those killed in recent months and years, from human rights activists to journalists in karbala, basra and elsewhere.

protesters accuse the government of allowing known perpetrators, thought to be from iranian—backed armed groups, to roam free. after a peaceful start to this planned demonstration, protesters threw bricks and stones. the police used tear gas and live rounds. at least one protester has been killed, with several injured on both sides. iraq's protest movement took off in 2019, forcing a change in prime minister, with demands for an end to foreign meddling and better public services. now there are fears these unchecked killings could continue for months in the lead up to parliamentary elections in october. some activists have fled, others want elections delayed until the killings stop. mark lobel, bbc news. the us has called on the world health organisation to ensure transparency during the next phase of

investigations into the origins of the coronavirus pandemic. this comes as a series of media reports in the us suggest there's growing evidence that the virus emerged from a laboratory in wuhan, rather than from animals. china has completely rejected the theory and last month the who said it was unlikely. well, earlier i spoke to jamie metzl, who served in president 0bama's national security council, and is a member of the world health organisation s expert advisory committee. i asked him what's prompted the resurfacing of these reports. we are almost a year and a half from the outbreak and there is almost no evidence that the pandemic began with a zoonoticjump in the wild but there is increasingly strong circumstantial evidence suggesting the very real possibility that the pandemic stems from an accidental laboratory leak and as this circumstantial evidence grows,

you mentioned what you call the who investigation, i think your viewers would be shocked to learn there has been no who investigation, as a matter of fact, to date, there is no international investigation into the origins of the pandemic and from day one, china has been engaged in a massive cover up and i think the rest of the world is making a statement, enough is enough. as the evidence for the laboratory leak hypothesis grows, and we all are and should be demanding the kind of full investigation of all origin hypotheses that is required. you say there's been no who investigation, we are actually seeing the pictures of the time who investigators went to wuhan to try and establish this and i remember my colleagues were trying to shout to get questions across and they were prevented from doing so, so in what sense was that not an investigation? it was both not the who and it wasn't an investigation, the entity that you are referring to was an independent committee

organised, partly organised by the who in conjunction with their chinese counterparts and actually, the who director—general has made abundantly clear in his statements, he keeps saying this is not the who and yet media around the world are reporting this as the who, incorrectly. it wasn't an investigation, the head of this international committee engaged in this joint study has been completely clear this is not an investigation, they didn't have the mandate, the skills, the access, there was this international group, they went on a two—week, highly chaperoned, controlled study visit to wuhan and really, didn't have any ability to draw the conclusions which they did say, correctly, this group did say the animal origin was likely, a lab incident was unlikely but then, tedros immediately rejected

the claim and it's probably the first time it's ever happened in the history of the world health 0rganization. tazmanian devils have been born in the wild, in australia's mainland for the first time in 3,000 years. it's a big milestone for this endangered species as the bbc�*s azadeh moshiri reports. the tasmanian devil. it's thought they were wiped out from australia's mainland long ago, so conservationists reintroduced 26 adults into a large sanctuary north of sydney, hoping to bring them back. and now, for the first time in 3000 years, new tasmanian devils have been born in the pouch in the wild in australia's mainland. ten years ago, we started with 44 founder devils and we've now had over a50 joeys. we've been able to historically, albeit in its infancy, return the devil to mainland, and today is another

milestone entirely. they get their name from their ferocity when they fight over food. hard to imagine, though, since these creatures are so — well, cute. there is so much at stake here. we've done everything we can, but if the devils don't breed, it's all over. they're still an endangered species, but with a bit more mating, these devils are one step closer to redemption. azadeh moshiri, bbc news. and finally, we leave you with an adrenaline boost. spain's bienvenido aguado has landed the biggest dirt to dirt frontflip in history at the darkfest 2021, the mountain biking event held this year in south africa — he jumped 30 metres. the previous record was at 21. here are some of the otherjumps of these incredible riders.

cannot try those at home! you can reach me on twitter — i'm @ ben m boulos hello there. the bank holiday weekend is fast approaching, and we could all do with something a little more settled, couldn't we, to make outdoor plans. well, i can offer you certainly some drier weather over the next few days and into the weekend, and it will be warmer, too. now, just how warm, take a look at this. with the wind direction coming up from the south by the weekend, we could see temperatures peaking into the low 20s, and we've only seen that once so far this may. so, that's something to look forward to. during wednesday, however, this weather front will enhance some showers coming out of eastern scotland during the morning and sinking their way steadily south across north east england, down through the pennines, maybe into the east midlands, although weakening somewhat. behind, we could see a few scattered, sharp showers developing. one or two odd rumbles of thunder, as well, into scotland. the best of the sunshine

across wales, central and south west england, but the wind direction coming from the north, so a cool source. that means that temperatures still on the disappointing side. 12—14 degrees into the north. we could see 16—18 across parts of england and wales. so, moving towards thursday, a relatively dry start with some early morning sunshine. conditions will cloud over a little into the afternoon, but a ridge of high pressure is building keeping things largely quiet. winds light, and as a result, temperatures will be a degree or so higher, 18—19 degrees. there is a weather front for the start of friday. it's pushing in from the west, but it's a very weak affair. as it bumps into that high pressure, it will die away. so, there is the potential on friday of some light patchy rain perhaps into northern ireland, western fringes of scotland, the isle of man, let's say. and it will be quite cloudy, misty, murky, patchy mist and fog to higher ground here. but the best chance of seeing that cloud breaking up perhaps the south east, east anglia, and temperatures will respond with highs of 20 degrees. that's going to feel

very pleasant indeed. so, if you are thinking about heading to the coast for the bank holiday weekend, i don't think you'll be too disappointed. we can't rule out the risk of a few showers up into the north, but generally it'll be fine and warm. if you want something just that little bit warmer and you don't want to head towards the coast, stay inland. again, temperatures are likely to peak into the low 20s, very nice indeed. and after the miserable month of may, that will certainly be welcome news.

this is bbc news: the headlines: president biden has urged the us congress to pass a policing reform bill quickly, in memory of george floyd. the president met family members exactly a year after mr floyd was killed by a white policeman. mr floyd's family have expressed disappointment that the bill has not yet been approved. the us secretary of state, antony blinken, has stressed that a two state solution — establishing a palestinian state alongside israel — was the only option for lasting peace in the region. he was speaking after holding talks with israeli and palestinian leaders. the un human rights watchdog has demanded the immediate release of the journalist, roman protasevich, by the authorities in belarus. it said the manner in which he was detained — after a plane was forced to land in minsk — was "tantamount to extraordinary rendition." now on bbc news, it's hardtalk.