welcome to bbc news, i'm lewis vaughanjones. our top stories. a blistering attack on british prime minister borisjohnson's handling of the coronavirus pandemic by his former chief adviser. fundamentally, i regarded him as unfit for thejob, and i was trying to create a structure around him to try and stop what i thought were extremely bad decisions. at least eight people are killed in a shooting at a rail yard in sanjose, california president biden tells us intelligence agencies to step up their investigation into the origins of covid—i9, as claims persist that it may have leaked from a chinese lab. a judge in australia dismisses what could have been a landmark case, trying to stop the expansion of australia's coal production.

we start in the uk. tens of thousands of people died needlessly from coronavirus — that's the claim of the former chief adviser to the british prime minister, borisjohnson. dominic cummings told members of parliament he believed the government had been guilty of disastrous failings. he described mrjohnson as unfit for thejob, and said he heard the prime minister say he'd rather see "bodies pile high" than order a third lockdown. britain has been one of the countries worst hit by the pandemic. our political editor laura kuenssberg reports. reality or revenge?

delving back into troubled recent history, dominic cummings�* day to give his version of events — a verdict of failure and an apology for his part. senior ministers, senior officials, senior advisers like me fell disastrously short of the standards that the public has a right to expect. when the public needed us most, the government failed, and i'd like to say to all the families of those who died unnecessarily how sorry i am for the mistakes that were made and for my own mistakes at that. he described the original expectation — a peak in early summer, protecting the most vulnerable. but as flaws in the numbers emerged, how rapidly plans were sketched out on whiteboards to accelerate to lockdown. showing if nothing changed, the nhs would collapse and the poignant line — who do we not save? and a prime minister unwilling to take the disease seriously. in february, the prime minister regarded this as just a scare story. if we have the prime minister chairing cobra meetings

and he just tells everyone, "it's swine flu, don't worry about it, i'm going to get chris whitty to inject me live on tv with coronavirus so everyone realises it's nothing to be frightened of," that would not help actually serious planning. only halfway through... i will first call the prime ministerto answer... ..the prime minister had to defend the claims next door. the handling of this pandemic has been one of the most- difficult things this country's had to do for a very- long time, and none of- the decisions have been easy. to go into a lockdown is a - traumatic thing for a country. mr cummings�* real vitriol was saved, though, for the health secretary, who may notjust be able to run away from a long list of accusations. i think that the secretary of state for health should've been fired for at least 15, 20 things, including lying to everybody on multiple occasions in meeting after meeting in the cabinet room and publicly. whether, he claimed, misleading on testing,

on ppe and putting people in care homes in danger. the government rhetoric was, "we put a shield around care homes and blah, blah, blah." it was complete nonsense. quite the opposite of putting a shield round them, we sent people with covid back to the care homes. the health secretary's team has rejected his claims, but then there were accusations that the prime minister wouldn't listen to mr cummings or the top scientists to bring back lockdown to save lives in the autumn as covid began to take hold again and cases rose. i said to him, "the whole lesson of what happened before is that by delaying, the lockdown came later, it had to be more severe, it had to last longer. surely we've got to learn the lessons from the past." the prime minister decided, no, and said, basically we're just going to hit and hope. did you hear him say, "let the bodies pile high in their thousands"? i heard that in the prime minister's study. the pm's denied that, but was blasted by the man who helped him into number ten. fundamentally, i regarded him

as unfit for thejob, and i was trying to create a structure around him to try and stop what i thought were extremely bad decisions. the relationship between dominic cummings and boris johnson is bitter and broken, so there's no surprise the former aide didn't hold back today. but whatever his motivations, dominic cummings was boris johnson's most senior adviser during the country's worst crisis in many decades, so his evidence can'tjust be brushed off as irrelevant. but after hours, for those who lost family, for those who've suffered, perhaps this most important verdict. tens of thousands of people died who didn't need to die. for the first time, someone who was involved in making the decisions during this crisis has come to that conclusion in public. a claim the government's always disputed or tried to ignore, but one day will have to answer in full. laura kuenssberg, bbc news, westminster.

a white house spokesperson says the us is suffering an epidemic of gun violence, and the president has urged the senate to pass legislation which would strengthen background checks on gun owners. it comes after at least eight people were killed in a shooting at a rail maintenance yard in san jose, california. mark lobel reports. this light rail service yard south of san francisco is now a crime scene. a bomb squad was dispatched after an employee shot his valley transportation authority colleagues. then it's thought he turned the gun on himself ataround 6:30am. this is a horrific day for our city. and it's a tragic day for the vta family. these folks were heroes during covid—19. the buses never stopped running, vta did not stop running. theyjust kept at work, and now we are really calling on them to be heroes a second time. with haunting echoes of past shootings in this area,

anxious families enter a reunification centre to find out about loved ones. unfortunately, this| is not the first time that our community has been through something like this. i this isn't the first time j that my team has done something like this. it's particularly concerning that this horrific shooting played out in this silicon valley tech hub in california, a state with some of the strictest gun laws in america. our hearts go out to the victims and their families. what's clear, as the president has said, is that we are suffering from an epidemic of gun violence in this country, both in mass shootings and in the lives that are being taken in daily gun violence that doesn't make national headlines. this isn't the first disgruntled employee to hit the headlines in this way, and the fear is it won't be the last. mark lobel, bbc news. let s get some of the day's other news. 160 people are feared dead after a boat sank in the niger river,

in northwest nigeria. it's one of the deadliest incidents in recent months. authorities at the scene said 180 people were on board — more than the ferry could transport. only 20 people have been rescued so far. dozens of villages along india's bengal coast have been hit by a severe cyclone. thousands of homes have been destroyed and at least two people have been killed. winds of up to 86mph have weakened, but rising waters from the torrential rainfall have breached river embankments, swamping low lying areas. mali's interim president and prime minister have resigned — the announcement comes two days after they were arrested by the military. they were taken to a military base outside the capital on monday after a cabinet reshuffle in which two military officers were sacked. the colonel who detained them also orchestrated last year's coup. the australian city of melbourne will enter a snap lockdown of up to ten days

to contain a new covid—i9 outbreak. at least 25 people have tested positive, after several months of almost no community transmission in the country. president biden has given us intelligence agencies 90 days to conduct a fresh investigation into the origins of covid—i9, as speculation continues that it may�*ve leaked from a chinese lab. this claim has been strongly denied by beijing who said politicising the issue would only hamper investigations. i asked the bbc�*s will grant what's the basis of the claims that the coronavirus emerged from a lab in wuhan. there is no sign of them going away, and they are partly stoked by news reports that appear to have information passed from intelligence agencies suggesting it could well have been from a laboratory incident rather than from nature. of course, the belief up until now was that it has perhaps been passed at a wet

market or something from bats in wuhan to humans somehow. but there was doubt being cast on this and that has led the biden administration to put a full stop on it, president biden said he received a report earlier this month from the intelligence community and asked for additional follow—up. but even anthony felt he said he was not convinced it had come from nature. given the questions possessed, and given the relationship donald trump had with china, do you see president biden�*s relationship with china is continuing to be a frosty relationship or has there been a reset? interestingly, there was a who—led team working alongside chinese scientists, and their conclusion was it is extremely unlikely this was from a laboratory incident, and that everything

points to it being somehow passed from exotic animals to humans. but it appears that more clarification is wanted, that washington simply accuses beijing of putting obstacles in the way of clear and transparent reporting and want more clarity. so clearly this entire incident will put greater pressure on the relationship between the biden administration and beijing. as you said, beijing has angrily denied this and said the entire thing is politicised. but the biden administration, as they put it, has specific questions for china, so we will see if they get any answers. the president of belarus has accused his critics of trying to "strangle" his country. it's his first public comments since a ryanair plane was forced to land in the country and an opposition journalist onboard was arrested. alexander lukashenko accused the west of waging

a hybrid war against him. sarah rainsford reports. in minsk, appearances are deceiving. this is a country in deep political turmoil. we were heading to meet a womanjust plunged into the heart of it. she asked to meet in the open on the edge of town because anna's daughter is now in a kgb prison, arrested with her opposition activist boyfriend when their flight over europe was diverted by force to belarus. the last anna heard from sofia was a text message. itjust said, "mum." the next was a video confession taped by her interrogators. it seems clear it was done under duress. anna is still reeling. translation: we are in such a state that we keep - saying to each other, "this can't be happening." we don't believe it's happening to us, to our daughter.

anna says sofia wasn't even part of the protests that swept belarus last year, as minsk turned red and white with crowds calling for president lukashenko to go. nine months on, everything has changed here. the mass arrest of opposition supporters and people's own fear have cleared the streets of protesters. but alexander lukashenko is still very much in power, and today he made a defiant address to the nation from right here in the country's parliament. he called new sanctions over the diverted plane a western plot to try to topple him. translation: our ill-wishers have changed their— methods of attack. they've crossed many red lines and the boundaries of common sense and human decency. they've moved from plotting riots here to strangling us. it's no surprise many belarusians are keeping

their heads down these days. as a new summer begins, very different from the last. sarah rainsford, bbc news, minsk. stay with us on bbc news, still to come. what happens now to the work and personal possessions of professor stephen hawking? in the biggest international sporting spectacle ever seen, up to 30 million people have taken part in sponsored athletics events to aid famine relief in africa. the first of what the makers of star wars hope will be thousands of queues started forming at 7am. taunting which led to scuffles, scuffles to fighting, fighting to full—scale riot, as the liverpool fans broke out of their area and into the juventus enclosure. the belgian police had lost control. the whole world will mourn the j tragic death of mr nehru today.

he was the father of. the indian people from the day of independence. the oprah winfrey show comes to an end after 25 years and more than a500 episodes. the chat show has made her one of the richest people on the planet. geri halliwell, otherwise known as ginger spice, has announced she's left the spice girls. argh, i don't believe it! she's the one with the bounce, the go, girl power. not geri, why? this is bbc news, the latest headlines. borisjohnson�*s former chief adviser delivers a relentless attack on his handling of the covid crisis. at least eight people are killed in a shooting at a rail yard in sanjose, california — the gunman worked at the rail facility.

in australia, a judge has dismissed what could've been a landmark case, brought by eight teenagers and a nun trying to stop the expansion of australia's coal production. the young people behind the case are the organisers of australia's school strike 4 climate campaign, which marched in sydney last week. the case in melbourne targeted the planned expansion of a coal mine in new south wales. butjustice bromberg has dismissed an injunction, on the grounds there was not enough evidence. our australia correspondent shaimaa khalil says coal production remains a divisive topic, and this ruling could have some ramifications. it came to light in the bush fires of 2019 when millions of acres were burned.

the science came in and said this is a contributing factor, climate change is a contributing factor to the extreme weather events we have had in australia, areas hit by drought, bush fires and floods in less than two years. trying to say this is only going to get worse. but essentially this really goes into the heart of domestic politics in australia. this country is heavily dependent on fossil fuels when it comes to its wealth and export, coal, iron ore, and the conservative government in australia has won successive elections on a platform of supporting the fossil fuel industry. and the climate activists and young people saying whatever investments are put in today, it is putting their future at risk because of the climate change effects. a real showdown between a country whose wealth depends on fossil fuels and young people saying that that just does not bode well for their future. and we're going to look at another climate change court case now, this time in the netherlands.

the oil giant shell has been ordered to make big reductions in its greenhouse gas emissions. the court ruled that the oil giant has a legal duty to do more to tackle climate change. the decision is only binding in the netherlands, but it could influence judges elsewhere. anna holligan reports. "a violation of human rights" was how the climate campaigners described shell's ongoing investment in fossil fuels. cheering. the dutch branch of friends of the earth, along with six other groups and more than 17,000 dutch citizens, brought the case to court, arguing that the oil giant's transition to clean energy wasn't going far orfast enough. thejudge agreed the corporation had to be more ambitious in reducing its carbon footprint and delivered a precedent—setting verdict. translation: the court

orders royal dutch shell| to reduce its co2 output and those of its suppliers and buyers by the end of 2030 by a net of 45% based on 2019 levels. this is the first time that judges have compelled a company to emit less carbon dioxide by changing its policy. this is an historical day. it's for the first time in history that the judge has decided that the large polluter royal dutch shell should stop causing dangerous climate change. this will have an enormous impact, not only on shell itself, but on major polluters throughout the netherlands and globally. in response to the judgement, shell acknowledged that urgent action is needed on climate change. translation: we are working hard to become a netzero - energy company by 2050.

thousands of people in shell. are working on that every day. we're investing billions - in that, and although we're moving in the right direction, we're being asked _ to speed this up. i've been speaking to shell over the last few days, and they've been telling me they are making efforts. they don't believe the court is the right place for this, but there is no doubt this verdict could set off many more around the world as campaigners see that their battle to protect the planet can also take place in courtsjust like this. energy executives globally were watching, too, conscious that if shell can be legally obliged to change, so could they. anna holligan, bbc news, at the district court in the hague. eric carle, the author and illustrator of the much—loved children's book the very hungry caterpillar, has died at the age of 91. first published in 1969, the book has sold more

than 50 million copies and been translated into more than 66 languages. carle also wrote the very popular brown bear, brown bear, what do you see?, the grouchy ladybug and the very busy spider. he died at his studio in massachusetts on sunday. there's a push under way to preserve the scientific papers and personal possessions of professor stephen hawking. the objects include childhood letters, scripts from his tv appearances, as well as his ground—breaking research into black holes. our science correspondent pallab ghosh has more. there is nothing like a eureka moment of discovering something that no—one knew before... he was the world's most inspiring scientist. his research, photographs and letters are his legacy to the world, and they're to be saved for the nation. ah, here he is, yeah. 0h, brilliant. his son, tim, sees many of them for the first time, including

a letter his father wrote to his dad when he was just six. "dear, father. once upon a time, some pirates were loading some treasure..." i think it shows a sort of tenderness in his relationship with his father. you know, he had a very loving relationship with his dad, as i did when i was at the age he was when he wrote the letter. here he is as a student. motor neurone disease went on to debilitate his body, but not his mind. this is his most important scientific paper on black holes, which have such strong gravity that not even light can escape. in a covering letter to a leading journal, he writes immodestly... his script from the simpsons is an important part of the collection. he had an enormous sense of humour. i that comes out through interviews that people i will have seen through that

kind of characterisation, i willing to be in the simpsons, for a little fun to be taken. - if what that did was help to. communicate about science. the contents of stephen hawking's office will be transferred to the science museum in london. most iconic of all is his wheelchair, a symbol of the physical challenges he faced and also the strength and determination he had to overcome them. the eventual aim is to reconstruct his entire office. there are very few scientific spaces that survive, so actually having stephen's office is wonderful because he is extraordinary, but it sends a big, powerful message about the prestige of science as well. future generations will now be able to learn about the life and work of a man who inspired us with his brilliance, courage and humanity. pallab ghosh, bbc news. in football, the spanish team villarreal have won the europa league after beating manchester united in one of the most extraordinary penalty shoot—outs in football history.

the match, which was played in the polish city of gdansk, finished 1—1 after extra time. all 20 outfield players converted their penalties in the longest shoot—out in a final of any uefa competition. in an increasingly tense stadium, it was then down to the goalkeepers. the villarreal goalkeeper scored with his penalty, then saved united counterpart david de gea's effort. it gave villarreal a first major trophy in their history and saw former arsenal boss unai emery lift the europa league for a fourth time. the result left man united's fans hugely disappointed. let's hear from some of them. i just think for the best of 120 minutes, we were the better side. we could have scored more, but when it went to penalties, i thought we'd lose sooner than we did because we've not got great penalty takers on the pitch. we didn't offer as much as we should have going forward. like, bruno didn't really

show up, cavani didn't show up, greenwood didn't show up, rashford didn't show up. like, these players we look for aren't showing up in these finals and that's what we need — like, we do need that. the world famous eiffel tower has gone green — not it's colour but how its spotlights are powered. for the first time, it was lit up using hydrogen—powered spotlights. for three minutes and thirty seconds, lights and lasers of various colours danced on the iconic monument�*s facade thanks to energy provided by a hydrogen—powered generator. it usually uses diesel power. it's part of the french government's plan to increase hydrogen production and usage in france. stargazers around the world on wednesday night have been treated to a special sight — a huge supermoon, also called a flower moon, in the night sky. it is the closest full moon to the earth of the year, making it look much bigger and brighter than normal.

i'm lewis vaughanjones and this is bbc news. hello. it feels like a while since i've been able to say this, but on thursday, most parts of the country will be dry. it's been one of those months, hasn't it? notjust dry, it should feel a little bit warmer, and that's after quite a chilly start. even though temperatures in single figures for most, rural parts of southern england, wales, northern ireland could drop down to 1—2 celsius at first light. so, there could be a touch of frost around. dry and sunny here. a bit more in the way of low cloud and mistiness across parts of scotland and eastern england, but that will break up. although it will stay grey in shetland through the day. sunshine turning hazy across western areas later. maybe a few spots of rain in west cornwall, fermanagh, and an isolated shower down eastern england and scotland. but the vast majority dry, and temperatures in the mid—to—high teens. into the evening and overnight, we'll see the return of some wet weather, particularly in the west.

a lot of low cloud with that. quite a murky start to friday morning, but notice the temperatures — double figures for some. coolest where we've got the clearest skies towards the east of the country. and it's here where high pressure is building in as we go into friday. and what that does — stops that weather front moving much further eastwards and it will decay in situ. damp and drizzly, murky across western areas to begin with. brightening up a touch, but there'll still be some rain and drizzle around into the afternoon. eastern areas favoured for the cloud breaking up, some sunshine, particularly in the north east of scotland, away from some coasts, that is. and temperatures are down a little bit on thursday, but if you get some sunshine, it should still feel pleasant. but the temperatures will be on the rise further as we go into the weekend, and more sunshine developing. we will start saturday fairly cloudy, especially in the west. still one or two light drizzly showers. isolated shower further east, most will be dry, increasing amounts of sunshine through eastern areas. and by this stage, a few more spots getting to 20 degrees. parts of southern england and western and northern scotland are best favoured for that. into sunday, though, after some

morning mist and fog patches, bluer skies for most. it will be a sunny day, little bit of fairweather cloud and some hazy sunshine out towards the north and the west. but by this stage, could be hitting 22 degrees in parts of scotland, maybe up to 22—23 in the south east of england. but with the sunshine out, the warmth, you may be tempted towards the coast, but our recent chilly spell has had an impact on sea surface temperatures. be brave — temperatures for some only around 8—9 degrees. as we go into bank holiday monday, well, high pressure and the warmth and sunshine lasts in the south. a chance of a return of rain in scotland and northern ireland. bye for now.

this is bbc news, the headlines: the british prime minister's former chief adviser has described borisjohnson as unfit for the job. in a parliamentary public hearing, dominic cummings said tens of thousands of people died needlessly from coronavirus, because of disastrous failings by the government. britain has been one of the countries worst hit by the pandemic. eight people have been killed and others wounded after a gunman opened fire in a railyard in san jose, california. the gunman, who worked at the railfacility, also died. there have been 230 mass shootings so far this year across the united states. ajudge in australia has dismissed what could've been a landmark case, brought by eight teenagers and a nun trying to stop the expansion of australia's coal production. they argued the federal government had a "duty of care" in protecting future generations from climate change.

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