this is bbc news. the headlines: russia, iran and turkey have suspended work at their consulates in the afghan city of mazar—e—sharif, as the taliban make advances across the region, a week after us troops completed their exit. over 1,000 afghan soldiers have been forced to flee across the border into tajikistan. england's covid lockdown will end in two weeks' time despite scientists urging caution as the number of cases is still rising. the british prime minister says it's possible because 86% of adults have been vaccinated. from the 19th ofjuly face masks will be voluntary and social distancing scrapped. a cybercrime gang thought to be behind a huge global ransomware attack, is demanding $70 million in cryptocurrency. the russia—linked revil group says it will unlock all the computer systems it's blocking in exchange for the payment.

the end of social distancing in england's pubs and restaurants means a return to drinking at the bar without the requirement for table service. nightclubs will also reopen. the hospitality industry has been hit hard by the pandemic and has welcomed the announcement, though some staff are worried about working in a crowded environment without face masks. 0ur north of england correspondent danny savage reports. another busy lunchtime at the bull inn, in north yorkshire. staff are wearing facemasks, customers have to register, it is table service only and all at a safe social distance. but in two weeks' time, all those restrictions go. a bit scared, really. commercially, fantastic, let's just go back to normal. gill runs the pub but does she trust the public to act responsibly? there is a big section of the community, particularly when they get a few points down them,

who don't take that much responsibility for themselves or others. and i don't want to damn people but it's a fact, i've witnessed that. lifting restrictions will potentially see demand soar in hospitality. you could stand at the bar again, although table service has won a lot of fans. but the big debate will be about facemasks. at the wardrobe bar in leeds today, manager ryan discussed the changes with his staff. no qr codes, no social distance, no masks around at work. how do you feel? what should we be doing? quite excited not to wear a mask in this weather! i think i'll be happy to get rid of them. | it's been so long having them on and it willjust be nice - to go back to normal. the easing of the restrictions is great, it quadruples the numbers we can get in, in the bar and in the music venue as well and by that perspective, yeah, it's fantastic. downstairs, this venue is currently allowed 70 customers. soon a50 will be allowed back in. professional guitarist jake can

finally see some hope arriving. i would say about 90% of my income was live performance and live sessions and due to theatres and venues being closed for that long, it's just not been able to go ahead at all. it would mean a lot. many people in hospitality will still wear facemasks, they feel safer doing so, but will customers match them? danny savage, bbc news, leeds. now on bbc news, the travel show you've gotta love it, proper british coastline. we're on an adventure across the uk as it opens up for travel again. yes! we're open! from rugged coastlines to breathtaking landscapes and natural habitats. see that?! 0urjourney will take us to the four nations that make

up the united kingdom. and with an eye on our carbon footprint, we're in an all—electric revamp of an iconic british motor. on this week's show, lucy's behind the wheels in wales, where she'll be trying to take it down a notch... oh, god. i'm going a bit too fast. that's right. it's quite a discipline. ..making some new mates in the countryside... do you want more food? oh, that feels really weird on my hand! cackles. ..and throwing herself right in the deep end. whoo! hello and croeso i gymru, or welcome to wales, and the next leg of our travel

showjourney across the uk. i don't know about you but i'm pretty excited! we're in cardiff, the capital of wales, a country that usually attracts 1 million international visitors a year. now, how do we turn it on? nothing but silence. at the moment, i don't really feel like i'm driving a big van. it's just — it's quiet, it's smooth — a bit too smooth. there's no sound, which is freaking me out a little bit. i'm not completely confident with it yet. at one of cardiff's most recognisable landmarks, there's definitely a sense that tourism is returning. but i'm heading south to the waterfront — a symbol of the city's successful regeneration. cardiff bay — or tiger bay, as it was known to locals — was home to one of the earliest

large—scale multiracial communities in britain. # tiger bay... # it's not very far from the dock...# as the welsh coal industry grew, so did cardiff. by the 19th century, it was the biggest exporter globally. workers flocked to the area, creating a community in butetown that was soon home to more than 50 nationalities. # tiger bay...# keith murrell is the man behind butetown carnival, an annual celebration of the area's diverse past. this is the core of the traditional butetown community. things have been changed but this is almost the epicentre of where everything was happening. so describe the festival to me. i would say it's two days of music and fun, but the emphasis is on local music.

so, you know, with a lot of tourists coming here, would you say butetown festival is something that they would consider? would they be welcomed here? absolutely. as i said, in its heyday, we were getting attendances of 25,000 people. that was a time when maybe 4,000 people were living here. so it was obviously catering for the whole of the city and yet, presenting butetown in the most positive light. this is a port. and this community most especially is built on a port. it's about people coming and going — we love people coming and going. one of the things is — again, about community pride — if you've got something, you want people to come to it. last year, organisers were forced to take the carnival online. but this year, they are hoping to hold a stripped—back event. and preparations are under way. for the last few years, june has performed at the carnival. her trinidadian—inspired outfit is homage to the people that

once migrated here hundreds of years ago. butohjapanese is a style of very slow motion. i'm not a young person anymore so moving quite slowly, it's giving me another vehicle to perform. so i'm just going to take yourfoot forward and you just slowly lunge as if you're in slow motion. it almost looks like the bionic man. chuckles. like someone has hit the slomo button on us. and you just — you just — that's it. you just kind of breathe and slowly move and maybe i'm gonna do a wave, so you take your time to... oh, god — i'm going a bit too fast! that's right. it's quite a discipline. and then just do a little way. just a little wave. oh, my gosh, the concentration! my legs are shaking a little bit. so what was that about you not being young? my thighs are aching and ijust did that for about two minutes! well, it's been brief — i've only been here for a couple of days —

but i have had the best time here in cardiff and i genuinely cannot wait to see what else wales has in store for me. i leave the city for the rolling hills of the brecon beacons, less than an hour's drive from cardiff. the national park is home to over 1000 farms, largely dedicated to livestock. and with over 250,000 visitors a year, one particularly savvy farmer has developed an interesting business model — trekking with sheep. he's checking me out. he's just checking — he's checking i'm all good. his problem is he can't really see very good because his hair is so long, it's in his face. meat patches, my new pal for the afternoon. do you want more food? i need to prove that i'm your friend. oh, that feels really weird on my hand! cackles. you've got a very warm

tongue there, patches! come on! patches, you can have more food in a moment. the plan is to follow a trail around the farm with my fluffy companion. he's pretty obedient. sometimes he kind of veers to the left or right and i feel like i'm the one being walked. it turns out to be trickier than it looks. come on, patches! come on! so nicola, since lockdown, have you seen demand for this experience growing? yeah, so a lot of people want to be outside in the open air. this experience, because we are able to be distanced, there is not so much pressure on that, and people just enjoy being with sheep and being able to stroke the sheep and actually being able to physically be around them, whereas normally they just see in the fields and they run away. when we first opened, it was quite slow. we did not really have that many people. i think people were a bit wary. they are bit like "hmm, really?

walking sheep?" yeah, yeah. they'd not really heard of that before. we started because it was similar to alpaca trekking but with sheep, it's more native. and we ourselves are used to looking after sheep, whereas alpacas is something a bit different and a bit scary. now before i head off, nicola says she's got one more surprise in store. welcome to wales' very own crufts—inspired goat agility training course. so the easiest one to start with this probably this one. they come out and you can give them a bit of food and then they will walk down the other side. alrighty! whee! up you go! come on, you can do it! you can do it! climb, climb, yeah! yay! there we go! woo—hoo! well done! good boy! i am getting tangled a bit! yeah! come though... ..and this way.

good boy! chuckling. so how did you start these agility courses? we've seen dogs do agility, we've actually seen pony and horse agility... yes. ..and we've seen some videos of youtube on people doing sheep agility and we thought "we'll have a go!" goats! why not? so, and goats love to climb. yes. they love to just jump and just cause havoc. as we saw. yeah! so we thought "why not have a go and to see whether they enjoy it?" and they seem to love climbing things. yeah, i was gonna say, they do really seem to enjoy this, and they are learning as well. exactly. these guys are only about 16 weeks old now. yeah. they have not been doing about long, so it's all new to them and they are just loving every minute of it, really. yeah, so what's the purpose. obviously, you said to me they are learning and learning skills, but do they compete? no. laughs. not yet! we haven't seen any goat agility competitions yet. yeah, yeah.

there's always a first for everything, huh? exactly, exactly! maybe we'll enter in some dog agility with the goats. both chuckle. i'm sure we will get some funny looks there. yeah, i'm sure! come on! for my next adventure, i'm swapping green hills for craggy coastlines as we head west. pembrokeshire is the uk's only national park, where beaches and coves punctuate nearly 200 miles of cliffs. the beauty of pembrokeshire has not gone unnoticed and in recent years, the amount of visitors to the area has been growing. now, as lockdown loosens, this summer, businesses are expecting more bookings than ever.

so welcome to ramsey island. my guide ffion has worked on the waters around ramsey island for over 20 years. this is the largest gull in the world. it's the great black—backed gull. i've seen one eat a rabbit, whole, live, down in one. they have also been known to take little terriers, so definitely not one to be messed with. seagulls are pretty intimidating though, aren't they, so... at nearly 400 feet in places, the western cliffs on the island are some of the highest in wales, making it one of the best places for birdwatching in the uk. 25 years ago, an oil tanker spilt 72,000 tons of oil into these waters, turning beaches black and killing thousands of seabirds. this devastating event spurred on locals to develop a marine code for visitors. part of the problem is other water users who are not used to the area don't know the area, don't know the wildlife. and it is not knowing about it,

so not knowing that they may be disturbing it. the code encourages visitors to plan ahead, reduce speed and keep their distance from wildlife. people will only save what they are passionate about. and to make them passionate about it, you have to take them out and show it to them. so it's about striking a real balance between showing them what an amazing wildlife we have on our doorstep, but also not impacting it, not having a detrimental effect on it in the sort of meantime, so it's trying to strike that balance. in recent years, this stretch of coastline has made a name for itself as one of the best places in the world to go to coasteering. which is essentially scrambling along the cliffs. it's hard to put a date on when coasteering started — i'm sure it's been happening for hundreds of years — but we are the first company to provide it as a commercial activity. so we made it more accessible

to people and gave anybody, essentially, the opportunity to come and see what the coastline about here has to offer, you know? and yeah, it's a bit mad to think that it started just over here. how did you cope during the last year? how has it been for you guys? so it's been really difficult but we are seeing a lot more tourism in the area. there's a lot of people that would be going to europe or further afield and if we can give them an insight into the spaces that we have on our doorstep, because we know how important they are — especially after the lockdowns, the difference that being outside can make. we just need to make sure that we're not abusing those spaces and that we're really looking after them, so that generations to follow can also enjoy them. so now that i'm looking out, the nerves are kicking in a little bit, but it's more about the temperature of the water, rather than the activity — i'm actually really looking forward to exploring kind of nature at sea level.

i've never done this before, so get me in that water. yes! there's no way i could have done that without my hands. i need more confidence. as well as performing backflips, sam was also an expert on the local geology and wildlife. then it was back into the waves for the big finale. sam had one lastjump in store for me. this is real adrenalinejunkie stuff, and it is notjust aboutjumping off the cliffs

and getting in the water, it's so much information, so much nature and wildlife, and sam is so good at breaking it down, so you experience the mixing of the crazy sport element and just learning, honestly i could do this all day. next up, iam heading 90 miles inland, to the dyfi valley. situated on the southern edge of snowdonia national park, it's home to one of the steepest cliff funiculars in the world. i can hear it filling up with water, here we go! we are on the move. what is unusual about this is that it's powered by water, one of only a handful of its kind. this funicular is 30 years old, and was put in place to essentially get people up and down the hill, a hill that was originally used to get slate down.

it's a little disconcerting looking at the view, but what a view, and what a fantastic use of sustainable technology. and it's all part of this — the centre for alternative technology. founded in the 70s on a disused slate quarry, this place was ahead of its time, a pioneer in the move towards renewable lifestyles. in 2009, the region was given unesco biosphere status to recognise the area's green credentials. down the road from cat, and another attraction is doing its bit to promote a more sustainable future. all with the help of the world's second largest rodent — the beaver.

well, as we came out of the last lockdown we have a new addition to the nature reserve, and we now have a family of beavers. family of beavers! so explain to me what i'm looking out on here. where would the beavers live? the beavers is an enclosure, that's just in this area here. they have seven acres of wet scrub to get their teeth into, and they are here to help us with reserve management. 400 years ago, beavers were hunted to extinction for theirfur, meat and oil. this loss had a devastating impact on the land, and today ecologists are hoping their reintroduction can reverse this effect. and what was it like finally getting them here? to actually release them and see them swim into that pool, it was a bit goosebumpy. i bet! here we are, the beaver enclosure. i say to people, i am going into the bog on a daily basis.

sadly, beavers don't have a great rep, but kim is hoping to change that. there is a lot of information out there about beavers, people don't understand that they are vegetarian, and so there is some conflict that they are going to eat all the fish from the rivers. as with anything that is new and change there is fear around that, but we are just trying to educate people that this is what beavers do in this landscape. beavers are just one additional tool in the current climate crisis. where you have beavers, you have increasing biodiversity. amazingly, kim has already seen a change to the reserve. they have only been in six weeks and already we're seeing in changes to the water channels, they are connecting up the pools, they have made a canal, and we are seeing lots of pathways like this when they are coming in and out and feeding on this stuff, on the willow. i couldn't come all this way and not see what all the fuss was about.

but because beavers are nocturnal, we had to come back dusk. yeah, yeah, there is a beaver coming! oh i see it, i see it, yeah, yeah, yeah! coming straight towards us. just coming across. right into the sun. well, we have been waiting quite a while, i was just about to give up hope, and around the corner came a beaver, totally worth being eaten alive by midges for, i think i've inhaled about 20 as well. totally worth it. we saw beavers! for my last leg of this journey i am heading west to aberystwyth, a popular welsh holiday resort and home to a thriving student population. i am at the university's art centre where wales' musical tradition is being given

a new lease of life. sings in welsh. the two outside rows are like the white notes ona piano... plays harp. ..which means you get that nice echo sound, and the middle row are like the black notes. but i won't demonstrate because i never tune them, because life's too short. this is the triple harp, an instrument only played by a handful of people across the world. i think it's europe's only unbroken harping tradition. so it very nearly did die out, but it's great that recently i think there has been a surge in interest in young people. cerys is member of avanc, a welsh folk band formed of young musicians from all over wales. 0ver lockdown they recorded and collaborated remotely, streaming their performances to thousands across social media. would you say doing these

virtual performances and recordings, has that kept you sane during lockdown? yeah, there's a world out there. yeah, but i bet you can't wait for things to get back to normal, so performances can resume, things like that. oh, the wind is playing the harp! it'sjoining in. yeah, this is the wind playing the strings. ghostly harp notes. well, here's hoping i can play this thing better than the wind. i am not going to lie, cerys, i feel a bit unnatural here. i look the part... you look the part, and that is all that matters. laughs. all right, here we go. i am on the red string... and you get the hand on the other red string, and you play them, and you've got a little echo. plays harp. like that, and back down again, then here... it's really messing with my eyes, how do you do this without going mad! that was the first bar of a famous welsh tune called pwt ar y bys, which is the one everyone learns first,

so you are well on the way. you'll make a star of me yet, cerys. what a trip! wales has made me feel well and truly welcome. and that's what's really struck me at every turn during this journey — the openness of the people i've met, their history and their hope for the future. next time, in the final leg of our uk series: christa is in northern ireland where she will take to the skies... try her hand at oyster shucking... and explore one of the country's magnificent natural wonders. incredible. legend has it that it came about because of a fight between two giants.

hello there. monday was drierfor a while across england and wales, but we certainly saw the weather going down hill from the south. this rain here is marching its way northwards across the uk up into northern england and scotland, where already in the past few days in edinburgh, we have had a month's worth of rain. now that early rain is moving away, but this area of low pressure is taking a band of rain — heavy at times — northwards up towards scotland and northern england with blustery showers following to the south. for a while, we will have some unseasonably windy weather along the coast of england all the way from dorset across to suffolk, gusts of 50mph in the morning. it won't be as windy in the afternoon, but there

will be some heavy showers around, and we have still got this more persistent rain, never really clearing away from northern england, pushing into eastern scotland. elsewhere, some brightness and maybe some sunshine. the showers are never too far away, and they may well be heavy as well. generally, temperatures a bit lower on tuesday, 18—19 typically, could be chillier than that where it stays wet in northern england and eastern scotland. and as we have seen, there are some showers around, they could well affect wimbledon once again. it's going to be another day where we may well have the covers on and off. those showers will probably tend to ease off though during the evening and into the night. more places become dry, still got some wetter weather towards the north—east of scotland. the breeze tends to ease down a little bit, and we will find temperatures typically again around 12—13 degrees. now, it's low pressure that's brought all the rain over recent days, in the centre of the low pressure, by the time we get to wednesday, it's close

to the north—east of scotland. so there's more cloud rolling in here and some patchy rain around, too. elsewhere, there may well be some sunshine, but we are going to find showers breaking out, and those could turn heavy and thundery come the afternoon, particularly across wales, the midlands, across to lincolnshire as well. temperatures may be a notch higher on friday, still no better than 20—21 celsius. let's end with a glimmer of hope, because the low pressure is trying to move away. this is where high—pressure is, dry weather, and this is trying to nudge up from the south—west across the uk. so during thursday and friday, the winds won't be as strong, and for more places, it will be dry. some sunshine, although still rather cloudy for scotland and northern ireland. temperatures should be a little bit higher.

welcome to bbc news. i'm david eades. our top stories: the taliban take advantage, with us troops pulling out of afghanistan, they seize more districts, while 1,000 afghan soldiers are said to have fled the country. in england the prime minister confirms plans to scrap most remaining covid restrictions — despite a sharp rise in coronavirus cases. a russian gang behind a huge global cyber attack demands seventy million dollars in ransom from dozens of companies. and the british teenager emma raducanu's wimbledon journey ends abruptly as she pulls out on medical grounds in the fourth round.