whether to pursue a diplomatic approach to ukraine, or one of confrontation. jens stoltenberg also dismissed suggestions from ukraine that western allies had over—reacted to the crisis. russia's foreign minister, sergei lavrov, says moscow wants equal, mutually respectful relations with the united states and other countries — but added moscow didn't want to remain in a position where its security is infringed daily. manchester united footballer mason greenwood has been arrested on suspicion of rape and assault following allegations on social media. manchester police have confirmed he's in custody for questioning and inquiries are ongoing. rafael nadal has claimed a record 21st grand slam men's tennis title with his victory in the australian open final. he came from two sets down to beat daniil medvedev of russia. now on bbc news...yalda hakim travels back to afghanistan to find

out what the country is like under taliban rule. last year, after 20 years of war, the taliban retook afghanistan. over 100,000 people fled. now, with access to the new taliban government, i want to find out what the country is like under their rule. they face a country shattered by war. the economy is close to collapse and millions face starvation. every baby and child in here is in a critical state and we just don't know if they are going to make it. and this one—time terrorist group now faces a new terror threat of its own.

can the taliban form a government that can put their violent past behind them and help rebuild this broken country? the last time i was in afghanistan, it was two months before the taliban took kabul. almost everyone i met then — members of the former government, human rights activist and journalists — have since led the country in fear of reprisals from the new taliban government. with routes into the country beginning to reopen, i decided to head back to afghanistan to see for myself what life was like for those who stayed behind. i had arranged to meet the dosts. they'd both lost their teaching jobs when the taliban took over. they are now living off their savings.

a month before we met, this dost family organised a protest against the restrictions on girls' education imposed by the taliban. they invited everyone they knew, but on the day, they were the only ones to show up.

i was struck by the risks this family were willing to take to demand an education for their daughter. under the previous government, girls receiving an education and women working had become the norm in kabul, but there are parts of afghanistan where things were very different. i travelled 500km to kandahar, in the south of the country. it has always been seen as the conservative heartland of the taliban.

me walking around here would have felt unimaginable a few months ago. and now, late in the afternoon as the sun's setting, we are out and about, walking around quite freely. it's clearly a different place, a different time — and a different country. but despite the surprising calm on the streets, there was a hidden threat here that was worsening by the day. widespread drought and economic crisis and sanctions against the taliban have created a situation where an estimated 98% of afghans are going hungry. i went to the paediatric unit of mirwais hospital to see for myself how families here were coping.

everywhere you look in this ward, there is a mother praying and it feels like that's all they have now. every baby and child in here is in a critical state and we just don't know if they are going to make it. like four—year—old munir, many of the patients in the ward were from the rural provinces surrounding kandahar city — areas that have been devastated and cut off by years of conflict. the next day, i drove to sangin, a small village in the south of helmand province. it was one of the most heavily bombarded areas during the war and responsible for more than 10% of daily casualties of the entire nato mission against the taliban.

we have just arrived at the outskirts of sangin and i have meta man who says his home was destroyed by foreign forces. much of this area was carved up by the warring sides with very little regard for the locals. this is where some of the most bitter battles were fought, and there seems to be very little left here standing. most of it is rubble. this building was a three—storey building and it's completely destroyed.

a long way from kabul and a very different story over here — people who genuinely felt occupied by the foreign forces and the former government, and this is what they've left

behind, homes destroyed. and this is the price of freedom that these people say they've had to pay. while i was in sangin, i've met a member of the taliban named abdul karim. he had previously kept his militant activities a secret from his neighbours but was now happy to talk openly.

i was shocked by abdul�*s admission that even local children had participated in the taliban's fight. but he was determined to demonstrate just how instrumental these tactics were against the foreign forces.

despite all the destruction and poverty in this region, there has been one constant. helmand's poppy fields have provided a vital source of income for impoverished fighters and the taliban. afghanistan controls approximately 80% of the world's opium and for the last two decades, there has been a lot of talk about eradicating these fields. but it seems that these farmers have been working and operating as normal.

the afghan opium market is worth an estimated $4 billion a year. shutting down these farms is clearly not an economic reality for the taliban.

poverty and hunger is now affecting nearly everyone in afghanistan. there is a increasing concern that terrorist groups are using this to recruit and to challenge the new found authority of the taliban. isis in the khorasan, also known as isis—k, are the regional affiliate of the islamic state. during the taliban takeover, thousands of isis militants escaped from jail, swelling the ranks of the terror group. i received news that an isis operative had detonated a suicide vest in a clash with the taliban police. we have been called here by the taliban police who wanted to show us an isis sleeper cell that they recently attacked.

so, what happened here? do you have reports of who they were and what their background is?

despite the assurances of abdul karim, a string of deadly isis attacks have erupted across afghanistan in recent months, many

targeting ethnic shias. one of the most devastating was a suicide bombing of a shia mosque in october that claimed the lives of 50 worshippers. one who lost his life was haji.

as well as attacks from isis—k, members of afghanistan's shia minority have a right to be wary of the taliban as they were heavily persecuted by the regime of the �*90s. after spending time with the kasemi family, i wanted to put some questions to the new taliban police governor for the province. upon arrival at his office, he was in the middle of receiving requests from members of the community.

a lot of the people coming to petition commander mawlawi seemed to be taliban fighters. i wanted to press him on whether he was also committed to protecting the interests of other communities in kandahar. so you can guarantee to the shia community here in kandahar that they will be safe, but they can go to their mosques, that they can worship without being targeted? what about the bomb that went off at the shia mosque?

there's been so much bloodshed over the last 20 years and the people now in charge were the ones terrorising the citizens of this province and this city. it's difficult to know how people will come together and how there will be some form of reconciliation now. during my time in afghanistan, i'd been trying to reach members of the former afghan police force — a community that had every reason to fear a taliban takeover. none of them would meet me in person but eventually, i got through to a police officer who had been in hiding since the collapse of the government. hello?

what i found during my time here in afghanistan is that this is a nation that is very much divided. there are those who are in the rural communities in sangin who feel they were ignored for the last two decades and then, there are those who are living in hiding, living in fear, concerned about the taliban sweeping back to power and what that actually means for their future. the harsh winter is now setting in and famine is afflicting millions of afghans. this will require more than the healing of divisions to solve. billions of assets are frozen abroad and sanctions on the new regime are biting hard. the afghan economy

is close to collapse. if the taliban cannot find a way to feed the citizens they now represent, they will struggle to even begin the process of rebuilding the country. hello. if you wanted to sum up the weather for the week ahead in just one word,

windy would do it. on saturday we saw the storm producing scenes like these across the north of britain and ahead, the wind will be a notable feature but monday potentially bringing some of the strongest of winds thanks to storm corrie which has been deepening in the atlantic approaching the north of scotland through sunday. this mass of cloud pulling away from the north—east of the us, the north—easter produced the snow and produced the winds and the remnants of the storm could brew up another area of pressure, and it looks like it will at the moment heading this way later in the week. here goes storm corrie as we go into monday, diving its way south across the north sea into the low countries. there will be a strong north—westerly wind following on behind that storm, still with the risk of damage and disruption, certainly into the early part of monday, for the north of scotland and then into the middle of the day along the north sea coast. high tides with the winds and a risk of

coastal flooding. quite a bit of sunshine, windy day for everyone, feeling chilly, between five and 9 degrees as our house. overnight in some areas, temperatures may even go up as this cloud pulls in and pulls in milder air from the atlantic. it will be a murky start across southern britain, clear sky further north, but 5 degrees on monday daytime and in aberdeen just four by the end of the night and further south, between five and 7 degrees, milder areas for tuesday, there is the pocket of milder air. even into the middle of the week, there is the milder air that went south, fronts trying to sink south about this area of high pressure bringing a lot of the rain, by the time they get into the south of britain. tuesday and wednesday, best summarised by a couple of days bringing generous amounts of cloud, brighter to the north later on, on tuesday, then wednesday another fairly big mass of cloud coming i from the atlantic.

not producing much rain, the best chance of that would probably be across scotland. further south, gloomy skies but it stays dry, it is windy, the wind is light on wednesday and temperatures on the mild side 12 or 13 degrees. remember the area of low pressure? it looks like later in the week heading to scandinavia, trailing a cold front south on thursday and friday, moving back into much colder air to finish off the week. this front, possibly the best chance of seening rain in the south of britain overnight into friday but it will be pretty scant, friday dry to the south, frequent showers on the north—westerly wind in the north and west of scotland and they do look like they will be wintry. again, windy for the end of the week, turning colder, most notably on friday, with the arrival of the winds and wintry showers. most interestingly is the rainfall accumulations for the week ahead, the totals for the next

five days, to the south of the uk, for quite a few areas, there is no rain in our forecast. more significant accumulations in the north and west, but it may turn out that this january ends up being one of the driest on record. we will keep you up to date.