welcome to newsday. reporting live from singapore, i'm karishma vaswani. the headlines: warnings of a "heat apocalypse" in europe as fires and now drought menace the continent. up in the woods, you can see guys tackling the fires. there's a huge amount of activity down here and it is hot, it is smoky. just look at the haze in the trees. in the uk, the worst is yet to come. tuesday could be the hottest day since records began. a chinese film—maker appears in court in malawi charged with child exploitation, following an investigation by the bbc, and the sentencing phase of the trial of florida school shooter begins — nikolas cruz pleaded guilty

to gunning down 17 people at his former high school. live from our studio in singapore, this is bbc news. it's newsday. welcome to bbc news — broadcasting to viewers in the uk and around the world. it's 7am in the morning in singapore and 1am in western france, which is facing a "heat apocalypse", experts have warned, as extreme temperatures continue to hit much of europe. they say temperatures could reach record levels in 15 regions of the southwest, with firefighters battling wildfires and thousands forced to evacuate. wildfires in spain, portugal and greece have forced thousands more to flee. our europe correspondent jessica parker has the latest.

into the forest and the front line of an exhausting battle, and one that, today, we were given special access to. up in the woods, you can see guys tackling the fires. there's a huge amount of activity down here, and it is hot, it is smoky. just look at the haze in the trees. the smoke thickens the further in we go — the flames suddenly all too apparent. translation: the fire | rekindles in many places. we have to be very careful in these conditions. we're in a pine forest. the vegetation is so dry here, and with the temperatures, the fire reaches the top of the trees very quickly. flames reach up to 80 metres high. along here, we were due to reach an evacuated campsite by the coast, but we never got there. things were getting worse. you could see it on the ground and in the sky.

water bombers, one after the other, flying over our heads. they never stop here. they can't. but soon, we — along with others — are told it's time to leave. back on the main road, the thousands of evacuations were plain to see. smoke means, for many, it's just not safe to stay. here at this centre, you can at least take a moment, cool down. translation: it was - very smoky this morning. it's very bad for the lungs. i knew there were problems coming, so i prepared a grab bag. even the medications for my dogs were ready to go. for some, it's a matter of frantic phone calls to find a place to sleep tonight. who knows when they'll get to go home? it can be in a few days, it can be in a few weeks.

it's very difficult now to say. but we'll try to make people come back to their house as soon as possible. france's wildfires seen from above are an alarming sight. winds and over 40—degree heat made for a destructive mix today. temperatures are set to drop tomorrow, and for these men, that can't come soon enough. jessica parker, bbc news, in gironde. well, you've seen the situation in france and other parts of europe. let's take you to the uk now, which has had one of its warmest days on record, with a high of 38.1 degrees celsius. it's thought it might be 41 degrees celsius on tuesday — hotter even than parts of asia right now. our correspondent daniela relph has more. keeping cool any way possible. normal everyday life has had its challenges today. in central london, some still braved an open top bus tour, while others coped with the intense city heat in a more traditional way.

we've had ice pops, we've had ice creams, we've had slushies, we've had smoothies. so...a fairfew drinks. we've just taken on plenty of water, staying in the shade as much as we can, and just making sure to... and having a wee dip. and having a wee dip, keeping the fluids up, so... we've got a lot of water inside and i've been giving it to them, pouring it on your head, you know, trying to make sure that they're active to be able to go around the city. engineers have been fixing the runway at luton airport where heat caused surface damage. flights have now resumed after being suspended this afternoon. the parched landscapes of southern and eastern england vividly tell the story of this heat wave. the ground in cambridge dry and brittle, as the weather takes its toll. and these conditions come with risks.

a 16—year—old lost his life here on bray lake near maidenhead in berkshire. he is the fourth person to die in recent days after getting into difficulty in open water. this evening, another teenager is missing in the river thames at richmond in surrey. there's a particular message, particularly for the teenagers children, some of those who may be tempted to go for a swim. there's significant dangers of that. quite often, when people go swimming in rivers when we have very hot weather. for many, today has been about shifting the usual routine. this building site in dagenham in essex limited the amount of time teams worked outside. over in the middle east, whether that be dubai or anywhere else, buildings are built. no—one stops because of the sun. if anything, we'd rather work in these conditions than when it's raining. and did you ever think of not working today? and we gave the option for people not to work and not to come in this week and next week. and everybody says no, of course not, the weather is not going to phase us.

building work still has to happen and it's not going to make a difference. so here we are. the prince of wales and duchess of cornwall experienced the high temperatures on a visit to cornwall. the prince used a speech to reinforce his long term interest in tackling climate change. if i may say so, these commitments around net zero have never been more vitally important as we all swelter under today's alarming record temperatures across britain and europe. and as i've tried to indicate for quite some time, the climate crisis really is a genuine emergency. 7.00 this evening — the seafront in hove was undergoing its own version of rush hour. packed beaches, taking advantage of some end—of—day sunshine, as we all try to find our own ways of managing in these extreme temperatures. daniela relph, bbc news. there have been warnings that extreme temperatures will happen more regularly because of climate change. periods of intense heat do occur within natural weather

patterns, but scientists say they are becoming more frequent, more intense and are lasting longer, as our climate correspondent jonah fisher reports. the livestock at the royal welsh show have been given fans and extra ventilation to help get them through the hot weather. despite record temperatures being predicted for mid—wales, organisers have decided to stay open and they're expecting several hundred thousand people. i think we've been slightly overtaken by a bit of a nanny state on this one, but that's my own view. we've got extra shaded areas. we may have to change judging times a little bit, depending on whatever happens. but the show will go on. the advice for the next couple of days is, if you can, change your plans. but it's important to understand that this isn't a one—off, a freak weather event. it's something that we are going to have to get used to. for as long as our emissions continue to warm the planet, and at the moment temperatures

are rising by 0.25 degrees every ten years, heat waves like this one are going to become more frequent and more intense. this particular hot weather system has made its way north from southern europe, where it has led to temperatures in the mid—40s and devastating forest fires. climate change scientists say it will be no surprise to them if temperature records are broken across the uk. heatwaves is one of the clearest signs in extreme weather of human influence on climate. it's one of the extreme weather events we can be most confident about are being affected by rising global temperature. is it too late for us to turn this around? it's absolutely not too late, because future warming is determined by future emissions. if we stop dumping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, the world will stop warming. it's that simple.

but rapid action to cut emissions has not proved simple politically. this heatwave is an uncomfortable reminder of how much still needs to be done. jonah fisher, bbc news. i want to tell you about another story now — one that our colleagues at the bbc africa eye service have been investigating with dramatic consequences. a chinese film—maker has appeared in court in malawi charged with child exploitation. this is the moment he was confronted by the bbc team, which documented how he had used local children to film personalised greetings, some of which included racist content. earlier, i spoke to our reporter azadeh moshiri, who has been looking into the amazing journalism that the bbc africa eye team did in order to get to this point. it was thanks to the journalism of our colleagues at bbc africa eye. these colleagues noticed that, online, on chinese social media, there were some videos that were popping up of children in africa that were becoming very popular. it was children singing content in chinese. often times, it could

be quite innocent — things like personal greetings, birthdays, holiday chants — but sometimes that content involved racist language and sometimes racist language about themselves. and clearly these children didn't necessarily know what they were chanting, given it wasn't their own language, and so that's when our colleagues decided to trace exactly what the source of these videos were. we had one colleague doing this investigation using data journalism tools within china and another who was doing on—the—ground reporting in malawi, to trace exactly where these videos were coming from and who was behind it. azadeh, fascinating stuff, particularly given the fact that the tools that they used, as you described, really allowed them to get a sense of what was happening. just talk us through what the implications of this investigation have been. some of the big issues here were that these videos were going for as much as $70 apiece online and they were

becoming widely shared, and so when this investigation came out, there was obviously a lot of discontent within malawi, especially within the communities who were affected, because of the fact that these children were being put in this position. and so the government in malawi launched their own probe in june and the attorney general of malawi confirmed to the bbc that a man, a chinese film—maker and a malawi resident who denies that he had any involvement with these videos, fled malawi, was then arrested for entering illegally in zambia and was then extradited back to malawi a few days ago. and as you mentioned, he's now appeared in court and was charged with five counts of trafficking in persons. though state prosecutors have said that their own investigation is ongoing and that more charges could be filed in the next two weeks. but this has also had a big consequence within china. the chinese embassy within malawi apologise on behalf of the government

and said that they have zero tolerance for racism. and the chinese government insisted that they would take action to clampdown on this sort of online content. and it also meant that some popular sites, social media sites, within china have said that they're going to take further action to try to prevent this sort of content circulating online. azadeh moshiri there talking us through that bbc africa eye investigation, and if you're interested in more on that, lots more on our website. as azadeh was describing, really quite remarkable. you're watching newsday on the bbc. still to come on the programme: how to stay cool in a heatwave. we give you some tips on how to stay safe during these soaring temperatures. coming down the ladder now. that's one small step for man,

one giant leap for mankind. a catastrophic engine fire is being blamed tonight for the first crash in the 30—year history of concorde, the world's only supersonic airliner. it was one of the most vivid symbols of violence and hatred that tore apart the state of yugoslavia, but now, a decade later, it's been painstakingly rebuilt and opens again today. there's been a 50% decrease in sperm quantity and an increasej in malfunctioning sperml unable to swim properly. thousands of households across the country are suspiciously quiet this lunchtime, as children bury their noses in the final instalment of harry potter.

this is newsday on the bbc. i'm karishma vaswani in singapore. 0ur headlines: warnings of a "heat apocalypse", as a blistering heatwave engulfs much of europe, with wildfires spreading in many countries. the intense heatwave is affecting most of the uk, where tuesday could be the hottest day since records began. moving away from that heatwave story to monkeypox now, which has been detected in close to 70 countries around the world. confirmed cases in the us have topped more than 1,800, although the true number is believed to be higher. health officials have been unable to meet the increased demand for vaccines in places such as new york city, which is the epicentre of the outbreak in the us. harvard medical school professor dr ali raja told us more.

and the fact is that every day in the emergency department, i have patients who come in and, given our experience with covid, they already have a predilection to being answered about infectious diseases. i get asked every day, how worried should we be about monkeypox? the fact is, we need to be aware of the disease so that we are on the lookout for it. if we have patients, if they have family members who have a few days of fever and lethargy and muscle aches and then develop that characteristic rash, we need to make sure they are then quarantined and that they contact their doctors to arrange for testing. so we all need to be aware of it, but is not sitting at a rate that we need to be very concerned about and, as you just mentioned it has a case fertility rate that is exceptionally no, ——? tell it rate. what we know about monkeypox is it requires some

direct contact to spread. it is probably not in the air, so that we know that it is spread by social networks, it allows for context racing and for vaccination of those networks around a close contact —— contact tracing. i don't mean to downplay the risk at all, but it is much more containable than something like covid is. we have a large stockpile of vaccine, tens of millions of doses, but it is not really enough to vaccinate the entire country, and the primary vaccine we are using as an order -- is in —— is in order vaccine that has significant side effect for some people, so the key to vaccines is using it strategically, using it for people in direct contact with known cases monkeypox or someone with a high risk of monkeypox being in their social network. and if we use it surgically like that, and, remember, it is notjust one dose, the cdc recommends two doses 22 days apart we can

hopefully vaccinate the at risk populations that are in the social groups that are getting monkeypox right now, to contain it as quickly as possible, and for the run—of—the—mill patient who does not know anybody who has monkeypox, has not been in contact, is not a high risk, we don't need to vaccinate that population just yet. that was harvard medical school professor dr ali raja, speaking to us a little earlier about the risk associated with monkeypox and the challenges in that increased demand for vaccines. if you want to get in touch with me about any of the stories on newsday so far, the situation in the united states or wherever you are, i'm on twitter — @bbckarishma i'm looking forward to hearing from you. let's take a look at some other stories in the headlines. at least 20 people, most of them women and children who did not know how to swim, died when their boat capsized in the indus river in central pakistan.

the overloaded vessel was ferrying more than 100 members of an extended family to a wedding. the bridegroom was among those who were rescued. it's not clear if the bride survived. in the uk, four candidates remain in the conservative leadership race to replace borisjohnson as prime minister. tom tugendhat was eliminated in the latest round of voting. of the four that remain, the former chancellor rishi sunak tops the polls, followed by penny mordaunt. a final two will be whittled down by wednesday, before conservative party members decide the winner. in the us, thejury selection has begun in the trial of steve bannon — the former close aide to donald trump. he faces charges of criminal contempt of congress for refusing to cooperate with the investigation into the storming of the capitol by trump supporters last year. sri lanka's acting president, ranil wickremesinghe, has said the country's negotiations with the international monetary fund over an emergency bailout are nearing conclusion. there has been no comment yet from the imf. parliament is scheduled to elect a new president

on wednesday. protesters are against mr wickremesinghe, who they consider to be too close to the family of the former president, gotabaya rajapaksa. well, to the us now, where the trial for school shooter nikolas cruz — who gunned down 17 people at his former high school in parkland, florida — has begun. this is a rare instance of a mass shooter facing a jury, as they often either take their own lives or are killed by police. it is being held to determine his sentence, whether to be executed or imprisoned for life without parole. 0ur north america correspondent barbara plett usher told us more about this case. it was a very horrific case in 2018, on valentine's day, at the parkland school in florida. nikolas cruz entered the school through an unlocked door, heavily armed with a high—powered rifle, and he started a rampage in the hallways of some of the classrooms.

he killed 17 people — 1a students and three teachers — and he injured 17 as well and, in fact, went back several times to students that he had shot and shot them again to make sure they were dead, so a particularly brutal execution of a mass shooting. he was captured shortly after he left the school. he had managed to blend in with students, but he was picked up, and eventually he pleaded guilty. the facts were quite clear. surveillance cameras had picked him up on their images and he was recognised by witnesses, so he pleaded guilty last fall, but the trial now is about whether he will face the death penalty, as you said, or whether he will get life without parole. so, the opening statement of the prosecutor basically tried to recreate the terror of the day. he went through the timeline of what happened, he named each of the victims that were killed — their names, their ages, how many times they were shot. he emphasised those times

when the defendant went back and shot his victims again. this is something that would be needed as evidence to prove the sort of aggravating factors or heinous crime elements of the accusations, in order to warrant the death penalty. there are family members in the courtroom, about 50 people sitting there listening to this. it's been a very difficult morning for them, very heavy atmosphere. some of them broke down, many of them sort of closed their eyes or looked shaken. one of them had to leave the classroom. so we're going to be facing a number of months, really, of testimony that's going to bring to life these very terrible days, bring back to life these very terrible days for the families who have lost their loved ones. that was barbara plett usher there, reporting on a story for us. well, before we go, a return to our top story on that intense heatwave in europe. here in asia, coping with extreme heat is something everyone learns. but for the others, though, it's more of a novelty.

0ur medical editor fergus walsh has some tips. the uk simply isn't used to this and nor are our bodies. oh, its warm in here, isn't it? this is the heat chamber at st mary's university, twickenham. that is warm. it's been used by sporting greats like andy murray and max verstappen. but even an amateur like me can show how heat affects our physiology. as my core body temperature starts to creep up, blood vessels near the surface of the skin open up, pushing heat to the surface, trying always to keep that core body temperature on an even keel. that can mean a drop in blood pressure as the heart works harder. now, another key way in which my body regulates its core temperature is through sweat. that's why dehydration can quickly become a problem. working out in this heat is not recommended, but staying fit

all year round is. people who regularly exercise are regularly experiencing higher body temperatures internally because you produce a lot of heat when you exercise. so then that leads to better preparation for these heatwaves. the elderly and those with heart and lung conditions are most at risk from extreme heat, but even the young and fit can feel the effects. too long in the sun can lead to heat exhaustion. symptoms include headache, dizziness, nausea, heavy sweating and pale, clammy skin. left untreated, it can progress to heat stroke, a medical emergency. this whole area is in the sun the whole time. stjohn ambulance are a familiar sight at public events in all weathers, on hand to offer help and advice. so what should you do if you come across someone with heat exhaustion?

you want to bring them out of direct sunlight, somewhere cool where they can lie down, raise their legs, encouraging blood flow back to the brain. hydrate them as much as possible with clear fluids, so water. and if they're not recovering in about 30 minutes, we'd recommend phoning 111. and the health advice is simple — stay in the shade, drink water, use sunscreen and keep an eye on the vulnerable. fergus walsh, bbc news. lots more on our web site about that for you — including this piece about how to keep cool in a heatwave — with lots of your questions answered about things like whether you should go to work when it's so hot or how best to find a way to get some rest and sleep. it's a very useful piece of information. lots of advice there for you. that's on bbc.com/news or simply download the bbc news app. that is, of course, if you've done already. that is it from

us on newsday. goodbye for me and the team. do stay with bbc news for the latest global headline. hello there. monday's heat was extraordinary, not least because it covered a really wide area. 38.2 celsius the highest temperature recorded at santon downham in suffolk, very close to the all—time uk record. jersey had its hottest day on record. wales had its hottest day on record as well, and with this met office red warning for extreme heat still in force through tuesday, some places could see temperatures get even higher than that. because we start tuesday morning in a wedge of exceptionally hot air. this is actually the air overhead. the hottest it will have been throughout the whole of this heatwave period. so as the sun gets to work on that, after starting temperatures like these, well, those values will really start to rise very quickly

as we go through the morning where we hold onto sunshine. most of us will have a sunny start. the further east you are, you can expect to keep sunshine through into the afternoon, potentially one or two showers, but for northern ireland, for wales, the southwest of england, we are going to see more cloud, maybe some showers and thunderstorms working in here, cloud bringing some rain into western parts of scotland as well. for western parts, a little bit cooler than it has been, but for the east, still some extremely high temperatures. maybe middle 30s across parts of southern scotland. and for some of these central and eastern parts of england, temperatures could climb to 40—112 celsius. so that would be unprecedented. through tuesday night, we will see some rain across northern scotland and some showers and thunderstorms elsewhere. it starts to turn a little bit fresher from the west, so by the end of the night, temperatures in glasgow and belfast will be around 1a degrees. still very warm across central and eastern parts of england, still in the midst of this very warm air. but we do see these cooler conditions pushing

in from the west as we get into wednesday. so a different feel to the weather on wednesday. we will see some showers around, maybe some thunderstorms popping up, perhaps most especially across central and eastern parts of england as we go through the afternoon. some spells of sunshine as well, but temperatures much lower. still 28—29 celsius across eastern england, more like 19 celsius for northern ireland and the western side of scotland. we stick with those cooler conditions for the rest of the week. there will be some sunny spells, but some bursts of rain bursts of rain at times. some of that rain could be heavy, possibly thundery. bye for now.

this is bbc news. we will have the headlines and all the main news stories for you at the top of the hour as newsday continues straight after hardtalk. welcome to hardtalk with me, sarah montague. my guest today is a hugely successful afrobeat star. the nigerian 0mah lay is just 25, but he's broken into western markets, partly because of a collaboration with the canadian singerjustin bieber. he's here in london on a world tour now. afrobeats emerged from afrobeat, political music,

a way to address social change that was pioneered by