welcome to bbc news. i'm david willis. our top stories: direct, in—depth, and straightforward: the white house's assessment of a marathon phone call between president biden and his chinese counterpart xi jinping in which taiwan was the main focus. on the frontline in ukraine where western weapons are said to be making the difference against the russian invaders. let the games commence: 5,000 athletes from around the world are in birmingahm in central england for the start of the commonwealth games. and the return of the tiger: why nepal kept its promise to double its numbers

in the last decade. president biden has spent more than two hours on the phone with his chinese counterpart, xijinping. the two leaders both issued warnings about taiwan, which has once again emerged as a key point of tension, following reports of a possible visit there by the us house speaker nancy pelosi. although the visit hasn't been confirmed, mr biden told mr xi that washington �*strongly opposed' any unilateral moves that would change the island's status, or undermine stability across the taiwan straits. president xi said: joe biden responded to that

by saying, "0n taiwan, the us policy has not changed." so where does that leave us? with an assessment of that phone call, here's the bbc�*s barbara plett usher in washington. the chinese are pretty blunt about their position on taiwan and that readout said that xijinping had emphasised that position, which is that taiwan is part of china and there is no room for taiwanese independence, that he had told president biden that they should stick with the one china policy. that means basically that washington recognises that there is only one chinese government and that it is in beijing, but it only acknowledges china's position on taiwan and it says that the status of taiwan should not be decided by force and there had been some question for some time about whether those goalposts were shifting. chinese were wondering, there was some confusion about whether the us policy was changing and then the trip

that nancy pelosi may or may not take at this point sort of added fuel to the fire because she is a very senior member, a very senior position as the speaker of the house and she also belongs to the president's party. let's speak with shelley rigger, a brown professor of east asian politics, and recently a fulbright scholar at the national taiwan university in taipei. thank you very much forjoining us on bbc news. i wonder how the people of taiwan may feel about all of this? is there a danger here that nancy pelosi's proposed trip could prove more harmful to the people of taiwan than to us— china relations? yes. this whole controversy is also controversial in taiwan because many people there are eager for the because many people there are

eagerfor the united states and political figures within the united states to show support for taiwan but they also know that they are at the front line, you know? they are the immediate target of beijing's activity and so on the one hand, you know, they appreciate gestures of support like this but on the other hand i think there is a certain understanding that if the us is not careful, taiwan could actually be put in a tight spot. actually be put in a tight sot. , , ., , , actually be put in a tight sot. , , ., spot. is there, perhaps, a decree spot. is there, perhaps, a degree of— spot. is there, perhaps, a degree of cultural - degree of cultural misunderstanding at play here in the sense that it may be difficult to convince the leader of a i—party state that joe biden does not actually have the authority to prevent nancy pelosi from going to taiwan? ,, ., , taiwan? sure. that is definitely _ taiwan? sure. that is definitely part - taiwan? sure. that is definitely part of- taiwan? sure. that is| definitely part of what taiwan? sure. that is i definitely part of what is going on. the prc has a very strict hierarchy and leadership of the chinese communist party

are ranked in order and by that reckoning nancy pelosi is number three after the president and the vice president, the speaker of the houses third in line succession to the presidency. so it is, first of all, difficult for them to believe she is not a very important person and then because she is in president biden �*s party and his close ally in governments they also are having a hard time imagining accepting that she is not collaborating or cooperating and perhaps even taking instruction from him in the decisions she makes. ice the decisions she makes. joe biden has — the decisions she makes. joe biden has had to backtrack more than once, of course, for claims that he has made in support of taiwan. would it be fair to support of taiwan. would it be fairto surmise, do support of taiwan. would it be fair to surmise, do you think, that he did not condone nancy pelosi's proposed trip to taiwan during that telephone conversation with mr xie today? yes. i don't know that they

talk specifically about that, about nancy pelosi's trip but certainly president biden has made it clear that the timing, at least, whether or not a visit by the speaker of the house to taiwan might in other circumstances be a reasonable or positive move it is clear from the white house that the administration does not think the timing of this visit is a good idea. and in his conversation with president xi today, president biden said that us policy toward taiwan has not changed. and i think thatis has not changed. and i think that is a way of saying, you know, if you are perceiving, as we understand, that there are some leadership... speaker policy's visit as some kind of indication that the united states is working to embolden

taiwan, that is a misunderstanding. us policy has not changed. misunderstanding. us policy has not changed-— not changed. thank you very much indeed _ not changed. thank you very much indeed for _ not changed. thank you very much indeed forjoining - not changed. thank you very much indeed forjoining us. | to ukraine now where soldiers on the frontlines are saying that the rate of russia's bombardment of the eastern part of territory has dropped by at least a half — thanks to the arrival of sophisticated western weaponry. is it, though, merely a lull in the fighting, this or a sign that the tide is turning in the conflict? andrew harding sent us this report. the familiar sounds of war thunder across ukraine's front lines. but something is changing here in the donbas. we're rushing to a secret location and a rare rendezvous with a weapon that mightjust be helping to tip the balance in this war. the caesar is a gift from france to ukraine. today, its giant gun

is aiming at a russian target 27 kilometres away. ok, now we have to get out quickly before the russians potentially find our positions and fire back. "these guns are making all the difference," says dmytro, the unit commander. "their range, their accuracy. as a result the russian bombardment has been reduced by half or even by two thirds." and here's the proof. footage of giant russian ammunition stores now being hit far behind the front lines. and ukraine can now target key bridges like this one near the russian—held city of kherson, perhaps the start of a push towards crimea — which all helps to explain this. all quiet, unusually quiet, on this stretch of the eastern front. anothersign, perhaps,

of russia's faltering momentum. just listen to that silence. the point these soldiers keep making to us along the length of this front line is that western weapons really are making a big difference, but not yet a decisive difference. they still need many more if they are to turn the tide against the russians. "it's balanced now 50—50," says colonel yuri bereza. "that's thanks to the artillery the west has sent here, but we're not yet in a position to counterattack. we still need a lot more weapons, or it will be a bloodbath". and it's notjust about equipment. ukraine has lost so many soldiers that it's still struggling to fill the gaps, often with barely trained volunteers. acquiring my sight. they lack the basic soldiering skills that the west is used to. but a good positive is this is their homeland and all 36, 37 of these soldiers seem eager to defend it. you've got to have heart. skill's good,

but heart's great. plenty of heart, then, but still not enough weapons or trained soldiers to be sure of turning the tide. andrew harding, bbc news in eastern ukraine. let's get some of the day's other news. sir christopher meyer, a former uk ambassador to the united states, has died suddenly. it's understood he suffered a stroke at his home in france. sir christopher — who was 78 — was the uk's ambassador in washington prior to the invasion of iraq. the two candidates vying to be the next uk prime minister — liz truss and rishi sunak — have taken part in the first official hustings with conservative party members. the event in the northern city of leeds was the first of 12 to be held over the next few weeks. the governor of the american

state of kentucky says flash floods — caused by torrential rains — have killed eight people, including a woman aged 81. andy beshear described the floods, which have hit areas in the appalachian mountains, as "historic and ongoing", and said he feared further deaths as several people were missing. gareth barlow has more. this is the power of the floods in kentucky. whole homes ripped from their foundations. everything is gone. my whole life is gone. it was over my head so it was scary. figs life is gone. it was over my head so it was scary. as the waters rose _ head so it was scary. as the waters rose residents - head so it was scary. as the l waters rose residents rushed head so it was scary. as the - waters rose residents rushed to rooftops, some airlifted to safety. rooftops, some airlifted to safe . y , rooftops, some airlifted to safe . g , ., , safety. my mum is there and she has parkinson's _ safety. my mum is there and she has parkinson's and _ safety. my mum is there and she has parkinson's and we _ safety. my mum is there and she has parkinson's and we had - safety. my mum is there and she has parkinson's and we had to i has parkinson's and we had to worry about getting her upstairs. worry about getting her

upstate— worry about getting her u stairs. ~ ., upstairs. with further rain forecast _ upstairs. with further rain forecast the _ upstairs. with further rain forecast the state's - upstairs. with further rain i forecast the state's governor declared a state of emergency in six counties, mobilising the national guard. with offices using boats to rescue stranded residents. using boats to rescue stranded residents-_ residents. the situation right now is difficult. _ residents. the situation right now is difficult. we - residents. the situation right now is difficult. we have - residents. the situation right now is difficult. we have a i residents. the situation right| now is difficult. we have a lot of people in eastern kentucky on top of a roof waiting to be rescued. there are a number of people who are unaccounted for and i am nearly certain this is and i am nearly certain this is a situation where we are going to lose some of them.- a situation where we are going to lose some of them. dozens of --eole to lose some of them. dozens of peeple have _ to lose some of them. dozens of people have been _ to lose some of them. dozens of people have been rescued - to lose some of them. dozens of people have been rescued and i people have been rescued and tens of thousands remain without power. the white house says the president has been briefed on the situation which is also seeing severe flooding and mudslides in neighbouring virginia and west virginia. irate virginia and west virginia. we had no virginia and west virginia. - had no time to get nothing out of my little apartment in the basement. i lost everything. this makes twice that i have lost everything.— this makes twice that i have lost everything. many parts of kentucky's — lost everything. many parts of kentucky's still _ lost everything. many parts of kentucky's still struggling - kentucky's still struggling after being hit by tornadoes

last year and this latest extreme weather is a reminder of the deadly impact of our changing climate. sorry scenes there in kentucky. stay with us on bbc news. still to come: a rare dinosaur skeleton sells at auction in the us for $6 million. he's a relative of the infamous t—rex, but faster and with a stronger bite. cheering. the us space agency, nasa, has ordered an investigation, after confirmation today that astronauts were cleared to fly while drunk. the last foot patrol in south armagh, once an everyday part of the soldier's lot,

drudgery and danger, now no more after almost four decades. if one is on one's own, in a private house, - not doing any harm to anyone, i don't really see why i all these people should wander in and say, _ "you're doing something wrong". six rare white lion cubs on the prowl at a worcestershire wildlife park, and have already been met with a roar of approval from visitors. they are lovely and sweet, yeah, they're cute. this is bbc news. the latest headlines: president xi warnsjoe biden against disregarding the one—china principle over taiwan in a marathon two hour phone call. ukrainian soldiers say western weapons are making the difference against

the russian invaders. sport now, and the 22nd commonwealth games are finally underway. the opening ceremony took place on thursday evening in the english city of birmingham, and friday will see the sporting events commence. the commonwealth is made up of nations and territories that used to be part of the british empire. the bbc�*s tim allman reports. there comes a moment in any sporting event where the preparations end and the competition begins. for birmingham, that moment was now. spectators lining up outside the city's alexander stadium, as diverse and multicultural as the games itself. we are so, so, so excited. we got it all to ourselves. i think for us, it's one of those where we all unite, especially as english—speaking countries, and we show our talent. well, it's a very different

group of people around the world to meet and join in together. in effect, it's a big broad family who enjoy each other's company and learn a lot from each other. the opening ceremony was the usual eclectic mix of a spectacular and the slightly bizarre, honouring birmingham's one—time role as the workshop of the world and the home of the british car industry. at one point, a ginormous bull made of aluminium and steel entered the arena, an animal that has long been associated with the city. the real stars of the show of course are the athletes, and soon they made their presence felt. more than 5,000 of them, from dozens of different nations and territories, in asia, africa and elsewhere. the queen's baton was then brought into the stadium, 0lympic gold—medallist tom daly among those doing the honours. prince charles, representing the queen, read out a message on her behalf where she paid tribute to the rich diversity

and unity of the commonwealth. the games were officially open and to celebrate, there were fireworks, lots of fireworks and a performance from local favourites duran duran. # and as i try to make my way # through the ordinary world...# they finished with their song 0rdinary world, the organisers hoping these games will be anything but. tim allman, bbc news. the bbc�*s jane dougall is in birmingham, and she has this preview of what we can expect on day one of the sporting events. there has been a party going on here in victoria square as people gather to celebrate the opening of the commonwealth games in birmingham. representatives of 72 territories and nations around the globe will be taking part with 6500 athletes and officials all descending

here on birmingham ahead of the events. it's going to be the biggest sporting programme in commonwealth games history, with new sports being added including women's twenty20 cricket, three on three basketball and mixed synchronised swimming. the events begin on friday and they are the most inclusive to date, with a record 42 para—sports be running concurrently at the games. and more medals will be available for the women than the men for the first time ever. 16 gold medals up for grabs today, the first of which is the men's and women's triathlon, then the men's gymnastics team final and in the afternoon, the track cycling. significantly more than 1.2 million tickets have already been sold for these games, making them the best attended yet.

and good luck to all of those taking part. a rare dinosaur skeleton has sold at auction in the us forjust over $6 million. he's a relative of the infamous t—rex, but faster and with a stronger bite. i asked gregory erickson, a dinosaur paleobiologist at florida state university, whether he was disappointed that the dinosaur had gone to a private buyer. as a scientist, i think i can speak on behalf of every vertebrate palaeontologist. anytime you have a vertebrate fossil, particularly this one, which is obviously a very exciting specimen, it's sort of robbing us of intellectual property, so unfortunately, a specimen like this gets into private hands, we have to ignore it as if it doesn't exist. we can't publish on it,

we can't do anything, so in a perfect world, this person would donate it to an accredited museum but as far as we are concerned, it went into a black hole. given the fact that dinosaur skeletons continue to, what, rake up millions of dollars at auctions, it's likely to have priced people like yourself, scientists, museums, out of the market, isn't it? yes, we don't have bribe money to get onto ranchers' lands. we reallyjust don't have the facilities to pay for these fossils, and going back to the 1800s, the 1850s, there were fossils collected by private parties, that museums paid for, but what happened is, in the 1980s and early �*90s particularly, the price of these things just

went crazy, and we just, there is no way to, you know — we don't have millions of dollars to buy fossils. museums don't. as a professor, we don't have any money to pay for anything. it used to be typically we would go onto ranchers' lands and we would dig up these things forfree. we never made any money off them either. now they have monetary value, and in america unfortunately, or the us, i should say, if it's on private land, it is like mineral rights, or water rights, whatever, it's your property, and so this is a legal specimen, so i'm ok with part of that but it's the way we are. had these remains been found across the border in alberta, canada, they would have automatically become public property, as i understand? that is correct as far as i understand. yes, any vertebrate fossil

found in canada belongs to the government. a lot of countries have similar laws. mongolia, china, peru, morocco, most countries have that, it's not the way it is in the united states. there were some high—profile fossils which were illegally collected, so in this case, it followed legal challenges. iam0k i am ok with that. i like to hope that whoever purchases this thing would try to make it available to scientists and maybe ultimately give it to a museum. let's turn to nepal now, where tigers are making a roaring comeback. the small himalayan nation is the first country to keep a promise to double its wild tiger population in the last decade. what's behind the success? from nepal, rebecca

henschke reports. tigers have more than doubled in number in the last ten years here in nepal. it's a victory in a battle to bring them back from the brink of extinction. one of the key factors of nepal's success has been strong enforcement against poaching, and that's involved the military. armed units like this one patrol across the park daily. tigers are the majestic creatures, you know? being assigned in the protection duties, it's an honour, you know, it's a privilege to be part of something that is really big. these forests where tigers are now being protected, used to be royal hunting grounds. archive: this is a land whose | people have always lived under the menace of marauding tigers. when queen elizabeth visited nepal in 1961, she took part in a tiger hunt. and yes, there was the tiger! king mahendra had fulfilled

a time—honoured obligation of a host in nepal and provided the royal party with a tiger to shoot. as a result of hunting, poaching and habitat loss, there's now less than 4,000 tigers in the wild. but here in bardia national park, there are signs of a remarkable recovery. hundreds of cameras hidden as part of a nationwide tiger census. and when you're analysing the footage, how do you make sure that your count is accurate? translation: just like people have unique fingerprints, - all tigers have different stripes. that's how we distinguish them and count them. we have seen tiger cubs and also tigers rolling around. it is definitely something to be celebrated. it does not come without the cost. the common area that the tigers and the prey species and the humanity shares is so tight. the community lives in terror.

so there is a price that the community has paid for the world to rejoice. and with the news that nepal has successfully doubled its, you know, tiger numbers. sanjana lost her mother—in—law last year. she's one of 16 people killed by a tiger in the last 12 months. translation: during the next few years, more families - will suffer like me. the number of victims will soar. ifeel like i'm going crazy. i want to scream into the forest and run. when a tiger kills a human, they're tracked down and taken into captivity. there's seven now behind bars. more number of tigers and more number of people. definitely there's going to be conflict. so it is going to be a challenging job for us to maintain peace between two species. keeping that peace will be key to the successful return

of the tigers. rebecca henschke, bbc news, nepal. i will be back with more of the headlines. stay with us. hello there. this week has been quite a cloudy one for many parts of the country, but it looks like we're going to end the week with more sunshine, and that means it's going to be feeling warmer everywhere. into the weekend, though, we're going to look at this cloud that's been hanging around in the atlantic to push down from the northwest into the uk. ahead of it, we still have some cloud that's been producing some rain in scotland and northern england. but away from here, we start with some clearer spells early on friday morning and temperatures around 11—14 celsius. there will still be some rain left over across northern england and southern scotland. it'll tend to peter out in the morning, sunshine elsewhere, but over land, the cloud will bubble up, mightjust give one or two light showers. bulk of those, i think, will be across northern england and eastern scotland. and many coastal areas will have a dry and mostly

sunny day. it's going to be warmer, though, for all of us. temperatures low 20s, scotland, northern ireland, northern england, warmer further south and making 28 celsius in the south east of england. notice, through, this cloud coming in to northern ireland. we'll see some rain arriving here during the evening. and overnight, that rain will push its way eastwards into scotland, over the irish sea into northern parts of england. but again, further south, it's staying dry. it's going to be a warm start to the weekend, actually, those temperatures, 1a to 16 celsius. now, i showed you the cloud earlier on. that's on this weather front here, which is slipping its way into england and wales overnight and during saturday, but weakening all the while. so there won't be much rain left over by the afternoon. we start cloudy and with some rain across northern areas in the morning, that rain tending to peter out, slowly brightening up in scotland and northern ireland, and just a little bit of rain left over for northwest england and western parts of wales in the afternoon. ahead of it, though, the midlands towards the southeast and east anglia, a warm day again on saturday with temperatures around 27 celsius. so we've got a weather

front heading our way, bringing with it the possibility of some rain. and then that weather frontjust hangs around for the second half of the weekend. this is where we've got a lot of uncertainty. just little bumps along that weatherfront, maybe pepping up the rain from time to time. and it looks like that rain now is going to be a bit further south across wales, the midlands and across east anglia, the far south of england may stay dry, and further north, it looks like it'll be dry, brighter and a little bit cooler in scotland and northern ireland. still some warmth, though, if we do get some sunshine in the southeast of england.

this is bbc news, the headlines: president biden has spent more than two hours on the phone with his chinese counterpart, xijinping. the two leaders both issued warnings about taiwan — which has once again emerged as a key point of tension. there are reports of a possible visit by us house speaker nancy pelosi. in ukraine, soldiers on the frontline are saying that russia's bombardment of the eastern region of the country has dropped by at least a half — thanks to the arrival of sophisticated western artillery pieces. it's not yet known if it's merely a lull in the fighting. the 22nd commonwealth games are under way. the opening ceremony took

place on thursday evening in the english city of birmingham. the commonwealth is made up of more than 72 nations and territories that used to be part of the british empire. friday will see the sporting events commence. now on bbc news, it's time for click. we've got a tasty programme for you this week. when is chocolate not chocolate? when it's made of... kinky salts! don't knock it till you've tried it! right. lj's feeling out of this world as she explores the new ways to tidy up high—speed space trash. we're going to be bathed in lights and sounds, and apart from that,

i have no idea what to expect. and spencer takes a trip to an inner world.