this is bbc news. the headlines... at least 2a palestinians have been killed by israeli air strikes on gaza, as the military continues its campaign for a second day. more than 120 people have been injured. israeli officials say more than 350 rockets and mortars have been fired at israeli territory since friday. the head of the un's nuclear watchdog, the iaea, says he's increasingly alarmed about the risk of disaster at the zaporizhzya power plant in ukraine. rafael grossi said military action could threaten public health and the environment. the plant is in the hands of occupying russians. cuba has requested help from the us and other neighbouring countries to tackle a major fire in fuel storage tanks, which were struck by lightning in the city of matanzas. i7 firefighters are missing and more

than 100 people have been injured. 0ne body's been recovered from the scene. now on bbc news, dateline london. hello, and welcome to the programme in which leading uk columnists discuss the week's news with foreign correspondents who write, blog, podcast, and broadcast to audiences in their home countries from the dateline: london. 18 months after margaret thatcher first became prime minister, underfire even in her own party as half a million more people lost theirjobs and facing calls for a policy u—turn, she delivered a speech that still defines her — "you turn if you want to,

the lady's not for turning". this week, the woman who would be her successor u—turned. america's third lady, nancy pelosi, did not, going ahead with a visit to taiwan, despite chinese warnings beforehand — and missiles after. nor did the bank of england u—turn, going ahead with the half—point rise in interest rates. the governor had said the bank was minded to impose the largest single hike in a quarter of a century. here to discuss all that are marc roche, an economist and journalist who was born in belgium, and writes from here for the french news magazine, le point. isabel hilton, who's been a foreign correspondent and broadcaster — she founded china dialogue, an independent organisation concerned with the environmental challenges facing that country. and with us in spirit, if not in person — because a family member has covid — yasmin alibhai—brown. she was forced to flee her native uganda by idi amin — the 50th amnniversary of the expulsion

of asian ugandans has been marked this week. yasmin is now a british newspaper columnist. welcome to all of you, yasmin, it's lovely to see you and i hope yourfamily member gets better. let's begin with china and the nancy pelosi visit. i'd say she's the first lady becausejill biden is the first lady and, harris is the second lady. nancy pelosi is next in line and an important figure. why this display of anger by china, which to many outside the region will see extraordinarily like an overreaction, firing missiles left, right and centre? some useful things about this display of anger — forxijinping, it's useful in advance of the party congress coming up, he is consolidating his position for a third term in office, and who knows what after that? it demonstrates to his home front that he is defending china's interests in a highly

nationalist atmosphere that he's done a lot to create. so if you create a nationalist atmosphere, you have to live up to it. if you define the us as your principal enemy, then you have to respond when something like this happens. and finally, if you want to intimidate the taiwanese, putting effectively a military blockade around the island and constantly probing into the airspace and provoking their defenders to have to respond, you test the defences, intimidate the population, and you look like the big man in town. nancy pelosi could be described as possibly on the way out, she could be speaker of the house for only a few months more if the midterms predictions are worth anything at this stage. therefore it seems a particularly dramatic response — yet she was advised,

as we are told by some in the biden menstruation, not to go. was it a misjudgment? i completely agree with what isabel has said, but one question does remain — the world is in such a precarious state at the moment, why would you, nancy pelosi, whom i've always admired greatly — the state department advised her apparently not to do this. what was the point, what was the purpose? and particularly she's known as someone beijing actively dislikes, because she turned up at tiananmen square not long after the massacre. she did, holding up a banner. i have a lot of time for nancy pelosi, but it looks like she wanted a big finale to her career. she won't be speaker after the midterms. she went on an asian tour — it's not actually clear that the taiwanese invited her, but they could hardly

say no to her coming, and it's not at all clear what they got out of this except for a lot of high tension from china. so i think it was sadly a political misjudgment on her part. everyone gets an unwelcome guest every once in a while, you have to grin and bear it. it's a fantastic opportunity for xi jinping to forget - about economic problemsj in the eyes of the chinese people by using this - nationalistic, militaristic attitude. because china is on the brink of a recession, because - of covid restrictions and their obsessionj about confinement. but also, the loomingl recession in the west, which is the principal client of chinese goods. - and so by doing that, he can avoid really. focusing on the economy.

i don't think china will go further than the sabre . rattling because you know, - the west, i think, has alarmed them with the sanctions, - and the sanctions on russia did work, do work, it is crippling the russian economy. - i don't think china wants that. so i think it will finish — what's worrying is thatl forever, there might be a blockade, and she - can correct me... i'm not sure there will be a blockade forever, but they did declare before nancy pelosi's visit that they no longer considered the straits international waters. now those are very important international waters, a great deal of shipping goes through them. and if china sticks to that, that will inconvenience the entire neighbourhood and international shipping, as well as taiwan. so there is a risk that things get ratcheted up in certain things are not retreated from.

the other great casualty of this, however, which i think is more serious, as they announced today they will no longer cooperate on climate change with the united states. this was one of the big announcements at the glasgow summit, out of the blue almost — it's almost like president xi jinping wasn't there, the americans announced they had this agreement. it was with the chinese john kerry equivalent and john kerry, the envoy — it was the only bit of momentum at cop26, because so many things have happened since then, the war and so on, that all those things have been put off, and it's looking very serious. we have until 2030 to bang the curve on omissions.

——we have until 2030 to bend the curve on emissions. when the us and china worked together, which was in the 0bama and xijinping era, they essentially got paris — that's how we got paris because they weren't fighting each other, and they were mobilising their respective allies and friends. the paris climate agreement? precisely — but now we need to ratchet up the ambition and we need them working together on this. this is the great dilemma anyway, american policymakers are working to make a wrestling with it and it's a terrible time to wrestle with something like this — what sort of relationship can you have with china, from the washington perspective, but other parts of the west, with neighbours like australia? i think they have to be very, very careful. i've often said that china's politics, not only across its neighbourhood, but africa, south asia, there's a lot going on there that should worry us. but at the same time, i'm sorry, but for 25 years or longer, everywhere the united states has

gone in as the saviour, it has left the place in total devastation. think of afghanistan, libya — so the idea that the us is the good pair in this, i agree with isabel, we are in such a bad place with climate change, this is not the time to start playground fights. we have to cooperate, the whole world, if we are going to save the planet. and ijust don't understand this rhetoric, i don't understand china's war games when the world is in such a crisis, i really don't. it raises an interesting question about the status of taiwan, in terms of how it is treated. i'll get isabel to give us context in terms of the history, but there are lots of people pussyfooting around whether taiwan is a country, can we offend

beijing by describing it as a country, all the rest of it — and that's one of the added complications here, isn't it? yes, absolutely. but there's this far bigger picture too, and taiwan is actually flourishing for a while, and after what happened hong kong, i would not underestimate. that's interesting what you said about hong kong, because you could argue that one thing that has changed, and which mightjustify america taking a more combative approach over taiwan, is what china has done in hong kong — it's change of approach. i was talking to victor gao this week who is saying it's just a continuity, there's always been a national security law — it clearly wasn't like the national security law, and you can criticise the british are lots of things, there was clearly no democracy in hong kong before the handover,

they were heading towards some elective process but it hadn't really been on the agenda. but it clearly wasn't the hong kong under the british and what china is now doing, it's not even what china was doing ten years ago. that has changed the calculation. completely, because no one believed china, - and what they would do - to taiwan if they occupied — first the taiwanese military is quite strong, it has veryl advanced military- equipment from the us. and also, the latest. warwaged by china in 1979 against vietnam - was a resounding defeat. we are not sure - of the preparedness and how good they are. but hong kong is a real warning that china is an authoritarian . regime, if we forget it. 0n the whole, the americans, |

the official admitted democrat american administration, as isabel said, _ she imposed it herself. so i don't think we are heading really for a clash between - america and china directly. it's more an event in a difficult situation. i taiwan is the part of china where the nationalists fought against the communists in 19119, but what is it about its status that matters so much to beijing? they've made it matter. and the story keeps changing — it wasn't really part of china until the ching dynasty, which was the 17th century. and it was only part of china then but the ching paid attention to it because of the meeting because of the ming resistance.

so taiwan gets retreated to as a result of wars on the mainland. after that it became a chinese colony in the 1800s, and it was returned to china in 1945 with the defeat of japan. there was an uprising in 19117 against the chinese by the taiwanese and the white terror, a massacre. then in 19119, the nationalists lost the civil war, they turned up and declared themselves the government of all china from taiwan, and were recognised by the americans until nixon went to china. so it's been a complicated story, but when taiwan won democracy, which it did after the dictatorship of the nationalists fell — they got in the streets the way middle class is doing got a democratic system — and the taiwanese identity emerged through democratic... and not the american identity, because that's the problem, you have two big powers

in dispute over this, and perhaps sometimes taiwan's voice doesn't get hurt very much. it has a guest it doesn't want to accept. you should point out that mao tse told edgar snow and bread star over china that he didn't regard taiwan, which he called for most as a part of china, he thought of it much more like korea which was also a japanese colony, and it was the duty of the chinese party to help liberate taiwan so he could be an independent country along with korea. so that could be an independent country. it was not considered then by the great founder of the communist party an integral part of china this is a much more recent phenomenon, and it's a part of a national story. if you stop being an empire, which is a much more flexible arrangement, if you like, and you try to establish a nation state, borders become much more important.

so xi jinping's great gift to the chinese people, as he presents it, is to recover the lost province. thank you all very much. let's talk about the lady who did u—turn, liz truss, who came up with this idea of potentially reaching pay rates — if you have a a job in a different part of the uk, outside of london, shouldn't you get as much as you would in london? they don't necessarily pay different amounts if they are national organisations in different parts of the country. the public sectors don't pay different parts of the country — she seemed attracted but then backed off of the idea of having regional pay boards. do you see any merit in that original idea? is there an economic argument where there might be some merit in that? there's absolutely no . merit, it's a stupid idea because the present system works very well where civil. servants are paid the same wherever you are. - you are serving the state, not the region. _

it's completely different to local people. - anyway, that story which she | retracted is completely driven by the announcement and - the cataclysmic announcement by the bank of england - about recession, about triple increasing energy bills, - and about the cost of living in general, 13%. and this is absolutely leaving no room of manoeuvre - to liz truss and her adversary. because basically, where will there be money to, i as they want, to diminish tax? because she wants to diminish company tax, he wants to geti rid of the energy vat. but there's no money — - so unless you in debt more

of the country, which is already 100% of gdp, | then you threaten to double | the rate, which means more money to pay, the only. solution, which is not very conservative, is to increase tax and diminish public- service, public expense — which you can't do at - a time of recession. so whoever wins will be in a no—win situation. . before we leave the point about regional pay, why was it so politically toxic and idea? because this woman, liz truss, seems to be producing ideas out of a christmas cracker or something — hardly thought through at all, then she spends and changes, she was a remainder, then she became a brexiteer, —— remainer she believes that then she doesn't believe it any more. it's actually quite embarrassing to watch her,

and i'm a feminist, and i would wish for a good woman to take over the party. but it is deeply embarrassing, she hasn't thought this thing through. and the other thing that's quite interesting is the letter in the ft today, which was fascinating because they keep referencing the global thing — out of the ten most productive countries in the world, 7—8 of them are in the eu. and when the uk was in the eu, it outshone all other countries. so there's a connection between what is going on with this situation come up with the recession and all that, and the decision, in my view, that was badly taken. people will ask why we have two people standing for leadership just not addressing those core questions.

i suppose the other point is, given the government's messaging in parliament has been about levelling up the country, it doesn't sit well with that succulent absolutely, and if there's a problem with differential payment, as there is in london, there's something called the london waiting you get an extra allowance if you have to pay more for your daily... but the idea that you can figure out that in bolton you can pay people less then you can in birmingham — as mark says, they're working for the state, it's preposterous. what happens when they move or get promoted? but it's also the kind of triviality of it that bothers me. this country seems to be staring over a cliff, and neither of them frankly seem to have very much to say about the very big issues. and what they do have to say, liz truss seems to be

on a collision course with the bank of england, arguing it's had the wrong response. a lot of conservatives are critical of the bank anyway, saying it didn't act fast enough against inflation, it directs itself, it's monetary policy committee, they put up rates of half of 1%, as it warned it would do. the government set on friday that in terms of what they had heard that they hadn't moved fast enough, he rejected that and said it's an approach to buying assets, this quantitative easing programme which arguably helped during the credit crunch, it was not part of the problem. so there is a political conflict opening up between the woman most likely to be prime minister and the government. and her reaction has been to suggest she could curtail the bank of england, which is characteristic of this contest — every time an independent body, whether it be the electorate commission or the bank

of england, produces a result that is inconvenient politically for the candidates, they suggest they can abolish the very factors that made them valuable and make their advice trusted. it's a depressing diagnosis, frankly. and to agree, brexit... which you were. i was, but i've - become a remained. it's a bit late! the fact is that brexit - is making it difficult to take advantage of even the i devaluation of sterling, for instance, sterling - is at its weakest compared to the dollar. imports are more expensive... so we should be reducing stuff ourselves? exports are now more - expensive because of brexit, because with your principlesl

with your commercial partner is not full of obstracters - with tariffs and administrative jumps. it's notjust the british, it's partly down to the eu, as well, it's about the partnership. come on, the eu has donej everything to ease the way for the british— to have a good brexit, but... there'll be lots of people who take issue with that. i know, they'll say- macron is the worst, etc. the fact is that the british - didn't have their act together, they were divided andl they treated brussels, as brexiteers do, - with utter contempt. let's not re—litigate that, butjust in terms of where this leaves the uk now, i was reading an article by melanie phillips, who was a long—standing

conservative commentator — she was writing an article this week that she kind of despaired over the conservative party, she said, "it seems to be an argument about the size "of state and tax, this leadership election, "without looking at some of the bigger issues," she talked of a fracturing nation and prices which are now being lost further. the party no longer understands what conservatism really was, she writes. yes, well, i'm sorry, you're asking the wrong person here to give any serious consideration to what they think. crosstalk. what about the point about the party... the french revolution was about upholding western values, that's what they used to say.

values, that's what they usd to say. traditional conservative feud. the tory party to uphold conservative values, and we should say nothing but how great our history was — it's all this woke stuff that she's going on about. what's interesting is that she feels like kemi badenoch, a black woman, articulates that fake national pride better than rishi sunak or liz truss. this is quite interesting — but i can't take that point seriously at all, i'm sorry. what about the argument that there's something about this debate that become too narrow? it's not just for the conservative party, but for the public as well, since after all, this is the debate that will help determine who is prime minister? indeed, prime minister of the whole united kingdom, i must point out. i've not read the article, but it seems to me since the one nation tories were expelled by borisjohnson for not supporting brexit, what we have is instead

of the conservative and unionist party, we have an english national party. there are remarks liz truss made about the leader of the scottish parliament this week were frankly, you know, shocking. you can'tjust ignore— accuse a serious politician of being attention—seeking, saying you'll ignore her. the snp has been repeatedly voted into power by the scottish people, what does that say to the scottish people? it says there's no future for us, whether liz truss's england, they are playing fast and loose with northern ireland. the next prime minister- is chosen by 150,000 people, completely unrepresentative of the country. _ thank you all very much, get well soon to your family,

and we will see you back in the studio. and we will see same time next week. goodbye. hello there. it'll be turning sunnier and warmer pa rt part two of the weekend is looking somewhat yesterday, cloud across northern half of the country. almost unbroken sunshine for the south. the best of the temperatures here, 24-28. best of the temperatures here, 24—28. warm in eastern scotland given some sun shone shine,

also northern ireland, because cloud and outbreaks of rain, top temperatures around 17 in stornoway. sunday night, we hold onto the cloud, the breeze, some splashes of rain across the north—west. further south, clear at the sky, like the wind. temperatures falling to 10-15, the wind. temperatures falling to 10—15, is nighttime values begin to rise. internet greek you can see temperatures really starting to rise across england and wales. widespread sunshine. could be up to the mid— 30s by the end of the week in some areas.

hello and welcome to bbc news. the palestinian health ministry says 2a people, including six children, are now known to have died in israeli air strikes on the gaza strip. israel is targeting the palestinian militant group, islamichhad, and says it expects the offensive to last a week. the british foreign secretary, liz truss, said britain stood by israel's right to defend itself, but has called for a swift end to the violence, which has broken more than a year of relative calm. from jerusalem, here's our middle east correspondent, yolande knell.

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