this is bbc news, the headlines: officials in somalia say security services there have ended a siege at a hotel in the capital, mogadishu. the claim has not been independently verified. at least 20 people are believed to have been killed after the hotel was stormed by members of the islamist militant group al—shabaab. the russian occupiers of crimea say they have again had to activate their defence systems in the city of sevastopol, which has been the target of drone strikes for several nights running. the city is the base of russia's black sea fleet and has also become a holiday destination for russian tourists. ukraine's heavyweight boxer, oleksandr usyk,

retains his four unified world titles with a win over britian�*s anthonyjoshua, that he dedicated to the ukrainian armed forces. now on bbc news, it's time for dateline london. hello, and welcome to the programme where british journalists debate the week's news with the correspondents who write, blog, podcast and broadcast from the dateline: london. living with double—digit inflation is an unwelcome, if familiar, experience in many countries. turkey, argentina, zimbabwe and iran started 2022 under that yoke.

for the british, it had been a distant memory, but not any more. in the united states, presidentjoe biden signed into law the optimistically titled inflation reduction act. would it were that simple. another bad memory from the 1980s, the threat to kill the author sir salman rushdie, came close to being fulfilled. liberals are relieved he survived, but have they helped to fuel intolerance? to discuss all that, in the studio are maria margaronis, a documentary—maker who, among other projects, has charted the crises, financial and environmental, which have afflicted greece. henry chu is part of the editorial team at the los angeles times as well as being its london correspondent. abdel bari atwan is a specialist in the politics of the middle east and runs the news website rai al youm. hello to all of you and thrilled to have in the the studio with me once again. let's start with the uk. maria, you have reported on how a nation can be atomised

by the extraordinary impact of rising inflation and people's efforts of surviving often because of forces well beyond their control. what do you expect for britain in the coming months and years? well, first of all people are going to suffer. people are going to if energy prices are not capped and we are now to think they might be up to over £4000 a year, it's going to be beyond choosing between heating and eating, it will be not heating and not eating. a number of nhs leaders spoke out this morning and said there's going to be severe health consequences because of this. people suffered horribly both physically and mentally during the greek crisis which you referred to, there was a very steep rise in the suicide rate. it's awful to be in that anxiety about, you know, notjust can you go out but can you eat, can you feed your kids?

it's terrible, it's corrosive and it's very polarising in a society. because it sets people against each other and it's politically polarising as well. are there any lessons from what greece went through in terms of how political leaders should try to steel people for what's coming? because in a sense one got the impression in greece that it caught them completely unawares and to be fair there were different circumstances. it's a very different circumstance, but at this point we'll don;tjust steel people, but we have the ability to do something about it. right? there are options on the table about capping energy price,s but there is a much longer—term project as we put into play as well because what is hitting this country so hard is not just the external influences, it's the chronic lack of investment in public services. i think public investment in britain was just five or six years ago 34th out of 36 measured by the oecd, so railways falling apart, the water is falling apart, the nhs is falling apart, these things need to be dealt with.

in the meantime, everything possible need to be done to protect the most vulnerable. henry, the situation is not as acute in the us as it is predicted to be here at least at the moment, but how are pocketbook issues affecting americans already? i wouldn't certainly say it is not as acute because certainly some in society here as there will be insulated, but we had a poll in my home state of california that showed over a majority had said they experienced moderate hardship already, in particular from the rising gas prices, which for americans and those in california and texas really hit the pocketbook. that has gone down and there looks to be some relief on the horizon in california. there are tax relief in for filling up your tank at the petrol station, but it is still something that is hitting a wide swathe of people and it's happening here disproportionately to for example people of colour, those who are already struggling to get by,

who were hit worse through the pandemic than those who were in better shape and are also they are getting pretty badly hit by this rise in prices. we did not hit the double digits of inflation as you did here and it is going down, but it's not going to go down enough for people to be feeling much relief, certainly within the next few months and also in terms of politics by the time the midterm elections come around in the us. that's really going to be on people's minds when they go into the voting booth. just on that bit of legislation, the inflation reduction act, is there much inflation reduction in this or is it more a good title for an omnibus bill? it is kind of a misleading title because that is not seen as the aim. it was to tackle climate change and other social issues such as drug prices. now i think most or many, i should say, economists have said that there is some built—in inflation reduction in it. over the medium to long term in democracies where we are with elections, they come around more quickly than we ever expect, that will be difficult

for the democrats who have passed this package to really show that there has been much reduction in prices going up. so the inflation reduction act is not totally a misnomer but over a longer period of time when we see drug prices going down and deficit reduction and money being pulled out of the economy and also a move towards renewable sources of energy that will not then therefore show big price rises in gas and oil. just over a decade ago, basic economic questions were at the heart of the revolutions that became known as the arab spring. i'm not certainly suggesting anything similar would happen in europe or the us perhaps, but it's worth reminding people how fundamental things like being able to afford to eat, about feeling that the taxation system was unfair actually destabilise regimes that had existed for decades almost unchallenged.

this is an excellent question because to be honest- we are on the edge of. arab food spring simply because the prices are shooting up and the people, poor people who are really - suffering from this. talking about 10% here, i 10.3 in london or britain, but you look at turkey, - it is 82% inflation rate there. a month ago i was in lebanon and i went to a well— known i restaurant and it's| like oxford street, and i was shocked. their owner recognised me and said, "sorry, . we don't have bread." seriously? and people said, "what, bread, you don't have bread?" - in the middle east, bread is essential. | it's not like here we can do with the roast potatoes - or chips, there you have - to have bread because of hummus

and everything and anyway, now the queues in lebanonl for bread is huge. people are digging in the dustbin in order. to look for food. there are famine spreading i and there are a lot of alarming signs because of this. so i expect a lot of problems and now the prices of wheat i and the price of grain - is going up because of ukraine problems and those i people are suffering. the governments are nearlyl bankrupt, so in lebanon now it is bankruptcy. it could be in egypt, - could be injordan, could be in sudan and other parts of the middle east, - so that the middle east is really on the edge i of starvation. they have corruption, - they have currencies falling down, the prices going up, energy prices going up, . food prices going up, i everything is going up and people are suffering there. so the name of the game is it. could be arab food spring very sooi'i. maria, you mentioned

that there are various proposals for capping energy prices, and the british labour party, the opposition, sir keir starmer, came up with one that he said would have an impact on inflation and the experts seemed to agree it would, but only a six—month plan. again it's a short—term plan, and then a longer—term plan is the labour party plan to connect a minimum wage to the cost of living, which seems a very reasonable thing to do, but we definitely need a longer—term strategy and you were saying, henry, about the inflation reduction bill being partly under climate change, but the green new deal, which is again part of the labour party here's plan, seems to be a more sustainable in both senses way of going forward with this. i'm not very good at economics at all. i don't have a clue... but it seems to me that if we are going to try to rebuild infrastructure and move forward in a way that makes sense on all the threats facing us at the moment, that's the way to go.

i hate to mention infrastructure in the context of donald trump's presidency, but it's one of the things he expressed a lot of passion about when he was president. and he is still the man to beat it looks like on paper. ijust wonder in the light of liz cheney's defeat in the republican primaries in wyoming, whether that is being echoed in other selections. is it still looking like donald trump's party? first of all on the question of infrastructure, that was not just a trump thing, but actually the biden administration also had a very large infrastructure bill trying to improve public works across the us, but your question about donald trump and the republican party after what we just saw it with cheney's loss and also the fact that of the few republicans who actually voted to impeach him that second time, all but two of them are now out.

either have decided to remove themselves from public life or they have been voted out, so it really shows the grip he still has on this party. now this search of his mar—a—lago home and people wonder whether it will have a backfire effect where it increases support for him or if it will show him for being someone who still does not respect the rule of law and thinks of himself as above it. in the us, i think everybody has in their partisan contact lenses that they view everything with, so if you or someone is already anti—donald trump, it's another sign then of why he should not be allowed back in the oval office, but if you are for donald trump, and it is now becoming a party where it's about the worship of a leader as opposed to necessarily the policies, it's further proof that he is someone who is being unfairly persecuted by an establishment that can't deal with somebody who is from the outside. so, still it's another polarising factor, but it is a little bit dangerous and i will say for the republican party which bills itself as the party of law and order to suddenly be attacking the fbi and even some saying defund the fbi.

that's a little bit of shaky ground for republicans to be on. lots of speculation about the documents that were seized at mar—a—lago by the fbi. top—secret documents and referenced with nuclear documents, but not quite clear what it is, but lots of rumours circulating in the american press. in the middle east now, - on speculation and rumours that actually president trump, when he was president, l |when he was in the white house, j he wanted to give the know— how, the experience to the saudi - arabia how to use nuclear power to generate electricity. and it seems there are - speculation saying or rumours saying that there are a lot of secrets about that, - so these documents could be

related to this cooperation i between donald trumpl and the saudi arabians, especially that de facto ruler of saudi arabia is really- maintaining a very good i relation with donald trump and his son—in—law, . which isjared kushner, so we don't know yet. and i have to say it again, - it is rumours and speculation, so we are waiting to see - what kind of there is there? one if it will actually - expose their relationship. we know for example - saudi arabia are on bad terms withjoe biden and the democrats in generall so there are rumours also - saying that maybe the democrats would like to use these - documents against saudi arabia, who humiliated president biden when he visited saudi arabia... | his recent visit, they never accepted that. his demands to raise production of oil in order to drive _ the prices of energy down in the us and europe. - i'm glad you talked

about it and emphasised that it's speculation. no one knows what's in these documents right now except for donald trump and his advisers and those who have actually... apparently he used to walk around the white house with a valet carrying boxes of stuff like, "this is my stuff." this weird combination of a six—year—old child and a maniacal... anyway. and we may never know. in my opinion, yes. even with the affidavits that might be released by the justice department, those could only be redacted portions and if it is about national security, we may never find out what precisely was in those documents. quite interesting because we all dug into this during the course of this week in the story, newsweek appears to be the source of the principal concerns, but newsweek then says it does not know and is quite honest that that there was this report made by the house oversight

committee published in february 2019 which basically accused the administration of what it said was strong private commercial interests pressing aggressively for the transfer of highly sensitive nuclear technology to saudi arabia, which posted a potential risk to national security absent adequate safeguards. in a sense, no great surprise that saudi arabia would want the technology given it knows that being an oil economy is longer—term... absolutely, but then you get the next step down the line which is saudi arabia's enmity with iran and you've got two countries with nuclear power claiming that they are not using it to develop nuclear weapons and what is going on? i think with that oversight committee report, that's been out in the public domain now for three years, so this is not any kind of mystery that saudi arabia and other countries, notjust saudi arabia,

do want nuclear technology. it's whether president trump actually passed any secrets along, and that we don't know and will remain speculation for a long time. in a sense it's understandable that the fbi will be resisting so strongly efforts to give full details of its investigation, which having unsealed the warrants, there is now pressure from some to unseal and including from the media to unseal the whole basis of the investigation. media, we want transparency in all respects, but the fbi has its procedures and so does a department ofjustice, which they want to adhere to. with president trump now as a normal citizen, as they do with any other normal citizen, granted an ex—president and he has certain benefits that come with having been president, but he is still also under the rule of law as are the rest of us.

so that also means protections from the law so that certain things are not revealed about you that should not be prematurely. absolutely. it's not illegal for example - for the american administration to give help to an allyl like saudi arabia, help in nuclear peaceful means, i mean. i so we know there is a huge competition between saudi| arabia now and iran and - the saudis would like to have this clean energy as they call it and produce it like many. people. so i believe, i don't know why the administration is shy over| telling the truth about it. it is not, you know, - nuclear power for actually producing nuclear weapons. no, it is only- for peaceful means... not necessarily a very big step from nuclear power technology and then getting eventually to a nuclear weapon and that's precisely why there is an agreement about iran to begin with. i'm going to say again

this is all speculation, but the administration might be shy about revealing it because of the kickbacks, because of possible kickbacks that they received or also because donald trump had a habit all along of acting off his own bat and meeting with vladimir putin, not having any notes or things like that, so that is the issue. yeah, and honestly if... we don't know if there has been a relationship, but some in the fbi will doubtless be looking at it if there is any substance to it. let's turn to this other question which has kind of focused all our minds not least as journalists, and that's what happened to salman rushdie last friday when he was knifed repeatedly by a man who attacked him at a literary festival. and there's been lots of discussion over not only the context for salman rushdie himself, still subject to the fatwa apparently imposed by the ayatollah khomeini, the late spiritual leader of iran, for the publishing

of the satanic verses which the iranian government has distanced itself from, but still nonetheless blamed salman rushdie for what happened to him. what are your thoughts on the incident and what it may or may not tell us about our tolerance of freedom of expression? obviously it was terrible, horrifying and kind of like this return of the repressed in some awful way, like the end of a dark fairy story were fate catches up. it was shocking and surprising and awful. i do think there are many different kinds of threats to free expression, and i would not want to confuse the knifing of a writer with a kind of consensus about what is acceptable and unacceptable to say in a way that does not involve violence or actual censorship. now there's a lot to be said about... we are in this moment

where there is this thing going on called cancel culture and all of that, and sometimes words are given an importance which does not take into account the context or the situation in which they are used. and there's this kind of great rise in identity politics in the united states which often seems to me to be partly a sort of defensive move, but also an inability to engage in a broader way with social and political issues. but i do think that religious fanaticism and a sense of a shifting consensus about what's acceptable to say or talk about are two different things. and of course notjust the us this dealing with cancel culture, we may be leading the way as we do in so many areas but it certainly has come to this country as well. and freedom of expression is a cudgel that each side has happily taken up at various times throughout even these last few decades to beat the other side with. so it was certainly popular amongst liberals to beat up

on conservatives saying that they were not allowing for proper debate or that they were using language that was deliberately insulting and gratuitously provocative. but then now you have conservatives saying about liberals that they are not allowing for proper argument to take place but let's also remember that these same conservatives in some states like florida are disallowing curriculum about different sexual orientations or about race theory, so there is a lot of blame that can be spread fairly widely on this issue. but it does show that we are at a moment that expressing what you believe and the way in which you do so is really coming under scrutiny and it's hard to find those lines to draw. you work in a region where this whole debate about and it's a passionate discussion, but it's not for most,

thank god,, not a life or death issue but it can be in parts of the middle east and has been recently. not only the middle east. there are two billion muslim people all over the world. i we should differentiate i between them and europe and western worlds in particular. - they have a feeling there, about 90% of the people i of the muslim world believe freedom of expression - is practised only. to insult muslims. you know, you have a problem with cartoons offensive - towards the prophet _ about mohammed and now these satanic verses are blasphemous completely and it's offensive. i salman rushdie, he was very cruel when he talked - about the prophet muhammad and his wives and to talk- about the wives of the prophet is really very dangerous. - people, i believe 95% i of the people never read the satanic verses. i was here when it was i published in this country 40 years ago.

there were demonstrations all over the muslim world l and many people were killed and again with the cartoons, j offensive cartoons, again - there was a huge demonstration against this and many. people were killed again. so it is a dilemma here. people are asking why - there are people and there was in particular specialising in offending the 2 billion - muslims all over the world. you know, they cannot represent themselves in the way— they like, but leave our prophet alone. | you should not actually talk about him. - i have read the satanicl verses a long time ago. it is very difficult . for ordinary people to understand it. in english or arabic, - but few other languages was publishing it because - simply it was not allowed to be translated and published. if a publishing organisation published this translation i of it in the arab-

world, it will be bad. of course, the one translator was murdered and another was attacked... yes, a publisher attacked. but definitely there - are people, secular people in the arab and muslim worlds who are against this kind - of crime to attack publishers or a writer because he - expressed himself in a way or like that. i and those people actually also, they are harassed or even - attacked by radical muslims. and this fatwa, it was about 40 years ago. i now why they revived it, why this government... i we won't know that until his trial if we ever know it. maria, i was going to quote you as of a minute or so left, in the sunday times accused liberals of over 30 years having worked as the de facto accomplices of the ayatollah because he said they are resisting the task of dismantling speech. what do you make of that?

sorry, i think that's rubbish, as henry said. it's not just liberals. every side is using... wanting... well, i disagree. but also i thinkjust to throw out something at the very end, what is most worrying to me is how difficult it is to know what we hear is true and what is not the moment. that speech itself has become notjust contested, but unreliable. and that is to me almost more worrying than attacks. i hope we do come together a few weeks on. thank you all and thank you very much for your company. dateline is back at the same time next week and i would just try to say remember that magic word we all sometimes forget, empathy. goodbye.

hello. a fine end to the day for many of us, but a bit of rain in the forecast, too, particularly in the north. but on the whole this evening and overnight, at least for most of us, it is going to be dry with clear spells. so, let's have a look at the forecast, then. here's the big picture, and in the last few hours, we've seen a weather front moving southwards across the country. here it is. and it's been affecting northern parts of the uk, so a little bit of rain here, which is going to fizzle away as we go through the course of the evening. you can see it crossing parts of lancashire through yorkshire, approaching hull, and then there's really not much left of it. apart from a few showers here and there, maybe in western parts of scotland, it is looking dry and the temperatures will range

from around ten degrees in aberdeen to 14 in london and about that in liverpool, too. so, the forecast fortomorrow, it's actually going to be a sunny day compared to today in the north of the country, but we are expecting more cloud in the south, and the reason for it is this weather front which will be approaching us. and a fair amount of cloud ahead of this weather front. so, here's the forecast, then, for the morning on sunday. quite a lot of cloud here across south—western parts of the uk, certainly for wales, south—western england, some spots of rain moving into mid—wales, north wales, perhaps reaching merseyside by the time we get to the middle of the afternoon. but for many southern, eastern and northern areas, it's going to be a dry day and quite warm there. in norwich, 25 degrees, hull will be up to 23, and not far off 20, i think, for newcastle and for aberdeen, where plenty of sunny spells are forecast. now, on monday, the weather fronts are right over the uk and that means a lot of cloud and outbreaks of rain, at least early in the day.

so, this is the morning. notice it's not raining everywhere. in fact, many parts of central and northern scotland are dry. most of the rain is across england and wales, but then come the afternoon, it does look as though that weather front clears away and there'll be some sunny spells developing, and the temperatures respectable, around the low 20s, maybe the mid—20s there for east anglia and the south—east. so, let's summarise that, then, and the weather for the rest of the week. typical weather for our shores, but quite warm at times. in the south and the south east, though, you can see temperatures in london nudging up to around 27 degrees middle of the week. bye— bye.

hello, and welcome to bbc news. we begin with some news which has been breaking out of somalia over the last couple of hours, where security forces say they've ended a siege that had lasted over 30 hours at the hayat hotel in the capital, mogadishu, where islamist gunmen were reported to be holding hostages. there's been no independent verification, and no official statement from the somali government. the militant group, al—shabaab, say they were behind the attack. our news reporter, emily brown, told us the latest on the story. we know this attack

began on friday evening, when the al—shabaab group detonated two bombs