this is bbc world news, i'm david willis. our top stories: the number of state—sanctioned executions in the united states falls to its lowest level for more than three decades. a new report also shows over a third were botched. a deadly wave of russian missile strikes hits multiple targets right across ukraine. at least three people are dead. residential areas and power stations are badly hit. translation: whatever the missile worshippers l from moscow are hoping for, it won't change the balance of power in this war. a rough ride for ramaphosa. the south african president is heckled at the anc�*s party conference, but he is still hoping to be re—elected despite last week's

impeachment proceedings. elon musk suspends several journalists' accounts. we'll be talking to one of the reporters affected. a very warm welcome to bbc news. the number of state—sanctioned executions in the us has fallen to its lowest level for more than three decades. that's according to statistics compiled by the death penalty information centre, which also says that more than a third of executions were conducted in an incompetent or flawed manner. let's take a closer look at the report. seven out of 20 execution attempts reportedly failed.

the reasons are claimed to be incompetence, failures to follow protocol or defects in the protocols themselves. this was mainly because executions had to be put on hold after officials were not able to carry out execution protocols in four states — idaho, ohio, tennessee and south carolina. in all, less than 30 people were executed, and across the us, fewer than 50 people were sentenced to death. the five—year average of executions, 18.6 per year, is said to be the lowest in more than 30 years. that's a 74% decline over the course of one decade. our north america correspondent peter bowes explains how problematic some of the executions have been. the statistics are quite damning. of all of the executions that took place in the united states

this year, one in three went wrong in some way. they were visibly problematic, according to this report. there were executions scheduled in only six states, involving 18 people, but a significant number of those cases they had to be abandoned partway through the process. something went wrong, the protocols weren't adhered to. there was one example in the state of alabama where it took three hours to connect the intravenous line, the iv that would deliver the lethal cocktail of drugs to that individual which would eventually kill them. and other examples, as well, around the country. and it seems one of the reasons given is that some of the personnel that carry out these executions are simply not medically qualified or experienced enough to deal with some of the potential problems that can occur during the process.

in some cases the inmates have a history of medical problems, of drug abuse, alcohol abuse, and that can make them more susceptible to some of the issues that occur during the process, and especially the attachment of the iv line. now, executions across this country happen far less frequently now than they used to, and they are concentrated in just a small number of states, and it seems quite likely that reports like this one and others will increase the pressure on politicians around the united states to look again at the process, to look again at executions and especially the technicalities of the lethal injection. there was a poll earlier this year that suggested some 46% of americans still support lethal injections, but that's lower than some previous polls and there may well be growing pressure on politicians in washington not only to look again at the process but to question whether

executions should be happening in america at all. russian forces have launched a huge wave of missile attacks on ukraine, damaging electricity and water supplies across the country. at least three people are reported to have been killed. the capital, kyiv, was hit, as was president zelensky�*s home town of kryvyi. in his nightly address, he warned that russia was capable of further massive strikes. the mayor of kharkiv described the destruction there as colossal and said that thousands of people were without heating in freezing temperatures. our eastern europe correspondent sarah rainsford sent this report. the rumble of a russian attack as kyiv was woken by more missile strikes. the danger drove people underground. the metro is the safest place to

huddle here when the city is underfire, but as russian missiles hit the power grid, the trains all stopped. i've sat here about three hours. i want to go home. but in southern ukraine, it was homes that were hit. hours later, rescuers were still searching for people trapped in the ruins. a child is missing here. this strike was on president zelensky�*s home town. translation: whatever the missile worshippers l from moscow are hoping for, it won't change the balance of power in this war. they have enough missiles left for mass strikes, but we have enough determination and self—belief to return what belongs to us. in northern kharkiv, the day turned dark, as the power went down right across the town.

this country now copes with what was once unimaginable, handing out hot food, keeping people warm. and even in kyiv, queuing for water in the street, defying russia's efforts to wear them down. but these attacks affect even the most vulnerable. we found this old people's home without heat, light or water. it's running on sheer resilience. nella's children just brought her here from the south, thinking she'd be safer. translation: we're all waiting for peace, really waiting. - putin says, let's be friends, but who is the unfriendly one here? he attacked us! our situation here is really miserable. the staff are doing their best to keep things normal,

but it's anything but that. they even have to store water now to flush the loo. "it is pretty hard," olga tells me, "but we will get through." tonight, there are no traffic lights in much of kyiv, no lights at all in large parts of ukraine's capital, as russia tries to force his country into surrender. but somehow, life goes on. sarah rainsford, bbc news, kyiv. earlier mitchel wallerstein, a senior foreign policy fellow at the chicago council on global affairs, gave us his analysis of the situation. well, i think this is part of a concerted strategy to terrorise and intimidate the ukrainian people, since the

russian forces have not succeeded in their main aim, which of course originally was to take kyiv, and now are falling back towards the donbas. the strategy seems now to be to keep firing missiles into the cities and to put pressure on the government to capitulate. there are competent countries that have air defence capabilities that could be useful to ukraine. including israel which has the iron dome and the arrow anti—missile system. a lot of this is coming in the form of drones. drones are very hard to shoot down because they flow very low, but they there are various systems that can take our drones. the ukrainian military is reporting a high percentage of success in shooting down these incoming missiles and drones. whether the reports are accurate remains to be seen.

the south african president has been heckled during an address to his own anc party conference. cyril ramaphosa — who's hoping to be re—elected as party leader — struggled to make himself heard, over chants of "step aside". i want to appeal to everyone who wants to raise their dissatisfaction to do so in an orderly manner, in the way that we do things here in the african national congress. yelling we've been in existence for 110 years, and this is not the time to come and display this type of disorderly behaviour.

the chanting began when the president's predecessor, jacob zuma, entered the venue to loud cheers. despite the opposition, he is expected to retain power. it is expected to retain power. it is a big threat — expected to retain power. it 3 a big threat because they expected to retain power. it 1 a big threat because they are accused of not providing the services demanded by the people, but the anc has been accused of corruption, which is what president cyril ramaphosa has been trying to fight since he began his tenure. and the reason why you heard that shouting in the conference of the anc is precisely because there is a group of anc members who do not want to see cyril ramaphosa continue with his fighting of corruption and reforming of the anc. many of those that are accused of

corruption or that were mentioned in a report that was commissioned in south africa involve members of the anc and former members of the anc, and those other people that are trying to push back cyril ramaphosa's efforts in trying to clean up the regime. they somehow came up with an accusation which is still, by the way, to be proved in a court of law, of cyril ramaphosa having foreign currency in his farm which was stolen by some people and later on reported to the police by one of the political competitors of cyril ramaphosa. a row is brewing in west africa over the increasing involvement of a russian mercenary group ghana has accused its neighbour, burkina faso, of hiring troops from the wagner group, a private russian military organisation which is also believed to be involved in fighting alongside russian forces in ukraine. ghana says the mercenaries are operating close

to its northern border. burkina faso has responded by summoning ghana's ambassador. our correspondent in the region sent us this update. the russian security group already has a presence in the sahel region of west africa, in countries like mali, where it is said to be aiding in the fight againstjihadist militants, and also in the central african republic. so far, there is no official information about an agreement between the wagner group and burkina faso, even though the prime minister recently visited russia. burkina faso has had two coups in one year. the current transitional government is trying to regain control of security of in areas caught in escalating violence from militants who are allied to both al-qaeda and isis. the insecurity that began in 2015 has killed thousands of people and left

millions displaced. still to come: nasa launches a mission to survey all of the world's water from space. cheering and singing. saddam hussein is finished, because he killed our people, our women, our children. the signatures took only a few minutes but they brought a formal end to 3.5 years of conflict — conflict that has claimed more than 200,000 lives. before an audience of world leaders, the presidents of bosnia, serbia and croatia put their names to the peace agreement. the romanian border was sealed and silent today. romania has cut itself off from the outside world in order to prevent the details of the presumed massacre in timisoara from leaking out.

from sex at the white house, to a trial for his political life, the lewinsky affair tonight guaranteeing bill clinton his place in history as only the second president ever to be impeached. this is bbc world news. the latest headlines: the number of state—sanctioned executions in the us has fallen to its lowest level for more than three decades. a new report has also shown over a third were botched. a deadly wave of russian missile strikes, has hit multiple targets in ukraine killing at least three people. residential areas and power stations were badly hit. a giant aquarium installed in the lobby of a luxury german hotel has exploded, sending 1,500 exotic fish cascading

across the floor. the ia—metre—high tank had become a well—known tourist attraction in berlin. from there, jenny hill has the story. this aquarium was built to impress — a million litres of water, more than 1,000 tropicalfish — there was even a lift in the middle. all towering over the lobby of a berlin hotel. my god! but early this morning, it seems the tank simply shattered. glass and metal ripped through the building. water and fish gushed out onto the street. sirens wail extraordinarily, just two people were hurt, neither of them seriously. the hotel actually shook inside. i could describe it as a... imitates explosion. and ijolted out of bed and turned around... i didn't see any movement so i didn't know what the heck was going on.

i looked outside the window, i saw a lady running. investigators are trying to establish what went wrong. look at this footage, taken when the aquarium was first built. "you could fire a gun at the tank," says this architect, "and it would only cause "a small hole, not burst the whole cylinder. "such a hollywood scenario is impossible." the authorities suspect material fatigue may be to blame, but they're not yet sure. there is a sense, i think, of relief amongst many here that this happened when it did. an hour or so later and that lobby, the street outside the hotel, would've been packed with visitors, many of them children. there's shock at the destruction, regret at the loss of so many fish, but an acknowledgement, too, that this could have been so much worse. jenny hill, bbc news, berlin. the grim tale of belen�*s

exploding aquarium. —— in berlin. the united nations has added its voice to the many critics of twitter�*s suspension ofjournalists' accounts. a spokesperson said the action set �*a dangerous precedent�* at a time when press freedom was widely under threat. earlier, the european union warned twitter�*s owner elon musk that the social media platform could be hit with sanctions, after he personally ordered the suspension of several journalists. tom brada reports. on twitter, vera jourova said that eu laws respect "media freedom and fundamental rights", and elon musk "should be aware of that". and she added: "there are red lines. and sanctions, soon." reporters from outlets including the new york times, cnn and the washington post have been locked out of their accounts. many of those suspended had criticised elon musk�*s twitter takeover, or had commented on an account that tracked the movement of

the his private jet. micah lee is one of the journalists that's been banned. he told me about how he found out. i had just posted a tweet and i was following the news of a bunch of accounts getting suspended and about 20 minutes after my tweet ijust got a notice inside of twitter that my account is suspended and i can't use it to post any more tweets. was it a shock or did you see this coming? i kind of saw it coming. i'm not in any way surprised that this has happened, especially because of the reporting that i've been doing on elon musk�*s takeover of twitter over the last month. i think that this is the highest profile time where he's kind of arbitrarily banned a lot of people because he banned several prominentjournalists but he's been doing this since he took over. there's been several arbitrary censorship of all sorts of different accounts.

does elon musk have a point, though, when he says that knowing the location of his private jet is a threat to the security, not only of his own security but the threat to the security of his family as well, potentially? i mean, i don't actually buy that. i think there's some room for discussion. i think that knowing, like, which airport his plane lands at and flies out of at which times, i think it's already public information and i think that, you know, it's perfectly reasonable for people to learn this about the private jets of billionaires. but i think that even the bigger issue is, everyone who posted anything related to that who got suspended, they got their account suspended — which is kind of extreme — but also a lot of us are journalists who weren't actually, like, posting the links to this website,

we were reporting on other things getting suspended. this is just part of our reporting process. the racist murder of emmett till in 1955 — and his mother's subsequent fight forjustice — has been made into a movie, which is due to be released next month. the film is produced by barbara broccoli, who's behind the bond films and stars danielle dead—wyler, as mamie till — who've been speaking to our culture editor, katie razzall. 14—year—old emmett till. they have a different set of rules down there. his brutal murder in mississippi in 1955 galvanised the civil rights movement. the body of emmett louis till has been found dead... driven by his mother, mamie. be small down there. you have to be extra careful with white people, you can't risk looking at them the wrong way. i know! i wondered how much you felt

the weight of responsibility, the weight of the civil rights movement on you, as you made this movie? oh, i felt every inch of it. and i knew that i had to honour it, i had to give it that kind of reverence. we have to tell these stories. if we don't recognise our history, we're doomed to repeat it. emmett was lynched for whistling at a white female shopkeeper in this segregated part of america. but the film deliberately doesn't show the violence he suffered at the hands of the woman's husband and another relative. i think we're overjust the grotesque nature of witnessing violence on black bodies. it shouldn't take that kind of visual to ignite folks to resist the kind of atrocities that are happening — that had happened in 1955, that continue to happen to black people or any oppressed group of people. back in 1955, mamie till—mobley had her son's violated body photographed, and insisted on an open casket at his funeral.

many thousands filed past it. that smell is my son's body reeking of racial hatred. come with me, please. she was one of the first people to recognise how vitally important the image would be to the world. and i think when you see what happened with george floyd, that young woman who kept filming that horrendous murder, we all saw it — we wouldn't have believed it if we hadn't seen it. the two men accused of killing emmett till were put on trial. and i do think that the trial will be carried on fairly, and that we're alljust praying for the best to happen. a white male jury found the men not guilty. they later admitted the murder but couldn't be tried a second time. though they're dead, emmett�*s female accuser isn't. do you think thatjustice will ever be served? good question. we hope.

i think that films have the opportunity to reawaken people's understanding of critical moments in history. that troubled history now being told on screen nearly 70 years on. engine ignition and lift off. for a landmark mission which aims to transform what we know about water on earth. the swot spacecraft will chart rivers and lakes and will also track features of the ocean's surface in unparalleled detail. the results could be vitally important, helping to improve flood and drought forecasts and giving researchers a better understanding of climate change. every three weeks, it will complete a map of 90% of our planet, so we can see

how ocean levels are changing, how the seasons affect things as well, so it is a wonderful satellite, a wonderful mission. once in position, swot�*s antennae will send pulses out towards the earth's surface and count the time reflections take to come back. it is these echoes which let swot make very precise determinations of height. it will measure all rivers 100 metres wide and all lakes larger than six hectares, or 15 acres. the data can provide crucial insights into waterways we are otherwise struggling to understand. monitoring networks even on some of the world's greatest rivers like the amazon and the congo are nowhere as near as thorough and comprehensive as they need to be, and in many cases are in decline so we are getting less indication now than we did some time ago. it will be a few months till it is fully operational but once it is up and running, scientists hope we can open a new chapter in our understanding of climate change and the water cycle on earth. tom brada, bbc news.

an incredible project indeed. stay with us on bbc news. hello. some very big changes in our weather over the next 48 hours. saturday, still a very cold day with a very frosty start. but then the thaw begins on sunday in the morning — when i say "begins", because for some of us it will be a slow process, particularly in the north of the country. so, here's the weekend. this is the air mass showing where the warm air is, just to the south—west of us. and then ahead of it, this weather front will sweep in across the uk. ahead of it still cold air, but the cold air will be deflected towards the east of the continent, so hence that milder air will eventually arrive. we'll talk about the rest

of that in just a second. here's a look at the here and now. so, still some snow showers around across the highlands, the pennines into northern wales. the inner—city temperatures well below freezing first thing on saturday morning. outside of town it's going to be even colder than that. so, the weather for saturday itself and some western parts will be cloudy at times. wintry showers are certainly on the cards. most of the rain around the coasts, snow or sleet inland. and already starting to feel a little less cold. 5 in london, 4 in glasgow and 8 degrees in plymouth. so, quite a change. now, that big change arriving saturday night into sunday. so, the weather fronts sweep in, a lot of isobars, gale force winds around the coasts. but for a time in the morning, with a lot of cold air about, early on sunday there could be freezing rain, icy conditions and hill snow. for example, in wales, hill snow is possible around the pennines and certainly in scotland. so, for a time in the morning on sunday it could be icy for some of us. but those winds are strong,

the air is mild, it will sweep in and by the early afternoon these are the sort of temperatures we will be getting. so, 10 in plymouth, still cold in the north. but those temperatures will continue to rise through the course of sunday night into monday. look at that — by monday morning we are talking about the mid—teens in cardiff and plymouth. and this is the outlook as far as the week ahead is concerned. it's going to be changeable, turbulent, windy at times. back to the sort of normal weather we would expect around our shores. bye— bye.

this is bbc news. the headlines: a report on capital punishment in the us states that more than a third of the 20 scheduled executions due to take place this year were botched. the death penalty information center also noted that the number of state—sanctioned killings fell to its lowest level for more than three decades. ukrainian officials say that one of the biggest barrages of russian missile strikes has badly damaged electricity and water supplies across the country. at least three people are reported to have been killed. south africa's president, cyril ramaphosa, was heckled when he addressed his own anc party conference. mr ramaphosa avoided impeachment proceedings earlier this week but is still hoping to re—stand as party leader.