welcome to bbc news. i'm david willis. our top stories: engineers struggle to restore power to millions in north america as one of the worst winter storms in living memory grips the region. the taliban clamps down further on women's rights in afghanistan, barring them from working for aid agencies. and the pope remembers those who are caught up in devastating wars as he holds his christmas eve mass in the vatican. hello and welcome to bbc news.

an icy blast is affecting nearly 250 million people in the united states and canada, as one of the most severe winter storms in living memory takes hold — bringing with it snow blizzards, strong winds, and freezing temperatures. at least 19 people have died, hundreds of thousands of american households and businesses are without electricity, and thousands of flights have been cancelled. the us state of montana registered a record—breaking low of minus 45 celsius. from washington, nomia iqbal reports. for much of america, this is the coldest christmas eve. can turn boiling water into a snow cloud and second. the

state of montana is bearing the brunt, temperatures are the lowest at —52. residents warned to stay indoors but some are trying to tackle the snowfalls. need to clear the sidewalk, i'm out here doing it with a shovel because the slow i wouldn't start. , , , ., because the slow i wouldn't start. , i, ., ., start. every type of travel thrown into _ start. every type of travel thrown into chaos, - start. every type of travel thrown into chaos, in - start. every type of travel thrown into chaos, in the | thrown into chaos, in the midwest fatalities, and buffalo new york isn't taking a chance, driving has been banned. conditions of blinding snow, the zero visibility, absolute white house, it may go down as one of the worst in history. fin one of the worst in history. on railwa s one of the worst in history. on railways many roots cancelled. it's a gamble you never know what's going to happen, you need to get there early and be prepared, be flexible there is always change. figs prepared, be flexible there is always change.— always change. as have thousands _ always change. as have thousands of _ always change. as have thousands of flights - always change. as have | thousands of flights with hundreds more delayed on the weekend. ., ,., ., , , weekend. the airport was shut

down so we — weekend. the airport was shut down so we drove _ weekend. the airport was shut down so we drove to _ weekend. the airport was shut down so we drove to nebraskai down so we drove to nebraska got on a flight there, then dc, delayed in dc. the storm is expected to last some time yet, it has left americans facing another ruined christmas after the pandemic obstructed the last one. darsha dodge, who's a journalist at south dakota's rapid cityjourna, travelled to the state's pine ridge reservation to deliver firewood to residents who've resorted to burning clothes and furniture in an attempt to stay warm. i talked to the representative of the pass creek districtjust a couple of days ago. they have been out trying to dig people out 21w, people with no firewood at all. a lot of these homes are heated by woodstoves or they're heated by propane because theyjust not together in a grid in the same way you would be in a city. so when the snow is four orfive feet, even higher drifted over the roads, there is no way for these

trucks to get in so they have started resorting to burning whatever they can just to stay warm. it's a similar story injapan, where heavy snow in the north and surrounding areas has left more than a dozen people dead and at least 80 injured. over 10,000 households have also been left without power, and the meteorological agency has warned that snowstorms and high waves along the sea of japan coast could lead to snow drifts up to 60 centimetres deep. let's get some of the day's other news. the us has condemned an order by afghanistan's taliban rulers to ban women from working for local and international aid agencies. the islamist group has warned ngos that their licences would be cancelled if they delayed implementation of the directive. the taliban said female employees had not followed their interpretation of islamic dress code.

at least ten people have been killed in south africa after a fuel tanker exploded. the blast apparently happened after the tanker hit a bridge. a0 people were injured in the incident which occurred in boksburg, a city to the east ofjohannesburg. the pope has held his annual christmas eve mass at st peter's basilica in the vatican. his sermon remembered victims of war — particularly those in ukraine. this year marks the tenth year of his papacy and later the pontiff will be speaking to the faithful who'll gather below the balcony for his christmas day blessing. at least 10 people were killed when russia carried out widespread shelling of the ukrainian city of kherson this morning. more than 50 others were wounded. president zelensky has described the attack, which came exactly 10 months after the start of the russian invasion, as "killing for the sake of intimidation and pleasure." our correspondent yogita limaye reports from southern ukraine.

more than a month after it was liberated from russia, kherson continues to live in terror. an artillery attack on the busy city centre, targeting civilians out to buy essential items. "i was walking and the ground started to shake beneath me. "i fell down. "i then saw smoke coming up," one woman said. kherson is hit multiple times every day, but this has been the biggest attack in weeks. from here, we took, i think, four orfive critical, injured patients. and then from the hotel, we took two injured. and then from the other — down three blocks away, most people were dead. sobs. the suffering is endless. siren wails. and so are the attacks. distant explosion. the sound of more mortar shelling as emergency workers try to save people.

for the people of kherson, who had begun to get used to the constant shelling, this attack strikes new fear. and the worry here, and on front lines of this war, is that the bombardment could get even more intense over christmas and in the run—up to the new year. yogita limaye, bbc news, mykolaiv. more information on the situation in ukraine on the website. french police have clashed with protestors at a demonstration in paris which was held in response to the fatal shooting of three people at a kurdish community centre in the city. all of the victims of friday's attack were of kurdish descent. a 69—year—old man has been arrested — he's described himself as a racist who hates foreigners. helena wilkinson reports. this was the scene on the streets of central paris earlier today — chaos as protests turned violent.

cars were overturned, fires started. riot police responded with tear gas. those protesting from the kurdish community are angry after friday's shooting which targeted a kurdish cultural centre. three people were killed, three others were injured. translation: there is no doubt in our mind that these murders l qualify as terrorist and that they are political assassinations. the fact that our association is targeted in this way is of a terrorist and political nature. of course, there's an investigation and we'll see how it evolves. the suspect in the attack has been taken from custody to a police psychiatric unit. the 69—year—old, who hasn't been named, is a former train driver who had recently been released from prison. despite no confirmed motive for the attack, prosecutors said the suspect had previously been charged with racist violence.

that incident was last year, where he attacked a migrant camp in paris with a sword. french president emmanuel macron said the kurdish community in paris had been the target of a heinous attack and has praised police for their courage. helena wilkinson, bbc news. let's go back to one of our top stories, and the us secretary of state antony blinken has said he is "deeply concerned" that the taliban's ban on women delivering humanitarian aid in afghanistan will disrupt vital and life—saving assistance to millions of people. the un has also condemned the move — saying it would violate the most fundamental rights of women. the bbc world service's, south—asia regional editor, anbarasan ethirajan, told us more about the international reaction. the un has strongly condemned this move by the taliban because this will have a far reaching impact on the ground. there are dozens of ngos,

health ngos and food aid ngos working on the ground, and not allowing women to work means people cannot access these services. for example, one woman worker was saying women can easily relate with us about asking for medicines. for example, if they want to give a polio vaccination, they can go into the any of the houses in the rural areas. but now they cannot express these things freely to any men health worker or even food aid. so this has become a huge issue. this has been a very bad week for women's rights in afghanistan, because a couple of days ago, the taliban rulers, they banned women from studying at universities. and within two days, they announced this far reaching decision to ban women to work from ngos. and it is not only local and domestic foreign ngos, also the un contracts many work to local ngos distributing humanitarian aid. there is acute food insecurity

in rural parts of afghanistan following a taliban takeover, the economy has collapsed. now how to distribute the food? that's why the un says that it is going to call for a meeting on monday with the taliban authorities and they have urged the taliban to reverse the decision immediately. yalda royan is the afghanistan team lead with voice amplified, an organisation working to end violence against women and girls in conflict. she told me today's announcement did not come as a shock. so the what decision that the taliban made today, this was not a surprise for us, we were ready for it and we knew that the taliban will use and make another decision to bar women from wherever they want it is very unfortunate that a group of 70,000 terrorists are challenging the whole world and international community and stopping women from work now at the humanitarian

agencies, means that already the $40 million that is being delivered to the taliban on a weekly basis under the name of humanitarian aid was not reaching to the right people. women—headed households, human rights defenders that we did the research last september on them, only one out of every four human rights defenders said that they were receiving human rights aid and that is in the case that women were working... crosstalk. sorry to interrupt, we have a limited amount of time. this comes just a week women were banned from attending university. there have been some student protests in response to that, i believe, will they have any effect? of course, it will have effect, because you know that women who are working right now in the ngos are the only breadwinners for theirfamilies or the only people who are working and bringing income to their families. in the context that there is no

job opportunities and there is an economic crisis going on. so with families losing their only income generating source, i am sure that there will be a lot of added protests again inside the country... crossstalk. will that have any effect on the rulers, on the taliban? we hope it will have effects, yes. because when the people are resisting the taliban it will be the end of them, hopefully. just very finally, the us has condemned this latest move. what can the international community do to put pressure on the taliban in this regard? well, specifically in terms of the united states, if we talk about it, they have an argument with the taliban which they did in 2020 with the taliban in doha, so they can go back to that agreement and hold the taliban accountable based on that agreement and the annexes that

they never made public. and the international community can do a lot of things to hold the taliban accountable, starting from stopping engaging with them to supporting them financially under the name of humanitarian aid and many other reasons, especially the travel ban and not letting the taliban to use the platforms, international platforms for their own benefits. yalda royan there. let's return to the north american storms now and for a view from canada, i spoke to ctvjournalist nate vandermeer in brockville, 0ntario for an update on the situation there. you know, i have been covering weather for about 20 years here in canada and this is like nothing like i have seen. this morning we had trains that was stuck at railroad tracks, we had a 400 kilometres stretch of highway close, no—one could travel here, one of the busiest travel days of the year. right now in our province of

ontario there are about 50,000 people with no power. what is different, though, about this particular storm, would you say? well, right now, our tiny little area here is under warning. we had wind gusts of around 100—120 kilometres an hour, blowing snow. when you went to bed last evening, you could hear it pushing on the house. this has been going on for about 2k hours here. we usually when we have a winter storm it is a few hours of snow or really heavy snow half a day but this has been ongoing now for 2h hours and it's expected to continue over night into sunday. for many of you up there this was to be, what, the first christmas with the family since covid, right? that's right. i mean, we had plans tonight — christmas eve, ourfirst family get—together for three years. that had to be cancelled. people could not even get out of their driveway to get out. i went around the town here today, brockville, to get some footage of what the conditions were like and it was just white—out conditions, wind blowing, you could not see

the car in front of you, that's why police were telling people to stay at home and not go out and stay safe. so, apart from working as a journalist, how has this affected your own christmas plans? we cancelled tonight. tomorrow, we are staying home here with our daughter and family for christmas day and we have christmas dinner tomorrow night so hopefully, the storm will be over tomorrow night and we will be able to dig out tomorrow afternoon and head to that turkey dinner. and how dangerous is it out there for those who are mad enough to venture outside? well, right now, police and two operators are collecting vehicles that are on the highway that has closed down. and i see they have just closed another part of the highway between the quebec border and ottawa as well. so they're telling people stay home and not go out, because if you do get stranded there, the snow drifts will overpower your car — i've seen photos and videos today of police officers on roofs of cars, looking inside to make sure no—one is inside — that's how powerful the storm is.

if you stay in your car and the roadways are stranded, the snow drifts over a few hours will be over the top of your car. how long is this expected to go on? they are saying it should die down over the overnight hours here. the wind has died down a little bit today, late afternoon and in the evening. it is still windy and snowing here right now. but they are saying anywhere between 20—40 centimetres by sunday morning. my goodness me. some people will be trapped in their cars, presumably, are they, and expecting to have to rescue people there as well? that's right. i have not heard of any nearby rescues. there was a significant pile—up on one of the highways — i believe 100 vehicles involved, tractors, trailers, cars, and vans. that is why they shut the highways down here — they did not want that to happen again. so, in my area here, eastern ontario, ottawa valley, no — we haven't heard of any fatalities here, but i mean, that's why police are saying and government agencies are saying stay home.

it is looking extremely cold. what is the temperature right now? i believe it is —7 right now. it feels around —18 with the wind chill. a very chilly nate vandermeer there. tens of thousands of people from around the world have gathered in bethlehem on the israeli—occupied west bank for christmas eve celebrations. christian leaders led midnight mass in the church of the nativity and the palestinian president mahmoud abbas was amongst the congregation. the eastern region of the democratic republic of the congo is emerging from a ten—year conflict and the un projects that 150,000 people will have fled their homes by the end of this year. now, a local n60 is ensuring that some displaced children do not miss out on the christmas cheer. they held a party for the children in a village in north kivu, a few miles away from the frontline. daniel dadzie reports. around the world by daft punk plays.

a reason to celebrate in the midst of chaos. for several months, these children and their families have been on the run from war. they found refuge in the kibati stadium in kanyaruchinya, a village east of the democratic republic of congo. it's in the north kivu province at the epicentre of a decade—long conflict between the drc government forces and m23 rebels, the most notable of numerous armed groups. on saturday, local ngoa new day visited the displaced persons in their makeshift homes to give them a taste of christmas. translation: in our villages, our children used to celebrate | christmas properly. but now, i was beginning to wonder how we were going to do it, as we had fled the war. by the grace of god, there are benefactors who thought of us and came with something to make us smile again. so, christmas went well

and i thank god very much. but even with all this good cheer, there's an uncomfortable reminder of the violence which ripped them from their homes. translation: we want the new year to start . with good things. let the enemies leave our villages in kibumba and let us leave this camp. on friday, m23 rebels handed over the town of kibumba to the east african regional force in a first step towards the implementation of a peace agreement brokered in november. the thousands of displaced persons in drc would be granted their christmas wish if they could peacefully return to their homes. daniel dadzie, bbc news. king charles iii is due to deliver his first christmas message on sunday. the british monarch is expected

to pay tribute to the late queen, but he will also reflect on his views about the importance of faith. 0ur religion editor aleem maqbool has more. another moment of history as, in st george's chapel at windsor castle, king charles records his first ever christmas message — a chance to reflect on the year, but also talk about faith. given its importance to him, we're likely to hear about interfaith relations. one of the first gatherings the new king convened, even before the queen's funeral, was of 30 faith leaders. he told them he viewed britain as what he called a "community of communities". at the start of the year, he commissioned portraits of holocaust survivors, including rachael levi, whose mother and three siblings — aged ten, eight and three — were all killed on arrival at auschwitz. she talks of her surprise at being honoured by the man who's now king.

i appreciate it. and i appreciate that the prince of wales at the time should do this for all of us as survivors. and he goes on doing things and being so, so very, very hospitable in every way towards the survivors. that is a great thing, absolutely, and that gives us courage. but, of course, the king has long shown an intense interest in people of many faiths. he's often thrown himself into celebrating other cultures. but the king's regard for people of other religions doesn't always go down well. when he suggested, in the �*90s, he looked at the constitutional role as defender of faith, not defender of the faith, some suggested he was sidelining the country's christian heritage, even wondering about his own beliefs.

others say that's just a misunderstanding. all i can say is that he's been very explicit about his own faith and from what i see of him, he does take faith and worship extremely seriously and is profoundly thoughtful about it. and i don't personally see any contradiction between the two. as i've said, the more you dig deep into your own faith, the more you're able to be open to others. and that has always been the king's point — that he feels it's part of his christian duty to protect the practice of all faiths and none. aleem maqbool, bbc news. maxi jazz, the lead singer of the british dance band faithless, has died at the age of 65. the group were best known for the club classic insomnia. take a listen. # come on, yo. # i can't get no sleep. # uh!

maxi jazz's former bandmate sister bliss said he died "peacefully in his sleep" last night. faithless was formed in 1995 and had a number of hits, including insomnia and we come 0ne. they were pioneers of stadium dance music and headlined some of the world's biggest festivals, including glastonbury. bbc radio broadcaster and dj edward adoo explains what was unique about maxi jazz. the way he connected with people, he was real, he was authentic and he's originally a brixton boy, came through pirate radio, a poet, a rapper. i saw faithless in creamfields in 2002. it was faithless first and then underworld. ijust remembered him saying those timeless words, "i can't get no sleep. "are you ready?" and then he got — he whipped the crowd up. i interviewed him in 2017 and out of all the people i've interviewed, he was really calm. he was — to be honest, he was too cool for school. he was too chill. he was like, "yeah, this is what i've been doing".

faithless, they — more or less, they revolutionised dance music. at a time where dance music had just become sort of noted by the mainstream, sort of in the late �*80s, early �*90s, it was kind of propping up. a lot of people didn't understand it and suddenly, they realised that it had a connection with youth culture, and faithless were a part of that. i think maxi jazz, he was part of that generation who came through the soul, the rare groove movement and then, suddenly, there was house, there was this electronic movement championed by the likes of pete tong on radio 1 and suddenly, it'd become mainstream — and faithless have become mainstream, to the point where you would hear insomnia on breakfast radio. now, the most important piece of news that we're to bring you. us military officials have assured anxious children that the bad weather in north america won't prevent santa claus from delivering his presents. the north american aerospace defense command, or norad, tracks santa's yuletide

flight every year. more than 4 billion presents have already been delivered. he is heading for new brunswick in canada. en route to someone, puerto rico, apparently. there we go. —— sanjuan. now, let's look at the weather here on earth. good morning. the countdown is over — it is now christmas day — and a popular weather question for christmas day is, of course, will it be a white christmas? starting us off today, you'd be forgiven for thinking "no chance!" we're in some fairly mild air, really, top to tail across the uk, which is being pulled in from the atlantic on a south—westerly wind. but there is some much colder airjust sitting to the north of the uk, on the northern flank of this area of low pressure. this low will drive the weather across the uk this christmas day. it will push bands of showers through with some sunny interludes between times

but occasionally, the showers lumping together into more persistent spells of rain, perhaps for northern ireland and northern england through the afternoon, later in the day towards the south—east. mild to the south. afternoon temperatures, 10, 11 degrees. but notice, the keen—eyed amongst you, the map turning blue across scotland through the afternoon — temperatures will actually come down through the day. now, the definition of a white christmas is not for blanket snow coverage butjust one flake of snow to fall anywhere in the uk during the 2a hours of christmas day. so, colder air in across scotland with showers coming in through the evening, and it looks like we could see a white christmas here. perhaps the odd flurry for northern ireland, too. for boxing day, the colder air extending, though, all the way south across the uk. a frosty start. look out for some ice across scotland, parts of northern england after the showers overnight. the south—east and east anglia getting off to a frost—free start but the colder air will trickle in here through the course of boxing day. i think there will be a lot of brightness once any early rain clears from the south—east, but it will feel chillier. further north, the showers

continue and they're likely to be wintry across western scotland, drifting some down into the pennines, the odd one across the mountains of northern ireland as well. and temperatures lower across the board for boxing day afternoon. however, this spell, if you like, of cold weather is barely a fleeting glance, really, of arctic air, because as we look further on into the week ahead, the final days of 2022, we start to pick up a more atlantic influence. once again, areas of low pressure whirling in from the atlantic. 0ur temperatures return closer to average values, if not slightly above, but there will be some quite showery, if not wet and windy, spells of weather to come in the following days.

this is bbc news. the headlines: engineers are scrambling to restore power supplies to hundreds of thousands of people as a winter storm affects large parts of the united states and canada. the severe weather forced the cancellation of thousands of flights and kept some of the busiest roads closed. the un has criticised a taliban ruling that bars afghan women from working for aid agencies, saying it violates their most fundamental rights. last week the hardline rulers announced women were banned from attending university.