this is bbc news, i'm monika plaha. our top stories: memphis police disbands the so—called scorpion special unit, whose officers are accused of murdering tire nichols. israel's security cabinet agrees new measures in response to the deadly attack on a synagogue in east jerusalem. a former head of the czech republic's armed forces wins the race to be the country's next president. can novak djokovic equal the record for tennis grand slam wins? we'll be looking ahead to the australian open final. and doing the monster mash in bulgaria, a tradition to ward off evil spirits that's made a covid come back.

hello and welcome to bbc news. the us memphis police department has disbanded the so—called scorpion special unit whose officers are accused of murdering tyre nichols. the 29—year—old black man was kicked and punched by five policemen, who are also black. they've now been sacked and face multiple charges, including murder. a warning: nada tawfik�*s report does contain distressing images. all chant: justice for tyre! woman: justice for tyre! the familiar rallying cry heard too often after incidents of police brutality. memphis�*s worst fears never materialised as protesters remained peaceful — a considered effort by city officials to deliver swift justice for tyre nichols seems to have worked.

small—scale demonstrations took place across the country — from new york to detroit and los angeles — mostly calm, just as the family wanted. five black officers have been charged with murder in the death of tyre nichols, in no small part due to the existence of these extremely graphic videos. bleep the officers aggressively approach his car after a traffic stop. taken aback, the 29—year—old black motorist is heard protesting his innocence. yells: damn! i didn't do anything! he seems to comply... calmly: i'm on the ground. ..but as this encounter continues, mr nichols breaks away and flees. when they find him, they repeatedly kick him in the head, strike him with a baton and punch him. in distress, he calls out for his mother. tyre nichols was ultimately taken to the hospital in a critical condition and died three days later from his injuries. woman: justice for tyre! all chant: justice for tyre! today in memphis, people again took to the streets, deeply affected by what

they saw in the video. this is horrific. we are traumatised by it but i applaud the city and the people here today who've gone about trying to correct this in an orderly way. this is an attack on human rights, this is an attack on the rights of black americans and, you know, this shows the true nature of policing. the mood here today is sombre. additional rallies are planned for later, where grief counsellors will be on hand for residents. and accountability is still key. in fact, after the video's release, the shelby county sheriff announced two other deputies who responded to this scene have now been relieved of duty. how can you look at that footage and not want to do something? at a press conference saturday, state lawmakers said they plan to introduce legislation aimed at police training. if a dog in this country was beaten like that, what the hell would happen? you all know what would happen.

0k? if a dog's beaten like that, somebody�*s going to jail. now, you got a man who's dead. these disturbing videos have reignited concerns about the culture of policing in america. the need for police reform is once again at the forefront of people's minds. that was nada tawfik. devante hill is the founder of one memphis — one vision. he told me about the mood in the city, a day after the footage was released. the temperature here in memphis is unequivocally peaceful. we always knew memphis has always been leading the charge for peaceful protests. i don't know if you remember in 2020 in the likeness of george floyd and ahmaud arbery and breonna taylor, the world was in flames and memphis was at peace and we truly began the systemic work of changing what policing looks like in memphis and changing the way we deal with issues like this, that we knew one day would actually happen in our city.

and so right now, the tone and temperature is that of peace because we were met with justice before we were met with the video. the trauma changed and the song changed and so, our protest, the sound of it has to change as well — and it has. and earlier on in the program, i mentioned that special police unit, the scorpion, being disbanded in response to what happened to tyre nichols. do you think that goes far enough, and what further changes do you want to see now? actually, i actuallyjust sent a message to the desk of the mayor and the police director, whom i'm incredibly proud of in their swift movement to termination and through arbitration and also into the realm ofjustice. but ijust sent message to them that we have to dissect what the scorpion — the damage that the scorpion unit has done. we need to know how many violent complaints have been made against this unit.

we need to ask questions such as, "what have we addressed "or how we are addressing these complaints made against these "units?" and, "how can we use this knowledge as a dashboard "to police departments across the world on how "they deal with violent claims against units that are created, "in their inception, to be aggressive? and so, there is much more work that has to be done and, of course, our first african—american female police director here in the city of memphis, she has remained committed to doing that work. i'm actually incredibly — as an activist, i'm oddly enough saying i'm incredibly proud of our police director in this moment. i'm disgusted by our police department but i am not shocked. i am not at all caught off guard by what i was able to see because this has been happening to young black men across the country in america for decades. this is nothing new. but i am glad that memphis is now faced with a unique

opportunity to show our country what it looks like to be a catalyst of change for the entire world and the world of policing. devante hill. a special meeting of israel's security cabinet has approved measures, in response to the killing of seven people outside a synagogue in eastjerusalem on friday. the israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu has promised a strong, swift and precise response to the attack by a palestinian gunman. here's our middle east correspondent, yoland knell. another victim of a jerusalem shooting being treated by medics. an israeli father and son were injured in a new attack this morning. the suspect is just 13. he's said to be the relative of another teenager shot dead by israeli forces this week. meanwhile, this was the scene of yesterday's shooting attack, the deadliest israelis

have seen in years. here, a palestinian gunman opened fire after prayers in a packed synagogue at the start of the jewish sabbath. as people rushed over to those injured, one witness said they were shot, too. translation: a guy stopped here to help them. _ he went out of his car and was hit by a bullet in his head. he died here, next to me, and his son was hit by a bullet in his back. after police shot dead the attacker, israeli politicians were quick to visit the scene. the veteran prime minister benjamin netanyahu has since promised to take immediate action. translation: iwill submit to the security council - additional steps in the fight against terrorism. this includes significantly hastening and expediting the licensing of weapons for authorised civilians. as we have seen time and again, this saves lives. on the streets ofjerusalem tonight, emotions are running

high. israelis blocked cars in palestinian neighbourhoods, here shouting "arabs, beware — hebrew blood isn't cheap". tensions had risen sharply after the deadliest israeli military raid in the occupied west bank in years. on thursday, nine palestinians, including two civilians, were killed. the israeli armed forces say they were acting on intelligence to prevent islamicjihad fighters carrying out major attacks. in response, palestinian militants fired rockets from the gaza strip. in recent months, amid rising violence, there have been repeated international calls for calm here but they've had little impact. and now, once again, fears are growing of wider unrest. yolande knell, bbc news, jerusalem. aaron david miller is a senior fellow at the carnegie endowment for international peace, and told us about the current level of tension.

you've had a perfect storm gathering now for several years. it's driven, of course, by a 56—year—old israeli military occupation of the west bank, a palestinian authority that is losing credibility on the streets and loss of control in many respects in many areas — for example, injenin and nablus — armed groups, independent or affiliated with hamas and palestine's islamicjihad that are continuing to plan attacks, and the onset of a new israeli government — the most fundamentalist and right—wing in the history of the state of israel, that is asserting an exclusive and unquestioned claim to the west bank and tojerusalem. so i think even if you find a way out of this, and i suspect there probably still is a way to de—escalate, sooner or later, you're going to be in for another explosion. it's only a matter of time.

that was aaron david miller. let's get some of the day's other news. differing accounts have emerged of a ukrainian missile strike on a hospital in an occupied part of the eastern lu ha nsk province. moscow says 11! people were killed, and 2a injured, including medical staff, but the regional governor says dozens of russian troops were killed. police in peru have fired tear gas and blocked roads to stop anti—government demonstrators marching through the streets of the capital, lima. the unrest began seven weeks ago when the left—wing president, pedro castillo, was impeached for alleged corruption and detained. president dina boluarte's proposal to hold general elections in december was rejected by congress. thousands of teachers and other school staff have gathered in lisbon for the latest demonstration in a long—running dispute over pay and careers. protesters assembled outside the education ministry

and at the palace of portugal's president. the former us president donald trump has begun his campaign for re—election in 2024, saying he's, "more angry and more committed than ever." delivering the keynote speech at the new hampshire republican party's annual meeting, mr trump accused the biden administration of running america into the ground. in the czech republic, the retired nato general petr pavel has been elected as the new president. he saw off a populist challenger andrej babis in a contentious campaign taking almost 58% of the vote according to initial results. mr pavel will replace milos zeman whose second term ends in march. azadeh moshiri reports. chanting thunderous applause and chants of "pavel to the castle!" they echo the chants for the czech republic's very

first president after communist rule. petr pavel�*s supporters see this as a victory for liberal democracy. translation: i see values winning this election - - values like truth, dignity, respect and humility. and i am convinced that these values are shared by the vast majority of us. cheering and applause in a symbolic moment, slovakia's president zuzana caputova joined him on stage. cheering and applause continues like him, she too is a pro—west and liberal leader. leader. across the country, fans celebrated wearing an unofficial emblem of his campaign — the flannel shirt. cheering petr pavel is a man better known in uniform. he's a former nato general and a decorated war hero. pro—eu, his win anchors the czech republic firmly in the west and signals more

support for ukraine. in contrast, his opponent andrej babis was widely seen as a populist leader. he previously served as prime minister and was criticised for running what some viewed as a negative campaign against petr pavel. applause but in times when concessions are by no means a given, he sent a clear message to his supporters. translation: i congratulate mr petr pavel on his victory i and acknowledge my defeat. i congratulate him on becoming the next president of the czech republic. but it marks the end of a toxic campaign trail. it was rife with disinformation as well as death threats — that's why mr pavel�*s victory is being hailed as a new, more dignified era for the country. azadeh moshiri, bbc news. severe rain sweeping

new zealand's north island have prompted more local emergency declarations as flood rescue efforts continue in the city of auckland. at least three people have died following the torrential downpours. naomi choy smith reports. roads turned to rivers and homes submerged as rising floodwaters left entire communities in auckland under water. the water was up to my neck when i went out of the house. i've been in this community my whole life, 45 years. i've never seen it like this. new zealand's prime minister viewed the damage from above. plunged straight into his first major crisis just a few days into his new role, chris hipkins called the flooding "unprecedented". the metservice has confirmed that yesterday was auckland's wettest day on record. and having just surveyed some of the extensive damage both on the ground and in the air,

it's clear that it's going to be a big clean—upjob. meteorologists say roughly an entire summer's worth of rain fell in just a few hours, cutting off power and forcing big events, like an eltonjohn concert, to be cancelled last—minute. nearly 2,000 passengers were stranded at auckland's airport after ankle—deep water flooded the international terminal. the chaos prompted questions about the country's response and whether it's prepared for the challenges posed by new climate patterns. it goes without saying that we need to have a conversation about how climate change is making these events more frequent and how cities like auckland are massively underprepared to deal with flooding events, which are going to become more frequent. hundreds of people have been rescued from flooded cars and homes as the rain shows no sign of slowing down. naomi choy smith, bbc news. earlier, we spoke to ricardo menendez march, a green party mp. he told us how communities have

been impacted by the flooding. having walked around the neighbourhood and visited tenants who have been left without a home to the event, it has been really heartening to see that. people have been delivering pizzas to shelters, offering their homes. i was one person who benefited from having people who offered their homes so that i could quickly escape and have somewhere to sleep in overnight. that is what is making things bearable for many. but ultimately, with the risk of more severe weather coming in our region, we're going to need more support, so i'm hoping that the community support can keep up over the next few days so people don't feel like we can go back to normal yet. ricardo menendez march. he isa he is a green party mp. a sunday newspaper here in the uk is reporting that the former prime minister borisjohnson was told

by government officials to stop asking richard sharp for "advice" about his "personal financial matters" just days before mr sharp was announced as the new chairman of the bbc. our political correspondent iain watson has been investigating, and spoke to my colleague lucy grey. the sunday times ran this story, in effect, last week, but what they've done this week is published a leaked memo from the cabinet office — the people who advise the prime minister on propriety and ethics. that memo comes from december 2020, so it was a couple of weeks before the announcement of richard sharp as the bbc chairman, and it is offering strong advice to the then prime minister borisjohnson. it tells him to, quote, "no longer" ask for advice on his financial affairs from mr sharp. now, this would then — you would assume — tend to suggest that perhaps, that advice had been sought in the period when richard sharp was a contender to become bbc chairman. but as far as richard sharp was concerned, he had said

at the time when this story first broke a week ago that his role has simply been to introduce a wealthy canadian businessman called sam blyth to the country's most senior civil servant to discuss how he could assist the prime minister financially. he had no knowledge, he said, of the financial arrangements. and in a letter to bbc staff, he said he didn't guarantee any loans himself and he didn't get involved in any financing, although mr blyth did turn out to guarantee a loan worth £800,000. now, following the publication of this leaked memo, as i understand it, mr sharp's position hasn't changed. his position is still insisting that he was not a financial adviser in any way to borisjohnson. he is, of course, a former banker. borisjohnson�*s spokesman is also saying he neither sought nor received any financial advice from mr sharp. as to the cabinet office itself, where this memo originated, they are refusing to comment. iain watson reporting.

tributes have been paid to the american singer and guitarist tom verlaine, who's died at the age of 73. # he founded the legendary punk band television, famous for their seminal debut album marquee moon. mike scott of the waterboys said he was the best rock and roll guitarist of all time. serbian tennis star novak djokovic is poised to make history later today as he bids for a record tenth australian open title. serbian sports journalist miodrag dimitrijevic told us earlier about djokovic's chances for winning his tenth australian open title. novak djokovic already won nine titles here, so he must be the player favourite, but tsitsipas has shown us in this tournament that he is playing pretty well. —— the clear favourite. he made some mistakes, some changes on backhand,

and that he will try to use against djokovic. for djokovic, it's his second home. he adored playing at rod laver in the night session. maybe it is the most difficult thing to do in tennis to beat djokovic in the night session on rod laver arena. it's never happened before in the semifinals and finals. at this moment, he has 19 wins and zero defeats, so he is trying to get his 20th win in these two matches and a title. —— and tenth title. how would you sum up novak djokovic's welcome back to the australian open this year? yes, the serbian community welcomed him back great. on the first game against pablo carreno busta, he had so much serbian fans, but djokovic fans who are not from serbia — i never saw

something like that. i was in a couple of football national team games, basketball national team games, but i never saw 100 serbian flags all around the crowds and everything, and there was chanting and everything. i mean, he got so much support for coming back. yes. he really is an icon to the serbian community. just describe that excitement for me. how excited are the fans to see him in action? yes, but i don't think that he isjust an idol for the serbian community. there is a big community of novak fans all around the world from kazakhstan, france, england, united states — even in australia, there are many people who adore djokovic.

there are some australians who came to me and said that djokovic is their favourite player. he is playing tennis for 15 years now, even with grand slams, so there are so many people who grew up when he was rising, winning grand slams, winning masters and, yes, the atmosphere is great on every occasion, and every match. as always, there are a few people who make mistakes and try to provoke him or anything but the australian open did a greatjob there and got them out of the stadium in the last two or three matches. yes, the atmosphere is great. every january across

the balkans, hundreds of people dress up as monsters. they do it to fend off evil spirits as the new year begins. the biggest such event takes place in the bulgarian town of pernik, but for the last couple of years, it was cancelled due to covid. now, the monsters are back, as the bbc�*s tim allman explains. no, they don't seem that scary to me, either, but maybe evil spirits are easily unnerved these days. the streets were full of colourful costumes and the sound of drums and bells, and they've been doing this around here for a long, long time. "our group has traditional masks from north macedonia," said this man. "the tradition is around 200 years old. "we have about 50 members

in the group and we have " pa rticipated in many carnivals." everyone seems to want to get involved, men and women of all ages — although it is mostly men. and the monster costumes can take a variety of different forms. "we started before world war two, around 1940," said this man. "our costume has horns. "we also have costumes that have feathers." since this was the first post—pandemic carnival of monsters, perhaps the celebrations were more ferocious than usual — dancing, gyrating, and whatever this is. tim allman, bbc news. there we go, the monsters are

back and in those interesting costumes. hello. after an uneventful first half of the weekend weather—wise, sunday does look set to bring something a little livelier with some stronger winds and some outbreaks of rain forsome, particularly across the northern half of the uk. the reason — an area of low pressure pushing to the north of scotland, this frontal system, which will eventually bring some outbreaks of rain. and plenty of isobars on the chart — that always shows that we will have some brisk winds. so, a breezier day, really, across the board. a lot of cloud to start off in the south of england and south wales. some of that will break up and, actually, for england and wales, we will see some spells of sunshine through the day but winds really picking up across parts of northern england, particularly gusty conditions over the pennines and just to the east of the pennines

as well. rather windy for this north coast of northern ireland and more broadly across scotland. strongest winds of all in the far north of scotland, gusting to 65 miles per hour. and this band of rain here pushing its way southwards and eastwards. but just ahead of that, a particularly mild feel — 12 or 13 degrees in parts of eastern scotland and, actually, a fairly mild day generally. now, as we go through sunday night, we'll push this band of cloud and rain southwards. much of the rain will fizzle. behind it, a mix of clear spells and showers with some slightly colder air tucking in. some of the showers could be wintry over high ground in scotland. it probably will be too windy for us to see anything much, though, in the way of frost. and then into monday, we see this little bump in the isobars here, this little ridge of high pressure building its way in. so, that means, actually, plenty of dry weather, some spells of sunshine. those early showers in the north—east should tend to ease off but we will bring more cloud in from the west as the day wears on. a little bit of rain with that — temperatures of eight, nine or ten degrees. now, as we look ahead to tuesday, we will see some spells of sunshine. but particularly through northern england, northern ireland and scotland,

there will be some showers, these falling as sleet or snow over high ground, but perhaps even to low levels in parts of scotland, where the winds will once again be strengthening. very gusty conditions the further north you are through tuesday afternoon. temperatures north to south, seven to 12 degrees. and then, as we head into tuesday night, well, there's uncertainty about the detail of this, but we could well see a really deep area of low pressure pushing close to the north of scotland and that could bring some very windy, even stormy, conditions forsome, particularly in the far north.

this is bbc news. the headlines: the memphis police department has disbanded the so—called scorpion special unit, whose officers are accused of murdering tyre nichols. the 29—year—old black man was kicked and punched by five policemen who are also black. they've now been sacked and face multiple charges, including murder. a special meeting of israel's security cabinet has approved measures in response to the killing of seven people outside a synagogue in eastjerusalem by a palestiniaun gunman. family members of attackers are set to lose their residency and health insurance rights. the former nato general, who will be the next czech president, has described the election outcome as a victory for the values of truth, dignity and respect.