tv BBC News BBC News March 5, 2023 5:00pm-5:31pm GMT
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this is bbc news — welcome if you're watching here in the uk or around the globe. our top stories. fire sweeps through a bangladesh camp destroying shelters that housed thousands of rohingya refugees. police in athens clash with protesters, who blame the government for greece's worst ever train crash, in which 57 people died. military spending in china will increase by more than 7% this year, way above the target for economics growth in the same period. the uk prime minister pledges to deport all small boat arrivals by asylum seekers. after a decade of talks, more than a hundred un member states agree on a treaty to protect our oceans. the ship has reached the shore. cheering and applause
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a huge fire has ripped through one of the rohingya refugee camps in cox's bazar in south—east bangladesh. the charity action aid said their initial assessment was that more than 2000 shelters had been gutted, leaving around 12,000 people homeless. hundreds of thousands of rohingya refugees, who escaped violence in neighbouring myanmar, have been living in crammed camps near the border in bangladesh. earlier i spoke to farah kabir, the country director of action aid bangladesh, about what happened. it's a very densely populated camp. we host more than a million people in the rohingya refugee camps. and so far, over 12,000 people have been affected. a lot of people have been
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temporarily evacuated. they came to the centres — action aid has some community centres in camp 11 — and they are taking refuge there. and the water points, as already mentioned by your colleague, and two of the health centres, primary health centres, were affected. and tomorrow morning we will have a clearer picture. but it's dry season. this is also another reason. it's dry season and the wind was blowing so it quickly spread. in such a short time. injust two hours it had damaged a huge area. right now, action aid is working with the volunteers. we're providing dry food and water. but the repercussions are going to be long term and we all have to work very closely. five departments of the fire service worked very hard to put the fire down and we are all together
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in this situation. and as you say, there are longer term repercussions and consequences here. what is needed in order to be able to help recover from this? and are the resources needed all there? the resources that we now need is to rebuild the infrastructure, and it takes a little time to do that. and as you know, the funding has been depleting. in fact, the world food programme had to cut down $2 from their existing package, which has also had repercussions on the rohingya refugees, particularly women and girls. to answer your question, no, we don't have all of the resources we need. quick mobilisation. and we need also resources and materials which will help to prevent in the future such spread.
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i also spoke to our south asia correspondent anbarasan ethirajan. do we know how the fire had started? officials have not given any details about how it started. it is camp number 11. i have been there. it is a very sprawling camp where tens of thousands of people live in cramped conditions. and these huts are made up of bamboo and sometimes by polythene sheets. or even tin roofs. and they are packed. there are tens of thousands of people living there. in the evenings, somehow the fire starts by accident. but officials say they managed to bring it under control. but thousands of people are now affected. they are now homeless, with the women and children as the aid worker was saying. it is a very terrible condition because they will be staying outside in the cold. but the aid agencies say they are providing all of the help. it is also a reminder of all the situation of rohingya refugees where nearly
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a million of them escaped violence from neighbouring myanmar. these camps are situated very close to the border. many people feel, the rohingya community feel, they have been forgotten by the world. from what your saying, it doesn't sound like the conditions in the camp lend themselves to reducing the spread of fire it starts. they are so close to each other and there have been a number of incidents in the past few years. some of them are arson attacks. infighting happening between very groups in the refugee community. and people are getting killed because of these fire accidents. the government wants to relocate some of these people to an island so that they can reduce the density and give more space for the people, for the rohingya. but many of them don't want to leave their relatives because it is on the mainland, they live as a community and,
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more and more, the population also increases over time. newborn children. the families of 6—7 are living in a small house. the chances of fire is always there. but again, luckily, this time, they managed to prevent. the issue of density in crowded camps, that needs to be addressed and that is what aid agencies have been talking about for a long time. anbarasan ethirajan, thank you for that. violent clashes have broken out between police and protesters outside the greek parliament in athens after last week's rail tragedy. the collision between a passenger and a freight train in which at least 57 people died has caused nationwide outrage. 0fficers said 12,000 people had gathered in front of the parliament to demand accountability for the collision. earlier on sunday, in a facebook post addressed to the nation, the greek prime minister said he owed everyone an apology — but especially the victims�* relatives. earlier, we heard from greek freelance journalist anthee carassava, who gave the background to the events on the ground in athens.
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these violent scuffles, as you said, broke out at the tail end of what was actually a very peaceful demonstration, one of many we've been seeing, rolling demonstrations and protests for the past four days. we saw black—clad youth, very militant youth, coming in and hurling petrol gas bombs at the greek parliament. and then there were scuffles instantly that ensued between them and riot police. we understand that these scuffles have died down, they have subsided a bit. but there are draconian measures in place to keep them from heating up again. this is a scene that is recurring and will continue to be recurring, because there is a lot of palpable anger.
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it's notjust here in athens in front of parliament that we're seeing these violent demonstrations. we've seen them up in the northern metropolis of thessaloniki, where most of these victims were... inaudible ..university students attending... ..back to school. where the station master today was ta ken to testify before a public prosecutor. so there's a lot of palpable anger — and rightly so, if i may add. because while the government has attributed this tragic accident, the deadliest in greek history, to human error, a nation is asking, why are these types of accidents recurring? and why this apology by the prime minister is coming
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57 victims too late. china has announced a large increase in military spending, over 7%, at the country's once—a—year parliamentary session. but the annual congress has set a more modest target for post—pandemic economic growth this year. as our china correspondent, stephen mcdonell reports from beijing, the gathering is also being used by xi jinping to further consolidate his power. the message to this mass gathering was that the government here has a plan for post—pandemic recovery. after xi jinping's standing took a hit from the strict anti—covid measures which hurt many people's livelihoods. the premier defended the party's handling of covid. translation: we overcame difficulties. _ we succeeded in maintaining an overall stable economic performance. ditching zero—covid has brought the economy back to life,
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and a 5% growth target was announced for this year. analysts think this is conservative. people are flocking to the major cities in search of opportunities, and the rebound is... i will say better than expected originally. people told us they're definitely spending more. translation: we are going out| with friends, eating and drinking. translation: the covid restrictions really affected business, _ and now we are back to normal. china's economy is already rebounding — but it is, after all, coming off a pretty low base following years of pandemic. now there are concerns that these key economic roles within government are all to be filled with xi jinping loyalists, who won't be giving him the frank and fearless advice he needs to be hearing about the trajectory of the country. the outgoing premier is a respected economist from a different power block to mr xi. the man expected to replace him was
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once xi jinping's chief of staff. it seems everyone now is from team xi. stephen mcdonell, bbc news, beijing. the british prime minister, rishi sunak, says he's committed to ensuring that people arriving here on small boats to claim asylum will be sent back. mr sunak says he wants to end the "immoral trade" of criminal gangs. in the coming week, the uk government is expected to announce legislation that will push for people arriving in small boats to be removed to other countries, including rwanda. but charities say the proposals are "vindictive" and "extremely concerning". earlier, i spoke to christina marriott, executive director of strategy at the british red cross, and asked whether government's proposed plans to reduce the number of migrants arriving in the uk via small boats will achieve its goal. so i think this puts at the heart of our asylum system, the heart of the uk asylum system a real catch—22.
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it's a completely impossible situation. at the moment, unless you're from ukraine or hong kong, or you're one of the very lucky 1,400 people who got on a resettlement scheme last year, the only way to claim asylum in the uk is to reach uk soils. under this bill, if you do reach uk soil, you will then be barred from claiming asylum. so our essential question is, if you are fleeing persecution, if you are fleeing war, if you are running for your life from afghanistan or syria, how do you claim asylum in the uk if this bill passes? i think we would also say that there is no evidence this bill will work. we work with 30,000 refugees and asylum seekers every year and what we know, what we hear time and time again, is that people don't know about the asylum system before they get here, and in fact the home office's own research has shown this. sojust making the asylum system
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harsher, making it more punitive, won't work because people literally don't know what the system is before they arrive in the uk. i want to put to you something that the prime minister has said, quoted in the mail on sunday today. rishi sunak said that illegal migration, as he calls it, isn't fair on british taxpayers, isn't fair on those who come here illegally, and he says it isn't right that criminal gangs should be allowed to continue this. what are your thoughts on that? so i don't think any of us feel that illegal gangs are right. it isn't right that people have to use them in order to access the uk asylum system, because they have to get to uk soil. there are other things we could do — we could build on the brilliant work that the government did for ukrainians, for example. we don't find ukrainians in the boats crossing the channel because they have safe and controlled alternatives to get to safety in the uk. we could think about things like humanitarian visas. there are safe and controlled
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alternative ways for people to access protection from the uk when they need it. that's a much more effective way of undermining the gangs. the government has said for quite a while now that they do want to turn the tide and need to turn the tide on the rising number of people crossing the channel in small boats — as you'll know, the numbers have increased and they're currently at the highest since records began — which was admittedly only in 2018. do you feel that there is any option that the government is using that might achieve that? what we know is what the government's done so far, talking about removing people to rwanda — very similar to the bill they're suggesting, talking about harsher asylum system isn't working. we know the numbers are going up in the cross—channel boats. and we know that removals from the country have actually gone down.
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this is all to be expected because this isn't the way that will reduce the numbers. one of the reasons we have more people coming across the channel is because we have less people coming in lorries. this isn't the crisis it's been made out to be. we have about a third of the applications that germany has, about half of what france has — our numbers are still lower than they were in the early 20005. this is not an enormous crisis we need to respond to. what we need to do is put in place good, safe, controlled routes to asylum — as we had for ukrainians, as we had at other times — and that's how you stop people crossing the channel in small boats. regulated railfares in england and wales will today see their steepest rise for more than a decade, despite record poor reliability. they will rise by 5.9 %.
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the increase will add hundreds of pounds to the cost of many annual season tickets, even though the government says it's stepped in to keep the rise below the rate of inflation which is around 10%. sport, and for a full round up, from the bbc sport centre, here's 0lly. everton are still in the relegation zone after drawing 2—2 at nottingham forest. they led twice but brennan johnson scored both forest goals to earn them a point that keeps them four points above the bottom three. everton had led 2—1 at the break thanks to a demari gray penalty and a header from abdoulaye doucoure, they are up one place to 18th and are only in the relegation zone on goal difference. yeah, disappointed — i think mainly with the goals and the way we conceded. i think they were really sloppy. without them, i think we played a decent game. we had good intensity and created some good chances. we conceded some very poor goals today. from a neutral point of view, i thoroughly enjoyed it. against an everton side that are very strong. that is what they are all about. we thought we had to match
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that and we didn't at the start of the game. in the second half, we match the intensity. liverpool and manchester united kick off at anfield in the next 15 minutes. third placed united won 2—1 at old trafford back in august and are looking to do the double over their great rivals for the first time in seven years. they've fielded the same side that won the league cup last weekend. liverpool have made three changes to the team that beat wolves last time — jordan henderson, cody gakpo and andy robertson come in. they would move up to fifth with a win. they played a better season than us so far. but thank god that means absolutely nothing for the game on sunday. it would be a boost. 100%. we have to make sure we really show that it is still incredibly difficult to play against us, because when we played there it looked incredibly difficult to play against them. but we have to make sure that they realise it is really not a joy to face them,
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in this case us. we don't have to compare. it's about the future. it's about now. so we face a fantastic opponent and we're looking forward so it is all about us getting the right preparation to be ready for that game. australian alex de minaur has won the biggest title of his career — the atp 500 mexico open in acapulco. the 24—year—old came from a set down to beat the american tommy paul. it feels great. it feels amazing. i know the hard work that has been put into be here and, you know, it is good to see the result. it is not always that you win a tournament and you get to finish a week. so i will definitely cherish this going into the worlds in miami.
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that's just about it. there are ten laps left at the bahrain grand prix. it looks like it is going to be a red bull 1—2 with max verstappen leading. but fernando alonso has taken his aston martin up to third. the the excitement in that race, you can follow that on the bbc sport website. that's all the sport for now. weightlifter mirabai chanu has won the bbc indian sportswoman of the year award for 2022. the 28—year—old commonwealth champion also won in 2021 and now becomes the first person to take the honour twice. the award honours the achievements of indian female players and is part of the bbc�*s commitment in india to cover women in sports and news. to talk us through the nominees, i'mjoined by our correspondent divya arya. so who is she up against?
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she was facing other olympic medal winners like vinesh phogat. and a boxing champion as well. she came out as the winner. she comes from really humble beginnings from a small village. she is the daughter of a tea seller and famously hitchhiked with truck drivers at 4am in the morning to make it to a training centre that was far away from the village. along with her, there were other categories that also were honoured, including the lifetime achievement award which went to a former indian hockey captain. then there was also an emerging player of the year award at the other end of the spectrum. a young woman who has been really kicking as as she begins her career in boxing. and then we had the para
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sports women of the year award to come out to make sure that the awards acknowledge all women in sport. she is the first indian woman to win a silver medal at the paralympics in table tennis. and she is any person to win the award twice so far. what you think her apart? mirabai chanu joined us remotely. and she stressed the point that the maximum support that is lacking in the country is at the grassroots, which is where these women are only training with their own grit and determination, and they really wish more investment went into training women who are coming from smaller areas, rural backgrounds. and support at that level, although they both acknowledge that these kinds of awards and recognition is really
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important in establishing them as a serious players in the world of sport, where women have not really got the recognition and highlighted the way men have been, especially in south asian countries, including india. thank you for that. an historic agreement to protect the world's oceans has been approved, after ten years of talks. the high seas treaty aims to safeguard marine life in 30 percent of areas that don't belong to any single country, most of which are currently unprotected. the deal, which was finalised at the united nations in new york, is being hailed as a "significant step" by environmental campaigners, as our climate reporter esme stallard reports. the high seas are home to most of the world's marine life — some two million species which provide food, jobs and medicines needed for human survival. after two straight days of negotiations, countries have
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agreed for the first time to work together to protect these ocean regions. the ship has reached the shore. cheering and applause we will formally adopt the text in all six official languages of the united nations. the world's international waters — or high seas — aren't controlled by any nation. until now, all countries had a right to fish, ship and research in these areas, but it's left the animals and plants living there vulnerable. 10% of monitored species are at risk of extinction. i think that this treaty that will lay the groundwork for creating 30% of the ocean into marine sanctuaries that cannot be fished in is so important. we have to save these creatures. talks were deadlocked for years — mostly over how genetic material from plants and animals found
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in the high seas should be shared between nations. several important drugs — including treatments for covid, hiv and cancer — were developed from marine life. the potential for profit is huge. now richer nations have promised to give a share of the proceeds from any products developed from the deep ocean to developing countries. the problem they still face is working out the value of the deep seas. it's a little bit hard to even wrap our heads around how big and how distant these areas are. if you imagine, like, a big high—definition widescreen tv, and if only, like, three or four of the pixels on that giant screen are working, that's kind of our knowledge of the deep ocean. like, we don't know so much of what's going on. an agreement might have been reached, but that is just the first step. before it enters into force, 60 countries need to sign the treaty and incorporate it into their national legislation. it is hoped this will be finished within a few years.
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esme stallard, bbc news. a reminder of our top story.... fire sweeps through a bangladesh camp destroying shelters that housed thousands of rohingya refugees. the blaze took hold in cox's bazar in the south—east of the country. the fire in now under control and the cause is unknown. you can follow that story and all the day's news online at bbc news online. you can reach me on twitter — i'm @luxmy—g. plenty more coming up including the headlines. but for now stay with us here on bbc news.
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hello. well, it's been a fairly cool, cloudy sort of weekend for most hello. it's been a reasonably cool and fairly cloudy sort of weekend. we may well see a bit more sunshine over the next few days, but with it a real drop in temperature and some wintry weather on the way, too. through monday and tuesday, we're set to see a bit of snow and ice, particularly for the north and east of scotland and northeast england as well. so there could be some travel disruption. but what we'll all notice is that drop in temperature with a cold arctic air mass piling its way in from the north behind this weather front here. so as we head through tonight, a period of fairly heavy snow for a time across parts of eastern scotland, a few centimetres there, icy conditions developing and then more frequent wintry showers across many northern parts of scotland overnight. further south, some breaks in the cloud allowing temperatures to get down a few degrees below
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freezing and a few splashes of light rain across england and wales. first thing tomorrow, that cold front sinks its way south. so a little bit of light rain through central parts of the uk. to the south of that, sunny spells few drizzly showers, but 7 to 10 degrees. further north, though, that's where that cold air is streaming in from the north. so typically only about 2 to 6 with those snow showers continuing to accumulate for northern and eastern scotland and northeast england heading through monday night into tuesday. now again, some snow and some ice expected across northern and eastern scotland and northeast england. so temperatures across the northern half of the uk below freezing but just about above freezing further south as that weather front continues to just push its way slowly southwards. tuesday morning, then we might well start with quite a bit of cloud and outbreaks of rain in the far south as that weather front slowly clears elsewhere, a return to sunnier skies, but a brisk northerly wind driving in more snow flurries, particularly for northern and eastern scotland, eastern england. but there could be a few for northern ireland, too. top temperatures typically only 2 to 7 degrees on tuesday. but when you add on the effect of that brisk northerly wind, it is going to feel subzero for many of us, particularly for parts of eastern scotland and eastern england where we've got
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those snow flurries. so this is the zone through monday and tuesday, most likely to see some snowy weather, 5 to 10 centimetres across parts of north—east england and scotland, up to 20 centimetres of snow over the highest peaks. there could be some wintry weather away from this zone. and then as we head towards the middle of the week, a subtle change starts from the south—west as we see low pressure approaching. and then through wednesday into thursday, that low pressure piles this milder air in from the southwest that could well bring a period of rain, sleet and heavy snow. and then temperatures in the south will be on the rise. bye— bye.
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honestly, the way i got into the nfl was a miracle. london is definitely still home for me, 100%. do you still head back to your old haunts? i still do, yeah. one, two, three. let's go. the more people to see your story, the more inspiration that gets people to think that to themselves, i'mjust like efe. i can do exactly what he did. the road to the nfl is well—travelled, but littered with pitfalls and broken dreams. typically, thatjourney begins age five or six and encompasses high school and college, before a select few reached the promised land. efe 0bada's route wasn't like many who've gone before, but then again, his story is far from typical. hisjourney to america's
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