this is bbc news with the headlines... the international criminal court issues arrest warrants for vladimir putin and his children's commissioner — accusing them of war crimes over the unlawful deportation of children. the judges issued arrest warrants. the prosecution depends on international cooperation. china's president, xijinping, is to make a state visit to russia next week — for talks with president putin. turkey will start the process of ratifying finland's nato membership bid as the leaders of the two countries meet. and a review of london's metropolitan police is expected to heavily criticise the force for racist, sexist and homophobic behaviour.

welcome to the programme. the international criminal court has issued an arrest warrant for russia's leader vladimir putin — for war crimes. the court says there are grounds to believe that president putin is personally responsible for the deportation of hundreds of children from childrens homes and orphanages in ukraine for adoption in russia, since last year's invasion. it's the first time the court has ordered the arrest of a prominent, serving political leader. ukraine's president zelensky has hailed the decision as historic, but moscow dismissed the announcement as outrageous, saying it doesn't recognise the jurisdiction of the court. our diplomatic correspondent james landale reports from kyiv. vladimir vladimirovich putin,

president of the russian federation and now alleged war criminal. accused — along with a senior official — of illegally removing children from ukraine, accused by this man's court. the judges have reviewed the information and evidence submitted by the prosecutor and determined that there are credible allegations against these persons for their alleged crimes. the indictment from the international criminal court says the russian leader is allegedly responsible for the war crime of unlawful deportation of children from unoccupied areas of ukraine to the russian federation since february last year. and there are reasonable grounds to believe mr putin bears individual responsibility. the court, based here in the hague, said the alleged crimes were still ongoing, so it was making the arrest warrants public to try to prevent more

children being deported. in the chaos of the war, with millions of people displaced, there have been repeated reports of thousands of ukrainian children being taken to russia or russian—held territory, some forcibly, some tricked. a kremlin spokesman said the allegations by the icc were outrageous and unacceptable. the foreign ministry was utterly dismissive. translation: russia is not a party to the rome statute| of the international criminal court and bears no obligations under it. russia does not cooperate with this body, and possible recipes for arrest coming from the international court will be legally null and void for us. these are only the first arrest warrants. more are expected for the killing of civilians here in bucha and elsewhere across the country, where russian forces have been accused of rape, torture and indiscriminate shelling. ministers said mr putin

would be brought tojustice. i would expect rhetoric, brinkmanship, but at the end of the day, we've seen it all before with other violent despots and dictators, and in the end, a large number of them cannot sit out the indictment from an international court for the worst crimes against humanity. here in kyiv, ministers expressed satisfaction that, as one said, the wheels ofjustice returning in a historic moment for ukraine. it may be that this is a symbolic act, it may be that mr putin is never arrested or ever faces a court, but it is still a significant moment. it is not every day that a serving head of state is accused of war crimes, and it is a signal that the international community will seekjustice for what has been going on here in ukraine. at the very least, vladimir putin is unlikely to be travelling

to countries that sign up to the criminal court, for they would have an obligation to arrest him the moment he gets off the plane. james landale, bbc news, kyiv. for more on the charges in the significance... frank gardner, our security correspondent discussed the charges and their significance. that charges are very specific and they specifically name not just president putin, but also russia's commissioner for child ren�*s rights, lvova—belova. and what they are accused of in both cases is having an overall responsibility for the unlawful and in some cases forced abduction of children from russian occupied areas of ukraine into basically russian internment. and as james landale mentioned earlier, different forms of this, somewhere forcibly abducted, some were tricked. there have been plenty of well—documented cases where parents have been told to hand

over their children to a bus depot at a certain time and when they were told they were going off to a holiday camp or a sports camp and they were taken to places like crimea, russian occupied, or even inside russia itself, where they are being systematically turned into russian citizens, for us to forget their ukrainian nationality and adopt their entirely russian nationality, singing the russian national anthem, speaking russian, learning the russian syllabus. the numbers here pretty big. the most conservative estimates i've seen is 6000 people. now, will these arrest warrants change the world ——war on the ground in ukraine? no. it's not going to have any great effect on the battlefield at all. is it embarrassing for the kremlin? yeah, a little bit. are we going to see president putin in the hague? not a chance. asjustice steve rosenberg mentioned there, he does not travel a great deal. he's got powerful friends, xijinping of china who is coming to see him and who is absolutely

crucial in all of this. so if we were going to look at the big picture, what is more important, russia's friendship at china and are they going to get weapons from china, that is far out weighing anything that a court in the hague, which has nojurisdiction in russia might say. where it does, i think i may have an effect is all those countries outside the western bloc who are kind of wavering a bit. they are optically in favour of the invasion but also thinking, nato asked for this. ——not particularly they kept expanding eastwards. russia is simply defending its own borders. the fact that russia, after 13 months of consistent denials of war crimes, is that these crimes, alleged crimes are being taken seriously enough after four visits

to ukraine by one of its chief prosecutors. the fact that this has been taken so seriously by an international criminal court that has brought to justice war criminals from the balkans and africa and elsewhere, that, i think might well, that is not going to play very well for russia in countries that are wavering on the sidelines, not sure who to believe, moscow or washington. i'm joined now byjames goldston, executive director at the open societyjustice initiative — who previously served as coordinator of prosecutions and senior trial attorney in the office of the prosecutor at the international criminal court. thank you so much forjoining us. what you think is the significance of these arrest warrants?- what you think is the significance of these arrest warrants? there has been talk since _ of these arrest warrants? there has been talk since the _ of these arrest warrants? there has been talk since the beginning - of these arrest warrants? there has been talk since the beginning of- of these arrest warrants? there has been talk since the beginning of the invasion that international law matters and this decision, issuance of warrants makes clear that in fact it does. the court has moved quickly, expeditiously to demonstrate its power to act and has gone right to the topic. with two very focused and sets of crimes. i

think it is very clear that it is piercing the veil of impunity. it is hearing the voices of victims and the court has made clear it is still investigating. these may not be the last charges to issue. it has put on notice everyone involved in this conflict including the most senior officials and perpetrators that the court is watching and ready to act. you say it has acted quickly this conflict has been going on for 13 months. why have they come for now? i think the court has extraordinary support from a number of states and has had the resources to move fast and are coming now because they have the evidence. according to what they have said. they have specifically set according to the prosecutor that president putin actually issues decrees signed by himself to expedite the conferral of a russian citizenship making it easierfor these children to be adopted by

russian families. so they seem to have evidence, that seems pretty compelling, and they are making clear that the court is serious in that they are actively involved in the situation. they have investigators on the ground and they are ready to move. you investigators on the ground and they are ready to move.— investigators on the ground and they are ready to move. you see the court is serious. — are ready to move. you see the court is serious, international— are ready to move. you see the court is serious, international law - is serious, international law matters, but if president putin never leaves russia how willjustice be served? we never leaves russia how will 'ustice be served? ~ ., , never leaves russia how will 'ustice be served? ~ . , , ., be served? we have seen in prior instances that _ be served? we have seen in prior instances that justice _ be served? we have seen in prior instances that justice takes - be served? we have seen in prior instances that justice takes time, instances thatjustice takes time, but eventually justice instances thatjustice takes time, but eventuallyjustice is often served. most immediately, though, even with president putin in moscow, i think these sets of charges stigmatize him, stigmatize the activities of him and his co—conspirators in ukraine, they serve to isolate him on the nicely dutch international scale and make it difficult for other actors to demonstrate support for president

putin. it will be difficult for him to travel to a number of places. i think in time this court's wheel of justice will move. seeing how political change is undertaken in the russian federation. to think there is a likely _ the russian federation. to think there is a likely scenario, - the russian federation. to think there is a likely scenario, what l the russian federation. to think| there is a likely scenario, what is there is a likely scenario, what is the likely scenario that would see president putin delivered to the hague. president putin delivered to the haaue. . , ., ., , hague. ultimately we have to be realistic about _ hague. ultimately we have to be realistic about that. _ hague. ultimately we have to be realistic about that. that - hague. ultimately we have to be| realistic about that. that probably would require some significant change in political circumstances in russian. i think we cannot discount anything at this point. the court has shown that it is serious, this is a serious charge, set up charges, and i think we willjust have to see whether circumstances change in such ways as to allow the president, ultimately, to sit in the the hague. you mentioned there may be more charges to have any insight on what this may be and when they may come? we have seen a number of

organisations documenting a vast array of charges, the prosecutor of icc himself has called this a crime scene in ukraine. so we do not know when, we don't know where, but the court has made clear it continues to investigate, so i think we can anticipate further charges may be issued. , . , anticipate further charges may be issued. , , ., , ., thank you so much forjoining us on bbc news. as we've mentioned, the news out of the icc has happened as china announces its president — xijinping — will visit russia next week to hold talks with president putin. beijing and moscow say the two men will discuss strategic cooperation. beijing is currently promoting a plan it says can bring a negotiated end to the war in ukraine. however, china's neutrality has been questioned, as beijing continues to maintain close ties with moscow. the announcement for the state visit was made by the foreign ministry in beijing. take a listen. translation: during his state visit to russia, president xi jinping -

will have an in—depth exchange of views with president putin on bilateral relations and major international and regional issues of common concern. china will uphold its objective and fair position on the ukrainian crisis and play a constructive role in promoting peace talks. here's our china correspondent stephen mcdonell on what beijing might want from this trip. beijing has created considerable expectation that this visit by xi jinping might lead to some sort of a breakthrough in terms of promoting peace in the war between russia and ukraine. now, the reasons for that are that beijing does have some sway with moscow, and some would say considerable sway. beijing says it's a neutral player in the war and therefore it could become an honest broker, and also, the chinese government has just come off the back of brokering

this deal which saw saudi arabia and iran resume diplomatic relations, so people are thinking, you know, if you can get those two together, could beijing also do the same thing in terms of the war between russia and ukraine? now, the problem is that some analysts would say, is it really in china's interests to stop the war if we consider the most cynical potential possibility? in a way, russia is doing china's dirty work. it is challenging the west, it is making the west eat up all of these military resources it has and actually furthering beijing's geopolitical goals. that said, of course, it has also disrupted trade, and china did have good relations with ukraine before the war started. so, for those reasons, people might say it wants to have peace. let's turn to nato now.

turkey says it's decided to start the process of ratifying finland's application to join nato after long delays. but it says more talks are needed about sweden's bid. president recep tayyip erdogan says finland has kept the agreement the three countries made last year, while sweden still hadn't handed over people he called terrorists. turkey has delayed ratifying the bids of the two countries — saying they haven't done enough to combat kurdish militant groups. here's mr erdogan announcing the development. translation: we have decided to start the protocol of finland'sj accession to nato in our parliament. i wish that this decision will be good for our countries and our alliance. the news came amid a visit by finland's leader to ankara. the nato alliance chief — jens stoltenberg — released this statement shortly after the announcement. i welcome today's decision to move ahead with the ratification of finland membership in nato. this will strengthen finland security and sweden's security

and it will strengthen nato. i hope that the turkish grand national assembly was vote to ratify as soon as possible. the most important thing is that both finland and sweden become full members of nato quickly. not whether the joint at exactly the same time. stay with us on bbc news. still to come, london's metropolitan police is expected to receive heavily criticism for racist, sexist and homophobic behaviour in a new report. today, we have closed the book on apartheid and that chapter. more than 3,000 subway passengers were affected. nausea, bleeding, headaches

and a dimming of vision, all of this caused by an apparently organised attack. the trophy itself was on the pedestal in the middle of the cabinet here. now, this was an international trophy, and we understand now that the search for it has become an international search. above all, this was a triumph for the christian democrats. of the west, offering reunification as quickly as possible. _ and that's what the voters wanted. welcome back to bbc news. a reminder of our top story... the international criminal court issues arrest warrants

for vladimir putin and his children's commissioner, accusing them of war crimes over the unlawful deportation of children. more on that story, then. earlier, our correspondent anna holligan spoke to karim khan, the icc�*s prosecutor in the hague. in terms of the ukraine situation, what we try to do is, as effectively as possible, use our resources to get a handle on the spectrum of criminality that we were seeing allegations relating to. and when you look at the issue that has led to the judges issuing warrants, there was clearly evidence of crimes against children in terms of deportation. and i think it's also very powerful because these are not combatants, these are not on one side or the other, they're the most vulnerable part of humanity, which are children. and to prise them away from their homes, their care homes or their orphanages, where they have family around them, they have familiar environments, they have languages, a language they know,

customs that are theirs, and to cross international boundaries, give them a foreign passport and all the rest of it clearly was in breach of the fourth geneva convention, contrary to the rome statute, and it was about collecting evidence that we could present to judges. and a lot of this was not denied. a lot of these fundamental aspects of the case were viewed or worn as badges of honour by some of the individuals in the russian federation and the individuals subject to the warrants, and this is why it was necessary to go in that direction. for the icc to be relevant, it needs to deliverjustice before there are peace agreements in the heat of battle. you know, if one awaits a decade or 15 years after a peace agreement, people will wonder, "well, ok, this is a nice place and these values are all well and good, but it's not relevant in the face of ongoing violations." if a child anywhere in the world

is in a familiar environment and they're taken by men in uniforms or in balaclavas or they're shipped, you know, in trains or in planes to another country with another language, it is not going to be necessarily pleasant. indeed it may be rather traumatic. and of course the geneva conventions make it mandatory to put children's welfare at the centre. one can't simply deport children, particularly if they're not in danger, and, you know, there were many other options. if there was a danger in a particular area, to move them to other parts of ukraine where the danger was not present. if that wasn't possible, offer to move them to third countries, but this accelerated processes that seemed to have been implemented in the russian federation to give them a foreign nationality, with a degree of permanence perhaps, is something that required attention. and this is what also gave additional impetus to the investigation,

and of course the judges looked at matters and were satisfied that the warrants as standard has been established by my office. some other news 110w. a major review of london's metropolitan police is expected to heavily criticise the force for racist, sexist and homophobic behaviour. baroness casey was appointed to examine the met�*s standards and internal culture after the murder of sarah everard by wayne couzens, a serving policeman. the bbc has been told the review — published next week — will be extremely bad for britain's biggest police force. our special correspondent, lucy manning, has been talking to former partners of police officers — who say the met fails to deal with abusive officers in its ranks. sirens. they used to be in uniform, until they were convicted. since wayne couzens was arrested, more met police officers have been sentenced,

many for sexual offences or violence against women. the force has faced criticism it can't deal with complaints against its own officers. i think it's easier to let these police officers stay than try and get rid of them. sally — not her real name — was the partner of a met police officer. they met when he investigated a crime she was the victim of. last year, she told the met he'd domestically abused her, and misused police powers. how do you feel that they have dealt with him, given the fact he is a police officer? well, they haven't dealt with him, have they? he's still working. he's still getting paid. he's still going to get his full pension. get everything he asked for. he is now going through the met�*s misconduct system, on restricted duties. i think, 100%, if he had attacked me and he wasn't a police officer, he would have been arrested, and taken and carted off. where are you on being

able to trust the met? i don't. i don't trust the police at all. and i do not understand why we report allegations against police to other police officers. there is no place in the police service for an officer like him. absolutely not. the met boss has accepted he is unable to sack hundreds of officers, and the bbc understands the casey review next week will heavily criticise the way the met tolerates wrongdoing and puts its own people ahead of the public. do you believe the head of the met when he says they are going to do better? no, sorry. prove it. prove it by actions. don'tjust stand there and give us a load of old words. we want proof that you're going to act on those words. you're brought up to believe the police are there to protect. the police should be there to protect. that's what we pay taxes for.

but theyjust seem to protect themselves. natalie claims her ex—husband, a met officer, coercively controlled her. she struggled to find the right avenues to complain to the force to get them to take action. her words are spoken by an actor to protect her anonymity. i've been in police stations. i've spoken to policewomen who squeezed my arm and looked compassionate, and told me this time it would be sorted, you know? it was unacceptable. you know, then like i said, you hear nothing. and it then makes him worse. he's bolstered by this, isn't he? he's enabled, and protected. what more do you think the met needs to do now? own up. i think they need total reform. we will take the most robust action against officers that are found to have committed these crimes. the re—vetting of officers has been stepped up. i recognise we are in a bad place. but we are committed, and absolutely determined,

to turn that around, and we are going to do so. i completely understand that people will often feel nervous or hesitant to go to the police to report a crime committed by the police. but it's clear it's notjust about a few officers who've been sentenced. the entire force will face serious accusations of racism, misogyny and homophobia. its reputation and ability to regain trust in serious doubt. lucy manning, bbc news. let's lighten the mood for a moment. ajewel from nature. this footage films in florida just after an alligator had emerged from the waters. apparently with dinner on its mind and it shows the screen, but the crane was just not to be scared in the two creatures ended up in what we think is fairly described

as a sterol. crane their standing its ground and there eventually, there goes, it seems to scare the alligator off. while there is hope. thanks forjoining us here on bbc news. hello there. spring daffodils in full bloom now right across the country, but what we could do with is some spring like weather. well, for some, we had that today. in fact, in north—east england it was a mild and often quite sunny day as depicted by this weather watch watcher in northumberland. it was a different story, though, elsewhere. we did have some sharp thundery downpours, a rainbow in the sky across falkirk with some threatening looking skies here. now, if we take a look back at the cloud and the rain radar from recent hours, you can see just how widespread those showers have been today, but, at the same time, there's also been some sunny spells as well. and that's the story as we go through the night, tonight and into tomorrow with low

pressure anchored out to the west, feeding in plenty of showers from the west through the night. so, we keep quite a lot of cloud around that's going to prevent those temperatures from falling too far. but it does mean a messy mixture of showers as we go through the night. those temperatures will hold up at around 5—9 degrees for most. we start off tomorrow on a rather cloudy note, for many, a mild note and, once again, it's going to be a case of sunny spells and scattered showers. light winds as well on saturday, so i suspect if you catch a shower, they could linger for quite some time. they should be fairly interspersed. top temperatures around 1a or 15 degrees, not out of the question. but yes, some of those showers, once again could be heavy and thundery. more persistent rain into northern ireland and western scotland by the latter stages of the afternoon. here we'll look at around nine or ten degrees, but noticeably colder in the northern isles. and as that area of low pressure gradually starts to ease away, the winds will pick up through the evening and overnight and swing back around to a northerly.

and that means on the back edge, we could see a little bit of snow across the northern isles. temperatures to greet us first thing on sunday morning, a little bit lower. so a chillier start, but hopefully a crystal clear blue sky sunshine at morning on sunday. very nice indeed. gradually, we'll see cloud developing out to the west as rain will start to push it in by the end of the afternoon. but not a bad mothering sunday in prospect. temperatures generally between 8—11; degrees, once again, a little bit cooler in the northern isles. so just to sum up this weekend, saturday will be a case of sunny spells and scattered showers better on sunday.

this is bbc news. the headlines — the international criminal court has issued arrest warrants for vladimir putin and his children's commissioner, accusing them of war crimes over the unlawful deportation of children from ukraine to russia. china has announced that its president, xijinping, will visit russia next week to hold talks with president putin. beijing and moscow say the two men will discuss strategic cooperation. turkey says it has decided to start the process of ratifying finland's application to join nato. the decision comes after long delays, but turkey says more talks are needed before proceeding with a similar bid from sweden.