this is bbc news. the headlines: jewish worshippers converge on the western well for the passover blessing injerusalem. a heavy security presence is being carried out as officials fear violence could breakout. a short distance away, hundreds of palestinians have barricaded themselves inside the al—aqsa mosque injerusalem. tensions remain high,

as israeli police stopped palestinian men from entering the compound, forcing them to pray outside the old city gates. tens of thousands of catholic worshippers have gathered in saint peter's square in rome — as pope francis presided over easter sunday mass. the pontiff is expected to pronounce the traditional holiday blessing later. a four—storey residential building has collapsed in the french city of marseille leaving at least five people from the surrounding structures injured. you're watching bbc news. now it's time for global questions: brazil's amazon fight. hello, welcome to global questions. we are in rio dejaneiro in a country which like most countries these days

is confronting many crises at home. few national policies have such global consequences as the fate of the amazon. it's the world's largest tropical rainforest, covering much of northern brazil. it's under growing threat, from deforestation, large—scale farming and ranching and mining. newly elected president lula has pledged to undo the destruction under the former president bolsonaro. he speaks of tackling the problem in the largest indigenous territory. what happens in the amazon will have a huge impact on our climate crisis. can president lula rebuild the protection programme or is time running out to save the rainforest and the indigenous people that call it home?

that is global questions, brazil's fight for the amazon. you join us in this stunning setting here in rio dejaneiro and the sun has just set on this spectacular city. we are joined here tonight with a terrific audience and a panel of experts and individuals intensely engaged in these environmental questions. let me tell you who are panel is. first of all, izabella texiera, a former environment minister, still continuing to be a leading voice on climate issues. she received a un lifetime

achievement award for champions of the earth in 2013. even her glasses are green. marina grossi, president of the brazilian business council for sustainable development, bringing together more than 100 leading business groups, you account for 50% of brazil's gdp, and more thani million jobs, quite a lot of numbers. paloma costa 0liviera, elected by the un secretary general, and the un advisory group tasked to take global action on climate change, one of the new generation in brazil, generation worldwide which is fighting for climate change, and we are doing it here in brazil. we are joined also by alok sharma, live from the northern part of the amazon, an activist from the indigenous people and defender of indigenous peoples. thank you forjoining us tonight. welcome to our panel.

remember, wherever you join us, you can also follow the conversation on social media. time to take our first question. brazil is appearing on the global stage, committing itself to the cause to mitigate the effects of the climate crisis. but what can be done to have permanent measures and laws for their protections and commitment to the environment that cannot be altered by economic interests and changes in government? permanent measures, you have talked about this izabella, no matter who was in power, you have the institutions and the laws to protect the environment. what can be put in place now in this third term of president lula? it's very important for the new government to play

based on the future, not the past. this is not a picture of 2003, this is a picture of 2023, and it is very important to understand how the government and president lula will play as a leader, national leader, to convince society, brazilian society, politicians, businessmen, embrace climate change, action against climate change, it's a really critical issue to address development and economic growth and social interest in our country. lula is a president that recommends democracy, and that relies on society, with a global pack but also a national political pack to come together to promote development, the pursuit of democracy, and those who have stakeholders here, this is a huge country, very important that we can recognise our diversity and difference to come together.

you have sketched out the contacts, so i'm going to bring you in you say we do need permanent structures and laws, what would you advocate? i would really advocate that izabella talked about the past and then the future. one thing i think is really important is courage to look at the present, because right now, the best years together, we have been in the front of the fight for climate justice, and this was impossible for us to hold up all the destruction that was happening in the last few years because we had strong laws, strong safe words. what should lula do first, what would you say to him? regulated carbon markets,

and protect the conservation units that we still have that have not been destroyed, like the animal territory that has been invaded by 2000 illegal miners. we will talk about that because president lula did make his first visit to the amazon, it was hoped he might delineate those territories, but he has not yet. let me bring in marina. though it's not a party agenda and that's how it is, we are a big country, as you said, with the biggest forest, so we have a very clean mantra, so we are more sustainable than the rest of the world, we have a competitive advantage if we can compare ourselves to the rest of the world, so it is a state agenda no matter who was in power, and we want to be at the forefront of a low carbon transition because you think that there is this huge

advantage but if you can have joint efforts with the federal government, that would be much easier, but of course we need more than that, we need all the institutions really in power, and we need efforts as izabella also said with the whole society, so we have to combat deforestation, and that represents half of our emissions, so it's amazing what we have to do. i'm going to bring you in now, we have already heard from paloma, the importance of protecting indigenous rights and the demarcation of territory, what would you say? what would be your priority? hello everyone, thank you for your patience. the whole government is currently... inaudible.

if you can put that into law we can protect our lands, we can protect our people. it is a challenge though, it's impossible to do that here in brazil, we can't demarcate our lands, we cannot fight more consistence for us in brazil. thank you so much, let's put a question to our conversation. what other measures to be taken to combat deforestation, and what are the actions for mitigation of already deforested areas? how to combat deforestation? the figures are absolutely staggering, and paloma is nodding. cop26 in 2021, 11 trees per second, 17% of the amazon already lost. what do you think has to be done paloma, to fight deforestation? honestly, this question is very easy because you have here a law that has been established and it is

the conservation plan against deforestation in the amazon and we also have one for another area. if it is so easy, why is the reverse happening? you have someone here who had the entire destruction of the entire structure that we had. you are talking about the former administration under bolsonaro? exactly, and the new administration has a part of organising and reorganising the entire room, and the entire scenario, so if we want to fight deforestation we have to take it very seriously, taking into consideration that deforestation is the main source of carbon emissions in brazil, and for that, not only putting and implementing the plan for restructuring the entire government, the entire environmental governence, but also providing education, providing access to information, because this is key, as izabella said, for democracy, and when we talk

about the climate collapse, about the destruction of the amazon, we're talking about the in our democracy, our entire lives of humans. you have already said tonight, izabella that it's complex, it's a complex issue. is this one also complex? paloma says it is easy if you just follow the laws. go there, try to solve it. i know what it means, let's try to decouple things here to make us absolutely agree that brazil has important legal frameworks to tackle the environmental crime. this is very powerful, brazil said this is ok, very important for us, and there are different agendas to tackle not only deforestation but also go into other types of environmental crime, like illegal gold mining, etc.

let me just pick up on that because you talk about environmental crime, since the last time the president and his team was empower the criminal gangs, they are better armed, more numerous, more powerful, arguably, they may be even more powerful than the security forces that are tasked with putting them out and fighting against them. is this part of the complexity that you talk about? yes, in the past, when i was minister for example, we reviewed this twice, and it was during my administration that we did this, and we shaved all the institutional regimes, and it's important to be highlighted, the international part was coming together to tackle deforestation because of the crime that goes together with environmental crime, and organised crime is connected to the international organised crime hubs, and in the past brazil

was able to do this, it was under our leadership, we promoted this, that's why we were so well suited to tackle deforestation. after this, what's happened, it's better to use this expression, the erosion, it was a political project as everyone knows, and now, president lula is back looking to address again, not to tackle deforestation but to restore credibility, trust in brazil, and make sure that brazilian society will come to support this development. let's bring injama, we are hearing now this new government, trust, credibility, rebuilding the institutions, fighting against deforestation, are you convinced this is a new start? you talk about hope. we are living in a time of hope, and we are making part of this new government the best thing for the new generation can see,

and older can see as well, and indigenous people, we feel like we are together. for the first time, the ministry of indigenous people. we are part of this building of the country, so we are very... it is a challenge for us, and it's a powerful thing for us, and we can make decisions, we can do decisions for us on local or regional or national levels, and this new government, it's so early to talk about it. yes, it's early days, early months, but we have had more questions about indigenous and private sector, let's bring in the next question.

how can the new government support those who can actually save the forest, that is the indigenous and traditional populations, and what should the private sector be doing? i'm going to bring you in because you represent a significant chunk of the private sector, and i have to say, when you look at what the private sector said it will do, including agribusiness likejbs, the biggest meat exporter, a big food giant, they sign up to all of these pledges, it looks good on paper, but there has been so many investigations, amnesty international, greenpeace, eco— storm, reporter brazil, that they are violating their very pledges to look at the supply chains, not to take products from deforested lands, you can match what they say but not what they do. we have to have an alternative to extending forest. today, we — what is happening is that still we have illegal deforestation, it's complex,

as izabella and paloma were saying, it's very complex, but we have to build up an alternative. wejust launched one paper with 50 companies, saying, "well, can we combine preservation and production?" crosstalk. in other words, this clash of this balance between growth, which brazil needs, economic growth, fighting against inequality, creating jobs but also conservation. yes, yes. you know, our big asset, environmental asset, it has to help, you know, the people that live there. it's not a simple thing for the private sector only. we have to have the state government, to have to have the federal government, all of them have to be aligned. paloma, is there a contradiction between what they say and what they do — really good words but is it good action? international cooperation to make sure that the money that is making sure by companies, by governments come and go to the front. we were promised in the cop in glasgow billions of money for...

crosstalk. and to compensate farmers? of course! but what is the money? i don't know anyone who received, who is using it. crosstalk. i think about half of what was promised was distributed. crosstalk. but it's not working if it's not coming. and the second thing is that we need regulation on traceability — what marina was saying. we need to regulate socio—biodiversity economy, carbon markets, how this is coming through the territories, because when we have a track where we understand what is coming, the illegal mining, the illegal gold, the illegal wood and so on, and we can understand this track. ok, let's bring in izabella. everyone wants all of us to be green, ok? i but it's not easy. we're trying to go to beef traceability in brazil, 0k? and beef production in brazil. 75% of beef production i in brazil are consumed by brazilians. so, i'm sorry. brazil needs to eat beef without deforestation, i

not the international community. - yeah, but your big beef exporterjbs has a carbon footprint as big as italy's! i know! almost as big as britain. i know... crosstalk. how do you reconcile that? you want to eat beef but you want to fight for the environment? look, you have companies that must be reviewed - and we address these things. we have other ones that bring the right things to make - the best... unintelligible. ..to have traceability more than this, - to be committed to restore degraded areas, to come . together to have social inclusiveness etc, etc. | this is a process. we are changing. this is a moment that we are looking for to change - because we need to set i the past in the past, 0k? and make sure that we can rebuild in short—term - prospects, in short—term fact to sure that we can rebuild i new conditions to move i the peace for a long—term prospect. the other thing that| i'd like to say here — brazil is a country i of alternatives, 0k? in what sense? with alternatives. you have diverse alternatives. look up our energy mix, look into our low carbon| culture, look at the industrial transition, etc, etc. - we have alternatives.

we have singularity, - amazonian singularity, 0k? and we need audacity. this is, for me, the big - challenge for our president, for our society. we need audacity to make sure that we can move the peace . in the right direction. boldness, yeah. absolutely, absolutely. 0k. shepherd foreman, you've got a question? what ethical guidelines or additional government regulations do you advocate in the face of companies seeking to extract private gain from public assets, whether through exploitation of the amazon or appropriation of national parks and monuments? let me bring in marina grossi here now. we all have to do more. they won't. the private sector, the federal government... crosstalk. and they reckon you speak for those more than 100 business groups? sure. we have to do more, we have to do more. i think there is a movement and, as i said, you know,

since 2019 more clearly because it was damaged, our reputation, brazilian reputation, and they put in the same place people that were doing right and people that were doing wrong things. even in traditional industries like mining or petrol, whatever, but you have to be sustainable in these areas, you have to respect the indigenous people that are the guardians of these areas. they protected the amazon, so i think the... crosstalk. do you recognise the problem that shepherd is talking about? yes, ithink, you know, the ethical problem, i think it's... you have to give an alternative. you have to do — carbon market, as paloma said, is a good alternative. we have the potential of 50% of the market from nature—based solutions in the whole world. izabella, does there need to be more guidelines? i mean, the rules are there, as paloma started by saying, you have the codes and the rules but they're just not being followed and maybe you can't enforce some of them for all of the reasons we've been discussing? i think there are ton

different things here. the first one, how to go . against illegalities and put this out of the market. this means... crosstalk. to stop the illegal activity. stop and put it out of the game, 0k?| and for you, does that include illegal mining, illegal logging? illegalities. i don't need to buy illegal gold, 0k? l i need to improve all- regulatory arrangements, institutional arrangements exactly to tackle this, - and make sure that we, . as consumers, cannot buy something like this... because they are one of the big causes of deforestation? absolutely. absolutely, absolutely, 0k? i like to remember by 2015, when we had the paris - agreement, the emissions in brazil, the brazilian - emissions related to, - linked to the deforestation were around 15%. now, it is 50%. so, look at how illegality came in the last four years, - 0k? unintelligible. ..everything. so, we need — all the . brazilians must support the public institutions - and to make sure that national

congress will go i against illegalities. we can have the powerful- president in the world but not be able to change - because this is democracy. that's why i mentioned that's so important that to go - to the national congress in the next few years i and to make sure that we are responsible to elect the right| people to protect, to preserve our nature and also to go - against climate change. we want to take another question. joao morale? thank you. actually, my question is about politics in the congress. so, given that most of the deforestation is undertaken by a small minority of landowners, why do politics and congress do not vote to protect the forest, but vote aligned with these this minority? paloma, i'm going to ask you whether this worries you, this narrow election victory of president lula — 50.9%. brazilian politics is about dealmaking and with some of those interests thatjoao has been talking about. do you worry it's gonna be gridlock to get things through? honestly, in a congress

like that, no way forward for the private sector, civil society, youth, indigenous people do, we'll bring results if we have proved something as the environmental license law that wants to make everything easier, the destruction easier and so on, and i think, like, when we're talking about education, putting this as the number one agenda, we are talking about changing the mindset and reforestating it, but if we keep having a society like this, it means that we have no ethics, as the last question, and no ethics means that people think that ethics is profit. but even the private sector leaders of agribusiness, they realise it. there is no private or no profit if there is no land. 0k, marina? so they became climate activists and they realised that we don't need any more centimetre of land to be deforested, to be honest, because we need... crosstalk. this is where you agree? yes, sure.

we have already enormous areas degredated that we can fulfil. we don't need any more. and i think brazil, maybe, is one country in the world that we have, you know, the possibility to combine productivity with preservation. i don't think there is other countries that would have this possibility. sharma, do you worry about the politics of fighting to protect the amazon and the indigenous peoples, the power of agribusiness? 0k. yes. we have to be together with the collective, - the organisations, you know? as we all live in this| area, our colleagues near agribusiness is like which type of economy. we are talking about? which type of development we are talking about. - this new government has to be near — near, really near — - near to the colleagues, i near to the organisation, near to this indigenous and other people - who live in this throat

of the amazonia. - that's a good point about how you have to listen more, as jama, says, to be near the people. what i believe is that lula and his ministers should establish the new pillars for our transformation over the next years. yes. so, this is very important to have trade—offs — we have trade—offs, absolutely, but we need to understand what are the critical pillars that must be fixed in such a way that we can move the peace in the right direction... 0k. ..and unintelligible in the future. this means leadership. this means brazil society support. and for me, we need to bring the future through to present, and not have the past as our present. 0k. well, we've heard tonight — we've heard jama talking about hope, we heard about — from paloma that it could be easy because there is a legal infrastructure. we heard from marina, saying that there is a new commitment and this fight is also ourfight. and izabella, you — you, in some moments, you seemed exhausted by the enormity of it but there's no doubting your

passion about setting up those pillars and moving towards this transition. i believe. she believes. i believe that we can change. i think our audience believes, and we hope that all of you at home who know about amazon, who care about the amazon, who care about our global climate crisis will have got some encouraging words. lots of questions were raised but i want to thank our audience, i want to thank our terrific panel. pleasejoin me in thanking everyone for this very, very important debate tonight in rio dejaneiro. global questions. applause. hello there. the weather story is on the change for our week ahead, but for many today we should see some sunshine and warmth. that sounds a little bit odd if you woke up to skies like this in aberdeenshire, a lot of low cloud, mist and fog.

the best of the sunshine first thing in the morning was out to the west and bigbury on sea in devon, a beautiful start here. and we will keep some sunshine today but there's rain on the way with this swirl of cloud, this area of low pressure that's going to bring rain into northern ireland through the middle part of the afternoon. so cloudy conditions as we go through the day, eventually wetter. a brisk southerly breeze starting to pick up and that should help to lift any low cloud as we go through the day. so, sunny spells for many across the country today. we could actually see the warmest day of the year so far. in orderfor that to happen, we have to see temperatures above 17.8 degrees. we mightjust see that, but unfortunately, with that sunshine and that warmth, well the pollen across england and wales, and it's tree pollen at this time of year, looks high or very high. now, as we go through the rest of the evening and overnight, the rain moves out of northern ireland and into scotland. the trailing weather front will bring a blanket of cloud as well across england and wales.

so that will clear away first thing on easter monday. and then tightly packed isobars drive in plenty of showers from the west. so a gray and wet start across eastern england, the center of the lowjust to the west of scotland — that's where we'll see most frequent showers. and some of these showers as we go through the afternoon could be quite heavy, maybe with the odd rumble of thunder. not everywhere will see the showers and if you do manage to escape them, you could see highs of 15 degrees, but will be a slightly cooler day, particularly in the sharper showers with temperatures struggling at around 12 or 13 celsius and a frequent rash into the far north of scotland — here nine to 12 degrees the high. so as we move out of easter, monday into tuesday, another low moves in bringing yet more wet and windy weather. the winds remain a feature and then another frontal system and an area of low pressure is set to push in from the atlantic. so our week ahead looks pretty unsettled. showers or longer spells of rain, the winds will be a feature at times and those temperatures just a little

bit below par for the time of year. live from london, this is bbc news. this is the scene live in rome, as the pope is about to deliver his christians around the world are marking their holiest day of the year. the king, queen consort and senior royals gather at windsor castle for the first easter sunday service of the monarch's reign. jewish worshippers converge at the western wall for the passover blessing injerusalem. a short distance away, hundreds of palestinians have barricaded themselves inside al aqsa mosque — as a tense stand—off with israeli police continues.