the racecourse at aintree. more than 100 people have been arrested. the start of the steeplechase had to be delayed. the perimeter of the course is a—s kilometres, so, to have a resource, whether it be security, or police officers, staff, at every point on the course, is extremely difficult. we'll have the latest from aintree. also tonight: coordinated strike action involving doctors and nurses isn't ruled out,

our correspondent sharon barbour spent the day at aintree racecourse. it has been really tense day at aintree, a day of high drama. it began with the protesters which threatened to disrupt the most important race in the calendar, due to start at 5:15pm. everybody said they could not possibly, there were so many police surrounding the race and inside as well. protesters arrived, they sat down on the ground, we spoke to them, they said they were determined to disrupt the race, but still it was not believed it was possible. well, they did, the race was stopped for around 15 minutes as they go onto the track, nine protesters were arrested. a little bit about that organisation, it was until a few

days ago animal extinction, we don't know how many were here, but certainly they got onto the track and managed somehow to get through security and disrupted the race that is so important, not only here in liverpool, where the income is about £60 million, but right around the world. 500 million, thejockey club, say watch the race in 140 countries, so, certainly, even though the race got under way, for the activists, it was a success in raising what they say are issues around animal welfare. certainly there will be a lot of questions, not only about security and what they can do to now protect that race, but also questions about what they can do perhaps about the safety of the horses taking part. heavy fighting has been taking

place in sudan between two rival factions of the country's military. gunfire and explosions rocked the capital, khartoum, with clashes at the presidential palace, tv station and khartoum airport. medical officials say at least 25 people were killed in the clashes, and over 180 were injured. sudan has been run by the military, since a coup in october 2021. earlier, footage showed large plumes of smoke khartoum airport. gunshots can be heard in the background and fighter jets seen flying passing over the airport. and these pictures show the panic inside khartoum airport, where passengers were taking cover on the floor of the check—in area, many of them stranded. international leaders have urged a return to talks, which are meant to restore civilian rule.

the uk foreign secretaryjames cleverly said the violence must stop and called on the sudanese leadership to do all they can to restrain their troops. the us secretary of state, anthony blinken, has described the situation as fragile. it's a fragile situation, there are other actors that may be pushing against that progress, but this is a real opportunity to finally carry forward the civilian led transition, and one that we and other countries are trying to bolster. a man has been arrested injapan, after he appeared to throw a smoke bomb at the country's prime minister. fumio kishida wasn't harmed by the explosion at a campaign event in the southern city of wakayama. the man was held by security guards after a loud explosion.

it comes less than a year after the assassination of former prime minister shinzo abe. here in the uk, the prime minister is to ban the construction of new smart motorways which use technology to regulate speed and traffic flow on some of the uk's highways. fourteen planned smart motorways — including 11 that are already paused — will be removed from government road building plans. the bbc�*s panorama programme in 2020 investigated smart motorways, revealing 38 people have been killed on them over a space of five years. it led to the government reviewing the smart motorway network. here's a snippet from the documentary by richard bilton. we put in a freedom of information request for one stretch of the m25.

0ne warning sign was out of action for nearly a year, 336 days. there was also a 20 fold rise in near misses, 72 in the five years, 1585 in the five years without. 0ur correspondent damien grammaticas has more on today's announcement. these are where you have had existing stretches of motorway in the uk, the government looked to manage those better and get more traffic flowing and created various schemes using slowing down the speed limits in some sections but the most controversial bit was where they were using the area on the side of the motorway, the hard shoulder, where you could park up if you had a problem, turning that into a temporary lane or a permanent lane in some cases with cameras and electronic screens to direct you when you could use those and tell you what the speed

limits were. there had been concerns about the safety of that, there was a bbc investigation that reckoned that 38 people had died in accidents on those stretches of smart motorway, so about four years ago the government announced a review into safety, then it announced it was pausing the construction of any new sections of these smart motorways while that was happening, and what we now have today is the government saying that the 11 that are currently in building plans and three earmarked for the future are all going to be taken out of the current road building plans, so they will not go ahead as things stand. what does this mean for the existing smart motorways? here in the uk, anyone who has driven on uk roads will know there are many around the country that are still ticking along. they will stay.

the figure i have seen is 400 miles�* worth, 10% of the uk motorway network, they have already been created, they will continue. the government says it will continue a project to improve safety on those stretches, and there will actually be two others nearing completion which will be finished. the government says this is all about responding to safety concerns and also saving money because these planned projects coming up, the 1a of them, £1 billion worth, but one thing they have also said — the information they have been putting out this evening, they will continue to monitor the public view of the safety of smart motorways, so the question i put this evening to the department for transport, does that mean this is actually an ongoing look at what these are like and could

at some point in the future these projects continue? they said not definitely, 2030 is as far as plans go, and no motorways will be built in that time. royal mail and the communications workers�* union have reached an agreement on a proposed offerfor pay and employment terms after a series of strikes caused disruption last year. in a joint statement, the two sides said the deal would be considered by the cwu's executive before being voted on by members. you are watching bbc news. now the billion dollar scam. these partygoers are scammers. they work for an organised crime group known as milton. they've had a good year. they've taken hundreds of millions from victims and now they're celebrating.

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