live from washington, this is bbc news. more western countries have evacuated diplomats from sudan. uk mp diane abbott suspended after playing down the racism suffered byjewish, irish and traveller people. and — bed, bath and beyond files for bankruptcy and president biden prepares to formally announce his bid for re—election. i'm helena humphrey, good to have you with us. we start in sudan, where more than two dozen countries have been evacuating their citizens from the capital khartoum as fighting between two rival armed groups continues. this was french nationals leaving earlier.

most of those being evacuated are diplomats and their families. spain, germany and italy are among other countries still evacuating people — the us and uk have already flown diplomats out, as well as canada. its prime minister, justin trudeau, tweeted that sudan's army has been fighting a rival paramilitary group — the rsf — for more than a week — and this is what khartoum looks like right now. and while foreign nationals are airlifted out, sudanese of civilians remain trapped in the fighting. the violence has worsened and it is already at desperate humanitarian crisis was up here is one journalist we spoke to. was up here is one “ournalist we spoke to._ was up here is one “ournalist we spoke to. lack of food, lack of electricity. _ we spoke to. lack of food, lack of electricity, lack _ we spoke to. lack of food, lack of electricity, lack of _ we spoke to. lack of food, lack of electricity, lack of water, - of electricity, lack of water, we don't have electricity for three days now and also we do

not have access to water since saturday but we are drinking from wells in khartoum. live now to kalkidan yibetal in the ethiopian capital, addis ababa. what is the latest you can tell us about the conditions on the ground in sudan as well as those ongoing evacuations? the evacuations _ those ongoing evacuations? the evacuations are _ those ongoing evacuations? tue: evacuations are increasing. more and more countries are airlifting or using boats to evacuate their citizens, particularly diplomats. while underground the situation remains dire, there are fears the fighting could escalate and even escalate even more and the humanitarian situation could deteriorate further. people are

facing the lack of food, the lack of water and necessities like electricity and now we are also hearing the internet access, the access to the internet is decreasing rapidly to the situation remains dire and many people who are left behind, millions of sudanese people, are facing a really disastrous situation if this fighting continues as we are now entering into the 10th day. and talked was a little bit about the people who have been fleeing the country, you hearing reports about people fleeing to chad. , what are we hearing therefore people seeking refuge?- hearing therefore people seeking refuge? they were already thousands - seeking refuge? they were already thousands of - seeking refuge? they were i already thousands of refugees in chad already because of the securities around the area. and now additional tens of

thousands of so chad itself is a country that is, that has been experiencing civil war in recent years and it is not well prepared to host an increasing number of people coming from sudan. and with this fighting lingering on and dragging on there is the potential for more people to cross the borders and arrive there and all the international humanitarian agencies are expected to co—ordinate their efforts from there but the situation is bad there, yeah. there but the situation is bad there. yeah-— there but the situation is bad there, yeah. kalkidan yibeltal in the ethiopian _ there, yeah. kalkidan yibeltal in the ethiopian area - there, yeah. kalkidan yibeltal in the ethiopian area addis i in the ethiopian area addis ababa. thank you. for more on this i spoke to cameron hudson from this centre

for strategic and international studies. what do we know about how these evacuations are carried out and how high—stakes they are. they've been a bit chaotic and they've been a bit unique in terms of every country essentially trying to rescue its own people. there has not been one single organised evacuation of all international diplomatic staff so as you suggested earlier, the uk evacuated its embassy staff earlier today, the united states did so on saturday night washington time. and there have been various other attempts ongoing by many other european embassies. the uk and the us were able to evacuate via air but we know that the french and others are trying to convoy over land, about 600 kilometres, to port sudan on the red sea coast. it is a very dangerous trip, any overland travel is going to be highly dangerous both because of the fighting that's going on which you have to traverse but also the number of checkpoints that you have to get through. we don't yet know how successful those convoys have been in getting through with international staff — there's a fear that

international staff could be targeted eitherfor a hostage taking or because they're driving very expensive 4x4 vehicles which some of the forces on the ground might want to have their own fighting so it's a very chaotic situation right now. with diplomatic missions shutting down, what does this mean for them and also in terms of the dynamics of this conflict and how it might evolve? i don't think that having diplomats out of the country hurts the diplomacy. they're going to be able to do more diplomacy if they can re—establish their embassies essentially in exile, perhaps in nairobi or addis or an adjoining country where they don't have to worry about the safety of their civilians. i think the real challenge with the departure of the international staff, however, is it's a signal to the local sudanese that it's not safe for anyone to be in the city any more, and what that's triggering is a mass exodus of people out of the city who no longer feel even a modicum of protection

by the fact that international staff was there and so we are seeing people who probably shouldn't even be travelling right now in vehicles that probably can't even make the trip to the red sea or to the egyptian border. these are very long journeys, much of which is across open desert and so you have people now travelling without food, without water, without medicine, trying to get to safety, all triggered, i think in many respects, by the departure of internationals and the uptake in fighting that we have seen happening in khartoum since those departures early this morning. and you are describing people travelling, spreading out across the country and we also know that the fighting is spreading out across the country as well. do you think there is a potential here for essentially other paramilitary groups to get involved ? absolutely, i think that is one

of the biggest fears right now. sudan borders a number of countries which in recent years have had their own internal rebellions, they have their own militia groups who are ready for a new salary and a new pay cheque in sudan if the call comes. so forces in libya, in chad, in the central african republic but we know have been contacted by the rapid support forces already, they could well be mobilising right now, trying to make their way, adding to the conflict in sudan. cameron, i dojust want to ask you, do you think the international community will be able to dissuade the warring parties to stop and crucially, how? well, not right now, i don't think that's possible. we have seen an enormous amount of diplomatic pressure put on the parties in the last several days calling for a ceasefire during the eid celebrations that took place over the weekend. again, what we're seeing is the parties agree on the phone to a ceasefire when they're called

by the secretary general of the un or the secretary of state, but then in reality on the ground they're not implementing that ceasefire. i think that we should have lost all faith and confidence that their words will be implemented and i think we have to act on the fact that there is not going to be a ceasefire any time soon. cameron hudson from the centre for strategic and international studies, a senior associate there. cameron, thanks so much. now to uk news. millions of people across the uk heard a loud alarm on their phones at 3pm local time on sunday. the government says it'll launch a review after many smartphone users said they didn't receive the alert and others said it came early. it was a test for an alarm to warn people about dangerous situations — like fires, flooding or terror attacks. the labour party says diane abbott has been suspended as an mp — until an investigation into a letter she wrote about racism to the observer newspaper is over. diane abbott is being investigated for suggesting thatjewish people suffer

prejudice, but not racism. she later said she was withdrawing her remarks and apologised "for any anguish caused". around the world and across the uk, this is bbc news. it's the newest and one of the biggest greenhouses in the country. the lights and a temperature controlled environment main crops can be grown here most of the year. between this site and another the greenhouses produced 20% of all british tomatoes and with recent sought shortages of salad crops in supermarkets to grow here say it is more important than ever to think local. important than ever to think local, , , , , important than ever to think local. , ,, ,~ ., important than ever to think local. , ., ,, , local. some supply chain issues and now obviously _ local. some supply chain issues and now obviously a _ local. some supply chain issues and now obviously a war, - local. some supply chain issues and now obviously a war, the i and now obviously a war, the energy crisis and emetic change. energy crisis and emetic change-— energy crisis and emetic chance. , , ., change. because the temperature is controlled, _ change. because the temperature is controlled, cucumbers - change. because the temperature is controlled, cucumbers can - is controlled, cucumbers can grow almost all year round. 25

million of them are produced here every year. the department for the environment, food and rural affairs says it is supporting farmers to produce food profitably and sustainably including £600 million in grounds. but produces hearsay far more needs to be done to help them grow more of our food locally. your life with bbc news. to some developing news now and the russian governor in the cray —— crimean losses the black sea fleet has come under sustained drone attack from ukraine stop on telegram the governor reported that the russian fleet was repelling an attack by surface drones and all services in the city were on alert and there has been no comment from ukraine in the crimean peninsula was annexed by russia in 2014 and we will continue to follow this story and update you as we learn more. us president biden is expected to formally announce

his bid for re—election on tuesday. if he does run, he would be the oldest president to do so. biden is currently 80 years old and would be 86 at the end of a second term. cbs news is reporting biden has picked a new campaign manager: julie chavez rodriguez — a senior west wing official and longtime democratic party activist. so far, biden does not face any major democractic challengers. several republican candidates are officially vying to take on biden including ambassador nikki haley and former president donald trump. florida governor ron desantis is also expected to run. earlier i spoke to ed 0'keefe, senior white house and political correspondence about president biden�*s plans. who is julia travis rodriguez and why was she chosen? she julia travis rodriguez and why was she chosen?— was she chosen? she was assistant _ was she chosen? she was assistant and _

was she chosen? she was assistant and senior - was she chosen? she was l assistant and senior advisor was she chosen? she was - assistant and senior advisor to the president who essentially deals with government issues at state and city level, somebody who is very familiar to governors and mayors and their offers across the country and also the granddaughter of the late labour and civil rights leader, popular in the 1960s and 70s in california and has been active in democratic politics for the last several years. for example worked on kamala harris�*s 2020 campaign that didn't go very far but a sign that she was the kind of person who was involved. she is chosen in this regard because she is somebody who has worked within the white house now for a little more than a year has come to the president very personally and that is something that is of value to him and somebody who is well—known and well regarded across the democratic party. just because your campaign managerforjoe biden just because your campaign manager forjoe biden doesn't mean you are going to be the one making all of the strategic

big picture decisions about what is the campaign about, where is he travelling this week, what is he going to say. that is still going to be handled by a group of five or six of his most loyal senior aides who work with him in the west wing and we are going to start splitting their time between the white house and the campaign —— who are going to start. campaign -- who are going to start. ., ~ campaign -- who are going to start. . ~' . campaign -- who are going to start. . ~ ., ., , start. talking about the aides, we understand _ start. talking about the aides, we understand this _ start. talking about the aides, we understand this weekend l start. talking about the aides, l we understand this weekend the president has been busy with his advisers preparing for that potential announcement. it comes, ed, what can we expect to see and also in terms of the campaign rollout as well? we are campaign rollout as well? 7 are anticipating it is going to happen on tuesday with some kind of a video announcement, very common for politicians to do it that way these days and it will be some kind of summation about what he would like to still get doom should he win four more years. what i'm keen to know is —— what he will still do. i think his age—

how does he explain that, how does he justify being an 80—year—old man running for president, already the oldest us president, can he assuage the concerns especially within his own party which is a far younger party than republicans, that he is up to the job, that he can literally survive it until the end of a second term. and what then does he say about what has not yet been accomplished by his team that he would like to get done but otherwise watching the accomplishments of the last few years, restoring america's position in the world, fighting to sustain democracy in this country and around the world as well and probably reminding voters that it —— if it is not him it is going to be a republican, either donald trump or somebody like him, would strip away a lot of the progress that has been made in the last several years.

0n on that point, how is he preparing to face his opponent? he has been preparing with his age and thinking about this for several months. you do not really get into running for president unless you are already thinking about two terms. it is not a sudden conversation that had to be had, he thought about this back in 2018 and 2019 and was banking in his head so long as his health was in good shape. his wife and family are on board and his doctor says he is healthy. there were things accomplished in the first two years especially but there is much more they would like to do and it will be far more aggressive on climate change, on addressing human infrastructure as affordable childcare and expanding kindergarten programmes more broadly, there is the ongoing concern about foreign policy, the war in ukraine, the rise of china. those are all things he is likely to talk about. he will also campaign against

republicans and we saw him do that in various ways talking about maga republicans and extreme republicans. it has worked, it worked during the mid—term elections last year and he will continue to say look, they want to strip away abortion right, they want to cut social care social security and medicare, they want to take us of the war in ukraine and lessen our support for ukraine against russia and those are arguments that the biden team will continue to make. he likes to say do not compare me to the almighty, compare me to the alternative. i am the better bad option, that is ok. those are some _ bad option, that is ok. those are some of _ bad option, that is ok. those are some of the _ bad option, that is ok. those are some of the issues - bad option, that is ok. those are some of the issues i - bad option, that is ok. those are some of the issues i want to touch on lastly the decks and logistics. the 2020 campaign, due to covid was largely from home. do you think we can expect to see biden out

on the road more? hot on the road more? not necessarily. _ on the road more? not necessarily. i- on the road more? not necessarily. ithink- on the road more? notl necessarily. i think what on the road more? tirrt necessarily. i think what every campaign is that you can still entertain voters in a virtual space. sometimes it will be overcoming soon, sometimes in person, sometimes sending text messages over the phone and reaching people that way. sometimes it will be in person. but the cost and logistics in the schedule of moving a president around is expensive and tedious and so if there are ways for them not to do that this campaign will do that. it will mean an expensive and aggressive push into the digital space and that is something that campaigns are still grappling with. but, yeah, if you can win it from your base in the middle of the pandemic then we do not necessarily have to go out and do it the conventional way as has been done before if you know that voters can be reached in other ways. it

know that voters can be reached in other ways-— in other ways. it certainly will be interesting - in other ways. it certainly will be interesting to - in other ways. it certainly i will be interesting to watch. great to have you with us, thank you, ed. the still unsolved question in europe as to who was behind the series of large eggs delusions that targeted gas pipelines last year. that targeted the nord stream gas pipelines in september last year. nord stream 1 stretches under the baltic sea, from the russian coast — near st petersburg — to north—eastern germany. that's around 1200 kilometres. it was able to supply up to 170 million cubic metres of gas to europe. in 2021, another pipeline — nord stream 2 — was created. these are pictures of that being built. but it never entered service. then, in september last year, four seperate leaks were found in both nord stream pipelines, near sweden and denmark. western leaders have stopped short of directly accusing russia of attacking its own pipelines, although it has accused russia of using its gas pipelines as a weapon. russia has blamed the west for the explosions. in short — there's no clear answer yet.

earlier i spoke to willem marx, a journalist who investigated the pipeline explosions — for bloomberg businessweek these blasts occurred seven months ago. are we any closer to knowing who was behind them? the short answer is not really, no. we've seen investigations in multiple countries. i myself have spent months talking to dozens of folks and in half a dozen different countries, and publicly at least, there have been no clear accusations made by governments with evidence at least. we've had a lot of finger—pointing and name—calling initially after the blasts but in terms of the actual identities of the perpetrators — no, nothing at all. the eu has said that it believes that this was sabotage and certainly the explosions themselves were so large, even if we don't know who was behind this, do we know more about the execution of these blasts? have you been able to find out more? yeah, this has been a big part of the work i've done in the last few months — to try to talk to people who understand the mechanics essentially of these kinds of acts of sabotage. and what i've learned is that the explosions themselves involved hundreds of kilograms of explosive

material that was likely placed just underneath the pipelines, very close to them. often at a depth of around 70m where these pipelines were along the baltic sea and what was incredibly important to note was that both the location and the timing of the explosions was, according to multiple officials i've spoken to, particularly in denmark, was intentional. these were outside of the territorial waters of both denmark and sweden but inside what's known as the exclusive economic zones. this was, officials told me, designed to send a very clear message to countries like denmark, a member of nato, and sweden, about to be a member of nato, that they could strike, whoever this was, close to the borders, close to the shoreline of these countries, and the timing has occurred just hours before the leaders of norway, denmark and poland, were meeting to celebrate the launch of another new gas pipeline that would bring norwegian gas into europe.

talking about those countries — denmark, sweden, multiple affected countries, we know they've all launched separate investigations into these attacks. but why aren't they investigating together? it has been one of the most interesting parts about this entire episode, is the idea that these countries, many of them nato members, many of them close allies, have not similarly shared a huge amount of information with one another. the lead prosecutor in sweden for instance saying there were so many sensitivities around the work his team were doing in their investigations, they didn't want to share it with other countries, and over last year or two there have been many, many incidences where potential espionage has threatened the security environment around information inside major nato members including, for instance, germany. and so a lot of countries are very wary when it comes to releasing information about what they're able to do underwater even with some of their closest allies. as you know, of course, these pieces of infrastructure, they are multibillion—dollar

pieces of energy infrastructure, essentially. i just wonder what have affected countries, northern european countries, been doing since these attacks to kind of mitigate these kinds of risks? yeah, of course. this is something that theoretically has been a concern for governments for many, many years and particularly with the extraordinary growth of the internet and a number of cables beneath the sea floor all over the world. governments have been concerned about this, they have spent some time and money thinking about how to mitigate but of course this was really the first really unprecedented attack on a piece of subsea infrastructure with a clear act of malice as forethought, as it were. and so governments in places like denmark, like sweden, like norway, like poland, like germany, even the uk, they're now thinking about they need to do to better guard against this kind of thing and that

typically involves greater defence spending, it's looking at new technologies. france, for instance, working with its defence contractors very closely, having unveiled its own strategy not so long ago, the uk going out to the market, buying a couple of ships that are very much dedicated on this kind of work and in countries like denmark where they plan ahead over a decade with their defence spending, this is right in the centre of those political negotiations about how they're going to spend their money in a relatively small country, to make sure that not only are they able to operate as part of nato, not only are they are able to defend against russia in their own backyard, but they're also able to safeguard a lot of its infrastructure that is really growing. and of course the backdrop to all of this is that this came at a time when we saw european countries already turning away from russia, but i wonder to what extent do you think that these blasts have essentially solidified that, made that more permanent? it's really interesting, of course, nord stream 1 and 2 built many years apart, but very similar

routes, both of them involved in these acts of sabotage, of course. we've seen a massive fall in russian imports into the eu over the previous few months prior to this attack following the invasion, and now with around two fifths of all russian imports to eu going through nord stream 1, it's a lot harder for a future possibility, let's say, of future russian imports going anything back to the level of where they were previously. briefly, if you don't mind, do you think we'll ever know who was behind these attacks? i've talked to a lot of intelligent officials in a lot of different countries and many of them say that eventually these things do come out but if there are countries out there in possession of information about who the culprits are, individuals i've talked to have said if it's not the russians, if it's another country, another actor, there's not currently a massive incentive to publicise that. one of america's most recognisable home goods chain —

stay with us here on bbc news. hello there. the weather for the first few days of this week set to be really quite chilly for the time of year, cold enough even to see some areas of frost, as we'll see in a moment. now, what's going on? the area of low pressure that brought some of us rain on sunday is moving eastwards. as that happens, we get these cold northerly winds plunging southwards across the uk, those winds originating from somewhere north of greenland. well, that's not going to be warm, is it? so, right now, we're seeing the colder air arrive across northern scotland. showers here have started to turn to sleet. did have a few thunderstorms around london and south east england, but they've cleared out of the way. rain is starting to develop into wales. now, temperatures for the most part around 4—7 degrees as we head into monday morning, but colder than that in scotland,

where we'll continue to see those wintry showers driven in on gale force gusts of wind in the north. further south, we've got this area of rain in wales moving across the south midlands and southern england, so turning quite miserable, and around the northern edge of that, there'll be probably some areas that see temperatures limited to around 7—8 degrees celsius. so, feeling cold, but particularly cold across northern scotland on account of those strong winds. now, those winds fall light as we go through monday night and we're looking at a widespread frost in the countryside. temperatures get down as low as —5 celsius. i think that could be quite damaging for some of the tender plants that gardeners may have out, so gardeners might want to pay attention to that. a frosty but sunny start to the day on tuesday, the exception northern scotland, where we'll see those sleet showers continue to be driven in on the brisk winds. cloud will tend to bubble up to a degree as we head through the course of the day and it will stay chilly. seven degrees in aberdeen, that's four celsius below average for this stage of the year. heading into wednesday, we still have pressure high to the north of the uk, so a reasonably dry and bright

start to the day across northern and eastern areas, but still cold, a bit of hazy sunshine. in the south and west, well, we start to see cloud thicken and it may well be that we start to see some patches of light rain arrive as those temperatures slowly start to creep up. becoming a little bit less cold is probably the way to think of that. it's not really until thursday that we get some properly milder air moving in from the south—west. but as that happens and the south—westerly winds strengthen, well, we start to see outbreaks of rain spread in and that rain looks to be quite heavy across england and wales, it's already been a wet month for some and more wet weather to come here, staying cold in northern scotland. that's the latest.

it's the newest and one of the biggest greenhouses in the country. the lights and the temperature controlled environment crops can be grown here most of the year, from this site and another in our they present 20% of all british tomatoes. with recent shortages of salad crops and supermarkets grows here say it is more important than ever to think local. ,, , , , important than ever to think local, ,, ,, i. ., important than ever to think local. ,, ., ,, , local. supply chain issues we now have _ local. supply chain issues we now have a _ local. supply chain issues we now have a war, _ local. supply chain issues we now have a war, got - local. supply chain issues we now have a war, got the - local. supply chain issues we i now have a war, got the energy crisis and seeing climatic change.

crisis and seeing climatic chance.