hello, i'm rich preston. welcome to the programme. the leaders of the military coup in niger have issued a statement, warning of what they call imminent military intervention. it comes as leaders from across west africa are due to meet for an emergency summit following the coup in niger. which took place earlier this week. soldiers announced the military takeover on wednesday, detaining the president mohamed bazoum. on friday, the head of the presidential guards unit, general abdourahmane tchiani, declared himself niger's new leader, saying insecurity, economic woes and corruption prompted him to seize power. the us, the eu, and france — niger's former colonial ruler — say they won't recognise the coup leaders, with some suspending

security cooperation and budgetary aid. there are concerns among many countries over which states niger's new leader will align with — potentially moving closer to russia — as happened after coups in neighbouring burkina faso and mali. later, leaders from the 15 countries that make up ecowas, the economic community of west african states, and the eight leaders from the west african economic and monetary union will meet to discuss their response. live now to chris ewokor in nigeria with the latest on this. good to see. tell us more about the statement about possible military intervention. well, right now in niger, things are happening quite fast. earliertoday, one of niger, things are happening quite fast. earlier today, one of the members of the military coup came out on state television to denounce the ecowas meeting and alleged that

the ecowas meeting and alleged that the meeting was intended to take action on carrying out military intervention of that country and now they have also called on nigerians to come out to protest against that mission. as we speak, hundreds of people are out on the street protesting against ecowas and against especially france near the france embassy and the intention possibly is to whip up enough sentiments among the people against ecowas and whatever the outcome of the meeting today would be. pork is through some of the potential ways forward on this because we have heard from the eu, suspending financial assistance, but at the same time niger is a country where more than 40% of the population live in poverty. there are suggestions that suspending financial aid won't help. what are ways that neighbours and regional allies can help niger?

well, niger is a member of the 15 nation ecowas block and basically it is landlocked. it is the seventh largest producer of uranium but is quite a poor country and has been dependent on aid from the international community. now, ecowas really has a problem and it is a tricky situation for the leadership of ecowas, now having to deal with four military regimes within the subregion, so it is not clear yet but usually what we have seen ecowas do was to slam sanctions on the country and it is not clear if that is going to be part of what the decision today will be, but now we have also seen that the co—leaders have also seen that the co—leaders have now called on russia to come to

their aid. this effectively put paid to speculations about interference and who is behind them and the coup. earlier, we had a statement encouraging nigerians and the co—leaders saying that niger is fighting to free themselves from their colonial master who enslaved them. so today what will be determined is whether the ecowas leaders are going to go into a form of understanding in order not to push the military leaders into an alliance outside of the west, just as mali has done. 0k, thank you very much. we really appreciate it. russia's president, vladimir putin, has said he does not reject the idea of peace talks on ukraine. speaking

after meeting african leaders in st petersburg, he said an african or chinese peace initiative could serve as a basis for talks. but mr putin also said it was hard to implement a ceasefire when the ukrainian army was on the offensive. it comes as the mayor of moscow has accused ukraine of a drone attack on the russian capital. two office blocks were damaged but there were no reports of any injuries. meanwhile, ukraine says a russian missile attack on the north—eastern city of sumy, has killed at least one civilian and wounded five. officials said the missile hit an education centre. earlier on, president putin spoke at the navy day parade in the city of st petersburg. let's take a listen to some of putin's speech. translation: patriotism is at the core of the - particular naval culture which helps

them fulfil all the tasks and evokes pride among our people in the strong fleet. this pride proves that the people of russia can hold the power on the seas. today, the russian fleet is solving the tasks of national policy and increasing its strength. this year alone, 30 new battleships arejoining the navy, one of which has been named after a glorious seafarer and it is great that we have this

tradition to give the names of our glorious seafarers to our ships. the name is a sign of our strong navaltradition, our courage and the staunch spirit of naval officers. in the name of russia, our officers and naval personnel are proving their... fulfilling their heroic tasks and i thank the personnel of the russian navy for their faultless performance, for their perseverance and resilience and for their loyalty to the motherland. glory to the russian navy! cheering. stephen hall is an assistant professor in russian and post—soviet politics

at the university of bath. what did you make of president putin's speech?— putin's speech? well, it was certainly _ putin's speech? well, it was certainly fascinating, - putin's speech? well, it was certainly fascinating, but. putin's speech? well, it was - certainly fascinating, but certainly short and it was the usual sense of showing russian pride to a domestic audience. at the same time, also providing a few threats to the west, primarily that they have 30 ships coming online and as we saw with 3000 sailors and 45 ships at the parade that this was very much about that and putin used his usual historical analysis as well, magic, mentioning a ship that he did to turkey ships in 1989, but as with many things with putin, his historical vision only go so far. you didn't mention that the commander of the ship was poisoned with arsenic in 1833, when he was

looking at the audit books of the fleet in sebastopol, so it isn't necessarily quite as rosy as he paints it, but certainly his speech was very much about threats, showing russian patriotism and how impressive russia is as a major power still. impressive russia is as a ma'or power stutfi impressive russia is as a ma'or power still. these speeches can sometimes _ power still. these speeches can sometimes be _ power still. these speeches can sometimes be a _ power still. these speeches can sometimes be a bit _ power still. these speeches can sometimes be a bit copy - power still. these speeches can sometimes be a bit copy and i power still. these speeches can - sometimes be a bit copy and paste, as you suggested there. glory to the motherland. the trips are doing fantastically. it mentioned 30 new battleships. was there anything else new in the speech, really, today? figs new in the speech, really, today? as far new in the speech, really, today? sis far as new in the speech, really, today? is far as i can see, from having listened to the speech, apart from the 30 new ships which are coming online, there wasn't anything which was necessarily new. it was the usual rehash of patriotism. we can't obviously say the russian army as we can we are going to lose this war, but it was the usual patriotism, it was the usual russia is a great power, everyone fears us, and we are moving forward towards our goals, whatever those are.—

moving forward towards our goals, whatever those are. meanwhile, as we mentioned, whatever those are. meanwhile, as we mentioned. mr — whatever those are. meanwhile, as we mentioned, mr putin _ whatever those are. meanwhile, as we mentioned, mr putin has _ whatever those are. meanwhile, as we mentioned, mr putin has suggested i whatever those are. meanwhile, as we mentioned, mr putin has suggested a| mentioned, mr putin has suggested a chinese or african peace initiative might work when it comes to settling things with ukraine. what you take from that? ~ things with ukraine. what you take from that? . . ., , things with ukraine. what you take from that? . . . , , , ., things with ukraine. what you take from that? . . . , ,, ., , from that? well, certainly russia is bein: ve from that? well, certainly russia is being very understanding _ from that? well, certainly russia is being very understanding towards l from that? well, certainly russia is l being very understanding towards the chinese peace deal because the chinese peace deal because the chinese peace deal isn't really workable, in my understanding, and it would allow russia to gain control of the territory that it already possesses in terms of ukraine and in terms of the african deal, which i think is led primarily by south africa, it is very similar as well. putin has said, yes, we are open to talks, but of ukraine has to accept facts on the ground and ukraine has to stop this counteroffensive and if it stops this counteroffensive, then maybe we can have these talks at a later date, but busy then the momentum of the ukrainian offensive, which has just started to get going, is going to obviously be limited, so again he

is trying to maintain his allies, as it were, or at least nominal supporters, by saying that, yes, we are open to negotiations and then leave it to the ukrainians to deal with the actual negotiations, so we will see what happens, but we know that saudi arabia is also having talks on the fifth and 6th of august about how to deal or find a solution to this crisis. russia will be excluded from those, so whether putin actually really wants negotiations, i still don't think he does. ,, , ., ., does. 0k, stephen hall, from the university of— does. 0k, stephen hall, from the university of bath, _ does. 0k, stephen hall, from the university of bath, thank- does. 0k, stephen hall, from the university of bath, thank you - does. 0k, stephen hall, from the university of bath, thank you very much. here in the uk, the prime minister, rishi sunak, has ordered the department for transport to review existing so—called low—traffic neighbourhood schemes, which seek to reduce the numbers of cars using streets in some residential areas. mr sunak told the sunday telegraph newspaper he wanted to show drivers that he was on their side. here s our political correspondent, damian grammaticas. low traffic neighbourhoods,

loved by some, loathed by others. they use barriers, bollards and automatic number plate recognition cameras to control or limit access to some streets. they've been set up in recent years in london, bristol, birmingham, bournemouth and more cities with tens of millions of pounds of government funding. the aim — to keep through traffic away from residential streets, lower average speeds, improve air quality and reduce carbon emissions. in some places, tempers have flared between drivers, pedestrians and cyclists. at least one opinion survey commissioned by the government has shown broad support in areas where they've been put in place, but some motorists and businesses are opposed. earlier this month, the transport secretary said he was halting funding for any new schemes in england. now rishi sunak has ordered a review into how existing ones are working. mr sunak told the sunday telegraph... "the vast majority of people

in the country use their cars to get around and are dependent on their cars", adding, "i just want to make sure people know that i'm on their side in supporting them to use their cars". it comes after mr sunak�*s conservatives retained the parliamentary seat of uxbridge and south ruislip in west london on the back of a campaign focused on opposition to the expansion of london's ulez charging zone for older polluting vehicles. the labour mayor of london, sadiq khan, is pressing ahead with that after a legal challenge brought by some conservative councils failed this week. he says it's important to clean up london's air and tackle the climate crisis. he's promised to look at new ideas to help people meet the costs. after uxbridge, rishi sunak appears to have identified car owners as a target for conservative policies. but it's not clear what effect his review of low traffic schemes will have. government sources could not say

whether local councils could be forced to remove any already in place. damian grammaticus, bbc news. now it's time for a look at today's sport with gavin. we'll start at the women's world cup — and cruel for the co—hosts new zealand, who are out of the tournament, courtesy of norway's emphatic 6—0 victory over the phillipines in the final round of matches in group a. it was a case of better late then neverfor the norway side, scoring their first goals of the tournament. sophie haug's hat—trick the highlight for them, completing the rout in stoppage time. the phillipines, despite that win over new zealand in their last game, finish bottom of the group. and that's because new zealand could only manage a draw against the group winners switzerland. 0—0 it finished. agonising for the co—hosts, who could have made the knockouts with a win, at the expense of their opponents. the football ferns becoming the first hosts to exit at the group stage. germany colombia approaching half—time... the second of their group matches. earlier, morocco beat south korea 1—0

in the first of the group h games. both sides lost their first match, with morocco thrashed by germany, but they recovered well to take the win today, and still have a chance of reaching the quarter finals. the fourth day of the fifth and final ashes test is under way at the oval in south london. australia need 384 to win after england lost their last second innings wicket this morning — james anderson out lbw for 8. that left stuart broad 8 not out in his final test after he announced his retirement yesterday. australia havejust started their run chase. so all attention on broad for this final ashes test. the last time we'll be seeing him as a cricketer. he's the leading wicket taker for england in this series and has played in all the tests this summer. it's a career which began back in 2007 for england, and our cricket correspondent jonathan agnew feels broad will be glad to go out on a high. it feels to me absolutely the perfect time for him. very few sportsmen really get to choose when

they leave. often they don't get to leave at the top of their game. he has had a brilliant series, taking 20 wickets. he is at the top of his game still and he could carry on, but he has always had it in his mind, ithink, that but he has always had it in his mind, i think, that that is how he wanted to go. he is not someone who's just wanted to go. he is not someone who'sjust going to wanted to go. he is not someone who's just going to drag on and eventually get dropped. he has been a brilliant performerfor eventually get dropped. he has been a brilliant performer for england, far better i think that he ever imagined. and today was a celebration rather than any form of sadness. you do feel sad when somebody steps away, but when they do it on their terms, at the top of their game, you feel proud of them. what a night for terence crawford. the american boxer has become the first undisputed welterweight champion in the four—belt era, which started in 2004. he beat compatriot errol spencejunior in las vegas in a dominant display, to claim the wbc, wba super and ibf titles, adding to his wbo belt. it's an incredible 40 wins in a row for crawford — who ended the unbeaten streak

of spence, in the ninth round. for all you guys that touted me, for all you guys that said i was too small, i was actually too strong. and now everybody gets to witness greatness. like i said before in the terence crawford era. finally, the netball world cup continues, and wales are through to the next phase after beating sri lanka earlier. there are four pools initially, with the top three teams in each pool progressing to the second stage. a win for australia, too, earlier, who beat fiji. later this afternoon, it's england —scotland, and trinidad and tobago versus uganda. the rest of the matches there on your screen. and that's all the sport for now. as russian forces moved into ukraine last year, thousands of people had to flee their homes — with many finding refuge in the uk. one family who came to live

in northern scotland are moving back to their home country after nine long months. and they're being helped by those who opened their home to them. daniel bennett reports. packing for a massive trek — it's not a holiday, but a journey back into a war zone for some ukrainians who've made their homes in scotland. and they're been driven there by friends chris harrison and danny ralph who took in refugees last year. we thought, well, we've got a big house, so we could do something to help folks that are just like us. you do things for friends. we didn't start out as friends — we started outjust as normal people introduced to each other, but now we're really good friends, at least i think they are, but they might say something different. danny's been joined by a fellow driver chris whose idea it was to take the family home. it is quite shocking to hear some of the stories they come out with and what they had to live through, it was an honour to help them where we could, and maybe six weeks ago danny

was having a coffee morning at the local hall and i texted danny and i said, do you fancy a road trip? dannyjust latched on like a limpet and said "magic". the journey will take them hundreds of miles to dover through belgium and onto ukraine, they are adding a detour for a family reunion in luxembourg. i it is very difficult for mothers i who had a full family in ukraine, before the war, but they are now | raising children without a fatherl who stayed in ukraine, _ it's a really important reason why some people are going home. the children are very homesick. they want to study in - ukraine, they want to work in future in ukraine. and with that, the group have set off on their 2,500—mile trek.

a braw brich moonlich nich the nich. well done! dobre! a 700—mile drive south, and the group were ready to get the ferry over to france. they pass through belgium and into luxembourg, for this. it's long hours but in the end, worth it. after crossing poland, a reminder on the border with ukraine of difficult getting in can be. a lot of vehicles being donated to the army, some of them are just ordinary cars. it looks like that is what some of these are. here we go. i'm going to have to put my phone down. finally we have reached kyiv. after a document check, they are back on the road. aye, and there's babushka... after five days and 2,500 miles, and nine long months, home.

daniel bennett, bbc news. a third firefighter has died in canada while battling the country's worst wildfire season on record. authorities say the firefighter died tackling a fire in the western province of british columbia. people are evacuating an area further south in the province, near the us border, as fires swirl out of control. so far this season, canadian wildfires have burned about 30 million acres of land, more than the land area of south korea or cuba. people are voting in the central african republic in a referendum on a new constitution that would allow president faustin—archange touadera to seek a third term in office. critics say he wants to become president for life — under the increasingly visible protection of the private russian mercenary group wagner. it was first deployed to the car in 2018. officials opposed to the changes, including the president of the constitutional court, were removed last year. the new constitution would also

raise the presidential term from five to seven years. to turkey where security forces have used water cannon to disperse environmental campaigners who have been protesting over the felling of trees to make way for an expansion to a coal mine in the south west of the country. activists had sat on a road to block the way for wood logging trucks. police equipped with riot gear surrounded the woodland area in mugla province where activists set up their camp to stop felling of trees. the old ways of making newspapers — the hot—metal typesetting and the rotary presses — were abandoned with the arrival of computers back in the 1980s. in northern france, they re still printing their local paper using machines that were familiar a hundred years ago. hugh schofield has been finding out more. it's like something out of a �*30s movie. the clanking press churning out the latest headlines, the rolls of paper transformed into news. the machine does indeed date

from 1924, but this is today. and this is the staff of newspaper casting a critical eye over a test run for the latest edition. as always with technology this old. a few minor problems that lines too much impression. since 1906, they've been serving up the news this way when the great switchover came to computers and new technology. they stayed put. and if they didn't exactly thrive, they survived. translation: our production method is different - - when all the other newspapers changed, we stayed with the old machines. it means we have a very small circulation and we just about keep our heads above water. the typesetting, the composition of the pages, is also all done either manually or using a hot metal linotype machine where the letter molds are dipped in molten lead.

part of the appeal is that you can look at it and understand what it's doing. with a computer, you look at it, you don't know what it's doing. and if something goes wrong, you don't know where to look. but this one, you can see where it's going wrong. you can see what it's doing. it's, yeah, it's alltransparent. upstairs are the rudimentary archives. only three times in it's 117 years has the paper briefly stopped printing — in the two world wars a cheval, a good horse for sale. and in anglaise? an english car. wow. at the end of the process, the paper has been printed, cut and folded, and 2,000 copies are ready for distribution. so what's the latest from this part of the world? we've got a hiking organization that's organizing something and also we have a farm show on the 14th of may.

the wonderful unchanging world of local news. fleet street it ain't, but who cares? the good people of vervins are getting their newspapers old style. hugh schofield, bbc news, northern france. much more on the bbc website. i will be back in half an hour. thank you for your company. goodbye. hello. it has been a promising start to the day with some sunshine and a few showers around two but if we look out in the atlantic, this weather system is pushing in the cloud and that will be bringing some rain to some parts of the country. around that first area of low pressure, we have had the showers swirling across scotland and northern england. the worst of those are moving away, so fewer showers

and still some sunshine into the afternoon. the wetter weather arriving and pushing into northern ireland and also across to the south—east of england. it could be quite windy for the time of year across england and wales. lighter winds for scotland and northern ireland. in the sunshine in scotland, it should not feel too bad. highest temperatures in eastern england ahead of the rain but it looks like the rain will be heading towards the oval for the morning session which sees the best of the weather. if we don't get the weather in the afternoon session, it will be arriving after tea. that steady rain pushing across more of england and wales and northern ireland. and that wet weather continues to journey northwards into parts of scotland. further south, the rain does ease of but we keep a lot of cloud so it will be a warm start to monday. northern parts will be more cold with the clear skies and the promise of some early sunshine to start the new week but the weather will be driven by an area of low pressure

which is focusing most of the rain. we still have that weather front sitting through the english channel so cloud and rain here, moving on to the south coast at times and threatening the south—east of england. the rain affects more of scotland through the day and then it gets wet again across northern ireland and wales. maybe a slice of something more dry and eventually brighter. not particularly warm for this time of year. low pressure continues to dry in across the uk. it is pushing on these winds. this is the jet stream. and we are in cooler air and there is one area of low pressure getting moved away and another one comes in as we arrive into wednesday which will bring some wet weather, especially across england and wales and the start of august will not get any warmer because as the rain clears away later in the week, we end up with a northerly breeze.

this is bbc news, the headlines: the leaders of the military coup in niger say that the west african regional bloc, ecowas, could stage an imminent military intervention. it comes as ecowas is to hold an extraordinary summit in the nigerian capital, abuja, to discuss possible sanctions against those who've seized power. president putin has been praising the might of russia's fleet at navy day celebrations in st

petersburg. earlier, mr putin said he didn't reject the idea of peace talks on ukraine. but he also said it was hard to implement a ceasefire with ukraine on the offensive. here in the uk, the prime minister has ordered the department for transport to review existing so—called low—traffic neighbourhood schemes, which seek to reduce the numbers of cars using streets in some residential areas. rishi sunak says he wanted to show drivers that he was on their side. now on bbc news, the spy who got away with murder. freddie scappaticci — one of britain's top spies in the ira. code name — stakeknife.

the famous sta keknife.