live from singapore, this is bbc news. all 45 hong kong pro—democracy campaigners are jailed in the city's largest security trial — with sentences of up to 10 years so far. russia issues a strong warning to the us, vowing an "appropriate response" if ukraine uses us long range missiles to strike its territory. and thousands rally in new zealand 5 capital over a bill that threatens to overhaul the country s founding document with the maori people.

welcome to newsday, i'm katie silver. we begin with some breaking news — all 45 hong kong pro—democracy campaigners have been jailed in the city's largest security trial — with sentences ranging from 50 months to 10 years so far. the prominent pro— democracy activist joshua wong has been sentenced to 56 months in prison for subversion. the lawyer benny tai has received 10 years — also for subversion. it marks the end of one of the biggest trials since beijing imposed a national security law on the territory to stifle dissent. the 45 were arrested after organising a vote to choose candidates for elections. i'm joined now by our reporter in hong kong — martin yip. before we get into the specifics, just remind us what this is all about and why now? this was all about unofficial

primary election that the pro—democracy camp try to organise for the 2020 hong kong council election. they wanted to send the best candidate and get as many seats as possible so they could have some kind of power against the government policies and that was during the height of the 2019 anti—government protests back in the day. but injune 2020, beijing, the chinese parliament, the npc crossed the hong kong national security law and put in draconian curbs on activities in hong kong and these activists went ahead with their primary injuly and the government said that they were possibly violating this law from beijing, so later we saw a

massive arrest of all of these activists at the beginning of 2021. many of them have been locked up since then and now some three years and eight months on we have a final lie of what has happen to these people and the judgments for all of these people have been announced today. dozens setenced today, but a few names our viewers will be familiar with, including joshua wong . what can you tell us about the sentencing today?- the sentencing today? yes, joshua the sentencing today? yes, joshua wong _ the sentencing today? yes, joshua wong has _ the sentencing today? yes, joshua wong has received l the sentencing today? yes, - joshua wong has received more joshua wong has received more than four years and benny tai got the most, and other people are receiving dozens of months if i can put it that way. gwyneth ho, she was a candidate in the primary election, and she was the only one who did

not submit any plea for leniency during the mitigation process, so she has got 84 months, so many of them are getting these lengthyjudgments getting these lengthy judgments in getting these lengthyjudgments in terms of months or years. martin, thank you for your reporting there. and it's a story we will continue to watch as well as having a live page on the website. do please check it out. the kremlin is vowing what it's calling a "tangible response" afterjoe biden gave ukraine permission to fire us—provided missiles into russian territory. at a press conference on monday, russia's foreign ministry spokesperson, maria zakharova, told reporters "kiev 5 use of long—range missiles to attack our territory would mean a direct involvement of the united states and its satellites in military operations against russia as well as a radical change in the essence and nature of the conflict."

the kremlin has been warning against the move for months. vladimir putin has said russia could retaliate by arming the us�*s enemies. 0ur russia editor steve rosenberg, has this analysis. a few weeks ago i sat down for an interview with the leader of belarus and he brought up the subject, and used as an example the iranian backed houthis rebels, saying be careful of the question of long—range missiles, he said what would happen if the houthis came to vladimir putin and asked for missiles, missile systems that could be used to target aircraft carriers? he said as an example. so he seemed to confirm that this idea was on the kremlin�*s radar as one way of reacting to europe or america deciding to remove restrictions on the use of these long—range missiles. we have not heard anything like that in the last few days from vladimir putin, but his press secretary today did refer everybody back

to his comments back injune, and that is when vladimir putin, as he sat down with media chiefs, came up with the idea of arming western adversaries. it is possible that could happen, but he also knows that in a few months�* time, donald trump is coming back to the white house. 0ur north america correspondent david willis has more on comments made by the us ambassador to the un, miss thomas greenfield made the point that additional american assistance would be provided to ukraine in the coming days. she did not specify the nature of that but we know that vlodomyr zelensky has been pleading with officials in the white house for months to allow those long—range missiles to be used and indeed his foreign affairs minister today said the approval could be what he

called a game changer. linda thomas greenfield also condemned the deployment of around 10,000 north korean troops to the region to fight alongside russian forces, saying this was a sign of russia's desperation and said it was a move that was unprecedented in modern times. the situation in ukraine has also been galvanising discussion of world leaders. at the g20 summit in rio, the french president emmanuel macron came out in support of joe biden�*s decision to allow the authorisation of those long—range missiles. and it is possible of course that this could clear the way for the use of the so—called stormchaser weapons, the long—range weapons that britain and france have provided to ukraine.

for more on what comes next i spoke to melinda haring, nonresident senior fellow at the atlantic councils eurasia center. the response from the kremlin was predictable. irresponsible but the thrust of their argument is that the west is doing something new and it said the kremlin claimed that washington would be using its intelligent support in order to fire these long—range ballistic missiles. that is true. us support will be required. but what they left out is that the us has been providing intelligence support since day one of the war so there is no major change. us intelligence provided support over the battle of kyiv and over the seeking of one of the major russian navy vessels in the black sea, so the kremlin is wrong

in that there is a new evolution in the west. that is absolutely false. the idea of arming western adversaries — do we have any idea who that might be and what the arming would look like and a timeframe on any of that? we don't know and the allegations are very vague. the previous allegation was the houthis but it's important to put russian reps in greater context. vladimir putin loves to threaten the west, it is his go—to. when the west does something he doesn't likes, he always threatens and he loves to threaten with nuclear weapons. it's very, very unlikely he will use nuclear weapons, even a tactical nuclear weapon because of the politics, so the biden administration has backed away and has refused to give permissions for these atacms, the long—range weapons because he was afraid moscow would respond with nuclear weapons. the biden administration

calculated it had a bit more room and that moscow is unwilling to use nuclear weapons as the presidential administrations are changing in the us. i was going to ask about the timing. do you expect to see any big reaction from the kremlin in the next two or three months before the president—elect comes to office or do you think they make sit on their hands and wait and see? i think they will sit on their hands and see but it doesn't mean they are not doing anything. since the weekend we have seen major strikes in ukraine. the russians have downed numerous iranians drones the russians have lobbed numerous iranians drones and ballistic missiles and they are lobbing them at civilian infrastructure. it might be a boring story, but it is hitting and killing civilians including children and this is just as temperatures are starting to decline in ukraine and that is no coincidence. the russians want to make it difficult, cold, dark

and they want to break the will of the ukrainian people and this is the third winter that ukrainians are going into. he there's been a mixed reaction from he there's been a mixed reaction from the rest of the world. the british prime minister refused to comment, saying doing so would only benefit russia. french president emmanuel macron, hailed the change in policy, calling it a long awaited decision. the german foreign minister — annalena baerbock — also welcomed the move. hungary�* foreign minister called the move "astonishingly dangerous". the country's prime minister, viktor 0rban, is close with vladimir putin. and at a meeting of the un security council to mark the thousandth day of the conflict — the us�*s envoy, linda thomas—greenfield, pledged more security assistance to ukraine in the coming days. thousands of demonstrators have gathered in new zealand 5 capital to take part in a rally protesting a controversial bill that threatens to overhaul the country s founding document with the maori people.

around 30,000 people atended. the issue has divided the country which is known as a leaderfor indigenous rights. haka chant. and it garnered international attention last week, when this clip from new zealand's parliament went viral. a maori opposition mp initiating a haka in protest of the bill. today's gathering is the culmination of a hikoi, a peaceful march, that started at the top of new zealand 5 north island nine days ago, ending today in wellington. i've been speaking to our corresponent katy watson in welington. those at the march were saying that this is notjust a maori issue, when the rights are threatened, it threatens everyone in new zealand and it gets to the core of what

new zealand is all about, the treaty of waitangi that was an accord between the maoris and the british colonisers of the time, and the argument is if you alter that, even just the principles of the treaty, you are altering the rights of the maori people. the proponents of the bill say this is a new new zealand, a modern new zealand where we are notjust talking about maoris and the english, we are talking about a multicultural society and that needs to be reflected, but certainly the strength of feeling at the march i saw was there was a big push to not let this bill pass. while it does seem unlikely to pass, many are saying even the introduction of it is stoking or generating an anti—maori sentiment. can you talk me through some of that? absolutely. in the last few years there's been a

push to include and empower maori culture here and when you speak to new zealanders they will pepper maori words with english. it's very much a real mix here, and there has been a pushback, and certainly that some people feel there is too much or too many rights given and that needs to be reined back and of course that is where the conflict lies and bringing in a bill like this or introducing it even if it doesn't have the support the critics of the bill say it is just stoking division and having that conversation in a country that is seen as a proponent of indigenous rights is making people see the division and questioning it, that is the damage being done about whether or not they will pass this bill. joining me live now is dominic 0'sullivan — thank you forjoining me dominic. first of all, can i ask you what you make of this treaty bill and if you could

give us some background on it, the treaty principles bill was an election commitment of one of the new zealand minor parties and even though it's unlikely to pass was it about trying to keep the commitments? 0ne trying to keep the commitments? one has to go back to the very beginning and look at what the treaty actually said and it wasn't an agreement established to set up a colonial state. and i doubt it we can call them colonisers, but is that bit comes later and the treaty is very short than just a few hundred words and it did three things and gave the british crown a right to establish government and protected what we call the maori authority to manage their own affairs and resources, so the idea was the got gong to establish would not be able to improve on the maori authority, it would protect and uphold it. i'm a third promise

made was a promise to the maori people individually that they would have the rights and privileges of british subjects and that has evolved into new zealand sedition ship today and continues to involve —— evolve and it's been interpreted in all sorts of different ways but to summarise it it's been interpreted to mean that maori people are entitled to a distinctive voice in public life. for example they are entitled to manage their own primary health services and to manage education and so on if they want to. there's a whole network of maori schools that are state schools but teach in the maori language and according to maori cultural values and things like that. so those things are quite distinctive aspects of new zealand which aims to diminish,

and itaims zealand which aims to diminish, and it aims to diminish them a couple of ways. firstly by saying that the rights to authority over 1's own affairs are not inherent right, but long to people only when parliament says so, so it is a transfer of authority to an inherent concept set out in the treaty to parliament and the other thing it does is it tries to diminish distinctiveness in public life for maori people. you are based in australia where i am from, and of course this isn't an issue unique to new zealand. many countries, canada and australia are grappling with the complexity of how to show respect to indigenous populations. can you give the international audience an idea of what makes new zealand's historic traditional relationship so distinct and in many ways so potentially respectful than in some of the other countries. i

respectful than in some of the other countries.— other countries. i think the fact the treaty _ other countries. i think the fact the treaty was - other countries. i think the l fact the treaty was originally not a colonial agreement, not an agreement where maori people had been defeated in war and were surrendering and agreeing to unfavourable terms of surrender, they were agreeing to their land being shared with settlers and although the specifics of how the government would work were not set out, they were to evolve with time, they were to evolve with time, the idea was that a maori authority would not be usurped and maori people would not be strangers in their own country in a way that has happened in australia where colonisation is very much of the political —— political philosophy that prevails in canada is different and it tries to look at this in the indigenous rights of peoples and they have been important court cases that upheld the authority of the

nations but not in ways that people think are just or satisfy justice and people think are just or satisfyjustice and its completeness, but certainly in ways that i guess acknowledge that human rights belong to everybody and don't have to be given up on colonial societies or societies like new zealand, canada and australia can develop non—colonial features and characteristics if human rights are recognised as belonging equally to everybody and that is the most important writer everybody is the rightful culture and that is what the people marching in wellington today are worried about that this bill will use up about that this bill will use up their right to culture and be themselves, the right to be a marriage notjust at home but in public life and in parliament, at school and so on. . .,

on. dominic o'sullivan, thank ou on. dominic o'sullivan, thank you very _ on. dominic o'sullivan, thank you very much _ on. dominic o'sullivan, thank you very much for _ on. dominic o'sullivan, thank you very much for sharing - on. dominic o'sullivan, thankl you very much for sharing your stories and insights with us, a maori scholar from the university of australia. around the world and across the uk. this is bbc news. the family of harshita brella, who was found dead in the boot of a car in east london last week, say they're heartbroken over her death. in an exclusive interview with the bbc in india, harshita's parents and sister, say all they want now, is justice. detectives in the uk believe harshita's husband, pankaj lamba, murdered the 24 year old, then fled the country. samira hussein reports from delhi. understandably these are parents and a sibling overcome with grief and they cannot believe harshitha is no longer with them and when i asked them to describe what their daughter was like, the father was quick to say she was really hard—working and studious and wanted to be a teacher and she would spend her time in delhi tutoring two sessions of children coming in and out of

their suburban home, and then she would turn to her own studies. her sister said the two of them were inseparable. you can stay up to date with that story on our website. you're live with bbc news. several students have been injured in china after a car crashed outside a primary school in central china's hunan province. it is unclear if the crash was deliberate. video circulating on chinese social media that matched images of the school online appeared to show the aftermath of the crash, with children running in panic and several people lying injured on the ground. last monday, 35 people were killed when a man rammed his car into an exercising crowd outside a sports venue in the southern city of zhuhai. apologies, i believe we showed

you the wrong images there. toxic smog in india's capital delhi, has hit severe levels, choking residents and engulfing the city. across much of northern india, pollution levels are more than 60 times higher than the world health 0rganisation recommends. the causes include farmers illegally burning straw stubble, along with factory smoke and traffic fumes. in the last two weeks in neighbouring pakistan, the city of lahore has also seen unprecedented levels of air pollution, with doctors telling the bbc they're concerned many more people will need hospital treatment because of it. the local government there says they had not anticipated this level of toxic smog. caroline davies reports. lahore was known as the city of gardens. now, you can hardly see the green through the grey. in the last two weeks, air quality has hit unprecedented toxic levels. some cannot escape it. translation: we are compelled to go out i because we have children. if we stay home, what will we do? we are labourers, we need

to earn to be able to eat. respiratory problems, eye infections, coughs, asthma. this ward estimates they've seen up to 25% more patients, and winter is almost here. in the coming one or two weeks, there will be the cool wave that will hit lahore and major cities of pakistan. and i am expecting that there will be a significant surge in respiratory diseases. lahore's markets are far from empty, but some have no choice but to stay inside. iram has three children, two with special needs. schools are closed, so are the parks. they are greatly disturbed by all this haphazardness, because they don't have anything to do. it is very difficult to survive in this environment. pakistan sees smog most years. the provincial government insists it was trying to control it, but hadn't prepared for this level. the air quality index is beyond our control,

and i must admit that it is actually a surprise for us. we were not ready to face such a kind of surge in aqi. change requires money and political will. if pollution outpaces pakistan's efforts, lahore and the millions who live here may stay trapped in these toxic clouds. caroline davies, bbc news. let's take a look at some other stories in the headlines. torrential rain from tropical storm sarah has cut off more than 1700 communities in honduras. honduran officials confirmed only one death but said the storm has affected more than 110,000 people. some areas have seen 500 milimeters, or 19.7 inches of rain. forecasters say storm sara is likely to further weaken as it moves over the south of mexico. a new survey shows that parts of the great barrier reef have suffered their biggest annual decline in coral cover, since the study

began 39 years ago. the report from the australian institute of marine science says much of the damage can be attributed to climate change—related extreme heat and cyclones. french singer—songwriter charles dumont — who composed the french ballad �*non, je ne regrette rien�*, has died at age 95. dumont was 27 when he wrote the song in 1956, which was later released in 1960. it topped the charts in france, belgium, the netherlands and canada. the song expresses a wish to make peace with the past and start anew. before we go let's return live to hong kong and our breaking news this hour — the high court there has sentenced 45 democracy activists to jail in the territory's biggest national security trial since beijing clamped down on dissent. the lawyer, benny tai, and four others received the longest sentences of up

to ten years. that's all for now — stay with bbc news. hello. for some of us right now, there are some pretty tricky travel conditions out there — some snow, some ice — as cold air sinks its way across the uk. certainly a very cold feel to the weather on tuesday — more snow and ice for some. so what's going on? well, we've got this battleground, this dividing line between mild air still clinging on in the south, and something much colder surging down from the north. and along that dividing line, we've got a frontal system that has been bringing a mixture of rain, sleet, and snow. a lot of the snow over higher ground, but even seeing some to lower levels. parts of northern ireland, northern england, wales, the midlands starting the day with that wintry mix — some ice, as well.

meanwhile, frequent snow showers in northern scotland — again, some ice to contend with here. through the day, the zone of clouds, still a bit of patchy rain and hill snow pushing southwards across wales, the midlands, towards southern counties of england. another dose of heavy rain for the far southwest and the channel islands. further north you are, some spells of sunshine, but frequent wintry showers into the north and the northeast of scotland. and these are your afternoon temperatures, that cold air pushing southwards — 2—7 celsius at best. very cold indeed through tuesday night. still frequent wintry showers in areas exposed to this brisk wind. dry for many places inland with a bit of shelter. but it is going to be a cold start to wednesday morning with a widespread frost. quite a lot of sunshine around on wednesday, but some icy stretches and further wintry showers, again, in spots exposed

to that northwesterly wind. it may be that we won't see quite as many showers at this stage on the east coast. the wind tending to push some of those showers out to sea. talking of the winds — that wind will be pretty brisk, particularly up towards the north and the east. so those are your temperatures, 2—8 celsius at best — factor in the wind chill, it will feel colder than that. now, this little frontal system here may usher in some slightly less cold air from the north, but still some wintry showers as we head through thursday and friday. and then, for the weekend, signs of quite a big change. uncertainty about the detail, but it could be quite a deep area of low pressure pushes in from the atlantic. that would bring wind and rain, but something milder.

45 pro—democracy activists jailed in hong kong in a landmark national security case. new delhi's pollution readings hit their highest levels of the winter so far — flights affected and construction work restricted. welcome to business today. let's start in hong kong. 45 pro—democracy activists have been jailed 45 pro—democracy activists have beenjailed in 45 pro—democracy activists have been jailed in the city's largest national security trial. these are live pictures just outside the courtroom. the activists were sentenced a short while ago, all charged with subversion after organising an unofficial

primary vote to select opposition candidates for