prisoner of war exchanges since the onset of the full—scale invasion of ukraine. and astronomers prepare to get a glimpse of a dazzling star system that hasn't been visible to the naked eye for eight decades. hello, i'm lukwesa burak. high winds and extreme weather has forced the cancellation of edinburgh's world—famous hogmanay celebrations on new year's eve. tens of thousands of tickets had already been sold, but organisers say high winds and extreme weather mean they've been unable to continue with preparations for the outdoor events both today and tomorrow. amongst the events called off,

a concert by the rock band texas and the traditional midnight fireworks display to see in 2025. rain, snow and strong winds will hit large parts of the uk this week, with a series of weather warnings coming into force between today and thursday. an amber alert for rain has been issued for parts of scotland on new year's eve, and stormy conditions are expected to spread to the rest of the uk. catriona renton reports from edinburgh. music. this is what people from all over the world come to edinburgh to experience. this was hogmanay last year, and preparations were taking place today for the famous street party, concert due to be headlined by texas and spectacular fireworks. that was until this afternoon, when organisers announced they have had to cancel on safety grounds

the met office issued yellow warnings for wind and rain. a spokesperson said... of course people or disappointed, but understand. no! we were allowed to go to the castle because of the wind. oh, my gosh! this is what i came for, this weather, i love it. it was a little bit blustery for the torches, so i understood that. we kind of came here forthe party, so... i organisers of other events like the fireballs plan to go ahead. the fireballs will go ahead as planned, but the only issue will be for the spectators to come and stand for a couple of hours beforehand. already today, the north of the country has been

deluged with rain. this is what part of the highland main railway line was up against. and there is an amber warning for rain in place for parts of the area tomorrow. the worst of the weather is due to have passed through scotland by new year's day, but there are yellow warnings for wind and rain for the south of england. catriona renton, bbc news, edinburgh. our correspondent in edinburgh, lisa summers, gave us this update. i mean, this is a huge event for the city. over the years that they've been hosting it, it's really kind of put edinburgh and scotland on the international map as a place to come to to celebrate the new year. now, we were expecting around 16,000 people to gather in prince's street tomorrow night to bring in 2025. you mentioned the concert in the gardens was due to take place as well as a big fireworks display that would be at the castle and was going to last six minutes. organisers have said because of the bad weather that we've had today and the extreme weather they're expecting tomorrow, they've been unable to continue with the plans

to get everything set up for these festivals. and for that reason, they've had to make the difficult decision to cancel events. it's quite early on to do that. we have had the street party cancelled in years gone by — twice in fact, in 2003 and 2006 — because of bad weather. but that all happened quite late in the day, so it was quite a surprise to hear this afternoon, especially with the weather actually not too bad at the moment, that they'd made the decision to cancel all of the outdoor events. but i think given we're expecting quite terrible weather conditions tomorrow morning, it may well be that the organisers just want to give people time to plan something different, not to come to the city, not to travel to the city if the weather is going to be really poor tomorrow morning. in south korea, families of the victims of the nation's worst aviation disaster in decades are calling for more support from the government. all but two of the 181 people on board died as thejeju air plane crashed after landing at muan international airport.

some reports say the pilot told air traffic control that the aircraft had suffered a bird strike. south korea's acting president has ordered an emergency safety inspection of the country's entire airline operation system. our seoul correspondent jean mackenzie is at the scene and sent this report. shouting. the bereaved are at breaking point. these outbursts come every few minutes. a day on from the crash, they're still at the airport, waiting to be reunited with their loved ones�* bodies. "why have only five bodies been released," this woman yells. "you're useless!" a police official spares her no details. "they're too badly damaged," he says. "forensic teams are still piecing them together." it's disturbing to hear. and for shin gyu—ho, it's even worse. his two teenage grandsons haven't even been identified.

translation: i've been sitting here all day, hoping for news. i i'm so frustrated. i feel like i'm waiting without an end. the plane was carrying koreans back from christmas holidays in thailand when it landed at speed without its wheels down. as it crashed, every passenger was killed. investigators are now trying to work out why the landing gear seemed to fail, but the flight recorder is damaged. it'll take time to decipher the data. so, today, the attention has turned to what happened on the runway. when the plane made its emergency landing, it was still intact, but because it couldn't stop, it then overshot the runway here. and we now know that it hit this concrete and orange structure that has been raised up on this grassy mound. this is a guidance system that is supposed to help planes land, but this is the point at which the plane exploded into this fireball and fractured into many pieces.

and aviation experts are now questioning why this was positioned in this way, so raised up and so close to the end of the runway. the acting president has ordered an investigation of the country's entire aviation industry. without answers, the families don't know who to blame. for now, the only place they can direct their anger is at the forensic teams, who are still searching, yet to complete their gruelling, unenviable task. jean mackenzie, bbc news, muan airport. a state funeral is to be held for former us presidentjimmy carter on the 9th of january. he died yesterday at the age of 100. he served one term as president from 1977—1981 and was later awarded the nobel peace prize. this is the scene in washington, dc, where flags are flying at half—mast.

a makeshift memorial has been set up at the carter presidential center in his home state of georgia. throughout the day, world leaders have been paying tributes to him. amongst them, king charles, who said he felt "great sadness" at president carter's passing and described him as a "committed public servant". tom bateman reports. tributes forjimmy carter from the heart of american democracy to the traders on wall street who paused in his honour this morning. and at the white house, joe biden ordered the flag at half—staff for 30 days to remember america's longest—living president. whatjimmy carter's an example of is just simple decency. simple decency. and i think that's what the rest of the world looks to america for. i, jimmy carter, do solemnly swear... jimmy carter's one—term presidency was marked

by inflation at home and crises abroad, but his landmark achievement was brokering a peace deal between israel and egypt. president—elect donald trump said while he disagreed with mr carter politically, he worked hard to make america a better place, and for that, "i give him my highest respect. " former president barack obama said, "he taught all of us what it means to live a life of grace, dignity, justice and service." he was so prompt, that the airport onlyjust - had time to give him - the red carpet treatment. president carter visited the uk in 1997, touring tyneside and bringing a message of economic revival. howay, the lads! cheering. today, king charles recalled the visit and expressed great sadness, saying mr carter... jimmy carter will be given a state funeral next week.

it will be a final goodbye to the southerner from humble origins who won the most powerful office on earth, but whose legacy was forged from his work well beyond the white house. tom bateman, bbc news, washington. professor lauren smith is a presidential historian and a teaching professor at arizona state university if you told us more about presidential crow to fall. well, we saw president joe biden come out and he's in st croix, he halted his vacation to make an address. he also made a statement

before the address, and he made quite a moving, emotional statement as he is wont to do, talking about hoinmmy carter... obviously he had known him... he was the first, i think, even elected government on the democrat side to come out forjimmy carter's campaign all those years ago, so he's known him for 50—plus years. had talked about how kind jimmy carter was at the passing of his son bo due to brain cancer, so they honestly had a close personal relationship. some he made that statement and we have seen other ex—presidents, too, obviously bill clinton now the oldest living ex—president. we've seen barack obama and donald trump also make a statement, a noncontroversial statement at that, i might add. so we do see sort of the presidents club as it were coming together for this moment of celebrating a life well lived. just looking at his us foreign policy. we were hearing so much about what he did during his one term. a lot of his achievements, though, were carried on and completed by president reagan. this is the interesting thing. obviously gerald ford completed richard nixon's term as it were, taking over after

nixon resigned after watergate, and ford was the first president to really sort of begin to move away from detente, move away from that friendliness that nixon built up with the soviet union to cool the tensions of the cold war and start to emphasise human rights. jimmy carter picks it up and takes it to a whole new level, really prioritising human rights and foreign policy to varied success, but what it does is it really highlights the contradiction in american foreign policy of the time. this idea that america was supporting autocrats and dictators as long as they weren't communists at the height of the cold war, very controversial places like latin america for example. so this push and that sort of deterioration that it led to with relations between the us and russia, it leads to reagan and his emphasis, of course his famous quote of calling russia the "evil empire" in his first term, very heightened rhetoric. so obviously there is still massive debate among historians as to which president should truly get credit for ending the cold war. they all contributed

in their own various ways, but carter was certainly saddled with multiple crises both domestic and foreign during his one term. a us federal appeals court has upheld a $5 million verdict against donald trump, who was found liable for sexually abusing and later defaming the author and journalist ejean carroll. the ruling deals with an assault that took place at a new york department store in 1996 and mrtrump�*s attempts to dismiss it as a hoax in 2021. in a linked case, he was ordered to pay ms carroll more than $80 million for defaming her and damaging her reputation. the president—elect is also appealing against that verdict. ukraine's president, volodymyr zelensky, has announced one of the largest prisoner exchanges since full—scale war began with russia nearly three years ago. 189 ukrainian troops are being returned home from captivity, and 150 russian soldiers are being returned in the deal,

which was brokered by the united arab emirates. from northern ukraine, our correspondent will vernon told us more about this prisoner exchange. well, we've just witnessed incredibly moving scenes here as the buses with those 189 released ukrainians pulled up outside this hospital here. they'd onlyjust been taken out of russian territory, and the emotion of these men who came out of the buses draped in ukrainian flags and also the family members that were waiting here to greet them really was overwhelming. there were lots of tears, shouts ofjoy, hugs and kisses, many of the men made phone calls to their families back home to say they were ok, they were out. many of them, of course, have been in captivity for a very long time, more than 2.5 years in many cases. so, you know, the emotion here was really incredible. the other thing that was

particularly touching was there are a lot of family members here of ukrainian soldiers who are still either missing or in captivity, and they were showing photographs of their loved ones to those who'd just been released, saying have you seen my husband, my son, do you know anything about them? so it really was quite an extraordinary seem to behold. i wonder if you could give us a sense more broadly the war is at at the moment? well, the war is going badly for ukraine. despite the jubilant scenes we saw here earlier, the mood is pretty gloomy at the moment here. interestingly some ukrainian officials here in ukraine were telling us that the negotiations with russia over these prisoner exchanges like the one that happened today, it was one of the biggest since the war started, those negotiations are becoming much more difficult because moscow is less when to negotiate because it's advancing on the battlefield.

ukraine has a serious shortage of men for the front—line, it's losing territory. ukrainians here feel that the west is losing interest, too. so 2025 is looking to be a particularly uncertain and worrying year for ukrainians. in his final weeks in office, presidentjoe biden announced nearly $6 billion in additional military and budget aid for ukraine. of that, $2.5 billion is designated for security assistance, while $3.1; billion will help repair critical infrastructure damaged by intensified russian attacks. it's the final disbursement under the 2024 ukraine security supplemental appropriations act. president zelensky said in a statement additional us security assistance for ukraine came at a "critical moment" and would help strengthen ukrainian defences along the front—lines. around the world and across the uk, this is bbc news.

five people have been charged in argentina in connection with the death of the former one direction star liam payne. the 31—year—old died after taking drugs and falling from a third floor balcony at a hotel in buenos aires in october. the hotel's manager, receptionist and a friend of the singer have been charged with manslaughter. two others who worked at the hotel have been charged with supplying drugs. our correspondent tom symonds has more. that final night, liam payne was intoxicated by drugs — vulnerable, defenceless — according to this new and detailed statement about events at the buenos aires hotel. prosecutors say staff were aware of his condition, but took him to his room, later found trashed, and left him. investigators believe liam payne fell from the balcony while trying to find the exit.

they say there's enough evidence to support a type of manslaughter charge. the businessman rogalia roger nores, liam payne's friend and driver in argentina, abandoned him to his fate, they say. two hotel staff, gilda martin and esteban grassi, acted recklessly by allowing the singer to be taken to his room. another hotel worker, ezequiel pereira, and a waiter, braian paiz, are accused of selling him cocaine. these charges follow a major investigation. police gathered hundreds of hours of cctv footage, phone messages and hotel records. before, liam payne described how his life on tour had left him struggling with addiction. when we were in the band, the best way to secure us because of how big it got was just lock us in our rooms. and, of course, what's in the room? a mini bar. so at a certain point, i thought, "i'm going to have a party for one," and that just seemed to carry on throughout many years of my life. one direction have sold

millions of albums worldwide. liam payne's death has left his fans distraught. the argentine judge overseeing the case has said no—one involved wanted him to lose his life, but their actions had put it at risk. tom symonds, bbc news. the head of the united nations has warned in his new year message that the world is facing "climate breakdown". antonio guterres called for action to cut emissions and switch to renewable energy. the world meteorological organization says climate change played out on an almost daily basis in 2024 with extreme weather events including floods, cyclones and droughts. let's hear some of what mr guterres had to say. in 2025, countries must put the world on a safer path by dramatically slashing emissions and supporting the transition to a renewable future. it is essential, and it is possible. i see hope in activists,

young and old, raising their voices for progress. i see hope in humanitarian heroes overcoming enormous obstacles to support the most vulnerable people. i see hope in developing countries fighting for financial and climate justice. i see hope in the scientists and innovators breaking new ground for humanity. and i saw hope in september when world leaders came together to adopt the pact for the future. our climate reporter esme stallard told us more about the importance of mentioning climate in the message from the united nations chief. it was mentioned last year in his new year speech, because 2023 broke the record for the hottest year. now, we don't yet have the data for the 2024, but based on the last 11 months of data that we do have, we expect this to break the record for the hottest year yet again. and i think it's very clear in guterres' message that he wants to make clear that this is notjust impacting in terms of extreme weather, but actually impacting on the un achieving some of its other goals and outcomes.

remember, antonio guterres is the secretary—general for the un as a whole, and so they have many priorities, not just climate change. they have priorities around education, around health care, around gender equality. and i think him referencing in this speech climate change is because he wants to make clear that actually those goals are also under threat if we don't tackle climate change. we know women are disproportionately impacted by climate change. we know previously that during the typhoon season that happened this year, children had to be taken out of school due to extreme flooding. that affects their education. so even though climate change isjust one goal that the un has to tackle as an issue, it does have a knock—on impact on other areas. whether this speech will drive change, it's very difficult. we saw at the cop conference, the annual un climate conference in november, that countries couldn't come together on some of the key issues, particularly how they will deal with fossil fuels. even though the evidence is quite clear that climate change is potentially getting worse, that temperatures are increasing, we're not quite seeing if that is enough

to spur action when it comes to countries getting together on that global level. astronomers are eagerly awaiting a celestial event that only happens about every 80 years. it involves a star system called t corona borealis, or t cor borfor short. researchers across the globe will be looking to the skies to catch a glimpse of it with the hopes it'll allow them to study this star in more detail than ever before. earlier, i spoke to jane clarke, vice—chair at cardiff astronomical society. forecasting these things is like forecasting the weather on steroids because, you know, around the earth, we've got all these wonderful weather satellites and things and loads and loads of data. this thing is 30,000 light years away. we've got none of that out there. ok, now this is a dead star, basically.

so how is it that it's going to brighten and come back to life? almost, almost, it's a pair of stars. most stars are in fact double stars. the sun is unusual in that regard. of these double stars, one as you say is a dead star, no nuclear reactions going on. it's what's called a white dwarf. the amount of gravity on a white dwarf is beyond belief, about1 million times as strong as our gravity, and it's hot as well. so if you were to stand on the surface, it's a toss—up whether you'd get crushed by the gravity or fried first. the other star is a red giant, which is huge. it's like thousands of times bigger than the sun. the surface gravity on that is quite weak. so the white dwarf with a strong gravity grabs material off it which falls in and it then gets kind of glommed on by this ultra strong gravity and crashed. and eventually there is enough of it and it's so crashed that the nuclear reaction starts.

it's like having a white dwarf the size of the sun, sorry, the earth. so it's like having your worst nightmare go on around the surface the size of the earth. and this thing will burn very, very brightly for about a week. let's just take you to america and show you the shots coming to us live from atlanta, where a makeshift memorial has been set up following the death of the us presidentjimmy carter at the age of 100 yesterday. his state funeral will be held on the 9th of january. hello there. the weather turning increasingly unsettled as we step into the new year. if you have plans on new year's eve, keep listening to this forecast because it's going to be dominated by this area of low pressure, particularly across the far north of the country. it's bringing increasingly wet and windy weather across scotland in particular. there will be some snow, as well, to the far north and east.

the met office has issued an amberwarning for the intensity of the rain from inverness down to fort william, so there's potential of some localised flooding and some travel disruption on what is a very busy day. so heavy rain moving its way south out of scotland, but a rash of showers tucking in behind the rain will tend to sit across northern england and north wales by the middle part of the afternoon. that means central and south—eastern england windy to end the day, but largely fine and dry. the rain across wales, across northern england, and then to the north and west of that, it's a case of sunny spells and scattered showers to close out the day. still double digits here, but in the far north of scotland, already in the cold air, just a couple of degrees above freezing for the northern isles. so as we move out of new year's eve into new year's day, we'll have this conveyer belt of moisture pushing in from the west. that means a day of relentless heavy rain sinking its way across central and southern england, and it will linger throughout the afternoon.

windy with it, as well. behind, sunny spells and scattered showers. here, the wind direction swinging around to a northerly. some of those showers could be wintry in nature, with the strongest of the gusts perhaps with the heaviest of the rain, gusts in excess of 55—60 mph. here, it will stay still relatively mild, but the colder air starting to dig in across scotland. and once that rain clears through, well, we see that arctic air taking over right across the country, a strong northerly wind as well. that means clear skies by day, but also through the night. hard frost to greet us first thing on thursday morning. plenty of clear skies continue, so there will be some sunshine. but because of the direction of that wind, it means that any showers could be a little wintry in nature as well. so, thursday and friday, we see more in the way of sunshine, but it'll be cold with it. somewhat milder, but a little more unsettled from sunday onwards.

this is bbc news, the headlines: edinburgh's world—renowned hogmanay new year's eve celebrations have been cancelled due to severe weather conditions forecasted across the uk in the coming days. relatives of those who perished in sunday's tragic plane crash in south korea demand answers from the government, as the agonising wait for the recovery of their loved ones continues. russia and ukraine carry out one of the largest prisoner—of—war exchanges, since the onset of the full—scale invasion of ukraine. and — astronomers prepare to get a glimpse of the t corona borealis star system that hasn't been visible to the naked eye — for eight decades. now on bbc news, bbc 100 women in conversation: allyson felix.

allyson felix is the most decorated track and field athlete of all time. she is widely considered one of the greatest athletes of the 21st century. off the track, felix is a celebrated entrepreneur and a fierce advocate for maternal rights after her own experience of maternal care in the health system and bruising encounters with sponsors. bbc 100 women met allyson here at the sports campus named after her in the university of southern california, where she studied, to talk about how we can make women athletes�* lives better, the challenges of combining motherhood and elite sport, and the changes she wants to bring about in her retirement years ahead.