♪ ♪ narrator: funding for this presentation of this program is provided by... woman: architect. bee keeper. mentor. a raymond james financial advisor tailors advice to help you live your life. life well planned. george: actually, you don't need vision to do most things in life. itto b rtf a am driving the technology forward. i think that's the most rewarding thing. people who know, know bdo.

narrator: funding was also provided by, the freeman foundation. by judy and peter blum kovler foundation; pursuing solutions for america's neglected needs. and by contributions to this pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. announcer: and now, "bbc news". anchor: hello. you are watching "the context," on bbc news. >> what was unwise was the fact that it happened, and that was a very, very grave error. it was consensual, but it was my fault. >> you were in a position of power over them. you use your power eventually to give them a job in the media, nurture the relationship and it

became sexual. they may ask what is the difference between that and grooming? ♪ anchor: welcome to the program. former tv star philip schofield says he feels nothing but sadness and regret after admitting to lying about an affair with a younger male colleague.we bring you his sit-down interview shortly. also, u.s. secretary of state antony blinken calls russia's invasion of ukraine a strategic failure. we look at how the war has impacted vladimir putin. after nearly one year in the u.k. of train backs, we will look at what they have done to the economy is rail union strike for the 29th time. with the debt ceiling crisis avoided, here are the real winners and losers in washington. we will have all those stories throughout the program.

first, breaking news we are following out of india. a train crash. i am afraid there are dreadful pictures on numbers. one train carriage is on its side, people desperately trying to help. it is about midnight or so, it is late, dark and desperate. some numbers we are getting in from news agencies, 50 are dead and 500 hurt. really desperate situation. a number of trains involved. we can take a look at the map now to show you where this has happened, this has happened in odisha, india, and earlier, we heard from the chief minister of the area. let's take a listen. >> we have been told there are casualties, but since our rescues, we have not encountered the numbers, so i cannot give the exact number, but it is a violent and tragic accident on

these people of the train. so, yes, so we cannot rule out anything. anchor: let's get the latest from our south asia editor who has been in the newsroom. bring us up to speed with what we know. reporter: officials are saying that multiple trains were involved in this collision. it happened in the eastern indian state of odisha. a passenger train caught an oriental express from calcutta, traveling to a southern city, which was involved ia derailment, with about seven to eight carriages. it came off the track and fell on thepposite side, according to one official person, and then there was another train, which rammed into the coaches, causing this horrific accident, and the pictures are on social media and television channels, showing

that the top coaches are all around the place, and rescue teams and also local villagers are now desperately trying to rescue those trapped inside these carriages. though officials have not confirmed any casualty figure, there are fears it could be a dozen or so people who died, and hundreds injured. the government dispatched more than 60 ambulances. and even local buses to ferry those injured people and passengers to various hospitals. anchor: talk us through the role of the railway network in the country. it is huge. what is the state of the infrastructure like? reporter: india has one of the largest networks in the world. people use the network every day and connecting and crisscrossing the entire country. it is alsone of the most economic, cheaper modes of transport, especially for nonbusiness trains.

the one we are talking about from calcutta is with hundreds of people traveling, at least nearly 1000 traveling to the superfast trains, but for years, there were no investments in terms of infrastructure, strengthening tracks, and systems. his have improved over the years, but, still, these accidents are happening. the accidents are not very uncoon in india, but, again, how this happened, what were the reasons? officials will have to conduct an investigation, but what people are trying to understand is how some of the coaches came off the track. and then there was another train coming from the opposite direction. that is for the investigation and the authorities at the moment are focusing on sending more rescue teams because these carriages would have been toppled and the doors jammed, and they have to cut through the metal to rescue those injured.

some of those probably badly injured, so time is of the essence. that is why officials are trying to bring more help from outside the state, as well. anchor: i know you will be keeping us updated. thank you. just to say, we should always have a note of caution when it comes to numbs with these incidents. it is so recent and as the news agency quoted 50, there was anher number at 30, but it certainly seems like dozens as we get a definitive number and more details about what happened and how. we will bring that to you. next, we are going to head a story with a huge amount of interest in the u.k., philip schofield is one of the country's best-known tv presenters. he told the bbc he lost everything and is not see a future for his career, after having an affair with a junior male colleague. he hosted the popular daytime show "this morning," and has

been in the headlines after admitting to an "unwise but not illegal" relationship. in his first interview since the scandal, he said the affair only began several years after he first met the young man, who was 15 at the time. he strongly denies grooming him but says he regrets the relationship online about it. they are going to investigate. >> come on in. >> good to see you. >> thank you for coming in. you have had quite the week. >> oya. -- oh yeah. last week, if my daughters had not been there, i would not be here. >> you have had quite the week.

>> it guarded me. it is like a weird numbness. >> you have been strong enough to do this interview. >> yeah, i have. >> why do you want to do the interview? >> because there is an innocent person here. he did not do anything wrong. i just have to say stop with him, it is ok with me, but stop with him. >> where did you first meet the young man in question, what were the circumstances? >> i was invited by a frie of mine to go to open a drama school. whether it was immediately or sometime after, he said, will you follow me on twitter? because he is a fan, and i said, sure. >> he was 15 at the time? >> i follow 11,300 people. and in all the time i have been on twitter, there has never been any whiff of impropriety.

>> how often were you in touch with him? >> hardly ever, hardly at all. and that was it for a while. and then he asked if he could visit the studios, work experience type of thing, i said, come down and have a look, for sure, which he did. >> how old was he whene was first interested? >> 19. >> to be clear, how old was this young man when you first had any kind of sexual contact with him? >> 20. >> do you have any kind of sexual relationship or sex with him when he was underage? >> no, god, no. in my statement, it says, you know, consensual relationship, fully legal, approved by both sides. no,e had been working at the show for a few months, and we had become mates.

we were mates, and in my dressing room one day, something happened. which, obviously, i will regret forever for him and me, mostly him. but that happened maybe 4, 5 times over the next few months, and i know it is unforgivable, but we were not boyfriends. we were not in a relationship. i was really in a mess with my own sexuality at the time. and, it just happened. >> how old was he at this stage? >> 20, 21?

>> who knew on the team? >> nobody, to my knowledge. >> did you ever tell holly? >> god no. holly did not know. nobody knew. >> what would you say to the young man in question? >> to him, i am the most sorry, like getting involved with me, i have caused you so much pain. i will never forgive myself. i made a bad dutchman called. -- i made a bad judgment call. >> phillip schofield, thank you for your time. anchor: the program phillip schofield used to present "this morning" continues on itv. after showing the bbc's interview, his former colleague allison was emotional. >> i find it really painful because i loved phillip

schofield, and it is weird because i still love phillip schofield. what he has done is wrong, he admitted it and said sorry. as a family, we are all really struggling to process everything. >> have you been affected -- anchor: if you have been affected by the interview with phillip schofield, there are organizations which can provide help. you can see amol and his full interview with look schofield on the player right now. ok, we are going to speak now to the independence chief tv critic kelton. thank you -- critic nick helton. thank you for coming on the program. in general, what was your response to that interview? what did you make of it? guest: it was a moving interview. it was very effective in communicating exactly what phillip schofield has been experiencing over the past week.

i think amol did a pretty good job of teasing the story and the narrative without trying to trap him or make him feel uncomfortable or like he was being ambushed. i think he was as effective at portraying a man in crisis as we were largely to get. anchor: what about the wider issue of why do this interview at all? guest: it is hardly the first time we have seen this sort of celebrity war being waged on the dbc flagship program. it is kind of like prince andrew walking into his own bear trip with it and dominic cummings did it with laura kuenserg and prince harry has done met around recently. it seems like these interviews are very visual or with people who are going tough the tabloid drinker. it -- tabloid ringer.

it allows them to control a narrative spinning out of control and allowing them to sit down with dbc is a much more effective way than to rely on the tabloids to litigate your case on your behalf. anchor: do you think he would have changed people's opinion? guest: i sense some people have a firm and entrenched opinion on phillip schofield on the case and there are broader questions to be answered about what was going on, but i think he would have changed people's minds and he was trying to reframe this as a story that perhaps, he accepts responsibility and has taken that on his shoulders, but he would like to highlight the fact that the role in news coverage and the coverage here on bbc and across the media perhaps is disproportionate to the accusations being leveled against him and are in danger of destroying his life for something that was a transgression that he admits to. i think in terms of communicating that narrative and making that the narrative that

goes forward, i think you did a pretty good job. i suspect viewers would have been largely convinced by that. anchor: on the level of public interest, for the day today here, three of the top 10 most viewed stories here at the bbc were three different elements to this story. there has been an extraordinary appetite from the public for coverage of this. guest: yeah, it is a story that has run and run, and it speaks to the extent to which phillip schofield is a household name, known by everyone in the country , whether they watched "this morning" or they did not, so the fact he is such an big whit's public figure has made the interest very -- ubiquitous public figure has made the interest row. and the interest around the schofield name has traveled into the story, but generally, these media interviews, and the bbc

has experienced it many times in-house, they capture the public imagination. it is not necessarily mean we ought to feed it, and we are probably reaching the saturation point, the point where we need to say, unless e story progresses in a different direction, which does not seem to be at the moment, maybe the man has served his time in the court of public opinion. anchor: we will that there. thank you for your time. thank you for joining the program. around the world and across the u.k., this is bbc news. we will take a look at stories here in the u.k. now, a teenager from essex has been sentenced to life in priso and will serve six years after pleading guilty to plotting terror attacks. 19-year-old matthew king admitted to carrying out surveillance at police nations, the army barracks in london, and train stations. the judge praised king's mother for reporting her suspicions to police. the government has appointed

dane stevens as the acting chair, replacing richard sharp, who resigned after an independent report showed that he breached the rules. she has described her role as a huge honor. a local safety group says a cheese rolling event puts a strain on emergency services, hundreds of competitors chased a cheese down cooper's hail on monday in gloucester. some people suffered serious injuries during the event. this is bbc news. you are live with bbc news. next, we are going to stay here in the u.k. and new development in the story of boris johnson the covid-19 inquiry. he says he is giving unredacted access to his whatsapp messages, direct to the inquiry into his government's handling of the cover pandemic. this is boris johnson going for

a run on wednesday, basically bypassing the current government to with this move. the government says some messages are not relevant and should not bhanded over and they will go to court to try to stop it. he only agreed to pass on messages into a 21, which would miss the first year of lockdowno sathe. u.k he can no longer safely access his messages from that time because of securities on his old phone. we will try to unpack that with the senior lecturer in politics in southeast london. thank you for coming on the program. it is slightly complicated and very detailed. why does all of this matter? guest: this is a lead up to the full inquiry into the government's handling of the covid-19 process.

this is the inquiry to realize and try to get to the btom of what decisions were made and when, what mistakes, frankly, were made and when, but it was done right and wrong. it is really important for the inquiry to get the full details of everything to learn lesson this was the biggest global health crisis of regeneration, if not more. that is what is at stake here, and that is what we are trying to get to the bottom of, when we talk about the kind of information's that it needs. anchor: that is the broad overview. in terms of the type of information, what is going on with boris johnson saying you can have all my unredacted whatsapp messages, but the government saying, no, we do not want to have those over to the inquiry? guest:t is all a bit strange really, and it highlights the unique combined, if you will,

that rishi sunak is in, which he is the prime minister and the believer of the conservative party, and he governs eight shaky coalition, if you will. he certainly has a lot of support amongst the conservative party, conservative mps and members, but also he has this group of boris johnson supporters and that can be awkward for him and it could make his governing quite awkward. what has happened is that he spent a lot of his time as prime minister trying to traverse the minefield to govern without upsetting, if you will, the awkward squad of conservative mps. what this presents, and with the whatsapp's and the text should be given to the covid-19 inquiry, it is a challenge for rishi sunak.

because if he gives the messages and whatsapp's away, he fears he could be critiqued by mp's and boris johnson as simply giving things away and making his life very awkward, even behind-the-scenes implicitly or explicitly, and or he could do just what he has done and suggest he is not going to do that. boris johnson confirmed she will release the whatsapp's anyway, so this will not make she sunak feel any more warmly -- rishi sunak feel any more warmly to whether boris johnson has or has not been a rather awkward presence on the back benches since he has taken over. anchor: sam power, great to have your thoughts. thank you. now to international affairs. antony blinken has described president putin's invasion of the ukraine as a strategic failure for russia. the u.s. secretary of state is

arriving in finland months after it became a nato member. strengthened the alliance. here is some of what he said. >> when you look at president putin's long-term strategic aims and objectives, there is no question, pressure is significantly worse off to date that it was before its full-scale invasion of ukraine, militarily, economically, geopolitically. anchor: so, let's go through that now. i am joined by a russian journalist, thank you for coming on the program. guest: thank you so much for having me today. i am not a russian journalist, i am a german expert. anchor: understood, thank you. fascinating statement from antony blinken.

we will mark the significance of where he was, in nato's newest member, a picture of strength and unity. under the substance of what he said, he really attacked russia's position. he is now weakened geopolitically. let's go through those. first of all, militarily, is blinken right to say that pressure is now significantly weaker militarily? guest: i would say absolutely. he has just repeated the jury, which is so popular the past months. when we look at what a terrible shape the russian army has now, russia has destroyed like most of their equipment in the first months and the best officers of the russian army have been killed within the first months. russia has not managed to

conscript new soldiers. they just get whoever they can. they try to use private companies, which were even worse in the commodity of soldiers, and they conscripted mostly inmates, who were mostly ill and could not be in military service and they just sent them as meat waves into attacks. the russians have lost several's of thousands of soldiers to just advance 30 or 40 kilometers. within months. anchor: i am going to have to jump in because we have to get to the other points blinken made, i can safely say that in your eyes, it is a comprehensive yes to his statement about being militarily weaker. economically, how is that impacted? guest: economically, as well, but back to militarily, russia

has been suffering from raids of the ukrainian special forces on the russian territory. that was unthinkable. regarding the economy, russia is now absolutely dependent on military technology from iran and not korea. like if you look at the number of personal bankruptcies and russia or the number of companies which do not pay salaries on time, it is the highest since the 1990's. also, if you look at industries like the asian industry, the automobile industry, they cannot produce anything. they, anthey substitute technologies by russian ones, but the russian government acknowledged they cannot do it now. the only thing ty can do is just import technologies but they cannot substitute everything the russians wanted.

economically, yes, i disaster. anchor: great to have your thoughts. i am afraid time has beaten us and we are up against the end of the section of "the context," but thank you for coming on the program. i will be back in a few minutes time. this is bbc news. ♪ narrator: funding for this presentation of this program is provided by... narrator: financial services firm, raymond james. man: bdo. accountants and advisors. narrator: funding was also provided by, the freeman foundation. by judy and peter blum kovler foundation; pursuing solutions for america's neglected needs. and by contributions to thipbs station from viewers like you. thank you. ♪ ♪

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♪ ♪ narrator: funding for this presentation of this program is provided by... woman: architect. bee keeper. mentor. a raymond james financial advisor tailors advice to help you live your life. life well pland. george: actually, you don't need vision to do most things in life. it's exciting to be part of a team driving the technology forward. i think that's the most rewarding thing. people who know, know bdo.