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work for a wide range of companies. what can we do for you? >> and now, "bbc world news." >> hello and welcome to "news day." >> the headlines. still triple-a-rated. the u.s. avoids an economic downgrade after a new deal to raise the debt ceiling and slash spending. serious brutal crackdown claims dozens more lives. the u.n. says assad has lost all sense of humanity. >> a former egyptian president mubarak prepares to face trial. growing fears for famine victims in somalia. half a million children could die as the threat of violence undermines aid efforts. >> it is to lay him in london, broadcasting on pbs in america

and around the world. the credit ratings agency moody's has confirmed the united states can keep its aaa status after the country avoid defaulting on its debt. president obama has signed into law an agreement raising the government debt limit. but moody's has assigned a negative outlook to the rating to show there is still a risk of future downgrade if the government's fiscal discipline weekends. in the past hour, china's the state news agency has said the deal has refused to diffuse the bond issue. >> there has been little to smile about in the last few weeks as the president and his

opponents try to cobble together a deal. but now it is done. disaster has been averted. the president who came to power promising hope and change has been pushed into presiding over cuts. he sounds cross. >> it is likely the uncertainty surrounding the raising of the debt ceiling for businesses and consumers has been unsettling and one further impediment to full recovery. it is something we could have avoided entirely. >> america is deep in the red. with every dollar the government spends, 40 cents is borrowed money. congress puts a ceiling on borrowing. the government will hit that ceiling today, but this bill raises it by a further $2.40 trillion. this is a victory for republicans. they turned what has for years

been a routine vote into a crisis, insisting there would be no borrowing without trimming back. >> make no mistake. this is a change in behavior from spend, spend, spend, to cut, cut, cut. >> listen to the democrats' reaction. >> this deal stink to high heaven. >> the left of obama as party is distraught. >> i think it will be a blow. a weak economy makes it hard for people to get excited about the president. i think they see him following public opinion rather than leading it. >> this is a victory for the conservative tea party movement, which started as local protests and now dominates the republican party, helping them win last year's election, at insuring

their main demand rocketed to the top of the political agenda. >> all of the tea party organizations were against the deal. all the tea party members in congress voted against the deal. all of them said it was not enough. while they pushed the debate, they did not declare a victory. >> they pulled back from the brink just-in-time. the basic problem remains. two parties with different visions of america and a system that forces them to agree. the crisis is over. their struggle is not. >> i have been speaking to a tea party member of congress who voted no to the debt held -- that bill, asking whether it was right to take the deal done to the wire. >> we were sent to washington to do a particular job. we had to stay within the principles we ran on.

but it did not have to come down to the wire. we were willing in january to negotiate all of this. we were unwilling to give the president his tax loopholes. we were willing to give the president his that commission. all we were asking for was a balanced budget amendment. >> there have been more reports of violence in syria. tanks shelled the city of hama after ramadan prayer. more than 300 people are said to have been killed in the last few days. the united nations secretary general said president assad had lost all sense of humanity. civilians in hama have come under sustained attack. >> today's of attack by army tanks and heavy machinery. a lot has been demolished.

they are targeting the mosques where people were praying. now we are in shortage of medical supplies and aid for the children. [unintelligible] we expect tomorrow to have shortages in the food supply. yesterday, there was a protester inside the city jail. we heard accounts from inside, and there are dead bodies. now we are in a very bad situation. there is no place to bury them in the city. people will bury them in their gardens.

more than 80 bodies were buried in their gardens. the people here are desperate and looking for life. from the tops of the buildings, they are shooting everybody moving. >> it is an important date for egypt on wednesday. >> that is right. the former egyptian president, hosni mubarak, is due to go on trial for the killing of protesters in february. it is thought he will be flown to the capital in the morning. in cairo, the trial is being seen as a test for the military council's commitment to change in the country. >> the long-running demonstration is over. the army moved in to get rid of the tent city in tahrir square, and did not do it gently.

a television reporter for egypt 's channel 25 managed to keep filming as he was bundled into an army vehicle together with a bunch of others who had been arrested and sometimes beaten up. a bbc producer managed to take some photos of police and army operations until she was picked up. she was held for 20 hours before being released unharmed. by this morning around the square, the familiar gridlock was back, just like the old days. riot police were completely in charge. no one stopped us filming. there were no demonstrators and nothing much was left of protest banners that used to hang from traffic lights and lampposts. when president mubarak went, the military government, made up of his former colleagues, promised a new president within six

months. there is still no sign of any elections. people are deeply divided about the future of the arab spring in egypt. hamid, who used to demonstrate in the square, is an optimist. >> the spring will bring us a beautiful flower. we have to wait. >> and what will happen? >> we have to wait. >> attitudes to president mubarak have changed. for 30 years, president mubarak was one of the fixed points in world affairs. foreign leaders never questioned the basis of his power. now they prefer to forget him. this is the hospital where he is being treated. in the next two hours, he is scheduled to be brought to cairo for the start of his trial. until late last night, this whole area was full of

demonstrators. now you can see who is in charge. the fact is there has not been much of a revolution in egypt. former presidents may be coming up for trial tomorrow morning, but in every other way the system he created is still just as much in force as it ever was. john simpson, bbc news, cairo. >> now to the crisis in east africa. the prime minister of somalia has urged militants to do the right thing and let aid get through. it is estimated half a million people are at risk of starvation, and 12 million require urgent help. in somalia, the situation is complicated by years of civil war. >> the visiting mogadishu, it is best to be prepared.

we're heading into a city that has forgotten the meaning of safety. it is us against the rest. near the front lines, we find the famine's latest fugitives. tens of thousands have come here seeking food and hoping for security. they are in bad shape. the familiar image is a shocking as ever. they are fighting for life. their mothers have fled from territory controlled by the islamist group al-shahbab. she says the militants killed her son. they tied him up, then shot him, because he was carrying a bag of food aid and they said it came from the infidels. the world is getting more supplies into mogadishu now.

soup kitchens are in every district. but it is not here somalia's famine must be defeated. this is an almost impossibly difficult, dangerous place for foreigners to operate. you've seen how much security it took to move around the center of mogadishu. the real battle is to find a way to move across nearby frontlines and get aid to where it is needed most. >> un food blocked by al-shahbab is handed over to local charities that have access throughout somalia. >> we can not deliver much food quantity anywhere in the country. >> this could be the solution to end the famine? >> this could be the solution in a way, or one of them. >> the needs are certainly overwhelming. the politics are messy.

it is not an easy place to help. >> at least one person has been killed in the philippines. the country has been hit by another monsoon, causing severe flooding. there have been back-to-back storms. at least 60 people have died over the past few weeks. forecasters are warning of potential rain. you are watching "newsday." still to come, where the second world war never ended. the row over remote pacific islands that is souring relations between japan and russia. >> the 20 year plan that is bringing our cultural history back to life. -- horticultural history back to life. >> international markets have risen sharply as concerns

continue about the eurozone debt crisis. the spanish prime minister left his holiday to monitor the situation. this was discussed in the italian parliament wednesday. >> he had delayed leaving for his holiday in the south of spain to follow the country's economic indicators. those showed that borrowing costs hit record highs during the day's trading. these are the levels that the sock and greece and ireland request by let's. the general elections will be brought forward from swing to november. there was hope that announcement would help steady the spanish economy, which has been driven by speculation for the need of bailout. the government has implicated --

implemented a major reform program about the jobless rate. the latest market panic has not been caused by any one specific economic indicator. >> there is nothing in the spanish or italian economy which at this point predicts there will be in need of a bailout. we do not have any reason to believe that now. as with many things in the economy, this could become a self-fulfilling prophecy. the fact that we speak about this prophecy even now could in the future. >> however, the moody's rating agency is currently reviewing the credit rating of spain. the country is fighting to shore up its reliability. bbc news, madrid. >> i am in london.

the headlines this hour. the u.s. has kept its aaa rating after president obama signed a new deal to raise the debt ceiling and slash spending. >> the un says syria's president has lost all sense of humanity after the brutal crackdown by government forces which claimed dozens more lives. australia has launched a legal bid to seize profits from a book written by a former guantanamo bay detainee. legal officials say any money made by david hicks from his memoir should be regarded as profiting from a crime. hicks pled guilty to helping the taliban in 2007 and was sent home to serve an nine month sentence. we are joined by nick ryan. what can we expect to hear from the court? >> i think today it will be largely procedural.

this case has a fairly clear-cut argument in the eyes of prosecutors acting on behalf of the australian government. david hicks was held for five years at guantanamo bay. he should not be allowed to profit from a book. in australia, that infringes a law which prohibits convicted criminals profiting from their crimes. what the defense will be arguing is that the conviction where he pleaded guilty to providing material support for terrorism is invalid because the military commission he appeared before at guantanamo bay is invalid. it is an interesting global test case. if the australian courts were to favor, itavid hicks' would cast legal doubt on the military commission process at

guantanamo bay. >> is there much public support for mr. hicks in australia? >> there is some support for david hicks in australia. he is a shy man. he does not appear in public often. he did appear at a festival a few months ago to talk about his book. at the end of his talk, he received a standing ovation. that was criticized, especially by right-wing commentators. they think that rather than concentrating on the five years he spent at guantanamo bay, where he claims he was treated unfairly and inhumanely, that people should focus on the activities that got him there. he is a polarizing figure in australia. there is some support on the left. the australian greens have said this is a political show trial. amongst the right, he is a bit of a hate figure. >> 66 years after the end of the second world war, russia and

japan have yet to sign a peace treaty. the sticking point is islands. the countries are slowly becoming intertwined as japan relies on russian gas. for 40 years, the southern part of the island was a part of the japanese empire. a report on its tragic history. >> the japanese are back. this time, as traders, not invaders. this restaurant is one of the two japanese-owned businesses now based on the 1,000 kilometer long island. the capital is very russian. the rundown in the structure is typical of the former soviet union. but the main museum is a prominent reminder of the 40 year history in the japanese empire. another reminder is the people

the empire left behind in 1945. her mother had married a career and who was not welcome in japan, but who was imprisoned by the incoming soviet authority. >> of course at school i really suffered, because my mother was japanese and my father was a political prisoner. >> the journey from the soviet court to the gleaming island of hokkaido takes a few hours. >> the northern coast of japan is just 40 kilometers away. major northern city is startlingly modern after russia. it is to hear that many of the japanese have returned to make their homes. her father worked on a

lighthouse, and missed the last boat to japan in 1945. her parents brought up their family and died under soviet rule. she promised her mother she would return to japan. 10 years ago, she did. >> i felt very sorry for my mother. she was left with eight children and did not see them have enough time. >> ironically, when she makes her tea, the guess she is using probably comes from the island. offshore from the island where she grew up, the russians have found vast reserves of natural gas, which are being pumped into ships for distribution across the far east. this has been operating for more than two years. 60% of all it produces goes straight to japan.

70,000 kilometers from moscow, the economy is struggling, benefiting little from its wealthy neighbor because the dispute means that russia and japan have never signed a peace treaty to officially and the second world war. -- and - end the second world war. >> tell us about one of england's most ambitious pardoning project. the part in bedfordshire was built nearly 300 years ago by some of the top designers of the age. it is being restored to its former glory. >> from an orangery to ponds and canals. the part of the signers were the best in their day. to help them, this photo from 1890 shows there was a garden workforce of 30 men.

a change in ownership last century left the park in a state of neglect. at one point, there were only for gardeners. when english heritage took ownership five years ago, they embarked on an ambitious restoration project. the park can once again claimed its place as one of the most important british gardens. >> what makes it important is you can walk through 300 years of garden history. there are elements of each of those major centuries that you can still see in their original form. >> gardeners spent weeks overwinter digging up this want to revert to the rose garden. the italian garden, which had been planted with low maintenance plants, is now transformed to its original design. the lake, the maine vista, has been restored to its 18th- century appearance, with gravel paths.

>> it is fabulous color. >> matthew biggs believes the work will return the garden to how the original owners envisioned. >> they wanted to make a wonderful, bounce landscape. we will see it again. how exciting is that? i think everybody should have a glimpse. gardening and gardens are for everyone. >> the first year of restoration is complete at the cost of 4 million pounds, with 1 million of which was a grant from the lottery heritage fund. 19 years before it is restored to the splendor of centuries past. >> scientists have found a 20 million year-old cape skull in northeastern new gone up. the researchers said it was the first time a complete skull has been discovered of an ape of that period. it is thought to have belonged

to a tree dwelling are before the size of a champ. it will be studied in -- of a chimp. it will be studied in france. a bird is believed to have escaped from the central park zoo. it has decided to make itself comfortable on a windowsill in this apartment block in the upper east side. it is attracting large crowds. zoo keepers say bp shop -- be cut should be left alone and should not be approached. -- at the peacock should be left alone and should not be approached. >> the credit ratings agency moody's has confirmed the united states is to keep its aaa status after the company -- country avoid defaulting on debt. president obama has signed into law an agreement raising the government's debt limit.

thanks for watching. >> make sense of international news at bbc.com/news. >> funding was made possible by the freeman foundation of new york, stowe, vermont, and honolulu. newman's own foundation. and union bank.

>> union bank has put its global financial strength to work for a wide range of companies. what can we do for you? >> "bbc world news" was presented by kcet los angeles.