very close contact with the secretaries including matt hancock and alloc sharma, foreign secretary domenic robor example. i think there is totally a cold war man tell any of us up we are living in the third factory —— decade of the ten he first century but those people still believe in old days when they we re still believe in old days when they were fighting the cold war. china is not former soviet union. i think china and uk... we are united by common interests then divided by other differences. i am very confident about this relationship. ambassador we have to end it there but i do think you very much indeed for joining but i do think you very much indeed forjoining me here on hardtalk at this difficult time. liu xiaoming, think you very much indeed. my pleasure. -- thank you. hello. it was not so much a case of april showers on wednesday. this was the scene for a time across birmingham but give it a wee bit of time and eventually that rain cleared away and out came the sun. the reason is we have two weather fronts to contend with and thursday again a mishmash of weather, low pressure very

domenic rob who is the foreign secretary and also the 1st secretary of state is acting on behalf of the prime minister at the moment that has been agreed by the 2 men at that it's still unclear exactly what powers he has he was at a press conference today where he was also repeatedly is he in charge until he could say was that he and the cabinets and those of the top ministers that he surrounds of boris johnson on acting in unity they are taking collective responsibility the problem is the longer that boris johnson is out of action the mood difficult that may well become that will be decisions that will have to be made and somebody will have to make them and will that be dominant rob you know we saw alex there a collection of sound bites with boris johnson and his infamous defiant stance towards the coronavirus it is a stance that some would say has landed him in intensive care in a london hospital but we certainly hope that the prime minister recovers but once this pandemic is behind us do you think that the public in the u.k. do you think that the public will demand answers about how

receiving updates from his colleagues it became obvious just after the daily briefing which for domenic rob gave on monday afternoon. that all was not all right with the prime minister we know now that he's in intensive care and that there isn't a ventilator vailable for him the fact is that almost 2 thirds of people in england wales know it all and to go into intensive can't do require a ventilator within the 1st 24 hours but we've had no update on that but it is understood that he was given oxygen sometime on monday last friday he was supposed to come out of isolation and in fact he was seen in a video looking very unwell saying that he felt ok but that he still had symptoms so he's going to carry on his isolation also urging he's urging the country robert to stay indoors and follow the advice but since then people have been wondering just how well could he be to be admitted on sunday evening to hospital let's not forget it was the same evening as good queen was addressing the nation and if it was really not important it was very unlikely that he would actually be taken to hospital and th

not any different really from the same information that we've been given throughout the day by domenic rob by michael gove's this morning by the promises bikes bus here on and on that's basically that he is stable is boris johnson stable in the intensive care. the most recent update is this he's staying there for quite small misfiring that if there's any change they will let us know about it but only one of the day we were told he has been given oxygen he has me put on a ventilator i think he has not received a diagnosis that he's suffering from pneumonia and that easy in good spirits so you know i think if you look at the spread of people in sense of care with covert 19 and. the amongst the worst of them but it's still a very grave situation for in the u.k. now is while it's basically without a prime minister he's still prime minister name and he's had to divest some of his g t's to dominate rob. the u.k. doesn't really have the same kind of formalized system of chain of come ons as say the u.s. does here is a bit more ad hoc. we could i think view it as the prime minister has said has se