tobias ellwood, former uk foreign minister and now chair of the commons defence select committee with, as i say, is still being treated in a german hospitalfor that suspected another nerve agent poisoning in russia. you are watching bbc news. and if you minutes we will be taking a look at the newspapers today, the front pages, and joined me to discuss the papers we have sian griffiths, education editor at the times. and the writer and broadcaster shyama perera — stay with us for the papers. now it's time for a look at the weather with tomazs schafernaker. for most of us, overall today the weather is not looking bad at all. we have a mixture of sunny spells, a few fleeting showers. that is pretty much it. if you are unlucky you might want into a downpour with thunder and lightning. depending on your point of view. this is the satellite picture and we have cloud streaming in from the north—west, it is thin and broken cloud for most, sunny spells getting through. here are the showers for the afternoon across parts of northern england and wales, just the possibility of a downpour across t

good committee — tobias ellwood. afternoon to you. yoi what good afternoon to you.e newspaper today. you may well have heard what he had to say to you and your colleagues yesterday in your call with him around the country. has it changed your attitude to this bill? it has not changed my attitude in wanting to support the prime minister and get brexit over the line. it has been a battering journey since the nation committed itself to leave the european union. we need to do that. the date of the 15th of october has been set. in getting there, i do not want us to lose our way, to lose our reputation asa lose our way, to lose our reputation as a force for good and as an exemplar as holding international law. i am afraid that as well find myself not wishing to support this particular bill, because it does mean that we would be challenging unilaterally a treaty and that goes against the principles that we stand for. the difficulty with this, i suppose, judging by a certain amount of reading between the lines here is necessary because there is a negotiation going on about

tobias ellwood speaking there. to protest in belarus again on sunday, calling for the country s president to step down. it's the fourth weekend of demonstrations since alexander lukashenko claimed victory in an election that was widely seen as rigged. donna larsen reports. olga kovalkova, another opponent of belarus' president, who says she's been forced to leave the country. it was either that, or a long spell injail. she's now in poland. translation: i consider everything that's happened to me in recent weeks to be torture. i received threats that i will be jailed for a very long time. when i fell ill in my cell, it wasn't doctors who came, but representatives of the authorities. they suggested that i leave the country, otherwise i would stay in prison for a very long time. translation: as long as belarus and belarusians are not able to speak freely about their views and beliefs, as long as repression continues, according to the decision of the prime minister, every person who has been subjected to political repr

tobias ellwood, the chair of the defence select committee, explained why.ng to support the prime minister and get brexit over the line. it's been a battering journey since that referendum, since the nation committed itself to leave the european union and we need to do that. the date of the 15th of october has been set, the next european summit. but in getting there, i don't want us to lose our way, to lose our reputation as a force for good, as an exemplar of upholding international rule of law. and i'm afraid that's where i find myself not wishing to support this particular bill, because it does mean that we will be challenging, unilaterally, a treaty. and that goes against the principles of everything we stand for. and there are other senior conservatives who are worried about that too. one, bob neill, has come forward and said he will try to amend that legislation when it goes before parliament. the eu are also ci’oss before parliament. the eu are also cross about this. they have said it would be gravely damaging of trust and could impact on the free tra

earlier, i spoke to tobias ellwood, the former foreign minister and chair of the defence select committeecommunity needed to take now. well, the first thing is that the outside world must pay attention as to what russia is up to, because this is all symbolic of an increasingly confident kremlin. putin has secured the presidency for life, as we know and he is consolidating control. he is regrouping and substantially rearming, and he has two clear objectives, firstly to strengthen his own domestic base, to remove opposition, as he has done with navalny, and the other one is to fuel western division and he is succeeding on both fronts. it is so important that we rally together and we don't speak about this just at the eu but also at nato, but most importantly with the us and i am concerned that we have not heard enough from the white house. let's pick up on that because president trump seems to be deflecting attention from russia. he said we ought to be more worried about china than russia when he was specifically asked about the alexei navalny case. what we need to be worried about is both,

the conservative, tobias ellwood, said covid—19 was the biggest threat facing the nation.capacity of all governments including the uk are being tested by this enduring capacity. i have said this before, please can the secretary of state encourage greater use of our senior armed forces to help advance whitehall strategic thinking, operational planning and delivery, as well as clarity of the message. they are after all trained for crisis management and emergency planning. let's make full use of them. not only did we do a fantasticjob in my view in the first phase, our men and women of the armed forces, not only did we help sick and across government by office rs sick and across government by officers going on and helping people, not only did we strengthen the logistics supply chain of the hsr notes only did we chain of the hsr notes only did we provide mobile testing to make sure testing went where people wear rather than expecting them to get in cars, i think expecting them to get in cars, ithink our expecting them to get in cars, i think our response was in an excellent po

that very much reflects the review of this committee, now tobias ellwood. that our great heroes are not forgotten? secondly, relating, going back to covid... forgotten? secondly, relating, going back to covid. .. yes is the answer to that. thank you. it's a good start. for them to the government's response to covid—19, please could make great use of our fine armed forces? it is not a mark of a failure to lean on the versatile skills more so than we are currently giving, when you're faced with