u. k. mike, we've been hearing a lot about a so called plan spring offensive coming up. and, and, you know, when you look at the situation right now, how do you see ukraine's chances going into that? well, the big problem the ukrainians have to soul is that the most obvious area of their offensive, which is going south from south parisha to get to the coast of the see of as of the splitting the russian forces into is also the area where the russians have built 2 or 3 or 4 defensive lines, so anti time bitches and concrete, po box and so on and so forth. so the ukrainians need to be quite clever about how and where they are sold. and that is, of course, the big question, whether they'll attempt maybe a river crossing in the region, whether they'll try to cut the russian supply lines over the other side of the wall in the northeast. like, i'd like to ask you just briefly before we go, ukraine wants nato membership. that seems to be far away because there's an ongoing conflict. they're not conflicts actually with, with nato's mandate. how do you think we've been talking als

the good friday peace agreement. air force one landed in belfast with biden greeted on the tom mike by u. k. prime minister b. she soon act. he showed all to meet representatives from all northern islands, main political parties before giving a speech and as to university. andrew simmons has more now from belfast. joe biden as arrived in northern ireland with the express intent of congratulating the people of northern ireland on the 25th anniversary of the good friday agreement. but there isn't a celebration atmosphere here and that's because power sharing the central point of the agreement isn't in existence. right now, and that's because the d u p, the democratic unit party has in fact boycotted the actual machine, the government machine, which is sharing power between the eunice and the nationalists. now will this be addressed? it's unlikely that it will be any traction, any movement towards a settlement, simply because the d u p. it is absolutely adamant that it will not accept the trading arrangements, the trading restrictions, the rules that are in place, post bricks it. and furthermo

let's mike martin, military expert joining us from the u. k. take letting out some of the other stories making news around the world at this hour. at least 7 people have died after a trained carriage burst into flames. in southern pakistan, at least 4 children are said to be among the victims. officials say they have opened an investigation into the cause of the fire. a new cove in 19 variant recently detected in south korea has been found to cause i diseases in some patients. the variant cause is red and itchy eyes, along with the usual coded symptoms. authority, say them monitoring the new barrier that the cove risks to the public remains low. now, spain is experiencing record heat for this time of year, which the meteorological agency is attributing to climate change. and the unusually high temperatures are exacerbating a long running drought. the poses risks to both people and wildlife. these tourists from england are getting a sneak peak of the spanish summer. we love it. absolutely. it's been so cold and wet. i've even the day you went to

u. k. competition regulator has blocked. microsoft's planned, $69000000000.00 take over video again, maker activision blizzard. the company behind games like call of duty would be mike soft, biggest ever acquisition. antitrust watchdog fears, microsoft would keep activision games off competing cloud gaming platforms. you as a condition, a giant carrier is making a big investment in green heating. it's buying the heat. pump division of germany is this man for $12000000000.00. a pumps are seen as a key way of making heating more climate friendly. they take over his res concerns in germany, though about foreign control of an important technology. ukraine's economy is expected to grow 1.6 percent this year. according to the vienna institute for international economic studies. last year, g, d, p tumbles 29 point one percent is millions, flat the country and production was halted in the war and improving business environment. energy supply, the grain deal and 8 are hoping the ukrainian economy and the european union has agreed a deal to set binding targets for airlines in the block to increase their use of sustainable aviation fuels. brussels aims to increase demand and s