18/12/2016 BBC News at Ten

In Syria the evacuation of civilians from eastern Aleppo is hit

by another set back, as buses due to help people leave

two villages north of the city are set alight.

It comes as the UN security council agrees a draft resolution ensuring

UN officials can monitor the evacuation of the city.

Gun attacks in Jordan kill at least ten people including a Canadian

tourist. Ahead of another strike

by Southern Rail conductors tomorrow, the RMT leader,

Mick Cash,dismisses claims his union is using the dispute to take

on the government. BBC sports personality of the year

2016 is Andy Murray. The tennis world number one and caps off a

fantastic year. Winning the award for a record third time.

Congrats to all of the athletes that are there.

It's been an amazing year for British sport

Good evening and welcome to BBC News.

The evacuation of civilians in Syria from the former rebel enclaves

Buses travelled into the area to collect people -

A limited evacuation did take place last week,

but stopped on Friday because of disagreements

is the suspension of a reciprocal evacuation of two

besieged villages - Foua and Kefraya -

which are mainly government-supporting.

Rebel forces are said to have attacked and destroyed buses sent

to rescue people from there - and this evening a human rights

group said the mission had been postponed for an unknown time.

Here's our correspondent Quentin Somerville,

and I should warn you, there is distressing

If only the ceasefire in Aleppo hadn't collapsed,

then this might never have needed to happen.

They are doing the best they can here, but this hospital

There are none left in eastern Aleppo, so nurses

TRANSLATION: The child has a birth defect.

We immediately brought the mother here to the operating

room for a Caesarean, which we are doing now.

The mother is in a bad way and her baby boy even worse.

But everyone here is at their wit's end.

TRANSLATION: As soon as the patient arrived,

I told the Red Cross that a patient needed emergency

surgery but there was no answer because the evacuation

In Aleppo's final days, all niceties have gone.

Some of the sick made it out of here on Thursday

After 24 hours, the ceasefire collapsed.

There are now 100 badly injured people trapped here.

He has been stuck here for three days, says this man.

We have tried to leave but they stopped us.

They've now run out of room inside, so outside the hospital,

TRANSLATION: I've been coming and going for four days now.

In the morning they promised to take us with ambulances and we've

been waiting since then, but what else can I do?

Rival factions attacked buses that were meant to free trapped sick

Only when they are freed will the regime allow convoys

And only after Aleppo's misery would you consider this salvation.

The buses that bring them are so crowded there

is no room for luggage, but here, there's relief.

TRANSLATION: Rockets, Russian jets and warplanes all bombing us,

We kept fleeing from one place to another.

There was hunger, poverty and sleeping in the streets.

This woman made it here with her twin girls.

The camp may be crowded but here the sisters can breathe again.

TRANSLATION: It is better than it was in Aleppo,

We have new friends walking and playing together.

There was a food shortage back there.

We hated life but here we are eating biscuits and everything.

Every minute and every hour of the ceasefire that is lost,

is another moment of life denied to the children of Aleppo.

Earlier I spoke to Tauqir Sharif - a British aid worker involved

in the evacuation of civilians who's currently in Idlib province -

and I asked him if it was clear who is in control

There has been a major, major upset on the ground.

Because there's many different groups that are controlling these

areas, there's not want hope that controls these areas,

it's made up of different militias and rebel factions.

The general public have basically, in a sense, started a revolution.

They are very unhappy that the rebel groups have not been able to unite

and they are upset that Aleppo was lost.

And for this reason many of these anarchist groups

people who are protesting and revolting have started

Just the other day a crossing was cut.

There has been a whole heap of security issues on the ground.

You work with an aid group, what sort of care are the sick

and the injured getting once they've left Aleppo and some of these other

At the moment the situation is very dire.

We just coming to winter, it's getting really cold,

We've only had one wave of people evacuated from Aleppo city.

The charity organisations here on the ground are

The first day when people were evacuated before

the ceasefire broke down, we found hundreds of people

At the moment we are opening up mosques, schools,

and temporary housing facilities until we can find a more

stable refugee camp, or move them to Turkey,

The situation is very difficult, people coming out with no

money and whatever they can carry in their hands, basically.

Let's speak to Dr Arash Aramesh, a Middle East Foreign Policy Analyst.

Lovely to see you. A confusing situation but the latest news we are

getting from the Reuters news agency is via a UN official that

evacuations are now back on. Encouraging, but as I said, slightly

confusing. Encouraging, and I just got this telex on the wires that

there are reports that in eastern Aleppo evacuations are being

resumed. But there is no guarantee that they won't be stopped again.

What happened in the past 48 hours was, after Islamist rebels in the

Italy province, let's remember that the Idlib province is more Assad

friendly, even though the rebels have had certain successes in the

past year and a half, two years, there are a couple of shia the

villages that were under siege. One of the tit-for-tat or reciprocal

conditions for allowing civilians and rebels to leave eastern Aleppo

was also to provide safe passage for Shi'ite villages in these villages

in Idlib. When rebels in Idlib started firing at the buses and

setting these buses ablaze, we're getting reports it was pressured

from the Iranians saying, unless you stop attacking these Shi'ite

villages trying to be evacuated, the Iranians and Syrian forces will not

guarantee safe passage to either civilians or militants in eastern

Aleppo. So it's a terrible tit-for-tat retaliatory sort of

move. The price of which is being paid by the women and children of

both those villages in Idlib and also eastern Aleppo. The other main

advance today in the situation is the news that there is a compromised

UN security resolution that's been put in place. We are expecting a

vote tomorrow. It sounds as if everybody is more or less on board.

Russia had been saying they were going to veto it. But as you've just

been saying, tit-for-tat, does that mean Iran will also be on board with

this? Because the finger is pointing at them a fair bit when it comes to

halting these ceasefires and evacuations. Iran certainly has a

hardline position. Iran is not there to save the secularists regime, they

are there to save Assad because Assad has been a very critical ally

for the Iranians and Iran counts on Syria to be able to support,

training and further enhance its agenda with Hezbollah in Lebanon.

And they have the largest Shia power in the region, and believes they

have this duty and obligation. Having said all this Iran obviously

does have a geopolitical interest and a national security interest as

it views it to support the Shia. So that was a red line for the

Iranians. If they are going to let eastern Aleppo civilians, mostly

Sunnis, to be evacuated, and if they are going to allow safe passage for

the militants, they wanted to see their Shi'ite brethren to also

receive the same safe passage. Having said that, as far as the UN

Security Council resolution is concerned, anything that is going to

have any language in tens of having blue helmet UN peacekeeping forces

on the ground is most likely going to be vetoed by the Russians. And

all you need is one country. All you need is just the Russians to veto

any UN Security Council resolution. If you want a resolution you

probably want to get it now, it's going to be less likely that the

Trump administration is going to be on board with any sort of

involvement coming to Syria. But the French and British are adamant to

get some sort of compromise resolution and to alleviate some of

this horrendous pain and human suffering that we've seen on par

with thread on each, -- on par with Strother nature.

And on par with some of the horrendous battles of the Second

World War. I want to jump in quickly and discuss the point, talk of a

ceasefire but he has made the point, Putin, that he does not want the UN

included and he does not want the US included. Many are saying that could

all change once Mr Trump is in the White House, why does that matter?

Well, when Mr Trump has promised a much more Russia friendly posture

and US foreign policy, I don't know what that means. If anything Russia

is both tactically and strategically a US adversarial. Russian interests

in the region and in the world are not what you would call parallel

with US interests. Russia views a lot of these issues as a 0-sum game

and is willing to go above and beyond, even partaking in what

people would call it genocide and a war crime to achieve its goals. I

really do not know what the Trump administration has up its sleeve. On

the one hand you've got key national security figures who are not exactly

very pro-Russia such as General James Madison coming in as the

secretary of defence, but then you've got other figures who have

shown a much softer stance on Russia and especially Putin. So we've got

to wait and see what happens. But what Putin wants is no US forces, no

British or French boots on the ground, he wants him to clean house

and the Syrian forces and allies to win and clean house and that is

going to be bad news for the civilian population. Great to speak

to you, thank you. And we'll find out how this story -

and many others - are covered evening in The Papers -

our guests joining me tonight are Martin Lipton,

Deputy Head of Sport at The Sun and Martin Bentham,

Home Affairs Editor The International Trade Secretary

Liam Fox has refused to rule out Britain remaining a member

of the European Customs' Union after Brexit,

which could limit the ability to cut He told the BBC's Andrew Marr

that he was "instinctively a free trader" and he would have his say

in the Cabinet. Here's our Political

Correspondent Ben Wright. There's some flash

photography in his report. At the moment, British

businesses know the score. We are full members of the EU single

market with its free movement We are also members

of the EU's customs union, The huge question is,

what will Brexit bring? This morning, the Trade Secretary

suggested we could remain partial We want to look at all

the different things. I hear people talking about hard

Brexit and soft Brexit as if it is a boiled egg

we are talking about. Turkey is in part of the customs

union but not other parts. The customs union includes all 28 EU

nations but also Turkey, Monaco, And all can trade

freely with each other. But they must impose the same

tariffs on goods from nations They are also barred from doing

bilateral trade deals That is why the Trade Secretary

would like a half way house. So he's got something to do,

and the government has The UK could stay in

the single market, but that would mean continued free

movement of people and the oversight We might only remain

in the customs union. Or the biggest change, the UK leaves

the lot and trades with EU The former Chancellor, now free

to speak without a Government script Yes, it is true that the grass

may be greener outside of those arrangements,

and we may be able to conduct new free trade deals with Australia

and the United States and so on, but that should not come at a price

of giving up the existing free trade arrangements we have

with Germany and France. You cannot say we are a beacon

of free trade in the world and then the main thing we can achieve

is a huge act of protectionism, Popping up again to offer his Brexit

services, Nigel Farage, friend of President-elect Donald Trump,

the former Ukip leader told the BBC he wanted to be a bridge

between the new trade Department Number 10 said there

was no job vacancy. Six months on after the vote

to leave the European Union, everyone in government agrees that

Brexit will happen but if ministers At the moment, all options

seem to be on the table. Remember, this is not a question

of the UK asking for a deal, in the spring Britain will begin

discussions with 27 other countries who are determined to get a Brexit

that works for them. In Syria the evacuation of civilians

from eastern Aleppo is hit by another setback,

as buses due to help people leave two villages north

of the city are set alight. Gun attacks in Jordan

kill at least 10 people Ahead of another strike

by Southern Rail conductors tomorrow,

the RMT leader, dismisses claims his union is using the dispute

to take on the government. Sport now, a full round up

from the BBC Sport Centre. Andy Murray is BBC Sports

Personality of the Year The world number one tennis player

beat 15 other contenders on a highly He wasn't at the ceremony

in Birmingham to collect the award - instead being presented

with the trophy by Lennox It's been the best year

of Murray's career. He won Wimbledon and the Olympic

title as well gaining the much Fellow Olympic gold medallists

Alistair Brownlee the triathlete was second and 58 year

old showjumper Nick Skelton was 3rd. Manchester City put their recent

problems behind them, moving up to second place

in the Premier League table after beating

Arsenal 2-1 at the Etihad. City had

to come from behind. It was Raheem Stirling

who scored their winner 20 minutes from time,

but earlier Theo Walcott had opened the scoring for Arsenal

after just five minutes. City are now seven points behind

league leaders Chelsea. Of course, it was quite

similar to Chelsea. With Chelsea, we didn't

win, and today we did. We have problems with

important players not That is very difficult to accept

in a game like that. I believe there is a lot going

on the moment that is not serious. It is unbelievable,

but every time the decisions go against

you, and unilaterally. Spurs are now only a point behind

Arsenal, in fifth place. They beat Burnley 2-1

at White Hart Lane. Like Manchester City,

Spurs also had to come from behind. Danny Rose scored the winner

20 minutes from time. Earlier Ashley Barnes had given

Burnley the lead before Dele Alli I think always the Premier League

is hard to win games. Today we knew that Burnley is a team

that fight a lot, run a lot, every ball, they

are ready to challenge. I think the team played

in a very good way. I think that we fully deserved

in the end the victory and I am pleased with that because it

was a difficult win. And in the other Premier League

match, Southampton won They were 3-1 winners

at Bournemouth. Onto rugby union, and

there's been an upset Scarlets survived a tense

finale to hang on and beat Leigh Halfpenny missed two late

penalties for the French team. Defending champions Saracens

continued their 100% record in this competition,

but they were made to work for a 26-10 victory against Sale

that keeps them top of Pool Three. Saracens relied on the boot

of Owen Farrell to forge a lead in a cagey opening to the game,

he gave them a narrow advantage Sale defended well and almost

snatched a try that would've put them ahead through Denny Solumona

on his debut in rugby union following his switch of codes

from the Super League, but the ball just

bounced over his head. And Saracens punished that slip up

with two late tries, Nathan Earle added some gloss

to the scoreline late on and Sale did pull one back

through Bryn Evans, but they left it too late

and remain bottom of the pool. There was one other match

involving a British side - England's hope of a consolation

victory in the 5th and final test India batted all the way

through the third day That's 86 behind England's

first innings score, with Rahul falling just one run

short of a double century. Marco Fu won eight frames in a row

to beat John Higgins in the final Fu had been 4-1 down,

but then the recovery began, It's the third ranking

title of his career. Earlier, Higgins had hit three

straight centuries to take the lead, but he had no answer to Fu's

brilliant fightback. Ten people, including a Canadian

woman, have been killed in a shoot-out between police

and gunmen in Jordan at a castle Several officers were

killed in the attack There are reports some people

had been taken hostage. Armoured personnel carriers racing

through the streets of Karak. They are responding to a series

of shootings in and around The security forces

desperately try to establish There is panic, confusion

and more gunshots. This amateur footage shows police

and special forces closing in on the gunmen who have now taken

refuge in the Crusader Castle and are still firing

on those around them. The medieval citadel draws tourists

from around the world, and there were initial unconfirmed

reports that some had Others were able to get out

as the battle raged around them. This is where most of

the casualties were found. All were Jordanian except for one

Canadian woman who was killed. Tonight, the city appears calm

although it is unclear There will be relief the attack

was contained but it will be another blow to Jordan's reputation as a sea

of calm in a region of crisis. The General Secretary of the RMT

transport union Mick Cash has dismissed claims that it's

organising strikes as part of a conspiracy to bring

down the Government. He distanced himself

from reported remarks by the RMT's president,

Sean Hoyle, suggesting trade unions were coordinating industrial action

to oust the Conservatives. Here's our business

correspondent, Joe Lynam. Some media reports suggest that

trade unions are trying The RMT National President

was pretty clear on the subject. They are talking about the left

trying to bring down the Government. There was the national shop

stewards network, the RMT, other left-wing organisations

are coordinating to bring His RMT colleague Mick Cash

dismissed the idea. When not about looking

at conspiracies to bring Our Southern conductor

members are on strike this concerns about safety

and the travelling public. The public might feel caught

in the middle as they face One former Conservative transport

minister thinks there is a link between industrial disputes. I don't

think it is a coincidence these disputes are happening now, I think

there has to be co-ordinated and it looks like they are determined to

bring misery on people. A lot of people will be travelling at this

time of year. Here on Downing Street there will be more than aware of how

annoying is the strikes up to the public. Even though this government

has introduced rules to make it tougher for trade unions to go out

on strike, some ministers want to go further. But that could be

politically tricky. It may feel as though there is a spike in

industrial disputes but compared with the 1970s this year barely

scratches the surface in terms of total number of days lost to

strikes. That will be cold comfort to Southern rail customers, though,

who will enjoy a fourth day of description in a week.

A suicide bomber has killed at least forty soldiers

The Islamic State group says it carried out the attack,

which targeted a crowd of soldiers as they were queueing up

to receive their salaries near a military base.

It's the latest in a string of such attacks on army recruits.

A week ago, Islamic State militants killed fifty troops in Aden,

which is under the control of the internationally-recognised

And for the weather now. Hello. Looks like the Christmas weather

will be more windy than white and that means next weekend will be very

different from this weekend. Some problematic fog but relatively

quiet. A fine view from the RSPB reserve in East Yorkshire. Other

parts of England and Wales with fog going back into it tonight. Some

dense patches around in parts of England and South Wales, the

Midlands. North-west Scotland has outbreaks of rain arriving later.

Could be some pockets of frost but we are mainly concerned about fog in

the morning, especially through parts of England and Wales. Patchy

but Denton places. Had an impact on travel over the past few days, but

may be problematic on Monday morning. Check the situation near

you with your local station before heading out the door. This is a

snapshot at 8am, Misty and murky start. Even if you are not in fog,

temperatures at this stage close to where they have been all weekend.

Plenty of dry weather, maybe drizzly in places. For Scotland and Northern

Ireland a weather front is edging in from the Atlantic. Week but reducing

outbreaks of rain especially to the Western Highlands. That is going to

spread south-eastwards through the rest of Scotland and Northern

Ireland through the day. Not a huge amount of rain left but down for a

time. Behind it some of us may brighten up for the end of the day.

England and Wales, emphasis on cloud rather than sunshine, some patchy

rain through parts of the east and south-east. If you start with fog

visibility slowly improving but temperatures still in single

figures. As we go into Monday night clear skies mean a night for

Scotland and Northern Ireland, so more could have frost. Plenty of

cloud in England and Wales. Rain around. Brighter skies developing

elsewhere in England. Then quite a change on the way to the far

north-west, parts of Scotland and Northern Ireland turning windier,

getting heavier rain moving in pushing south-eastwards during the

day on Wednesday and that is the first of a number of weather systems

coming our way later this week. We are starting the week with

high-pressure, mainly dry, quiet. From midweek onwards turning wetter

and windier at times and it looks like that sort of weather will take

us right through to Christmas.