25/06/2016 Reporters

Welcome to Reporters, I'm Philippa Thomas.

From here in the world's newsroom, we send our reporters to bring

you the best news stories from across the globe.

The rockets went off, breaking the fall, the capsule is down.

David Shukman joins astronaut Tim Peake as he returns, at last,

Tim, it's a remarkable sight, you're looking so well.

Wyre Davies meets the indigenous tribes risking their lives

to save Brazil's rainforests from the illegal loggers.

TRANSLATION: This is our land and we will fight to defend it.

The disappearing Dead Sea. How the lowest place on the earth is getting

lower. Look how far down it has gone over the course of the century. It

is still dropping every single day. And we join a British survivor of

the terror attack is in Tunisia. -- attacks. It is hard to process it.

Chi Chi Izundu joins party-goers as they go deep underground

for the world's first ever live gig inside an Icelandic volcano.

Well, in his words, it was the best ride of his life.

Britain's best-known astronaut, Tim Peake, touched down back

on earth this week after six months on board the International

His mission has taken him on around 3,000 orbits of Earth,

covering a distance of nearly 125 million kilometres.

Now back on land, he's still having trouble adjusting to gravity,

but says he'd go back into space in a heartbeat.

David Shukman was in Kazakhstan to greet him when his team landed.

A race to rescue Tim Peake and his two colleagues.

A fleet of helicopters rushes across the empty

No-one knows exactly where and when the spacecraft will land.

I'm the only British journalist on-board.

The pilot spots something high above us.

The giant parachute, it looks tiny from here,

just drifting down through the clouds.

The three astronauts on board, Tim Peake among them,

making their way back down to earth and it looks like it's

By now, radio contact is established, but one

Touchdown approaching any second now, I think.

There it goes, the rockets went off, breaking the fall.

Minutes later, the whole fleet was on the ground and the three

spacemen started to be pulled out of the capsule.

After six months without any feeling of weight, they were too

Our first sight of Tim Peake, looking happy, his mission

Tell me how you're feeling right now.

Just the smells of Earth, they're so strong.

It's wonderful to be back in fresh air.

After half a year without feeling the warmth of summer,

and still in his space suit, he was overheating.

He managed a quick word with his wife, Rebecca.

Then he was carried off for a medical check.

He wants his time in space to be useful to research.

Tim, it's a remarkable sight, you're looking so well.

And do you know how many people have followed you on Twitter now?

I know, it's been incredible, it really has.

I thank everybody who's helped with this mission.

With the astronauts being checked, the capsule was rolled upright

so that technicians could get to work.

An hour after landing and the capsule is still hot,

and being this close I can smell how burnt it is.

It became charred as it descended through the atmosphere.

The spacecraft was returned laden with research samples.

The mission is over, but a lot of science gets

For the Russians, this operation is routine,

but for Britain, it marks the first government-funded space flight

and Tim Peake hopes that more will follow.

2015 was the most dangerous year ever for environmental activists

That's according to the campaign group Global Witness.

It says one of the worst countries was Brazil, where 50 people have

been killed fighting against illegal loggers and miners.

Wyre Davies has been to the Amazon to meet the indigenous

tribes on the frontline of Brazil's land invasion.

Brazil's indigenous tribes are as diverse as they are numerous.

The one thing they have in common today, perhaps above all else,

is the relentless, insatiable pressure on their land

The Ka'apor people of the eastern Amazon are fewer than

The jungle is their home, their source of food,

and they have minimal contact with modern Brazil.

But their lives and their lands are under constant threat.

This is our land and we will fight to defend it, says the village

chief, as the tribal council meets to discuss the latest threat.

Since 2008, six Ka'apor leaders have been killed for trying

to protect their land from illegal loggers and miners.

For the Ka'apor, maintaining a traditional way of life and living

in and off the forest is what their existence

is all about and they are prepared to defend it at all costs,

but it puts them into direct conflict with others

from the outside who want access to the Amazon's precious

More than 5,000 square kilometres of the Brazilian Amazon rainforest

80% of that is thought to be illegally cut and exported timber.

Brazil's environment agencies are fighting back, but they're

often up against powerful and corrupt business interests.

TRANSLATION: We're facing a situation of organised crime,

well structured and supported by people with money, using poor

A new report says at least 50 environmental defenders,

indigenous leaders and rural campaigners, were murdered in Brazil

The perpetrators are rarely, if ever, caught.

The man who she is warm and's husband have never been caught. A

cross marks his grave. TRANSLATION: My life has no value. Nothing. I

husband was threatened they and night and refused to leave this

land. -- my husband. -- my husband. I wanted to stay where he died but

my son did not let me. While threats and intimidation have

forced some communities to give up the struggle,

it's not an option for the Ka'apor. Small in number, with their own

language and traditions, this is more than a fight

for their land, it's The Dead Sea. For years, there has

been fears it might live up to its name and died. There is a plan to

build a water carrier from the Dead Sea to the Red Sea which might help

solve it. Bart its waters are shrinking at an alarming rate. --

But. The surface of the Dead Sea. It is the lowest point on the face of

the earth and it is getting lower. The level of the dense mineral rich

water is dropping at the rate of more than a metre a year. 100 years

ago, British engineers marked the level of the waters of the Dead Sea

here, high up on this rock. How much have things changed? Look how far

the level has dropped over the course of the century. And it is

still dropping every single day. As the waters retreat, thousands or

sinkholes are forming. -- of. They are created, and underground pockets

of salt collapse. They give the landscape a kind of lunar beauty.

But they can be bad for business. The buildings of this beach resort

collapsed into a sink all last year and now it has closed down. The

effect, like a slow motion earthquake. -- sink hole. Even the

resorts that remain are struggling. This one opened 30 years ago on the

Israeli sure. The waves reached these beach umbrella is. -- shore.

Now it is a two kilometre ride on the tourist train to the water.

Every year, the right gets longer and the future seems more uncertain.

-- ride. It has been a bad life in the last few years because you are

seeing your homeland, your home landscape, disappearing, shrinking,

and you know that maybe your children and grandchildren will not

be left something that you grew up in. The tourists keep coming. Some

like the way in sea of the super salty water that is impossible to

sink in. -- buoyancy. Others find something magical and medicinal in

the mud. It makes you feel so good, free and stressless, like you are

living in another place. The ones mighty river Jordan was the Dead

Sea's main source of water. -- once. Now it is dying itself. More people

are tapping into the rivers of the Middle East to water their farms and

feed their people. This bone dry landscape was once a hydroelectric

power station. The river that drove it has dried to a trickle. Jordan

and Israel still evaporate the waters for its valuable deposits of

phosphates. Salt residue producers a landscape that is almost arctic in

the desert sun. A small group of Jordanian families was found here in

this harsh landscape and has been here for generations. Now the ground

has disintegrated beneath them as sinkholes appear here, too.

But where it does retreat, nature sometimes returns. Our cameras

filming at this camping ground, abandoned because of sinkholes only

last year, caught a lens of this herd of Ibics, a type of desert

goat, moving back in. There is a plan to save the Dead Sea by pumping

water across the deserts to the south from the Red Sea. It will be

expensive, the governments in the region say it is worth it, and it

will happen, though. In the meantime, though, the sea continues

to dwindle. BBC News. Nigeria has had some limited recent success

against the militants of Boko Haram, but the frustration of the campaign

of violence has led to a rise in the number of vigilante groups. It was

one such group that found the first of the missing Chibok schoolgirls

last month. Hundreds of other girls are still thought to be held by Boko

Haram since they were kidnapped two years ago. We have been to Boko

Haram's former stronghold of Maiduguri to meet the Nigerians

taking the law into their own hands. They are preparing for a routine

control. These vigilantes are the ever present guardians of eastern

Nigeria. Their hunting guns many appear menacing, but they also have

local knowledge the enemy and their allies can not match. They were the

one group successful in finding some of the missing Chibok schoolgirls.

The news was appreciated nationwide, and began when they got an

unexpected from the vigilantes. His sister had been missing for two

years, but was now back home alive. The news has given the parents of

the other missing girls a sense of renewed hope that they also can be

just as fortunate. TRANSLATION: When I heard, I said to myself, is it

really true? Is it true that she was reunited with her mother? Could my

own child be found? If only I could just see my daughter, that would be

enough. Combined with the military's own successes, the progress made

against the insurgency is good news for the public. Residents in

Maiduguri are attempting to restore their will society to what it was

before the troubles began. Now there is a sense amongst people here that

the worst is now behind them and they can rebuild their city. Schools

and public places were common targets for jihad the attacks. But

the cloud of fear that would have kept people away has since been

lifted in many places. One problem that has emerged, though, is the

stigma often faced by the women who are believed to have suffered sexual

violence under Boko Haram and had children as a result. How do you

think your sister will cope when it comes to getting back into life as

normal and reintegrating into society?

This might spoil some hope for other former captives of Boko Haram, as

they and their communities hope for the end of a painful conflict. The

vigilantes might not get a lot of praise for their role in fighting

for peace but they are content in keeping themselves and their homes

safe. It is almost a year since gunmen opened fire on a beach in

Tunisia, killing 38 tourists, 30 of whom were from the UK. It was the

greatest loss of British life in a terror attacks in the London

bombings in 2005. The self-styled Islamic State claimed responsibility

for the result on the -- assault on the resort of Sousse. One survivor

wanted to return to Tunisia and the BBC took him back for what he called

a journey of healing. Orla Guerin went with him. All right, let's do

it. Let's do it. Psyching himself up to face the past and all its trauma.

Colin Bidwell returns to the imperial hotel, a difficult journey

that he wanted to make. Amateur footage captured the chaos.

And here, the gunmen stalking the short where Colin and his wife Chris

lay sunbathing. -- shore. He leads me to the beach which became a

killing ground. I just had my headphones on, just heard some

sounds, just thought fireworks, like everyone else did. Just turned and

looked at my wife on the sunbed next to me, and she was already off the

sunbed. Running in that direction. I just decided to run straight down

the beach. Into the sea. I could still hear everything still going

on. You never forget that sound. You never forget the sound. What can I

say? Than a reunion with Mahmood. Thank you, thank you. He rescued:

and other tourists from the sea. Thank you so much, thank you for

what you did. It was a very good thing you did for me, you saved my

life -- Colin. I think I was here, was I? Went Colin was pulled from

the water he realised he had been grazed by two alerts. You pulled me

up there, that is where I was. Yes. Thank you, Mahmood. At the local

hospital he searches for the wards where he and other victims were

treated by staff who were in shock themselves. I heard someone firing a

gun. This was Colin just after the attack. Now he is here with a

message of gratitude. Just to say thank you very much, from everybody,

from the survivors that you treated here. We were so sorry. So were we.

Back at the beach Colin is hoping there will be a full recovery for

the victims and for Tunisia. I hope and pray it becomes a safe country.

That other people can come back here and help the economy, because the

economy has been ruined just because of one person. And there are still a

lot of survivors that will be scared to come back, and I understand that.

I was scared to come back here but for me it was a process. I had to do

it. I had to process it, to put me in a better place, where I am today.

But for Colin and other survivors, nothing can wash away the horror of

what happened on the Golden sands of Sousse. Now for a festival with a

difference. The world's first-ever live music

performance inside a volcano. As the festival season gets under

way, it is an attempt by organisers to stand out

in a crowded market. Chi Chi Izundu joined

revellers as they headed down Not your average

journey to a festival. For this gig, there are only two

ways to get to the venue. A hike across lava fields,

with the changeable Icelandic weather,

or, if you can afford And the 20 tickets made available

sold out in just ten days. This volcano erupted 4,500 years

ago, but they only allowed the public to have

access five years ago. The journey to get to this part

is via this special lift, and it would be the same, nearly,

as me scaling Big Ben Over the past decade,

the explosion of festivals means Annually, tens of thousands

happen across Europe alone and with the summer spent

going from one to another, even this is a standout event

for the international artist. You know, when I was asked to do

this, my first thought was, will I ever get a chance to do

something like this ever again? And so it's definitely something

different for the festival. But, with the hefty price

tag, was it worth it? Even not knowing what bands

were performing, I knew that the experience

in and of itself was worth it. Also being a part of something

for the first time, obviously, I don't want to leave,

I don't want to get the lift back up,

I want to stay down here. Events like this aren't

cheap to put on, either, so it doesn't guarantee

the festival's survival. The rapid deterioration

of the weather meant an evacuation Trust the weather to put

a dampener on things! That's all from Reporters

for this week. From me, Philippa Thomas,

goodbye for now. As the thunderstorms

rattled around once again, our Weather Watchers were out

there capturing all sorts