03/08/2017 World News Today

Our top stories: An all-time and very dangerous low -

President Trump's Twitter verdict on US-Russian relations,

blaming Congress for new sanctions against Moscow.

Caught in a heatwave - from Romania to Spain and Portugal,

temperatures in Europe reach dangerous highs.

What we are seeing are at those temperatures around 10-15dC above

average, some very high and causing problems.

of the world's most expensive footballer Neymar appears to be over

- after Barcelona say they've received his quarter of a billion

And a major oil reserve lies beneath this Arctic ice,

but do the benefits of drilling outweigh the costs?

In one Alaska whaling community, some are fearful

Just imagine if there were to be a big spill on the ocean. None of this

would be happening right now. Hello and welcome

to World News Today. Donald Trump has signed

the bill authorising new US sanctions against Russia,

but he's clearly not happy about it. Hardly surprising -

what president would want Congress It's described the new sanctions

as tantamount to declaring a "full-scale trade war" and show

the complete impotence The sanctions are retaliation

for Russia's alleged meddling in last year's election

and its actions in Ukraine. Laura Bicker is following

developments from Washington. Laura, Donald Trump putting all of

the blame on Congress. How reluctant was he to back the sanctions? He was

very much boxed into a corner. Remember, right at the beginning of

his administration, he wanted a new relationship with Vladimir Putin, a

preset with Russia. He said he thought he would get along very well

with Vladimir Putin, and here we are just six months later and already

relations seem to be, in his words, at an all time low, but when it

comes to Donald Trump and his view of Russia and the view of those

politicians on Russia, they are very different. Republicans and Democrats

have long viewed Russia as a full, not a friend. And when they heard

evidence from the evidence committee that they alleged that Russia

meddled in the US election, they proposed this kind of bill, the

sanctions to just say to Russia no more. Once they drop that bill, it

had to land on the desk of the president. He had to sign it because

it was overwhelmingly supported, which meant that if he vetoed it, it

would have been overridden by Congress, sunny was backed into a

corner and they have also put constraints on him within this bill.

It means he can't lift or waive sanctions against Russia. You have

heard some of the comments there from the Russian Prime Minister, who

has said that this makes Donald Trump impotent. Well, when it comes

to it, that is not going to go down well in the White House. Donald

Trump feels that Congress is stepping on his toes is impeding his

presidency, and that is something that he is not going to take

lightly. And by saying what he said on Twitter, like distancing himself

from the decision, how much does it send a signal to Russia sailing, "I

wanted to improve relations with you, but my hands are tied." Well,

he may be trying to do that inadvertently in his tweet and

really aid to Russia, "Hang on a second, I am not Congress." But at

the same time, I think mostly his message is to his base and it is to

say that he is still an outsider. Remember, this is a president who

ran on a ticket to the White House of being a political outsider. He

has not really got many Republican establishment figures around him any

more atoll, which means you can separate from party politics. It

means that when things like this do not go his way and when he made

reference to the health care boat, which also did not go his way, it

means you can blame politicians. He can say, "It is all their fault, not

mine." Another story that is dominating the American airwaves and

beyond is leaked conversations between Donald Trump and other

leaders, in particular Mexico. This has come out from the Washington

Post. It is a series of transcripts that they published from Donald

Trump's January cold, pressed or the Mexican president, but he seems to

say to him that he should not or would prefer that he did not say

publicly that he would not pay for the wall. "You Cannot say that to

the press," is one of the quotes. He also seems to imply that funding

will be found from other sources and that they will find it somehow, and

when it comes to the relationship between him and the Australian Prime

Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, that transcript is very interesting.

There is increasingly heated debate over whether or not the US should

accept refugees from Australian detention centres. Donald Trump

didn't want to do this, he says, "You are killing me here." And then

the conversation heats up even more and he says, "He hated those

people,"" and he guaranteed they were bad," and he then goes on to

say, "This is the worst conversation I have had all day but the

conversation I had with Vladimir Putin was rather pleasant."

Venezuela's opposition has postponed a protest

against a powerful new assembly backed by President Maduro until it

The opposition believes the powerful pro-government assembly

The country's attorney general has opened an investigation into last

Sunday's election following claims that the government inflated

The BBC's Katy Watson has been telling us more.

Well, she's a big critic of Mr Maduro.

Now, she has said that she will employ some prosecutors to look

into four of the directors at the electoral council.

One of the directors has been quite critical of the constituent

I was at a press conference just a few days ago where one

of the politicians talked about her as Louisa

'what's-her-name.' She's certainly not liked.

So this, of course, just heaps more pressure on President Maduro,

In the speech he gave last night, he talked about the fact that

despite the allegations of vote tampering, 10 million Venezuelans

tried to come out to vote and only 8 million could because 2 million

were stopped by fire, by barricades, so he's very resolute on that.

He's saying this vote happened and it happened fairly.

FC Barcelona has confirmed in the last hour that

representatives for Neymar have paid the $263 million release

The Brazillian is now expected to sign with Paris St-Germain

Richard Conway is at Paris Saint Germain's

Where are we at with all of this? Well, this deal is now on the verge

of being confirmed. The necessary steps to clear Neymar from his

contract with Barcelona, as you have discussed, has now been done, but it

was a convoluted process and there were a few hiccups along the way.

Lawyers for Neymar went to the offices of Paris St Germain, that is

the Spanish league, this morning in Madrid. They try to pay them, as is

the normal route in such circumstances it is the

responsibility of the player in Spain to play -- paid the fee. They

said that they believed this was financial doping, as it was put.

They are not happy with what they see as a potential breach of

European football finance regulations. So the club has had to

go a different route to make the deal happen. Instead, what we got

was Neymar's lawyer is going to Barcelona directly and paying them

the $263 million into their office today. That's now according to the

club has released Neymar from his contract and he is now free to come

here to Paris St Germain, where he will sign as a player. There could

be an announcement tonight, certainly something tomorrow. There

are definitely things afoot around the stadium. They are planning

perhaps for an event, so it is not known now if we will see Neymar and

when confirmed as a Paris St Germain player. How much people is it for

Barcelona to lose a player like Neymar? If there a certain amount of

hurt pride going on here? Yes, I think there is the degree of hurt

pride about it, but I think more than that, they have been caught

napping. When the established his contract, they put this release

clause in there, perhaps thinking that no one would ever pay such a

sum of money. Well, their bluff has been called and Paris St Germain

backed by Qatar's sovereign wealth fund have come up with the cash, so

there will certainly be some political ramifications for their

board of directors. Of course, they are, Barcelona, owned by their fans.

Their president is elected, sweating there will be some political

limitations of losing such a star player who is in his prime. He

perhaps wants to step aside and leave out of the shadow of players

like Lionel Messi, who are there. So they will have to try to reinvest

some of the money they will get back from this deal, that $260 million,

so I think it will be something of a cascade effect within the transfer

market, there are some weeks left in this transfer window, and I think we

might see some more big-money deals being processed before this window

closes. We will keep watching. Richard Conway, thank you very much.

Let's take a look at some of the other stories making the news.

Millions of people living in South Asia face a deadly threat

from heat and humidity driven by global warming,

The study in the journal Science Advances warns that most

of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh will experience temperatures close

to the limits of survivability by 2100, without emissions

Two men have been charged with terror offences in Sydney,

after being arrested on suspicion of plotting to bring down a plane.

A third man detained in a series of raids

across the city at the weekend, is still being questioned.

A fourth man has been released without charge.

China says there will be serious consequences if India does not

withdraw its troops from a Himalayan region claimed by Beijing.

China says Indian forces are of trespassing in the Doklam area

which borders China, India and Bhutan.

India says the troops were sent in in June to stop the Chinese

Health warnings are in place across Europe as temperatures reach

A record-breaking heatwave is currently affecting

swathes of the continent, from Romania to Spain and Portugal.

In southern Italy, temperatures have been as high as 45 Celsius,

and it could get even hotter this weekend.

With me is Phil Avery from the BBC Weather Centre.

How bad is it? We are not quite in unknown territory. I should say

that, although we are going to focus on Europe, I am also keeping a close

eye on some other situations across the world. There is a typhoon in the

north-eastern corner of Asia at the moment which will be all over Japan

within the next couple of days or so, some of those wins with an

excess of 200 mph. And we have the storms and the rainfall coming from

that. We will move on to talk about heat, but I must acknowledge that we

have been with many times over the next few weeks -- over the past few

weeks talking about the heatwaves. Real concerns and also extensive

wildfire action across the world, so we have not forgotten about the rest

of the world by any means at all, but as you say, the situation in

Europe as the battle quite some time now. Just a few weeks ago, we were

talking about extensive wildfires across parts of Portugal ended to

Spain, and now recently we have seen this explosion of heat across the

southern parts, and as you said, quite extensively all the way from

the central and southern parts of Europe, Italy very widely indeed,

all the way through south-eastern Europe and into eastern parts of

Europe too. Temperatures which should be at this time of year

around the 30 Celsius mark, 28 Celsius or so, are widely in excess

of 40 Celsius. This is not record-breaking nationally, because

for example the record for Italy is 48.5 Celsius. Athens had 45 Celsius

back in 1997, so I think we have not got there yet but some local records

will be broken. Giving out any indication of how things will go for

the rest of August? As ever, you are pushing me a long way into the

future there. As a forecaster, I like to do about the next week or so

to give people some certainty about that and the news that I have you is

that book for example a single which has been up at around 40 Celsius or

Tuesday of next week coming back down to around 36 Celsius, but the

red on this particular chart shows you the extent of the searing heat,

all the way from central and southern parts of Spain, certainly

through Italy, across the Adriatic and widely across eastern parts of

Europe. And you would hope that that weather front that I am showing just

north of the Alps might come down and offer some relief, and I have

alluded to the fact that northern parts of Italy may be part of

Switzerland to good seems -- to see some reduction, but adds that

weather front comes in from the Atlantic, that boundary becomes very

explosive and we could be back here on Sunday or even into the start of

next week suggesting that frontal system produced a lot of

thunderstorm activity widely just to the north of the real heatwaves area

and that could be producing 100 millimetres of rain just like that,

so that could be very gusty winds, torrential downpours, flash

flooding, but all the while, southern parts of Italy and the

south-eastern corner of Europe stays at around 40 Celsius, 10-15dC above

normal. Auntie for updating us. -- thank you for updating us.

The head of the Libyan National Army has vowed to repel any Italian

ships approaching Libya's waters without permission.

This follows a decision by the Italian parliament to send

naval boats to Libya to stop migrants

The Italian authorities are also clamping down on international

charities which have been helping to rescue those trying to make

At the start of the migrant crisis, the Italian Navy used to play a key

But now its mission is to enter Libyan territorial waters to

help the Libyan coast guard spot migrant

boats as they set sail, and

The abrupt change of mission was given

the go-ahead by the Italian parliament.

Most politicians clearly wanting an end to the crisis.

The goal of the Italian government is to

stem the flow, bring it close to zero and basically tweak the Turkey

deal and adapt it to the situation in Libya

is to bring a flow which is in the hundreds

of thousands, to close to

Almost 100,000 migrants have reached Italy so far this year.

Other EU countries were supposed to have taken many of them.

So large numbers are applying for asylum here, putting

the government under pressure with elections looming next year.

Now the Italian Navy's sophisticated radar

will enable the Libyan coast guard to stop many migrant boats before

they leave Libyan territorial waters.

That is sparking alarm amongst human rights organisations.

There is automatic detention of irregular

migrants in centres where people are systematically abused, and it is

completely unclear how the Italian government think that these people

would be protected after disembarking Libya with the key

assistance of the Italian government.

Italy is also imposing restrictions on boats used by

It's feared fewer ships will now be in

the key areas, and already this year more than 2000 migrants have

The rift within the World wide Anglican communion over the support

of some churches for same sex marriage seems to be widening.

One of the leading conservative figures in the church

and Archbishop of Uganda, Stanley Ntagali has said

he won't attend the next gathering of its leaders in England

because of some churches' stance on gay marriage.

The BBC's religious affairs editor Martin Bashir sent this report.

archbishops are on a mission, heading north towards refugee camps

The welcome they receive is rapturous.

There are nearly a million South Sudanese

living in camps like this, after fleeing

a brutal civil war, with

many families rushing to the border carrying only their children.

God loves especially the refugee, the

And that means he loves you specially.

While the archbishops are of one mind, in their support for these

refugees, there is another issue about which they are deeply divided.

And it concerns not one country in one continent,

but the entire unity of the Anglican Communion.

That numbers almost 80 million Christians in 165 Nations.

Your Grace, shouldn't you be in the middle?

Stanley Ntagali, a conservative evangelical, walked out

of a global gathering of archbishops last year after the American

Episcopal Church voted to endorse same-sex marriage.

He says the Bible teaches that marriage is between a

man and a woman, and that the growing Ugandan church will not

remain in fellowship with those who support same-sex unions.

The next meeting of Anglican leaders is in

You've been invited to the primates meeting in October.

No, I have made it clear I am not attending because of

the position the Church of Uganda holds.

And that is that homosexuality is wrong?

I thought you wanted to ask me about the

refugees, but now you're concentrating on that subject.

Stanley Ntagali says he remains committed to

the Anglican Communion and will not be pulling the Ugandan church out.

Although we have differences of agreement, of opinion, over issues

around human sexuality, when we were dealing with refugees,

Archbishop Justin Welby concluded his visit by

praying for peace and reconciliation in South Sudan.

A prayer that he probably repeated privately for the

The Inupiat of the high Arctic call the ocean their "garden"

and they view its greatest harvest as the Bowhead whale.

They believe the whales give themselves so that hunters can

But what will happen if the Trump administration allows more oil

Our environment correspondent Claire Marshall travelled more than 300

miles north of the Arctic Circle, and sent this report.

The climate is changing, and the ice that covers

Here, the conflict between the natural world and the business

This town is the furthest north in the United States,

so remote it is cut off by a road from the rest of the country.

The Inupiat call the ocean their garden.

And this is where they store their harvest of whale meat.

And that skin you put on top of the heart.

This is an ice seller dug out of the permafrost,

It helps to sustain them during the long, Arctic winter.

As your mouth starts to warm it up, it softens up like chocolate.

It's a richness you can't get from anything else.

Just kind of let it dissolve a little bit in your mouth,

I don't mind the meat of it, but I'm not mad on that.

We use white because Wales can see colour.

She takes us to a feast on the beach.

The Inupiat have hunted the bowhead whale in their sealskin boats

Now, Donald Trump intends to reverse the ban on drilling

And many are afraid they will lose their way of life.

I honestly want to be at the shore and tell them, "No, you can't."

I mean, just imagine if there were to be a big spill in the ocean.

None of this would be happening right now.

But, like the rest of Alaska, this town is almost

Taxes on the industry in other parts of the country pay

for the infrastructure, and every Alaskan gets

We'll just start slicing all of the mukduk off this layer.

Fred believes that oil is the only way they can carry on hunting.

It costs money to go whaling, so there is an opportunity

to coexist together and an opportunity for not only

industry to thrive, but then also the local traditional hunters.

We are closer to the North Pole here than we are to Washington, DC,

but the White House has its eyes firmly fixed on this region.

It's an unstable world, and what lies beneath his eyes

could be crucial to the energy security of the United States.

But drilling here would be very risky, just as it's risky to hunt.

Armed in case of polar bears, some other hunters take us up

The Arctic is warming twice as fast as anywhere else on the planet.

Most scientists agree that oil and fossil fuel is helping

Maybe we should start looking ahead for something that's more renewable.

Maybe wind in the winter and solar in the summer,

Traditional Inupiat dancers tell the stories

Donald Trump and his decisions may well be woven

Finally, the British film and television actor Robert Hardy has

died. He was famous for his roles in Harry Potter and All Creatures Great

and Small. His family say he had a tremendous life. Gruff, twinkly and

celebrated eye everyone who knew him and everyone who enjoyed his work.

Don't forget you can get in touch with me and some

of the team on Twitter - I'm @KarinBBC.

Hello. Low pressure will be moving away slowly tomorrow. It will still

bring