16/08/2017 World News Today

President to president - the critical reaction

to Donald Trump's latest comments on white supremacists now includes

an outright condemnation of bigotry from America's last two

Grief and anger in Freetown as authorities are blamed

for hampering rescue efforts - at least 600 people are still

missing after Monday's devastating mudslide.

Heavy rains across South East Asia have also caused severe

flooding in Bangladesh, India and Nepal -

with more than 250 dead, and millions of people displaced.

Hello and welcome to World News Today.

Donald Trump's determination to blame both sides for the deadly

violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, has brought condemnation

today from some very senior figures on the American right.

In an angry news conference, the president appeared to defend

the organisers of the white supremacist rally, saying that

anti-racist protesters were "very violent" too.

Republican presidents - George Bush senior and junior -

put out an unprecedented joint statement saying: "America must

always reject racial bigotry, anti-Semitism,

Here's our North America Editor Jon Sopel.

The memorial service for an antiracism

white supremacists in Charlottesville on Saturday, but far

from this being an occasion when a nation comes together,

America seems more between divided than ever.

They try to kill my child to shut her up.

This was Charlottesville on Friday night, racist groups chanting

Jews will not replace us, carrying Ku Klux Klan-style

torches and marching to the slogan white lives

Yesterday, the President blamed both sides for the violence

You had a group on one side and you had a group on the

other and they came at each other with clubs and it was vicious and it

was horrible and it was a horrible thing to watch.

There was a group on their side, you can call them the left,

you have just called them the left, that came

violently attacking the

other group, so you can say what you want,

It is true there was violence

But the race hate protesters had come ready for trouble.

the Army, but a right-wing militia that turned up whistling with

Most had clubs, helmets and shields with white supremacists

The antiracism demonstrators were not organisers,

they were mostly local people on whom a small group had come

But Donald Trump seeming to draw a moral equivalence between

swastika carrying Neo Nazis and antiracism protesters has brought

The senior Republican Paul Ryan tweeting...

The only significant voice of support last night came from the

former leader of the Ku Klux Klan David Duke, who said...

There is reported to be deep unhappiness among some senior White

House staff over the President's comments.

He had not been due to say anything and, significantly, a new

intervention, this time from two former Republican living presidents

George HW Bush and George W Bush, saying there is no room for bigotry

and anti-Semitism in today's America.

There has also been significant reaction from the American business

community. Let's go to our correspondent

Gary O'Donoghue in Washington. What has been happening to the

President's business advisers today? We ignore the manufacturing Council

started losing members, one resigned after Saturday and Donald Trump's

words via, the chief executive of the pharmaceutical company, a string

of others then resigned and a separate advisory body called the

Strategic Policy Forum started to resign and now Donald Trump has

disbanded both. Does it matter, advisers? Donald Trump came to power

saying he will bring back manufacturing to the USA and here

was the great and the good of the manufacturing sector lining up to

help deliver that and now he has had to get rid of them. So it matters

not only in how it looks but will also help in how he can deliver on

his promises from the campaign. At least 600 hundred people

are still believed to be missing in Sierra Leone -

after the devastating mudslides that More than 100 children are among

the 400 confirmed dead so far. Martin Patience is in Freetown

and sent this report. In Freetown the ambulances are

rushing not at the hospital but to They are ferrying the dead,

victims buried alive by a The relatives wait outside

to collect their bodies. Daniel wasn't home

when disaster struck. But he tells me six members

of his family are dead, The grief and anger

is tangible here. This is a nation in mourning

the loss of hundreds. And rescue workers say

that authorities are This gaping scar was once

a neighbourhood, but now the scene Diggers have been drafted in

but there are no sniffer dogs, not The fear is disease could

spread unless hundreds A trickle of aid is getting

through but many like Adama Dr Nathaniel Williams works for one

of the main hospitals in Freetown and treated the injured

after the mudslide. Nothing prepares you for this. We

were not prepared for it. With so many countless lives lost, but some

people who were not told they lost their son, there are some people who

are only finding out days after the incident. Also there are a few that

have lost several members of the family. So the case I mentioned

earlier about the man who lost three relatives and also the lady who had

to be called later on. We had to do resuscitation for them, some were in

shock, some were due to blood loss, some had injuries from minor

injuries to very serious ones and fractures, which we attended to,

mostly. But now we are not seeing survivors, sadly.

Days of relentless monsoon rains across Bangladesh,

Nepal and India have killed over 250 people.

This satellite image from The United Nations Institute

for Training and Research shows flood-affected regions

The red areas show that nearly 40% of central

17 million people are believed to be affected by the flooding.

Meanwhile, in the northern Indian state of Bihar alone,

floods have killed 56 people since Sunday and affected

Back in neighbouring Bangladesh, at least 39 people have been killed.

And in Nepal, at least 115 people have been killed,

with severe flooding affecting around 20 percent of

A third of Bangladesh is now underwater after

Rivers flowing in from neighbouring India are swollen,

adding to the woes of this low-lying nation.

The floods have affected hundreds of thousands of people.

Those affected are doing their best to salvage whatever is left

Bangladesh army troops have been deployed across the flooded areas

Many people have moved into one of more than 1000 temporary relief

shelters that have hastily been built for those

In some parts of the country train services have been suspended

after the floods washed away railway tracks.

In Nepal, much of the heavily populated southern lowlands have

This is the situation in one district in the south-east

Residents say they have lost everything.

The Government have been slow to react.

Translation: Cattle were mostly affected.

But our Government is not paying attention.

If Government doesn't do anything who else will?

The focus is now on getting relief to those in need.

The Nepalese Army soldiers are doing their best to come

to the aid of victims, but already aid agencies warn that

Nepal could face a humanitarian crisis if food and water does not

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

A leading Iranian opposition figure has begun a hunger strike in protest

at being under house arrest for six years.

80-old-Mehdi Karroubi ran for the presidential election

He was detained for his part in mass protests over the disputed result.

The defeated candidate in last week's presidential election

in Kenya, Raila Odinga, has announced he intends

to challenge the result in the Supreme Court.

Mr Odinga said his opposition coalition had collected concrete

evidence of what he described as 'massive irregularities'

The re-election of Uhuru Kenyatta was described as free and fair

The Philippine president, Rodrigo Duterte, has said he can

solve the country's drug trafficking problem by killing

His announcement follows raids by police in Manila on Tuesday

which saw 32 people die - something he described

Thousands of people have so far been killed since President Duterte

One of the most challenging issues in Britain's

departure from the EU - Brexit - is how to manage the border

between the Irish Republic and Northern Ireland,

The British government has now published proposals on what should

It says, it doesn't want any physical infrastructure,

like customs posts, or the "hard borders of the past".

It's an issue which has profound implications for the economy

and politics in Northern Ireland - given the violent

Chris Buckler reports from Narrow Water on the Irish border.

For more than 300 miles, crossing fields and bridges,

roads and rivers, there is a political dividing line

But it is a border that cannot be seen, and many want

Soft toys and cushions are the latest protest

Where some kind of barriers could divide towns like Belcoo and

Blacklion in the Republic, they are either side of this bridge

and people in areas like this have jobs,

businesses and friends that require them to cross this border regularly.

I trust this board are up to 20 times every day, sometimes moving

goods or sometimes managing staff on whatever is required and my daily

work. If there were any checks that slowed that that would create lots

of logistical difficulties. The Government wants no return

to the days when border huts and customs posts marked

where the Norwich Island This paper seems to dismiss the idea

of a return to infrastructure or And ministers say they are

determined to protect Allowing the free

movement of people across Ideas and aspirations

that will be welcomed beyond these islands

and Brussels, but ones which raise political

and practical difficulties,

with claims that it could allow a back door

for We do want to ensure

that we don't see a return to the borders of the past,

we don't see a return to a hard border and that are able to ensure

that the crucial flow of goods and people between Northern Ireland and

the Republic of Ireland is able to Some have raised doubts

about the UK's ability to forge trade deals

with other countries if it agrees to meet

the EU's standards for

food and agriculture. And if a customs deal cannot

be agreed with the EU, there are questions

about what will happen to the billions of pounds

of trade carried along

these busy border roads. The British Government believes

technology and online declarations could be used

to monitor goods carried But there are concerns about

smuggling and the Irish Government I don't believe the island

of Ireland issue's will be resolved through technology

and I believe this paper but we also accept that, which is a step

forward and I welcome that. It does leave you wondering

what the board it is going to look like and if you are

outside of the customs union how you We are no clearer as to knowing

what that is going to be, That is because a negotiation now

needs to take place. And there is a will to find

solutions in this negotiation because tied up with the politics

and practicalities are concerns about the attention impact of peace

and prosperity at this, what is We can cross to Westminster now

and talk to our political I want to talk about the bigger

picture because the triple triggered the formal announcement about

leaving the EU in March. What progress has been made? More

than one year since the letter ends and there has been some criticism

the UK Government has been slow to get on with it. Now the talks are

underway, formal negotiations are happening, and other violent at the

end of August and what we're seeing from the UK Government is what it

thinks might happen on some of the key issues after Brexit. So we had a

paper on customs policy and now this one on the Irish border. All of this

is still subject to negotiation with the EU who set out their own

position on various elements and we are led to believe there is some

agreement on some issues but still a long way to go on the big picture

stuff. The UK is meant to lead the EU by March 2019, so the clock is

ticking. Now we are hearing that is likely to be a period of transition

after the official date that could last up to three years while all the

new arrangements have time to bed end and that is to give the issue

since two businesses in the UK and on the continent.

Broadly speaking, still a long way to go. Is it fair to say it is not

clear what Brexit should mean both for the Government and also the main

opposition, Labour Party? And there are different factions

within the party about what they would like to see from Brexit. The

Conservative Party have always been deeply split on the issue of the EU,

it has played the party for a long time and many in that party put the

referendum would settle the issue but still some think the UK should

take a hard approach and leave the customs union and single market as

quickly as possible. Now we are hearing from Government ministers

are there could be this slightly longer phased approach before we

reached that point. And the Labour Party also has different views about

whether or not the UK should stay in or out some of the key EU

institutions such as the single market. There is no consensus. That

is to some degree making negotiations harder because the EU

seeks clarity from the UK Government and it is through this position

papers we are seeing today, with the Government setting out its

negotiation position, it hopes to provide that clarity sought

negotiations can progress, but there is still lots questions about how

these ideas can work in practice. Thank you. There is a lot more on

this issue on the BBC website as well.

We may have a solution to the mystery of the Frankenstein

dinosaur - the skeleton found in South America -

and mysterious because the bones appeared to come from many different

Our science correspondent Pallab Ghosh reports:

In the mountains of Chile, researchers discover a dinosaur,

the like of which has never been seen before.

Back in their lab in Buenos Aires, they carefully cut through

the sandstone to find a bizarre skeleton.

They named their dinosaur Chilesaurus.

This animal had a real mix of features from different dinosaurs.

It hip bones were like those of plant eaters such

And its arms and body were like meat eaters such

And so Chilesaurus became known as the Frankenstein dinosaur.

But now a British researcher thinks he has solved the mystery.

Chilesaurus has been revealed to be the missing link

between one group of dinosaur, like the Stegosaurus

and Triceratops, and another group which contains dinosaurs

It really is the missing piece of the puzzle.

Tyrannosaurus Rex and stegosaurus were thought to be in different

branches of the dinosaur family tree.

But researchers have shown that they are both

The Frankenstein dinosaur now fits in perfectly as an earlier animal

that came before them, which is why its skeleton

This reassessment is important, because it will radically change

the theory of how dinosaurs evolved and split into different groups.

Chilesaurus is there at the beginning of one

And hopefully, by understanding more about its biology,

we will understand what the driving features of those big

The skeleton was once a puzzle, but now it might be the key

After months of speculation, Daniel Craig has confirmed

that he will play James Bond again - but just one more time.

So why the change of heart - here's the BBC's Chi Chi Izundu.

Months of speculation, will Daniel Craig comeback

Daniel is the seventh actor to take on Bond and is commercially the most

successful of the franchise with Skyfall being the first

to break the $1 billion mark at the box office,

it was only a matter of time before he was back home at MI6,

regardless of how many times it's been destroyed in the films.

Despite the cars, the Martinis on tap and of course the women,

let's not forget that after the release of Spectre, Daniel

said he would rather slit his wrists than play the fictional

And if you believe what you read in the press,

And while Daniel was mulling over that offer other names

But for the fans, Daniel is The Man with the Golden Gun.

After all of this talk we finally have an answer

Daniel Craig has reinvented bond and his films are among the most

successful and critically acclaimed, so I think we are really glad we got

the answer we are looking forward to Bond 25.

He will be 51 by the time Bond 25 hits the cinemas in 2019

and the stunts from Spectre left him needing knee surgery.

So it's understandable that he says this time is the last time.

Tens of thousands of Elvis fans - have been at a candelit

vigil at his home - Graceland in Tennessee, to mark

His daughter Lisa Marie, and his former wife Priscilla

thanked the crowd for their decades of dedication to his memory.

They have come to honour his swagger, stale and voice that made

them of the most injury artists of the 20th century. This is the moment

fans have been waiting for. Lisa Marie Presley 's stand at the gates

of the great plan to welcome them in, some light candles as they make

the pilgrimage up the hill to pay tribute at Elvis Presley's grave.

She was one of the coolest man in the world, he lost all the people,

no matter where they come from, no matter what your skin colour that

catalogues all the people. Can you remember the first record

you heard? My mother had his music playing in

his womb so I all it took my mother I am an Elvis fan.

What is so impressive about Elvis? I like his snarl. Can you do it?

That's pretty good. At just.

At just 21, Elvis changed the face and sound of rock and roll forever.

Record labels said they were looking for a "white man

Some saw his music as dangerous, as crossing racial boundaries.

Before we discovered rhythm and blues and turn it into rock and roll

your music was your parents' music. Here we have our own music and it

was dangerous music. Maybe religion or politics didn't bridge these gaps

but the music did. An Elvis was right on that edge.

His death broke the heart of thousands.

40 years on, a visit to Greece plan is a pilgrimage for many people and

saw Elvis does live on. His influence in modern music and in his

fans, who believe his influence will never die.

Our top story, more criticism of Donald Trump's comments on white

supremacists. America's last two Republican presidents have issued a

joint condemnation of bigotry, anti-Semitism and hated whatever it

is found in the USA. There is lots more on the BBC website, including a

piece that has just gone up call Charlottesville, What Made Donald

Trump's Remark So Offensive? And that includes eyewitness reports

from the BBC journalist who was there at the weekend. Thanks for

joining us.