President trump has warned iran that the us has 52 potential iranian targets lined up should tehran attack any of its citizens or assets in response to the killing of its general Qasem Soleimani in iraq. Meanwhile Us Led Coalition forces in iraq have confirmed that two rocket attacks have taken place near bases housing us troops in baghdad. It happened after the funeral procession for general soleimani took place. Iranian officials have promised what theyve described as severe revenge for his death. Quentin sommerville reports. They came in their thousands to honour Qasem Soleimani and they called him a hero. To many more in iraq and beyond, he was the regions principal villain. Familiar chants rang out, death to america, death to israel. He served his iranian masters well. Its regime has cast him as a proud shia martyr. In death, he has been elevated to the rank of lieutenant general. In iran there were more anti western protests. President rouhani visited the soleimani family and again warned of harsh revenge for the assassination of the general. He said, the americans are not aware of the big mistake they made. They will face the consequences of their crime, not only today, but also in the coming years. President donald trump gave the assassination order. He is facing re election. He was planning a very major attack and we got him. But already doubts are being cast over the reason for the strike and there are fears that the us will cast the middle east into another war. I dont believe for a moment that he does want a war and i am sure he has calculated what the response is likely to be, but i think if he is going to be effective, there needs to be a more consistent long term approach. Thousands of american soldiers are pouring into the region. Other americans have been told to leave. Britain and france is advising against travel to most of iraq. The funeral continued to karbala. After iraq, Qasem Soleimanis body will be flown to tehran and then to his hometown for burial. He did more thanjust serve iran overseas, he was iran overseas. And in a rare honour, the countrys Supreme LeaderAyatollah Khomeini will preside over final prayers, mourning the death of his most influential general. Quentin somerville, bbc news, beirut. Nader hashemi is an iranian american and director of the center for middle east studies at the university of denver. Hejoins me now from toronto. Thank you forjoining us. First of all let me ask you. We were talking about the ways the situation could escalate quite a lot over the last 24 escalate quite a lot over the last 2a hours. What about the ways in which it can de escalate, what are the options for calming things down and taking a step back . There are not a lot of good options available. What has to happen is we need High Level International figures with gravitas, people such as the us secretary general perhaps, the president of france who has in the past tried to broker some sort of dialogue between iran and the United States but they are going to have to travel to tehran and to washington, dc to try to talk both sides back from the precipice. The big question is, what is iran going to do in response to the assassination of Qasem Soleimani and which arguments will be persuasive that roughly within the next year there will be a new president in the us possibly that might improve irans position and you know iran has to be convinced that they have to respond proportionately, not to escalate what seems to be an imminent war thatis what seems to be an imminent war that is on the horizon. You talked about brokering some sort of deal or trying to get someone with a big name to come in and help the situation. The problem here is that iran is stuck between a rock and a ha rd iran is stuck between a rock and a hard place because it must ramp up the rhetoric and threatened to retaliate but it has to be seen to be strong but it isnt want to escalate things really, does it . Be strong but it isnt want to escalate things really, does mm is not going to win a battle with the largest power on the planet, so it has to be careful it does not overreach. You it has to be careful it does not overreach. You are it has to be careful it does not overreach. You are dealing with a president that is very erratic, com pletely president that is very erratic, completely unpredictable, that doesnt care about stability in the middle east or International Peace and security. He is driven by his own ego so and security. He is driven by his own ego so that is a cause for concern but at the same time, if iranfor concern but at the same time, if iran for its own National Security perspective doesnt respond that shows that the us can get away with assassinating senior leaders. So tehran is a much weaker military power, and it does not have a lot of good options but at the same time from tehrans perspective they feel that this is another attempt by the United States to try and collapse the regime so i suspect there will be some serious military response in the coming weeks. I have spoken to a few a nalysts the coming weeks. I have spoken to a few analysts over the last day or so and they say similar things about the iran nuclear deal, many people see that as the genesis of these issues, the us stepping away from that deal has caused huge problems. What role do you think france has in bringing that deal back together . France has been pretty close, in late summer and france has been pretty close, in late summerand in france has been pretty close, in late summer and in the fall, trying to broker some sort of dialogue. The unique position that france is in is that Emmanuel Macron has fairly good relations with donald trump. Donald trump seems to trust him to a certain extent but he also has a direct line to the iranians, to president rouhani. So this is a time for france to try and restart those types of negotiations, or to bring about at least a dialogue which was the focus of the Previous Branch attempt to try to bring both sides back from the brink of what seems like an imminent war. Thank you very much indeed. The australian bushfires crisis shows no sign of abating. A number of new fires have taken hold in the state of New South Wales, and some residents have been warned its too late to leave. Shaimaa khalil reports from the Southern Coast of New South Wales. It promised to be a day of danger and these bushfires have lived up to every emergency warning. The hellish combination of high temperatures, strong winds and dry conditions have made some of these blazes too vast to control. In kangaroo island, a famous holiday destination, a couple died trying to escape the inferno. They were found near their car. In victoria, as blazes continued to rage in the east, evacuees from mallacoota were getting ready to board the navy ship taking them to safety. A moment of relief, after a harrowing few days stranded in the fire ravaged town. Our only option was to go down to the foreshore and sit it out and at one stage we had 25 fire trucks with us. Sorry. The prime minister, scott morrison, has said 3000 reserve troops will be deployed to help tackle the raging bush fires. The first time this has happened in australias history. But this video he posted on twitter, showing the governments response, accompanied by upbeat music, drew angry criticism. Many accusing him of using this catastrophe as a pr opportunity. This gusty wind is now picking up very strongly and it is bringing heavy smoke to southern New South Wales, here on the coast. This is what the firefighters are dreading, because it fans these blazes, making them unstoppable, but it also spreads those embers, making the fire behaviour quite unpredictable. The howling winds and billowing smoke were enough of an alarm for people in this holiday park in this coastal town. Some were hosing their cabins. 0thers took to the beach to seek refuge. This woman did not take any chances. She gathered her family, her pets and her sons wheelchair and headed straight to the shore. Ijust got a phone call from a friend, whose brother is a Police Officer and he said, get the hell out. We have just had the police come up our street and said that they expected it to impact our houses in the next 20 to 30 minutes. The authorities have warned that the situation is still volatile and could get worse. A foreboding and now a familiar message to the people in australia. Shaimaa khalil, bbc news, on the Southern Coast of New South Wales. A short time ago ben shepherd from the Rural Fire Service gave me an update from their headquarters in sydney. Still across New South Wales more than 140 fires continue to burn covering an area 3. 4 million hectares. Thankfully today a bit more favourable weather but we continue to see the fires move, particularly in the south east of the state, the far Southern Coastline of New South Wales where we see fires across the border from victoria into New South Wales burning in a northerly direction towards smaller villages and towns like eden where we are currently still advising people to leave and to seek shelter indoors, as a fire purchase. Over the coming days we will see more favourable weather where we can start back burning on a number of these fires to try to bring them under control, but towards the end of the week it is likely we will see again hot, dry and windy conditions return to many parts of New South Wales and we wont have all of those fires contain by that time. We have been hearing of temperatures hitting 50 degrees in some areas. That must make it incredibly difficult. It is the temperatures, humidity and extraordinarily strong winds. Yesterday we saw westerly winds which come out of the centre of the continent, the drier centre, whipping up across the state then the low humidity has combined with those temperatures driving up the fire dangers into the top of what we know as the extreme, causing fires to behave very erratically. We saw them causing thunderstorms and lightning as a result. It was an incredibly difficult day. 0n the back end of that we saw a terrific southerly change made its way up the coast forcing these fires in a more northern direction impacting on further homes in town so it was an incredibly difficult day, so we have some more favourable weather coming but what need is rain and lots of it. In terms of evacuating, you have mentioned it is too late for some people to evacuate but have other people be leaving their homes and moving away from areas of danger, having found that easy or difficult, to persuade people to go . Over the last few days leading up to this weekend a number of people on the south coast of New South Wales, a very big area at this time for holiday makers, we saw tens of thousands of people move out of those areas ahead of this fire danger day which makes ourjob that much easier, not having to worry about people in isolated communities on headlands and beachfronts, where these fires were heading to, so we are seeing a Great Community response but also many land holders ensuring that their homes are well prepared, but there is no doubt that over the past 2a hours, we have lost a number of homes. We will be looking to take stock over the coming days to work out how many homes and businesses and structures like churches, schools and all that may been lost in the firefight yesterday. And we have more from australia later in the programme. Let s get some of the day s other news. At least 28 people have been killed and many others wounded in an air raid against a military school in the libyan capital, tripoli. Its thought forces loyal to the militia commander Khalifa Haftar may be behind the attacks. Violence has intensified in libya since last month, when general haftar announced a new phase in his forces advance on the capital which is held by the un recognised government. China has sacked the official in charge of relations with hong kong, six months after la rge scale anti beijing protests began in the territory. Rumours had been circulating about wang zhimins departure in recent weeks, amid reports that china was dissatisfied with his offices handling of the crisis. Mr wang has been replaced by luo huining, formerly communist party leader in the Northern Province of shaanxi. Police in florida have charged sir rod stewart with battery, after he was accused of punching a Security Guard on new years eve. The rock star is reported to have been trying to get into a private event, at a hotel in palm beach. Stay with us on bbc news, still to come why a plan to recreate an historic walk through the jungle by the ugandan president has been greeted with scepticism. The japanese people are in mourning following the death of emperor hirohito. Thousands converged on the imperial palace to pay their respects when it was announced he was dead. Good grief, after half a century of delighting fans around the world, Charlie Brown and the rest of the gang are calling it quits. The singer, paul simon, starts his tour of south Africa Tomorrow in spite of protest and violence from some black activist groups. They Say International artists should continue to boycott south africa until majority rule is established. Teams were trying to scoop up lumps of oil as france recognises it faces an ecological crisis. Three weeks ago, the authorities confidently assured these areas that oil from the broken tanker erika would head out to sea. It didnt. The worlds tallest skyscraper opens later today. The burj dubai has easily overtaken its nearest rivals. This is bbc news. The headlines rockets land near the us embassy in the iraqi capital just hours after thousands across the countryjoined a funeral procession for assassinated iranian general qazem soleimani. Australia suffers one of the worst bushfire days of the season as temperatures nudge 50 celsius and strong winds whip up the flames. Lets get more on that story now. As the fires continue to burn, many are assessing how best the country should prepare itself for future bushfire seasons. Lets speak now with david bowman, a professor of Fire Sciences at the university of tasmania. Thank you forjoining us, professor. Lets talk about the fact that these fires have been so serious and so deadly this year. What is the reason behind that, and why has it been so bad . The reason is pretty straightforward. We are looking at a climate and weather driven event, extreme drought, extreme heat, extreme drought, extreme heat, extreme wind, lightning, all of the factors that make fire being given to us ina factors that make fire being given to us in a gigantic volume, and it is just recurrent. It has been going on for two months and will probably go on for another two months. How big a problem is it that australia has not been possibly as prepared as it could be for fires of this extent . Honestly it is a bit like driving without a seat belt on and then having a high speed collision. You know, many people have been trying to say, put your seat belt on, we have got to start preparing for Climate Change. We have got to start preparing for the fact that without Climate Change we were exposing ourselves to great risk of bushfire and unfortunately those m essa 9 es bushfire and unfortunately those messages just were not coming through. We have had many near misses this century over the last 20 yea rs, misses this century over the last 20 years , we misses this century over the last 20 yea rs, we have misses this century over the last 20 years, we have had some extreme events, the famous black saturday fires, but there have been many others and the huge policy adjustment and adaptation programmes of decarbonisation, all of those m essa 9 es of decarbonisation, all of those messages just fell through the cracks. What needs to happen, what needs to change to improve the way that australia deals with these fires . Unfortunately now, we cannot sort of rely on the old idea ofjust decarbonising. A lot of the political debate is still trapped, talking about as if a Climate Change policy is going to fix this problem when we are now moving into adaptation which is extremely disruptive culturally, socially and economically. We have to think seriously about our firefighting responses, our capacity and our communities for coexisting with those fires which are becoming more frequent and more intense, so we are talking about absolute major shake up, like a huge shake up. This isa shake up, like a huge shake up. This is a head on collision shake up. Have much appetite is there amongst australian people for that level of social, economic and day to day change in their lives . social, economic and day to day change in their lives . I think that this has been so traumatic, without some very clear leadership. I am very concerned that we have gone from a very complacent state to bare terror, and that is not healthy for society either way. What we need is some really calm guidance. Australians are amazing people. They have got great capacities. We can get through this. We now pretty much the direction we have got to go, and i think there is now a real, genuine hungerfor change i think there is now a real, genuine hunger for change and interestingly thatis hunger for change and interestingly that is being expressed often at the local government level not at the federal level and that is because the people at the local government level a re closer to the people at the local government level are closer to the action, closer to the trauma and the concerns and anxiety of the society. 0k, professor david berman, thank you for taking the time to talk to us on you for taking the time to talk to us on bbc news. At least 60 people are now known to have died in indonesia, following heavy rains that started on new year s eve. The extreme weather caused landslides and flash flooding around the capital, jakarta and neighbouring regions. Rich preston has this report the new year rains were some of the worst in nearly a decade. Tens of thousands in jakarta were forced from their homes and still are not able to return. Roads and bridges were wiped out. Locals were forced to use boats and makeshift rafts to get between houses and villages. Officials say more than 10,000 Health Workers have been deployed. Medicines and disinfecting kits have been distributed amid concerns over a surge in waterborne and mosquito borne diseases. Many have already sought treatment in makeshift clinics. Landslides have made some villages inaccessible. Emergency supplies had to be dropped in by air. Jakarta regularly floods during the rainy season. But this weeks flooding is the worst since 2013, and there are fears that more rain may be yet to come. The government says itll start cloud seeding, spraying chemicals from planes to try to prompt rainfall before approaching clouds reach the most populous areas, in the hope of preventing further damage or loss of life. Rich preston, bbc news. The president of uganda has begun a six day march through the jungle a journey of nearly 200 kilometres. Yoweri museveni is retracing the route he and his supporters took when they seized power in a military coup. The bbcs tim allman has more. For his supporters, this is a chance to relive a moment of national liberation. For his opponents, it is merely a cynical piece of electioneering. Yoweri museveni will spend the next few days retracing the past, the same journey that he and his guerilla fighters made, some 35 years ago. We ended up back in kampala, on the first, on new years day of 1985. President museveni was sworn into office in january 1986. He had helped overthrow the dictatorships of idi amin and later milton 0bote. He has been criticised for alleged corruption and clamping down on political dissent. President museveni is one of africas longest serving leaders and it is expected he will run for a sixth term of office in 2021. 0ne opposition mp said that ugandans deserve better than a president walking through a jungle. This may be a chance to remember days gone by, but some want to focus on days to come. Tim allman, bbc news. Cape town has celebrated its traditional second new year. Gail maclellan reports. Tweede nuwe jaar, second new year is one of the biggest events in cape town, turning the centre of the city into a huge street party. These minstrels spend all year preparing for the carnival, a celebration of culture and freedom in what South Africans call, the coloured, that is, mixed race community. Its easy to get caught up in the dancing and the music and forget the deeper significance of the carnival, which began over 100 years ago when slaves were given permission to hold their own new year festivities. During the apartheid years, the government tried to kill the tradition and it was made all the more difficult when residents were forcibly removed to areas far from the centre of the city. Isolated out on the cape flats, theyve struggled with unemployment, drug and alcohol abuse and gang violence. Which is why Community Leaders are determined to keep the tradition of the carnival going. They practise evening, after evening. It is really keeping the people of cape town busy, keeping the youngsters in our communities busy, keeping them away from the drugs, away from gangs. The minstrels event year after year, playing a significant role in transforming the society of cape town. The annual carnival is testament to the survival of the community and an uplifting beginning to each new year. You are watching bbc news. Good morning. 0nce good morning. Once again there will be some sunny breaks across parts of the country but for many it will be a cloudy day like yesterday with the odd, fleeting, light shower in the west. The breeze starting to pick up, signs of something windy into next week but with light winds wince out into the morning, clear skies and eastern areas where there could bea and eastern areas where there could be a touch of frost around. Further west, the wind coming from the south west and a fairly mild start. We will see some fleeting, light showers in the west with persistent rain in the hebrides spreading to the highlands, 0rkney and shetland, introducing milder weather compared with yesterday and the breeze picking up elsewhere. For the best of the brakes, the east of wales and the midlands, and the north east of mainland scotland, and temperatures between eight and 12 degrees. That rain clears in the north of scotland and other than a few showers and the west others will have a dry night on sunday into monday. Of course the return to work for many after the christmas break but look at what is waiting in the wings. The weather is set to turn to a lively note as we go into next week. A livelyjet blowing across the atlantic and in each dip we will see areas of low pressure developed. The first one spreads northwards across iceland as we go through into monday, spreading its weather fronts south and eastwards into the uk and ireland and with it strong to gale force winds. To begin with they cross ireland on monday morning, spreading in through much of scotland during the day into wales, western england during the afternoon. Many parts of Eastern England will stay dry throughout monday. Some spells of hazy sunshine at times and a brighter day to finish in Northern Ireland. Temperatures around ten celsius. Heading into monday night, and more potent area of low pressure arriving from the north. This one much larger as well, so the extent of the strong winds will be greater. A very windy day, across the board. The best of the dry weather to the south and east, but heavy rain across the north west of scotland and Northern Ireland, with the strongest of the wins here, touching 80 mph in the north west of scotland. The wind could bring some travel disruption and it could be exceptionally mild, peaking at 16 celsius in the moray firth, with 15 in Northern Ireland and wales, too. And theres winds, to start the week could be pretty disruptive. Stay tuned to the forecast. This is bbc news, the headlines huge crowds have joined funeral processions in iraq, for irans top military commander and other officials killed by a us drone strike. Crowds chanted death to america as Qasem Soleimanis coffin travelled through iraqi cities on its way to iran. In the capital baghdad rockets landed near the us embassy. The premier of New South Wales warns that australia is in what she called unchartered territory after the worst night of bushfires since they started two months ago. Temperatures have nudged 50 degrees celsius in some parts with winds spreading the fires and making their paths even more unpredictable. The death toll from the new year flooding in indonesia hasjumped to 60 with fears growing about the possibility of more torrential rain. Tens of thousands in jakarta are still unable to return to their waterlogged homes after some of the worst flooding in years hit the enormous capital region. Councils in england have urged the courts to impose biggerfines