the deal largely brought an end to the 30 year conflict in northern ireland, known as the troubles but political turmoil persists, even if less violent in nature than the past. here s president biden s schedule: on wednesday, biden will deliver a speech at ulster university before travelling to the republic of ireland. there, he ll celebrate his own family s roots, attending events in louth and mayo. there will also be official discussions in dublin, where biden will meet with irish president michael d. higgins. he ll then head back to america on friday. the bbc s lucy hockings has more from belfast. so president biden has arrived and there was a small crowd that came down to the centre of belfast to greet him. they braved the wind and the rain the weather has truly been atrocious to welcome him to belfast. ana i spoke to one northern ireland politics student and he said the reason that he had come was because a visit by one of the most powerful people in the world, a us
and their philippine counterparts. we ve seen a much warmer relation between the us and philippines under president ferdinand marcos, jr, much more, much closer than they were under his predecessor, president duterte, who was beijing leaning. i think this again further strengthens that relationship and defence alliance the philippines was after. and it comes as we are seeing these massive military exercises. tell us what these joint drills involve. that s right, the exercises, called balikatan, which means shoulder to shoulder , now the largest exercises, involving 17,000 troops, and 5,400 philippine troops. 12,00 american troops. they involved for the first time live fire exercises at sea and live fire exercises on a sunken ship in the south china sea. remember these were preplanned and they were announced when the us secured a defence