to world news today. the foreign secretary, borisjohnson, says he has had frank and constructive talks with his iranian counterpart in tehran over the case of british iranian nazanin zaghari—ratcliffe who's been injail since 2016. our diplomatic correspondent james robbins reports. it could look routine, shaking hands before talks. but there is nothing routine about this encounter. the foreign secretary looking uncharacteristically tense, and with good reason. he wants to improve relations, but also criticise some of iran's actions, while arguing for prison releases, including of nazanin zaghari—ratcliffe, a case many accuse him of damaging because of loose talk last month. watching anxiously with me in london, nazanin‘s husband, who has campaigned day in, day out for freedom since she was arrested last year. i'm sure it will make a difference, him being there, raising her case, and in the context of a lot of other stuff, can only help improve relations, can only lead to a better case for us. i think that's right. i'm not expecting that on monday morning he comes back with her on the plane. borisjohnson is saying nothing at all publicly while in iran, instead the foreign office issued a statement after two hours of what they called a constructive meeting. one good sign is that iran's foreign minister confirmed borisjohnson should be able to meet president rouhani tomorrow. something that is not automatic on a visit like this. talks went on for two hours. it seems that this was a genuine discussion, not a pre—scripted exchange. positives and negatives in relations were aired. we should not expect immediate consequences, but iran is in no doubt how much importance the british side attaches to getting nazanin zaghari—ratcliffe home. earlier i asked siavash ardevan of bbc persianian about what might have come up in those meetings. he hasn't met the head of iran'sjudiciary, which is really the branch he should be meeting, the people handling the case. because they are different, aren't they? the government and the judiciary are separate. that's significant in this case. it's a power struggle between the two. often you have the judiciary trying to undermine the government's foreign policy. as much as the president rouhani or borisjohnson‘s counterpart may want to help it boils down to hardliners who controls the judiciary. what do you make of the fact borisjohnson will meet with the president tomorrow? well, the president is not handling her case, so as much as the president may be able to pressure the head of thejudiciary, it's very good. but at the end of the day really it's up to the judiciary whether they want to go along with the government and release her or not. the due process is that after five years, which is the sentence that she has received, if you serve a third of that sentence, then you are eligable for par role. next month will be that, we approach that dead dlien. —— deadline, so that's good news. her husband is being cautiously opt miscontinuing you could say. even though he is not expect willing her to come home on the plane with borisjohnson, he is crossing his fingers she may be back for christmas, is that a realistic time scale if the judiciary decide to release her? it is, like i said, next month will be approaching the third of the sentence she's already served. even according to iranian law if thejudiciary served. even according to iranian law if the judiciary decides that it's appropriate to release her, yes, that could be done. in terms of negotiations, and as you have said, borisjohnson is talking to the government which is separate to the judiciary, but what kind of conversations do you think will be going on, negotiations on the ground? well, we know that the iranians are demanding money owed, something to the tune of £400 million owed by the british government from back in the 70s, they want that money back. the british government has not paid the iranians back because of revolutions and sanctions and we understand they're facilitating now to make that payment possible, that would make the iranians happy and there are bilateral issues, trade and other things signed between the two sides. so the more the iranians feel they've made headways with the british government and private sector they'll feel like they've gained enough concessions to release her. journalists at the bbc are hoping that boris johnson her. journalists at the bbc are hoping that borisjohnson will raise theissue hoping that borisjohnson will raise the issue of how british or persianian journalists over here in the uk are being treated by the iranian government. yes, after boris johnson went to iran the bbc released this statement calling on borisjohnson to bring that issue up. yes, we here at the bbc persian tv are hoping that issue also comes to the foreand boris johnson's negotiations with the iranian authorities. what's the issue? that they are harassing families in iran, interrogating them, summoning them every now and then, pressuring them to somehow force us to resign from oui’ to somehow force us to resign from our jobs, to somehow force us to resign from ourjobs, spreading fake news, personal slander against us. they've also just recently frozen all our assets, so is disinherited dozens of people from properties and whatever assets they may have had in iran. the palestinian president mahmoud abbas has pulled out of a meeting with the us vice president mike pence, which was due to happen in cairo later this month. the announcement comes as protests in the middle east and other muslim countries continue over donald trump's decision to formally recognise jerusalem as the capital of israel. there have also been israeli air strikes on gaza — after rockets were fired from the territory into israel. tom bateman reports. a display of grief and of anger. funerals were held in gaza for two people killed in israeli air strikes last night. the islamist group hamas said the men belonged to their armed wing. weapons stores and a base run by the militant group were targeted said israel. a new round of hostilities between old enemies. israel said three rockets were fired from gaza last night. one landed in this southern israeli town. there was minor damage but no casualties. further disruption took place in jerusalem as palestinians continued to vent their anger at president trump. police broke up protests before they gained momentum. and for a third day in the occupied west bank protesters threw stones and burned tyres. israeli troops responded with tear gas in bethlehem and palestinians answered back. the clashes since mr trump's statement have so far not matched the scale of previous escalations in violence this year but people here remain wary and diplomatic relations between the palestinian leadership and the white house are under severe strain. president trump appealed for calm and moderation. his critics point to what's happened here in the three days since his announcement and say he has stoked precisely the opposite. many israelis continue to praise his move but it comes at the cost of increased tensions. staying in the middle east, and iraq's prime minister has announced that the war against the armed group islamic state in his country, has been won. haider al—abadi says iraq has been liberated and his army is now in full control of the areas along the border with syria. at the height of its strength, the militant group controlled a third of iraqi territory, and proclaimed a caliphate. but in the last few months, it has lost control of all of the remaining areas it held in iraq. i thank all the countries, as well as humanitarian and international organizations, that stood with iraq, and its people, during this battle. i salute every iraqi fighter who took up arms to defend our land. i salute the souls of the martyrs and those injured, and theirfamilies, who preserved iraq and its people. iraq survived united and victorious. the new york times has carried out an investigation which suggests that the number of people who've died in puerto rico as a result of hurricane maria is far higher than official figures suggest. the authorities said that 64 people were killed by the storm in september, but the paper's investigation says the total number of deaths caused by the hurricane could have risen to more than one thousand. let's speak to frances robles from the new york times now. tell us about the investigation, how did you acertain the figure could indeed be far higher than the government said and how certain are you of those fa cts ? and how certain are you of those facts? well, the beauty of what we did is that we are looking at the government's own figures. this is not a scientific study based on theory. it's based on the mortality statistics being compiled by the department of health. what you see is on 20th september the deaths there shoot up, really markedly. so, 0k, there shoot up, really markedly. so, ok, what happened on 20th september? well, there was almost a category five hurricane. so we went back and looked day by day comparing september and october to 2015, 16 and 17. it's absolutely indisputable that about 37 people a day additionally were dying... what do you put the inaccurate government figures down to, this vast discrepancy? well, the thing that's important to consider is that we are not looking at people that drowned 01’ not looking at people that drowned or got hit by a tree or got caught up or got hit by a tree or got caught up in or got hit by a tree or got caught upina or got hit by a tree or got caught up in a tornado. we are looking at what happened when the system collapsed in the days and weeks and months after the hurricane. you have to remember even today most of puerto rico does not have electricity, a lot of people don't have cell service. we are talking about people who didn't have cell service to call 911 or if they did have a landline the ambulance never arrived. people who didn't have electricity to power their respirators. if you are the guy who didn't have electricity for the respirator machine you get to the hospital eventually and you die, that's a natural death. ok. so that's a natural death. ok. so that's how it was coded. the government isn't going out of its way to get behind all of those natural deaths to say how many of these natural deaths were people who we re these natural deaths were people who were waiting for ambulances who had no electricity in their homes and died of heat strokes and things of that nature? i guess that's important to learn from what happened in case heaven forbid this happens again. what are the government saying now they've been presented with this information? they started hedging a couple of weeks ago because other news organisations had also done other kinds of investigations, cnn for example, literally called every single funeral home in puerto rico and what's interesting about the cnn study compared to ours is that the results match identically. cnn was able to reach half of the funeral homes and came up with 500 deaths that the funeral directors thought we re that the funeral directors thought were hurricane—related. we came up with 1,000 deaths looking at the totality of the mortality statistics. so now the government is saying ok, well, if you bring us the information we will look into it. so this morning in fact the day after the story first posted online, they increased the total by two. so one of them is a person whose respirator machine was not functioning and another is a person who died waiting foran another is a person who died waiting for an ambulance. what's interesting is both those people did die on the day of the hurricane.le. what do you make of president trump's intervention in this, on the day he tweeted that the island had to deal with its massive debt, food water and medical top priorities and doing well, hashtag fema he said. weeks later he visited costa rica and praised the low official death toll, related it to hurricane katrina saying that had been a real catastrophe so welcoming this relatively low death toll in the area. that's right. i think that donald trump was working off the information that he was being given by the government and the day that he was in puerto rico they were still sticking to the number 16 and it was a few hours after he left that the number first doubled and everybody was like, wait a second, a second ago the president was here praising the number 16. then when i went back and we looked, went day by day from the 20th september until october 3rd visit, we saw that 550 people had died, above that same time period the year before. is it 16 or was it 50? that's the question. 0k -- 550. there we will leave it, thank you forjoining us. tens of thousands of people have filled the streets of paris for the funeral of the singer johnny hallyday — who died on wednesday at the age of 74. his coffin was driven in a cortege down the champs—elysees, followed by hundreds of leather—clad bikers. from paris, hugh schofield sent this report. for nearly 60 years, johnny hallyday sang his songs to the french, and today they came to bid him goodbye. tens of thousands of fans, many of them from the older generation, people who grew up to his sounds in the happy, optimistic days of the 60s. for france, johnny was le rock and roll. he was the first to open their ears to the thrilling new music coming from the united states. america was his obsession. america and motorbikes. hence the escort of hundreds of bikers for his funeral cortege down the champs—elysees. translation: let him rest in peace and wreak havoc up there. let him sing, and get it going, and open his heart up there, surrounded by family and friends. stars of music and screen, political leaders past and present, they were all there for the funeral service inside the church. for the french, johnny was their rock hero, the man who, for half a century, was always there with new songs and new performances. with his death people do feel that part of the nation's life has gone. donald trump's visit to the southern us state of mississippi has been met with a protest by democratic leaders. mr trump toured a new civil rights museum in the state capital, jackson. he said he'd studied and admired the american civil rights campaigner, martin luther king, all his life. two democratic party congressmen and the city mayor pulled out of the ceremony, accusing the president of deepening racial divisions in the country. officials in california have extended the red alert caused by a series of wildfires. and say it will now remain in force until at least sunday. one person has been killed, and 700 buildings have been destroyed, by fires burning out of control in several parts of the state. more than 200,000 people have been forced to leave their homes. stay with us, still to come. a new discovery from ancient egypt. archaeologists unveil a mummy and other treasures dating back more than 3,000 years. britain's foreign secretary says he's had frank talks with his iranian counterpart over the case of a british—iranian woman held in prison there. there have been further protests in the israeli occupied west bank and the gaza strip in response to president trump declaring jerusalem to be israel's capital. let's get all the sport now with john watson. the football action first. chelsea suffering a surprise derby defeat at west ham in the premier league today. a goal in the 6th minute was the difference between the two sides to give david moyes his first win since taking charge. west ham remain in the bottom three. the defending champions could be 14 points off the top by the end of the weekend if manchester city beat neighbours united tomorrow. what a great result for us. we needed to find one of the results, we came close against manchester city for long periods, thought we were going to get it. don't get us wrong, it was tough today. chelsea kept us under pressure. we scored a good goal, played well at times in the first half. if we had been better with the ball a couple of times in the second half we might have got another goal. to face one game, at the same time when you play almost always with same players it's very difficult because you have to play something and only is that we have just started this period. the day's other results. christian benteke missed a last minute penalty in palace's 2—2 draw with bournemouth. england's ashes tour of australia has been affected by news of another drinking—related incident. this time ben duckett dropped from england's tour match today for pouring a drink over the head ofjames anderson at a bar in perth. it's the latest incident relating to poor player behaviour in a series which threatens to become a nightmare for the team trailing 2—0 with three matches to play. i think it's fairly trivial. in the climate it's just not acceptable. everyone's been warned about even small things can be blown out of proportion and the ecb have also been quite strict to the boys with their message. it's simply unacceptable. doesn't matter how trivial it is in this environment and what we have had to go through already with some of the small problems. as i said, it's not right, not acceptable. today's warm—up match was intended to give england's batsmen the chance to press their case for inclusion in the remainder of the series. still no one registering that big score which england have missed so far. ronnie o'sullivan is closing in on a 6th uk championship title after a 6—4 victory over stephen maguire in the semifinals. the rocket booked his place in tomorrow's final after holding off a late fightback from maguire. he did hold a 4—0 lead. that was cut back to 5—4 before he took a decisive 6th frame in york. he faces the 2008 winner shaun murphy or ryan day who are playing now. he has been known as a cyclist but bradley wiggins finished in 21st place on his competitive rowing debut at the british indoor championships in london. he retired from cycling last year and was competing in the elite men's 2,000 metres race. he began slowly after mistakenly believing he had false started. he finished with a time of six minutes 22 seconds. half a minute behind the overall winner adam neil. that is all the sport. we're taking you now to the story of a man who over the last 50 years, has discovered more than 20% of the world's coral species. charlie veron was also one of the early scientists to document coral bleaching. we follow him underwater on the great barrier reef i have been diving on the great barrier reef for just i have been diving on the great barrier reef forjust over 50 years. beautiful pictures. archaeologists have discovered a mummy in one of two previously unexplored tombs in the ancient nile city of luxor. the mummy is believed to be about 3,500 years old and that of a senior official from egypt's "new kingdom". other items on display include wooden masks and richly coloured wall paintings. the tombs were apparently discovered by a german archaeologist in the 1990s, but were kept sealed until recently by the egyptian authorities. that's it from me. there is plenty more on our website. don't forget you can get in touch with me and some of the team on twitter — i'm @samanthabbcnews. good evening. the weather has been causing disruption over the past couple of days. we are not out of the woods yet. more ice and snow and strong winds too. tonight ice developing widely across parts of scotland, northern ireland, northern england too. temperatures getting as low as minus 12, perhaps minus 14 across rural parts of scotland. a cold start. further south this band of initially rain turns increasingly to snow as it bumps into that cold air. the met office have issued an amber be prepared warning for the extent of the snow. this is the region we are most likely —— likely to see that disruptive snow, central wales, midlands, parts of northern england also, five to ten centimetres widely, we could see double that over hills. we have this band of rain, sleet and snow. on the southern edge it will mostly befalling as rain. but there could befalling as rain. but there could be some sleet and snow mixed in. further north, birmingham, for instance, towards sheffield, we are likely to see significant snowfall. the winds are a feature, gusting to around 60mph, through the english and bristol channel. the northern half of the country much quieter. still wintry showers for northern scotla nd still wintry showers for northern scotland but things are looking dry elsewhere. it will feel bitterly cold once again. temperatures in glasgow for instance around minus two, that's the top temperature through the day. it will be turning milder further south as that sleet and snow turns increasingly back to rain. but ice once again a problem as we head through sunday night. monday morning rush hour could be quite tricky with slippery surfaces. this low pressure is what we are keeping an eye on on monday. causing disruption in spain, france and portugal. for the uk we could see some of that rain potentially for a time falling as sleet and snow, combined with brisk winds. a quieter picture for monday elsewhere across the country. cold once again, not quite as cold as we are seeing through the weekend. still the odd shower in the west but mainly falling as rain, perhaps sleet. a quiet error day for tuesday with high pressure. we lose the strong winds and most of the wet and snowy weather too. temperatures just around one to nine degrees. a band of rain working in from the west, during wednesday that will push eastwards. wet and windy weather followed by storms. it will be turning milder after a very wintry weekend. bye. this is bbc world news. the headlines: borisjohnson says he has had frank talks with his iranian counterpart in tehran. nazanin zaghari—ratcliffe has been convicted of trying to overthrow the government, which she denies. there have been further protests in the israeli—occupied gaza strip in response to president trump declaring jerusalem to be israel's capital. in rocket fired from gaza has exploded in southern israel. iraq's prime minister has declared the end of the war against is militants in his country. he says his army is now in full control of the areas along the border with syria. and hundreds of thousands of people lining the route of the funeral procession in paris for vetera n funeral procession in paris for veteran french rock star

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