is the front—runner ahead of next month's poll. live from our studio in singapore, this is bbc news. it's newsday. it's 6am in the morning in singapore and 1am in the morning in moscow, where the united nations secretary—general has embarked on a diplomatic mission. antonio guterres took part in talks with president putin, after which the russian leader repeated his stated reasons for invading ukraine, while claiming that he still hoped for a diplomatic solution. the un says russia's president vladimir putin has agreed "in principle" to the un and the red cross being involved in the evacuation of civilians from the azovstal steel plant in the besieged city of mariupol. in a major policy move, germany has now authorised the supply of dozens of tanks to ukraine. and the us has committed to supporting ukraine's resistance "for the long haul". our russia editor steve rosenberg reports from moscow. he was trying to show it was business as usual. in the kremlin, vladimir putin began the day meeting russian olympic champions. like them, he hates losing. with the olympians, putin was up close and personal. not so with his next guest. the un secretary—general had come to talk about russia's invasion of ukraine. the seating plan said everything about the gap between moscow and the international community. translation: you're telling me that russia's humanitarian corridors - in ukraine are not functioning. mr secretary general, you've been deceived. the corridors are open. we've helped more than 100,000 people leave mariupol. and from the un, a plea to russia for peace. it is my deep conviction that the sooner we end this war, the better, for the people of ukraine, for the people of the russian federation and those far beyond. the kremlin agreed in principle to un and red cross involvement in evacuations from mariupol. but moscow isn't rushing to halt its offensive. for diplomacy to succeed, there needs to be the political will for peace. but right now, there's little sign of that in the kremlin. vladimir putin seems determined to continue the offensive he launched in ukraine — at least until he can secure what he can present to the russian people as a victory. that means no ceasefire in ukraine. the russian military continues to attack, and continues to deny that russian troops have committed war crimes. kremlin critics argue that considering the scale of destruction, the un chief should have travelled to ukraine first before flying to moscow. i'm not in a position to give any advice to the general secretary of the united nations, but i would probably go to mariupol first. i would go to bucha. i would go to irpin. i would go to all those places, talk to people and then fly back to moscow and meet with putin and say, "mr president, "what you are doing is crime." russia claims to be acting in self—defence, but it was president putin who ordered his troops to attack ukraine. the kremlin started this. it's determined to end it on its terms. the us secretary of defence says he wants russia to be less able to "bully its neighbours". lloyd austin was speaking in germany at a meeting of more than a0 nations about the conflict in ukraine. mr austin committed to supporting ukraine's resistance against russia's invasion "for the long haul" and pledged to move "heaven and earth" to make sure ukraine was victorious. i'm joined now from washington by douglas lute, the former us ambassador to nato and a retired us army lieutenant general. it's great to have you on the programme, douglas. just to say, listening to what the security of defence from the us has just said, about the fact that it will move heaven and earth to help ukraine, what does that mean in your view? i think that means that conferences like secretary huston hosted today in germany, so some a0 nations, not just the 30 alleys and the nato alliance but other nations, joints to co—ordinate the supply of military weaponry, and increasingly heavy weaponry, to the ukrainians as long as it takes, so as much as it takes, as long as it takes, i think is the message coming out of secretary austin today. and is the message coming out of secretary austin today. and what do ou think secretary austin today. and what do you think rush _ secretary austin today. and what do you think rush or— secretary austin today. and what do you think rush or a's _ secretary austin today. and what do you think rush or a's response - secretary austin today. and what do you think rush or a's response to i you think rush or a's response to that will be? because we've already heard from the foreign minister, haven't we, who said, there's a real risk of this conflict is collating into world war iii? president putin meanwhile says a diplomatic solution is possible. where do we go from here? i is possible. where do we go from here? ., �* ~' �* , . here? i don't think there's much chance of— here? i don't think there's much chance of a _ here? i don't think there's much chance of a diplomat _ here? i don't think there's much chance of a diplomat solution i here? i don't think there's much i chance of a diplomat solution yet, but i think that's premature. the battlefield is such that neither side has much room for compromise at this point, and that's why while secretary—general who —— antonio gutierrez made a brave attempt today to make a dialogue. douglas, let'sjust look attempt today to make a dialogue. douglas, let's just look at nato for the moment and your experience there, and valuable at this time. when president putin first invaded ukraine, he consistently claimed that he was doing that because of nato's extension on his borders. what effects do you think the invasion of ukraine has had on nato's membership? i invasion of ukraine has had on nato's membership?— invasion of ukraine has had on nato's membership? i can tell you it has had the — nato's membership? i can tell you it has had the opposite _ nato's membership? i can tell you it has had the opposite effect. - nato's membership? i can tell you it has had the opposite effect. his - has had the opposite effect. his invention has accelerated the moves. and now you have two nordic states, sweden and finland, who are on the bridge of declaring their intent to apply for nato membership, so the 30 member alliance is on the verge of becoming 32, and finland of course has the lungs land border with russia of any european state, so if anything, president putin has been very nonstrategic in terms of the effects he has generated —— the longest land border. effects he has generated -- the longest land border.— effects he has generated -- the longest land border. douglas lute there, the former _ longest land border. douglas lute there, the former us _ longest land border. douglas lute i there, the former us ambassador to nato and retired us army lieutenant general. the head of the international atomic energy agency has said the levels of radiation at the disused chernobyl nuclear power plant are "abnormal and very, very dangerous". russian troops took over the former power plant on the first day of the invasion of ukraine and stayed there for several weeks. workers told the bbc they were forced to steal fuel to keep generators working and prevent a dangerous leak of radioactive material. our eastern europe correspondent sarah rainsford reports now on the iaea's visit to chernobyl. the road to chernobyl is littered with the wreckage of war. this was a route taken by russian tanks as they advanced on kyiv. it cuts right through the contaminated zone, around the world's worst ever nuclear disaster, but hundreds of russian troops stopped and made their base here at the atomic plant. very good. well done, well done... today, the head of the un's nuclear energy watchdog thanked the ukrainian technicians who stayed at their post, protecting the site under occupation. i don't know if we were very close to disaster, but the situation was absolutely abnormal and very, very dangerous. the un brought radiation monitors and other kits to replace what was damaged by the russians or stolen when they withdrew. the troops had dug trenches into radioactive soil here and churned up dangerous dust with their armoured vehicles, apparently oblivious to the risk. the un says radiation levels here are now back to normal, but the ukrainian military are still clearing the area of mines and booby—traps. one word that's used about the russian troops' presence here in chernobyl is "reckless" — the very fact that troops occupied a nuclear facility in the first place, and then the way they behaved while they were here. the risk of an accident here was real. slavia ukraini! so as they marked the anniversary of the 1986 meltdown, ukrainian officials said they diverted another disaster, although the soldiers on guard when the russians rolled in were all captured. 169 from this unit are now missing. "they're our comrades and we're worried about them," alexander tells me. "we want them back as soon as possible." just beyond the exclusion zone, the invading troops occupied houses too. here, they parked a tank right outside. nina was so scared, she hid in the woods. "we stayed there for two nights without any food "or water," she tells me. "it was awful." nina's fear was no high—tech nuclear accident, it was the russian soldiers who climbed through her window and took over her home. sarah rainsford, bbc news, chernobyl. meanwhile, the russian company gazprom says it will halt the supply of gas to poland and bulgaria later on wednesday. both countries rely on gazprom for most of their gas imports. poland's state gas company has described the move as a breach of contract, but gazprom said warsaw had refused to pay in roubles, in line with new rules announced in march. we have a live page on the war in ukraine on our website. and it's constantly being updated. you can also find an analysis of events, the latest news from reporters on the ground. just log on to bbc.com/news or download the bbc app. let's take a look at some other stories in the headlines. police in pakistan say three chinese nationals and their pakistani driver were killed in an explosion in the southern port city of karachi. a group that opposes chinese investment in pakistan has said that a female suicide bomber carried out the attack. the group has targeted chinese nationals on a number of occasions, as has the pakistani taliban. the government in sri lanka, which has run out of money to import food, fuel and medicine, has come up with a new visa plan to bring in foreign currency. the golden paradise visa programme will allow foreigners to live and work in the country for ten years if they deposit at least $100,000 us in a local bank. there've been widespread anti—government protests over the desperate shortage of basic goods. the mother of a man due to be executed in singapore has failed in a last—minute appeal against his sentence. nagaenthran dharmalingam, who has a low iq, is on death row for smuggling a small amount of heroin into singapore more than a decade ago. despite pleas for clemency and protests in singapore, his sentence has been upheld on a number of appeals. to the philippines now, where — in just over two weeks — filipinos will vote for their next president. the current frontrunner is bongbong marcos, the son of the country's late dictator ferdinand marcos, whose corrupt and autocratic rule led to him being deposed in popular revolt in 1986. marcoer says he will make the country "rise again" but has been criticised for avoiding serious scrutiny about his father's legacy during election campaigning. howard johnson reports from manila. activists and students out in force during a public holiday to commemorate the popular uprising that ousted late philippine dictator ferdinand marcos. mr marcos ruled the country for two decades, much of it under martial law. his regime rigged elections, tortured and killed political opponents and plundered an estimated $10 billion. more than 30 years on, his son bongbong marcos is on the verge to returning the family to power. he's currently the front—runner in opinion polls, with his nearest rival leni robredo more than 30 percentage points behind. opponents of marcos believe that online disinformation, whitewashing the crimes of the past, is at the heart of the family's reversal of fortu nes. but some truths are indelible. boni ilagan's sister rizalina, a student activist, was abducted by government forces in 1977 with nine other students. of course, the marcoses keep on saying that, "we have to move on, we have to unite," but moving on means you have found peace with the past. how can the likes of me find peace with the past when the disappearance of my sister has not been explained? but there are millions of people in the philippines who support bongbong marcos. in the 1970s, this former mayor allied himself with ferdinand marcos to receive preferential treatment to develop his town. i know that he wants this country to be great, again. what about the people whose loved ones disappeared? yeah, it could happen. it really happened, yeah. but why will they point out at marcos for all of this death? oh, i actually know that — bridge over troubled water. bongbong's election team says theirs is a positive campaign, direct to the people through social media... again, we will have to skip mr marcos, who is absent... ..but he's refused to take part in several primetime tv debates and independent media interviews, so we approached mr marcos at a rally. mr marcos, can you really be a good president if you don't answer serious questions? sorry? can you really be a good president if you're not doing serious interviews? are you hiding something from the public? despite facts proven by court evidence, intelligence and whistle—blower accounts, many in the philippines say the reporting of the marcos—era abuses is not true. misinformation is prolific here, and it's turning philippine history on its head. howard johnson, bbc news, manila. you're watching newsday on the bbc. still to come on the programme: what does elon musk�*s $aa billion takeover mean for twitter�*s 300 million users? nothing, it seemed, was too big to withstand the force of the tornado. the extent of the devastation will lead to renewed calls for government help to build better housing. internationally, there have already been protests. sweden says it received no warning of the accident. indeed, the russians at first denied anything had gone wrong. only when radioactivity levels began to increase outside russia were they forced to admit the accident. for the mujahideen, the mood here is of great celebration. . this is the end of- a 12—year war for them. they've taken the capital, which they've been - fighting for for so long. it was 7am in the morning on the day when power began to pass from the minority to the majority, when africa, after 300 years, reclaimed its last white colony. this is newsday on the bbc. i'm karisha vaswani in singapore. our headlines: the un secretary general, antonio guterres, holds talks in moscow with russian president vladimir putin. the us defence secretary, lloyd austin, says staunch support for ukraine in its battle with russia will continue "for the long haul". the boss of the social media platform twitter has admitted that its future is uncertain, in light of its planned purchase by the billionaire elon musk. mr musk, the founder of tesla and the world's richest man, has agreed a $aa billion deal to takeover twitter. he has declared that "free speech is the bedrock "of a functioning democracy". what that means for twitter�*s 300 million users is not certain, as our technology editor zoe kleinman explains. lift off! elon musk�*s big ideas include colonising mars and implantable human brain machines. his successes include the tesla electric car and the payment giant paypal. and now he's set his sights on his favourite social network, twitter. this is not a way to sort of make money. having a public platform that is maximally trusted and broadly inclusive is extremely important to the future of civilisation. he wants to see less moderation. some people are delighted, especially those whose tweets have got them banned from the platform in the past, like the right—wing commentator tucker carlson, who is now back. unlike the leaders of facebook, google, apple, amazon, elon musk believes in free speech. he thinks everyone should be allowed to talk, including people who disagree with him. the twitter community is divided, as usual. musk tonight described the response of his critics as "an extreme "antibody reaction from those who fear free speech." actress mia farrow said... london mayor sadiq khan warned... but twitter founderjack dorsey voiced his support... it sets the news agenda for both big issues and small issues. and i think the concern might be that it generally is the quieter voices, the minority voices, the voices who don't have the strength, who suffer when twitter is a little bit un—policed. elon musk�*s £3a billion offer came as a bit of a surprise to many, including twitter itself. it may be influential, but it's nowhere near the size of, say, facebook or tiktok. downing street and the eu have already reminded musk that there are rules around what's not allowed online in europe. in addition, tesla's shareholders seem worried that twitter might distract elon musk from the business of cars — the value of the company fell by $110 billion earlier this evening. all eyes are on controversial former tweeter donald trump. he has a lifetime ban and, so far, says he's happy to stay away. but for how long? zoe kleinman, bbc news. police in new mexico have released footage from a film set of the moments after the fatal shooting of a cinematographer last year. haleena hutchins, who was working on the film rust, died after a prop gun held by the actor alec baldwin discharged. he's previously said he didn't pull the trigger and had no idea how a live bullet came to be on the set. our los angeles correspondent sophie long has more details. there are hours and hours of footage that we've been sifting through. some of it, of course, is very harrowing, and you see the frantic attempts, people trying to save haleena hutchins' life. we know, of course, they were ultimately unable to do so. it's notjust footage from body cams and dashboards but also text messages that are sent between key witnesses and private investigators over the months of the investigation that has taken place, which is now... six months has passed since haleena tragically lost her life. i think what we learned from this new evidence so far is there are still, crucial parts of information that the santa fe sheriff's office is still waiting to receive from the fbi. they're regarding ballistics and forensics evidence, and they say until they have those, only then will they be able to pass this case in full to the santa fe district attorney's office, and only then will we know if criminal charges will be brought. certainly at this stage, they have not been ruled out. but i think that's the main takeaway from the information we've received so far. all of it is very interesting, but it hasn't fundamentally changed the investigation. a lot of questions are being asked as to why they've released this amount of information, this detailed information, while the criminal case investigation is still ongoing. as you mentioned there, the lawyer for matthew hutchins, haleena hutchins' husband, has said that they're very surprised that they chose to do this and they've asked the media here to be discerning and exercise discretion in how they use some of this very graphic footage. that was our correspondent sophie long there, reporting on that story for us. now, onto a different kind of story, and i wonder how many of you be honest about this! how often do you put off work — or find excuses not to get things done — right until the last minute? we've all been there, haven't we? well, here's the answer. japan has opened an anti—procrastination cafe — and the rules are pretty tough. writers facing deadlines can go to tokyo's manuscript writing cafe, but with an understanding they can't leave until their work is finished. rachel stanton reports. you may think this is your normal everyday cafe, but this is far from your typical coffee shop. known as tokyo's manuscript writing cafe, people head here to work in peace and quiet. again, it isn't unusual to see people typing away whilst having a drink. but this place is different. with ten seats reserved for writers, editors and anyone grappling with their deadlines, people come here with one translation: i'm writing a blog post today. - my goal is to deliver three blog articles, and i'll do my best to achieve that. translation: an important thing of this experience - is the deadline issue. the owner said it's a pain point that everyone would have. just like everyone needs family affection, the demand to meet a deadline is a shared demand globally. customers enter, write down their names, writing goals and the time they plan to finish. they can also choose from a range of progress checks — staff gently checking in to see how they're doing, or they could just stand directly behind them. translation: the cafe went viral on social media, - and people are saying that the rules are scary or that it feels like you're being watched from behind. but actually, instead of monitoring customers, i'm here to support them. the cafe was originally a livestreaming space, and it was hit badly by the coronavirus pandemic. whilst there are many recipes for success, here, it is hoped that by tracking your time and blocking out distractions will result in you meeting those hard—hitting deadlines. rachel stanton, bbc news. what will they think of next? that's it from us and the team at newsday. thanks so much forjoining us. do stay with bbc news for the latest headlines. hello again. it was southern areas of both england and wales that had the best of the sunshine on tuesday, temperatures reaching 17 degrees and parts of southwest england but also around cardiff's bute park as well. wasn't like that everywhere, though. after a largely sunny start for quite a few, we had cloud tending to bubble up through the afternoon and spread across the skies, as you can see here on the satellite picture. with that cloud increasing, temperatures weren't as high for many of you. indeed around the eastern coast, just 8 degrees in places. right now, we're seeing a good feed of cloud coming in still from the north sea, so predominantly cloudy weather in scotland and across eastern areas, from northeast england all the way into parts of east anglia. but there are breaks elsewhere, notably across parts of southern england, across parts of the midlands, wales, running into northern ireland, northwest england as well. these areas, you might well start off with a little bit of morning sunshine, but even where you start off with the sun, cloud will tend to bubble up and spread across the skies in any case as we go through the day. so, whether you start off cloudy or cloud develops later on, most of you will see quite a lot of cloud through the day. across northeast scotland, you might hold onto some sunny spells through the afternoon here. there will be one or two elsewhere in the west. temperatures about nine to 1a degrees for most. the area of high pressure has been bringing us this long spell of settled weather, still on the charts for thursday, but it is starting to weaken to a degree. we may well see just a few showers running into northern scotland, maybe one or two not far away from southwest england. otherwise, still predominantly dry, often a lot of cloud building through the day and temperatures not really changing a great deal, 10—15 or maybe 16 celsius. friday follows a very similar pattern as well. if you start off with the sunshine, cloud will tend to develop later on. one or two showers for northern scotland, but otherwise it's another dry day with light winds across the whole of the country. temperatures not changing a whole deal either. looking at highs potentially peaking up to 16 degrees where any sunshine breaks through the cloud. the weekend will start to see some changes in the weather as high pressure starts to relinquish its grip. a little area of low pressure could thicken the cloud up enough to bring just a few passing showers. that's most likely across northern areas of the uk, the south most likely to stay dry with a few brighter spells. this is bbc news, the headlines. the un secretary general, antonio guterres, has told vladimir putin that the invasion of ukraine fully contradicts the constitution of the un charter. addressing mr putin in the kremlin, mr guterres said he was deeply concerned about the humanitarian situation. the us defence secretary, lloyd austin, says staunch support for ukraine in its battle with russia will continue "for the long haul". speaking in germany at a gathering of nato allied countries, he said they would now meet every month. there has been heavy fighting in the donbas area — which borders russia. the governor of the luhansk region told the bbc that ukraine had repelled six russian attacks in the region in the past twenty four hours. police in pakistan say three chinese nationals