their demonstration "rolling thunder." it comes two months after truckers protesting against covid restrictions occupied the city centre for several weeks. now on bbc news: dateline london with martine croxall. hello, and welcome to dateline. i'm martine croxall. this week, we discuss whether there are any signs of meaningful peace talks in the war in ukraine, we look at the aftermath of the french presidential election and ask where europe goes now, and we look ahead to the uk local elections and ask, "could the outcome sink boris johnson?" joining us in discussion tonight, here in the studio — at long last — the editor in chief of the gulf—based daily the national, mina al—oraibi. bet it feels good, mina, doesn't it? and you get your make—up done as well! the bbc�*s business editor simonjack, hot—footing in from whatever else he's been doing today. and dateline�*s long—serving expert on all things french, marc roche — formerly london correspondent of le monde and now le point. welcome to everybody. the united nations boss has had talks this week with presidents putin and zelensky. the us secretary of state and the us defence secretery have been in kyiv. but what have these high—level diplomatic shuffles actually achieved? mina, you watch all of this very closely for your readers, and interpret it, contextualise it. what have you been telling them? the last few days, as you said, of diplomacy have been important to at least maintain the momentum of trying to get a solution, but we haven't seen anything tangible that brings this war to an end. for our readers, there is the primary developments, which are the military developments on the ground, and of course the ukrainian people, what they're suffering. the fact that there was an attack on kyiv as the un secretary general was there was again an indication of how serious this is, not only for the poor ukrainian people who are suffering but also wider ramifications. so there's that immediate element. then there's the cost of oil going up, the fact that we worry about wheat imports in the middle east, for example. in egypt, 80% of wheat imports come from ukraine and russia. likewise for lebanon, where it's at 90%. here in the uk, we're talking about cooking oil being a problem, because so much of the world's cooking oil and wheat is impacted by that. and then there's the bigger picture, which is that if we don't get peace in the next few weeks, what does this mean for the global order? and there's talk now that both president zelensky and president putin will be at the 620 summit in november. hopefully the war hasn't dragged out that long, but all indications are that it could have dragged out that long. so could diplomacy then actually wield the result? and the fact that, the 620 this year, the presidency is by indonesia — that's trying to keep i would say a somewhat neutral position to try to push both the russians, but also the americans frankly, to try to find a solution. the americans this week, marc, president biden�*s committed $33 billion for military, economic and humanitarian aid, but at the same time, lots of countries are still buying russian oil and gas. how do leaders square that circle? it's sort of cancelling each other out, the aid and the fuel costs? first, things are going badly for putin because the west, the americans are giving masses of heavy armament and aid, economic aid. also, the europeans now are much more united because the blackmail on gas, on poland and bulgaria, misfired, and the european commission has decided to buy gas through qatar, through the us, even through israel. and thirdly, things are quite bad for russia on the insurance market because the russian crude cannot get insurance from the lloyds of london. that's a decision the british government might take. so all this is very negative, but at the same time, russia has the upper hand because europe are very divided between the hardline eastern europe and northern europe are threatened by russia, and much more thought is on a softer approach, like the german — and then the pro—russian, which we forget, which is greece, malta and cyprus. so that's an advantage for putin. and there's a big question about the effect of inflation and cost of living. exactly. greece, malta and cyprus. so that's an advantage for putin. and there's a big question about the effect of inflation and cost of living. exactly. that brings us very nicely onto what i was going to talk to you about, simon, in terms of sanctions. how effective are they being? but down the track, there are ramifications not just for president putin and his economy but the rest of us. true. one thing russia would consider a victory is they have managed i to split the european union on their approach to how. they're going to deal. with this gas problem. some people say they'll pay in roubles, some i people say they would not, so they've managed to - put a crack in that. the sanctions are very damaging to the russian economy, - you could see output fall 15—20% there. i but i don't think enough in the short—term to - deter vladimir putin in his endeavours. l but i do think one of the other things, and you talk— about inflation, i think- that is the really big thing. everyone in the west hopes, hopefully, in six to nine - months, maybe a year, l we'll get some resolution and everything will go back to normal, but i think- the reality is it will never again in our lifetime be i considered to be acceptable, strategically or politically, i to be that reliant on russianl fuel sources, and that means huge investment in renewables, finding other fuel sources. - that means these energy prices we see are not - just a blip or a spike, - this is a step—change in energy costs for western economies which will take years - and will take huge amounts. of money out of the economy, so i think the economic ramifications of this - are pretty long—term. i want to pick up on that. part of the conversations that the world has been having about the energy transition and need to transition, there was a lot of pressure, particularly from the united states, to stop investing in hydrocarbon markets, to stop investing in the oil development and so forth, and so you had everybody on the back foot and then this crisis happened. if anything, it proved that, again, american policy of almost saying, "we need to wipe our hands of this and we can just transition easily" is not actually accurate, and so it's a very harsh lesson to learn because it will stay with us for years to come. we will see the oil- and gas profits of some of the big ones next week. cop26 climate summit seems quite a long - time ago right now. it does. marc, we've heard that whilst a lot of leaders around the world are keen to express their pro—zelensky credentials, but we've had president putin saying, "if anybody interviews, you'll feel the force of our retaliation." so how far dare leaders go in their support of ukraine without incurring the wrath of the kremlin? i think there's only one language putin understands. it's strength. if you give away anything to putin, he will take advantage. so i think the west should resist, like they do at the moment, by giving money and giving armaments to ukraine. and we shouldn't care about it. the only thing that worries me is a certain ukraine fatigue. public opinion in the west, which has open—armed welcomed refugees — there starts to be problems in belgium, in france, with people finding the cost and the difficulties. and there could be a fatigue on compassion and that would be terrible. can i pick up on that? up to now, they've repelled them from the west. - kyiv was seen as a victory. everybody's really saying, "plucky ukrainians, let's i give them some arms." talking to our foreign - correspondent, jeremy bowen, who's out there, saying, - "what happens if russia starts winning in the east? are you going to keep pushing arms, military into that? - that's a very different i proposition, politically, domestically, to sell at home." a western flank is a different prospect, isn't it? i suppose what this has done is brought nato together in a way that... emmanuel macron hadn't been as warmly disposed towards nato until this crisis. exactly, and during the campaign, he said against marine le pen, who wanted to get out of the military command, he said, "we have to reinforce nato," which for french people is quite surprising because macron is a big defender of european defence. so we can see in the coming time nato killing in a way this idea of european defence. and at the same time, it came just a few months after the afghanistan withdrawal and no real stock—taking of what happened in afghanistan, and the fact that nato has almost swept that under the carpet and gone back and talked about russia, but we'll see what happens with the nato summit. where there was supposed to be this global view for nato, now they're back to the traditional role. you asked me where i've been. i've been speaking - to nikita khrushchev's great—granddaughter, whojust told me in. an interview you can hear- tomorrow morning on the today programme, that she thought actually the world was closerl to nuclear war now than 1962 during the cuban _ missile crisis. which gives me no pleasure to report that information, i and she may be completely wrong — but there it is! _ what a name drop! sorry. anyway, we're glad you made it. now, france has re—elected macron as president, but not with great amount of enthusiasm, it has to be said. his far—right opponent, marine le pen, says her vote share at 42% was unprecedented and still a victory for her party. marc, france is clearly divided. what does emmanuel macron do about that? i think france has never been so divided. it's generational — the young voting for le pen, the middle age and the old voting for macron. it's regional — the north and east, where you have all the industry and difficulties of reconversion voting for le pen, while the south and the west, where you have high—tech and services, voting for macron. it's social — you have the pro—lgbt and pro—#metoo, black lives matter, the french version, voting for macron, and the traditional catholics voting for le pen. it's divided on the whole line. more importantly, it's pushing macron, because of the first round, the left doing so well — the corbynite left with jean—luc melenchon — is pushing him to a terrain which is not favourable to him, which is the centre—left. he is basically a right—wing politician who believes in de—regulation, in increasing retirement, etc, and suddenly he's there, and it means he will have to focus much more on internal affairs and on the question of immigration and all that than on his favourite patch, which is foreign affairs. we've also got the legislative elections coming in france very soon, mina. 577 members of the national assembly to be voted for. if you don't hold the majority, as the president, that makes things — whether you're the french president, the american president, lots of different leaders around the world find this — it's much harder to get your policies through... and that's the big question that waiting now. in a few weeks�* time, will the french electorate go out and do what they usually do, which is support the party of the incumbent or at least the political programme of the incumbent president, or do they actually, seeing the split that there is in the country and the abstention that we saw during the presidential elections — not deliver that for macron, at which point he will be suffering throughout to try to implement any of his policies? one of the issues, as an outsider and people looking towards france, is this idea that marine le pen was able to get the percentage of votes above 40% — was shocking. and so the question is, what is the long—term ramifications for france? but also the fact that the traditional parties as we know them have now gone, and so i think in countries like, for example, the uk, where it has to be the conservatives or labour predominantly and we always thought you couldn't have new parties. look at this. you have completely new parties shaping and dominating the political discourse in france. whether it's france or any other european economy at the moment, simon, though, the problems are the same, aren't they? a lot of leaders are grappling with those issues of cost—of—living crisis, fuel security, which we have already touched on. it is a nightmare scenario for any finance minister. i in france, i get people . asking me here in the uk, france capped its energy price rises at 4%, why can't - we do that here? i point out to them, - they have state—controlled energy supply called edf| which took a massive hit, 8 billion at the time — - it could be double that by now i — and that is a national asset, | the shareholding, so the public in some way have paid for that. we talk about local elections, we have some coming up - in the uk which we may talk about — any time where - the electorate is getting. poorer every day is a pretty toxic political- situation to be in. the political offer you make to the citizens of any - country is, "stick with me, you'll be a bit better off i by the time we finish - than at the time we started," and it is hard to see l how any politician can deliver on that... and by the way, madame le pen did the campaigning not on the veil for muslim women, not on the question of her links with russia and that sort of thing, only on the cost of living, and she got 42%. so it shows it is the foremost issue, and macron will have to take care of that, despite the fact that, as you said, the energy price cap, inflation is much lower than here, there is more protection for workers. during the campaign, he said, we will have retirement above 65 instead of 60. now he can forget that. the problem as well, as you mentioned, we stopped thinking about afghanistan, because everybody threw themselves into ukraine, and that's what emmanuel macron did. the first round of the presidential elections, he was barely visible, wasn't he? and again, the turf he is comfortable on is foreign policy, that great statesman role. but he won't be able to get away from the problems that are facing every world leader at the moment. again, for him going forward, he has pledged to try to bring the country together, as many politicians do, but there is no clear path into how he will bring the country together. what role might there be for the third—place finisher? the role of the prime minister, with that big climate change remit — how tempted would macron be to put him in that post? he cannot put him in that post, it is the french electorate who have to decide, and jean—luc melenchon almost beat le pen. it would have been a much more interesting election. what was possible but not probable is that he has the majority or that macron, and then becomes prime minister, and then you have a completely... one on the right and the other on the left. it would be for france a very bad time. but the polls show at the moment that macron will have the majority, because generally people vote the same way for the presidency as the parliamentary election, but surprises can happen. indeed, they certainly can. let's carry on talking about different elections. because as simon said, next week, there're local elections here in the uk. borisjohnson is expected to lose a lot of support. butjust how bad are the results likely to be? and will they be enough to trigger a vote of no confidence by the tories in the prime minister? often in the middle of a national government's term, the electorate are keen to give the incumbent government a bloody nose. how likely is that? a couple of issues here, | for the one thing is that, you are right, these are local elections, they are city - councils, county councils, where people get to - express their democratically... how they're feeling i about life in general, and that can be seen... the particular importance i of this one is that everyone is looking, including - borisjohnson's own mps, they are still not sure - whether the man who delivered a massive majority is. still an electoral asset, or through various scandals, partygate, etc, or if- he is a liability. obviously the papers, left and right, will- give him a good kicking. he has not been tested yet about what his electoral. brand is still worth. so people will be looking - for that and everybody will be looking like hawks at it. however, many of the seatsj were won by labour in times when labour was doing very well, so the potential- for a massive... in terms of huge numbers of county councils and city councils moving to labour, many of them already- are, so to see... there won't be this kind i of wave, but there will be little pockets in those red wall seats, seats that - used to vote labour, - yearafteryear, generation after generation, - which voted conservative, there will be little pockets. will it be a sea change? i'm not sure it will deliver a definitive verdict - on boris johnson's electorial brand as prime minister. - we have to remember, in northern ireland, it is different again, because they're looking to get their devolved government in stormont up and running again. because that has been rather dysfunctional for a long time. how is borisjohnson regarded in the gulf, mina? he has made a big thing about, "let's forget about partygate, let's get on the business," and he has had a lot of praise from volodymyr zelensky on support the uk has given to ukraine. he's quite popular in ukraine, forsure. the way they look at him in the gulf is trying to understand if he will last as a politician. the uk's position as a country is still hugely important and influential in the gulf, so borisjohnson really benefits from that rather than borisjohnson himself delivering it. on the contrary, if you had a stronger prime minister, the ties would be quite strong, because of the absence of the us at the moment when it comes to the gulf. so in some ways, he could do better, but given all his domestic woes, it's a wait—and—see situation. when he went to india, he tried to stage all these moments, but it really did not go very far, and again the indians are looking to the uk because of traditional ties with india rather than borisjohnson himself really furthering much of these relationships. what's important is, again, for the local elections, the way people see this is that, what does this mean for the government, but also how will the rise in cost—of—living, how will inflation actually impact this government? and a strong economy like the uk's, compared to other countries which are going to suffer much more from the rising possible in cost around the world. local politicians might have nothing to do with fixing these national problems at all, marc, but that's what people choose to vote on in some cases. local elections are very often a protest vote on national issues, and i find borisjohnson extremely vulnerable not only because of partygate but for the first time you see a possible successor coming up. the defence secretary ben wallace, the foreign secretary liz truss were not really considered. now they're being taken seriously. the problem is he has to expect no gift from the europeans, because brexit is still... it is still the issue that divides england and the uk from the european union. on all the things on brexit, he will be blocked by the european union, so he can expect nothing on this side of the channel. it's interesting. i think we have seen... you talk about, "there's not much talk about brexit." - i think people are being cagey, because they think that ship i has sailed, but there _ is emerging evidence that trade as a percentage of the uk's economy has fallen two - and a half times faster - than any other g7 economy. you've had the uk, - they were supposed to have these border checks coming in the same way— as they come out. they've decided after many years, they're saying, - "given what's going on, - we're not going to bother," so it is no surprise that if you look to europe, i the conservative government is not going to find _ too many friends there, but again the question. will be, and you madel that point, can you...? do people blame their local councillor who may be - conservative for the fact that global gas prices have hit - historic levels and are doing so around the world? - or do they want their bins collected more often? - and those councils, who have to provide those local services like your bins being taken out, local services — they are struggling for money, aren't they? do they put up business rates and drive more businesses out of business? or do they reduce their aspirations when it comes to services? because they've not got the money. we have in this country, as you do in europe, - in many countries, an energyl price cap for retail customers. and it does not exist. for government offices, for businesses, so if you're running social housing - projects where you have to keep the heating on, | if you're running social care homes, the economics - are disastroys at the moment, and i think that is where... - those are the kind of services where people feel the energy| crisis and what is going . on actually hits their life, and whether they blame their local councillors, l whether they blame boris - johnson or whether they blame vladimir putin for that will be quite an interesting _ thing to see next week. quite a few people who choose from in the blame game! for those who feel strongly about partygate, and whether they can trust the conservatives or not, it really will come down to emotions and trust. this is a way to get that message across, so i think in some cases, if people do blame the war in ukraine or global developments, they want to say, but in the past year, we no longer trust the conservatives in the way we did before, and that shows much more in local politics than on the national level. "i could not visit my- mother in a care home." exactly. if there is a way to get it out. and the other question is, where is labour? and if you had a strong opposition party, i don't know how this government would survive, and the lib dems. can they make a comeback? i think those kinds of dynamics will be interesting. it is notjust the national or local, it is down to the personal. that is all we have time for this week. thank you to our panelists, mina, marc and simon. thank you for watching. do join us again next week. goodbye. hello. well, april as a whole was a very dry month, but in its final day, we actually got a decent dose of rain, particularly in north—western areas of the country. and indeed, on sunday 1st may, we will have some rain elsewhere, but it's going to be quite overcast wherever you are on sunday. and you can see the weather systems streaming in off the atlantic here. that's the low pressure that brought the rain to north—western parts — to northern ireland and western parts of scotland. now it's a weak area of low pressure on sunday, meaning that the rain is starting to fizzle out and, if anything, it is going to be mostly an area of cloud spread across the uk. so this is what it looks like early in the morning, some dribs and drabs of rain around the irish sea and wales. it's also very mild first thing — 7am, ten degrees in belfast, ten in london, and elsewhere it's typically around seven to nine degrees. so let's pick up on that rain. a soggy morning in parts of wales, damp around the irish sea. very slowly that area of damp weather will spread into the midlands and perhaps other parts of england too, but also in scotland and northern ireland it's actually going to brighten up and this is where the best of the weather is going to be on sunday. in fact, in glasgow, our highest temperature�*s expected — 17 degrees celsius. compare that to cardiff and plymouth, between i! and 13 degrees with that damp weather. now, monday is going to be a brighter day. we still have the remnants of that weather system over us, maybe a few showers across parts of england, but quite a chilly day in northern scotland in a northerly wind — seven in lerwick, ten in stornoway. but in the south of the country it's going to be a good deal warmer — 18 degrees, but again, not a sunny day. sunny spells, though, expected. so here's the forecast for the week ahead. tuesday, wednesday, we have some rain heading towards us. but from around about thursday onwards, high pressure is expected to build across the uk. that means settled weather and also around this area of high pressure, we will have this current of warmer air spreading in all the way from the azores, so the temperatures will start to rise across the uk towards the end of the week. so here's the summary — bank holiday monday, a rather overcast day. in fact, the first half of the week will be fairly changeable with showers possible, but then from thursday onwards, it's turning warmer. hello and welcome to bbc news. ukrainian fighters besieged by russian forces inside mariupol�*s azovstal industrial complex say twenty civilians have been able to leave the site. but hundreds of people are still believed to be sheltering inside the plant. it's the first such release since president putin announced he was locking down ukraine's last bastion in the city. speaking in a video post a commander of the azov battalion, inside the complex, said he hoped the evacuated group would be taken to territory under ukrainian control.