One of lifes most underappreciated talents is to know when its time to move on to lifes next chapter. So i stand before you today, mr president and my colleagues, to say this will be my last term as republican leader of the senate. For more on mitch mcconnell� s stepping down and the spending deal, heres our North America correspondent gary odonoghue. After repeated attempts to get a spending agreement, it does look like leadership in congress from both sides have at least reached a partial agreement on some other Spending Bills that they have been arguing about. It looks now in the next couple of days that resolutions were put through senate and the House Of Representatives to extend one of the deadlines until next friday, by which time they will pass Spending Bills on six separate departments. Now, they havent reached an agreement on the other six departments, but they are going to push the deadline for that back until march 22. So in some ways, this is progress being made and in some ways, it is still a long way to go, particularly because some of those Spending Bills are controversial ones involving Homeland Security defence. They will all be have to be organised by the leadership in both places and weve learned today that mitch mcconnell, republican leader in the senate, the minority leader there has decided to step down from leadership at the election in november. The longest serving party leader in the senate, his been in the post since 2007, since George W Bush was president. He entered the senate in 1985 while Ronald Reagan was president , so almost a0 years. His been of force of nature, hes pursued conservative aimed in the senate relentlessly and his got a lot done. But he did fall out with donald trump particular Overjanuary 6 where he accused the former president of being morally and practically responsible, he has had some Health Issues in the last year or so, which may have been a factor in his decision to stand down from leadership in november. He once described himself as the grim reaper. Well, hes evaded that, but the political grim reaper has come calling. President joe biden also weighed in on mitch mcconnell� s announcement. Reflecting on his time as the Republican Senate leader, he said a judge in the us state of illinois has barred donald trump from appearing on the ballot there because of his role in the january 6 riots. But she delayed her ruling from taking effect, pending appeal. A statement from former president s campaign called the ruling unconscitutional, has said he will appeal the decision. Mr trumps time in office is at the centre of two major developments at the Us Supreme Court on wednesday. The first is whether donald trump can claim president ial immunity from being prosecuted on charges of trying to overturn the 2020 election. It will mark the first time the nations highest court will hear such a case. The Supreme Court says it will hear arguments in the case in the week of april 22. In the meantime, former president trumps washington, dc case will be on hold while justices consider the matter. The other case involves a trump era gun ban on � bump stocks�. The Supreme Courtjustices appeared divided on whether the ban on the Gun Attachments which allow a semi automatic rifle to fire more rapidly should be upheld. The Trump Administration banned bump stocks after 60 people were killed in a Mass Shooting at a Las Vegas Musical Festival in 2017. The gunman had dozens of ar 15 style rifles outfitted with the device. The incident is the deadliest Mass Shooting in us history. The justices wrestled with whether the administration acted lawfully. To discuss all this, i spoke earlier with scotusblog reporter amy howe. Quite the busy day at the Supreme Court, and we will get onto bump stocks injust a moment, but if we start with this case that quite late on the date of the Supreme Court says its going to hear, it is going to hear the case whether donald trump has immunity or not, how do we expect them to handle that . They will hear arguments some time in the end of april and what the real 64,000 question right now is how quickly will they rule . Because the judge has already put the proceedings in washington, dc on hold. And shes indicated that even if the court were to rule that trump is not immune, that there would be some more time, as much as three months before the trial could actually go forward. What a lot of people are paying attention to is if the court were to rule latejune or earlyjuly, which is when one would normally expect a high profile case like this, particular one thats argued in late april, that might mean that the trial would not be ready to go forward until september or even early october, which would put it right in the middle of the president ial election in early november. The special Counseljack Smith has made the case previously that is an emergency and should be treated as such. Has been an indication from the Supreme Court within the justice has considered it an Emergency Case . The singles are mixed to that they dont regard it as quite as an emergency as he does. He asked them, first of all, to let the case, to say that they were not going to weigh in, that the decision by the federal Appeals Court in washington, dc stand for itself and allow the trial to go forward without the Supreme Court ruling, and today, they indicated that they were not going to do that. The other option he said was for the case to go forward in the Supreme Court, but he asked them to really fast track it, to hear Oral Argument in march and issue a decision quickly. And they didnt do that and one signal that they didnt regarded as an emergency as he did was it took them almost two weeks to indicate today what they were going to do, the case has been fully briefed and sitting before them for almost two weeks before they finally acted, which is certainly not something that you would regard as a true emergency. The timeline you outlined with possibly a decision in earlyjuly and what they were me for a trial may be not happening until the time of the election and if donald trump is re elected, that trial would fall than entirely, wouldnt it . One can only assume, he would be in charge of the Department Ofjustice, and one would expect that he would direct the Department Ofjustice to drop the charges. The Supreme Court were also awaiting a decision related to colorado, deciding that donald trump should not be on the ballot there again, that was described as something for urgency of consideration, the colorado primaryjust around the corner. Do we know when you make a decision there . We dont have any idea when that will happen, the Supreme Court, you dont know what decisions you are going to get unless its the very last day of the Supreme Courts term, untilyoure sitting at the Supreme Court and they say, they have the opinion and trump versus anderson. So they dont have any days are scheduled, they indicate usually ahead of time when they will issue opinions, they didnt have any days scheduled this week, so we dont know when that will be. Super tuesday, when they have all of these different primaries over the countries for much feared and so, one of the things that colorado was for them to act quickly, but we havent seen in opinion yet. We hear illinois saying that donald trump will be excluded from the ballot there as well. The other big news from the Supreme Court was this hearing around bump stocks and whether the Trump Administration had been correct in banning them, these little attachments that turn a rifle into something akin to a machine gun. What arguments are there today . There are different strands of argument, one part of the case was highly technical, the argument that the challengers are making is that the definition of machine gun that congress enacted in 193a doing prohibition, doesnt apply to bump stocks and the variety of different arguments that relate to exactly how the bump stocks work and how thats different from the definition of machine gun and the government has counterarguments about why it does fall within the definition of machine guns. Some of the courts conservative justices were worried because for a long time, until 2018, the bureau of alcohol, tobacco and firearms had indicated that bump stocks werent machine guns. So some of the justices were concerned about the people who bought bump stocks before 2018 and could be now subject for criminal liability for something that was not a crime when they purchased it, the governments response was weve given them an opportunity to turn those in and it is a well publicised issue. But several of the conservative justices were concerned about that. Amy howe speaking to me there. Meanwhile, ukraine has blamed congressional inaction in the us for its recent losses on the battlefield as its troops face a shortage of ammunition and key weapons. On wednesday, president zelensky even proposed that ukraine start partnering with other southeastern European Countries to manufacture that critical ammunition. Lets take a closer look now at the State Of Play on the front lines where russia has pushed back some key Ukrainian Defensive advances since late summer. In august, ukraine retook the city of robotyne, hoping it could cut off a key supply route to russian controlled crimea. But this week, Russian Forces appear to have advanced to the western and southern outskirts of the village. Russia also appears to be advancing around the village of krynky, ukraines bridgehead across the dnipro river. And this month, ukraine withdrew its troops from avdiivka, A Key Eastern Town russia had besieged for months. Ukraine had hoped the town would be a gateway to reach the russian controlled city of donetsk. Now, as James Waterhouse reports, ukraine has retreated yet further from the town it fought so hard to hold onto. Ukraines military today says it has pulled its troops out of two villages close to the town of avdiivka, which fell last week after months of bombardment and assault from Russian Forces and its clear they are not stopping there. 0n the ukrainian side, we are getting told that they are trying to re establish the front lines, theyre trying to stabilise the situation, they say. But it is clear that russia is trying to push on, and while these villages, like so many places, have been mostly deserted, 100 people are thought to live in both of them, we are once again seeing a russian flag hoisted above a pile of rubble, the thought here in kyiv is that russia has assembled 80,000 troops in the closed city of bakhmut where they are looking to push and make it as difficult as possible for the Ukrainian Forces to re establish themselves. It is clear that russia has the momentum and it is clear that waning western support, notably, a sizeable Military Package in the us, is directly hampering ukraines ability to stem that tide. Now, while these villages individually dont mount to much, it puts cities in really difficult positions because this is where people are going to evacuate to, the places that come under constant bombardment, and it may well be the case that the threat of Russian Occupation could be as great as it ever has been. Earlier, we spoke with former cia director david petraeus. He broke down some of the factors determining the way forward in ukraine. First and foremost, again, getting the us assistance authorised and appropriate in the pipeline fuelled back up to be sure, but then, there is an issue that ukraine has a result of the selves that has to do with the generation of forces and units. As you probably know, the average age of a fighter, soldier on the front lines is over a0 in the Ukrainian Army in contrast to the 18 to 23 average age of those that i was privileged to lead in iraq and afghanistan. This has to do with the conscription systems, the policies and the laws, that clearly they are going to have to reduce the age of conscription from 27 to 25, take other steps so that they can be a Unit Rotation Policy as well monitors individual replacement. These are very, very authority issues, president zelensky is working with the members of their parliament but theyre very difficult, its the one issue that he generally does not want to address in public commentary, but its one that they have to come to grips to resolve this particular issue. Around the world and across the uk, this is bbc news. Lets look at some top stories in the uk. The duke of sussex has lost a high Court Challenge over his security when hes visiting the uk. Prince harry was contesting the governments decision to downgrade his Security Status when he stopped being a working royal. The prince argued he had been treated unfairly in the changes to his Police Protection when he still faced significant security threats. He plans to appeal the ruling. In northern ireland, a judge has ruled that the government should scrap plans to grant conditional amnesties for killings committed during the troubles. The high court in belfast found that the proposals were in breach of human rights law. The case was brought by relatives of victims who were angry at changes to the way investigations are being carried out. Thousands of farmers descended on cardiff to protest against the Welsh Governments new farm subsidy plans. The proposals would require farmers to commit 10 of Agricultural Land to be used for trees and 10 for wildlife. Farm unions have called it unworkable. The Welsh Government said its listening to the farmers� concerns. Youre live with bbc news. Ghanas parliament has passed a tough new bill that imposes a Prison Sentence of up to three years for anyone convicted of identifying as lgbtq . It also imposes a maximum five year jail term for forming or funding gay or transgender groups. Lawmakers blocked attempts to replace Prison Sentences with Community Service and counselling. It is the latest sign of growing opposition to lgbtq rights in the conservative west african nation. Live now to neela ghoshal, who serves as senior director of law and policy at 0utright international. She formerly served as Associate Lgbt Rights Director at human rights watch. Thank you forjoining us on bbc news. If this bill becomes law, what is this going to mean for members of the Lgbtq Community in ghana . Thank you so much for the what it means in a practical way is that lgbtq people will no longer have the right to exist in ghana. This bill is appalling. It is one of the most severe bills we have seen. It prohibits simply holding out as a lesbian gay transsexual, transsexual person or an ally, which means that simply the act of identifying yourself as a queer personal identifying yourself as an ally to the community is punishable by law. That is absolutely extreme and unprecedented, even with the array of and i homosexuality bills we have seen around africa and other parts of the world. In addition, practically speaking, this bill will make it impossible for lgbtq people to go about their daily lives, to go about their daily lives, to be employed, to have a safe place to live, access healthcare. The bill includes a duty to report, which means that anyone who knows that there is a queer person in their surroundings will be required by law to report them all report allies to queer people to the police. So it is nothing less than an attempt to eradicate queer people and clearness from public existence, and visibility of all also anticipate that the bill will lead to an increase in violence. In fact, starting in violence. In fact, starting in 2021 when the bill was first introduced in parliament, activists on the ground in ghana but we were speaking with medially told us that people started to be attacked in their communities by mobs, by their neighbours, saying he said the government wants to outlaw you, we dont want you here. So we know that if this bill is enacted into law, the violence will increase further. This bill is a watered down version of an earlier draft jail terms have been shortened and a controversial clause around Conversion Therapy has been removed but why are ghanaians moving against members of the Lgbtq Community in this way now . Well, lets keep in mind that it is an Election Year in ghana, so lgbtq people are an easy ta