it s wednesday, 31st january. our main story. scotland s former first minister, nicola sturgeon is due to give evidence about the decisions she took during the pandemic, when she appears before the covid inquiry today. ms sturgeon, who led the scottish response to the coronavirus outbreak is expected to face questions surrounding lockdowns, and missing whatsapp messages as the inquiry continues sitting in edinburgh. our scotland correspondent lorna gordon reports. 1,044 positive cases were reported yesterday. nicola sturgeon was at the helm throughout scotland s pandemic response. as head of the scottish government, she was the key decision maker and first in the firing line when things went wrong. we will have made mistakes on all aspects of the handling. now about to be questioned on that handling and how decisions the truth, the whole truth. the former first minister s closest political ally amongst those who admitted texts between the pair no longer exist. are those t
statutory public inquiries are noted in if i wasn t prepared to give assurance and i would have the ability and the sabia judge let statutory public inquiry. however, now, she says, she noted key points from her whatsapps and then deleted them. i was very thorough, notjust in the pandemic but in all my work in government to ensure that things were appropriately recorded, but in line with the advice i had always been given since my first day in government, probably, was not to retain conversations like that on a phone that could be lost or stolen and therefore not secure. but did you delete them? yes. but others have provided whatsapps. the inquiry was shown messages for october 2020 in which ms sturgeon told her chief of staff, i m having a bit of a crisis of decision making in hospitality, not helped by the fact i haven t slept . after discussing the possible restrictions on pubs and restaurants in detail, ms sturgeon concludes, it is all so random but i think we need to
but there is no substitution. there is no way any organization can replace or substitute the tremendous capacity, the fabric of unrwa, the ability and their knowledge of the population in gaza. the palestinian representative at the un has called for unrwa to be defended, because it is the only organisation capable of helping the people of gaza. israel s government has accused unrwa of being a front for hamas which several countries consider to be a terrorist group. meanwhile, the fighting continues in gaza with several explosions heard in the southern areas around khan younis and rafah. the israeli army has confirmed it s been flooding tunnels in gaza with sea water to try to neutralise the threat posed by hamas and other militant groups. it said checks had been carried out beforehand to ensure that ground water was not contaminated. let s get more on this with our middle east correspondent nick beake. what are the un saying about these allegations by israel about some un
let s start with this video which shows the incident. you can see the plane here circled. it disappears out of view for a few seconds and then you can see the impact. now, we have verified this. everything in the video is consistent with what we know about the area and the weather this morning in the belgorod region. that was the moment the plane going down about 20 seconds into the video. we see this this smoke plume. could this be a sign that the plane was hit by a missile? well, experts we ve spoken to think, yes, it could be. the open source defence intelligence company believes that this smoke cloud may hint at the use of surface to air missiles. they also told us it could be a warhead detonating near the plane. another expert, mark hansen from the centre for strategic and international studies, has said that this is consistent with an aircraft being shot down. this smoke plume, he says, is consistent with an explosion. so there s that. the governor of belgorod said that
we ll be at craven cottage ahead of tonight s second leg. good evening. welcome to the bbc news at six. more expensive stamps and fewer deliveries per week are all possibilities for the future of the postal service as a range of proposals are put forward by regulators. the centuries old service has to be reformed they say because of the present day reality of fewer letters being sent. the royal mail is required to deliver 93% of all first class mail within one working day. but last year it managed that only for 73% of the total. second class mail was also behind target. the change in the last 12 years in the volume of letters we write and send has been significant from more than 1a billion a year, down to just over 7 billion. today the prime minister told mps he s absolutely committed to retaining deliveries six days a week. here s our business correspondent zoe conway. have you thought any more about making a hole in the wall. allison and chris young making a hole in t