hello and welcome to bbc news. the number of covid 19 deaths in the united states has passed half a million. it s the first country to do so. the bells on the national cathedral in washington tolled 500 times to honour the victims. bells toll. 500,000 lives are more than were lost by the us in both world wars and the vietnam war combined. the pandemic is still claiming 2000 americans every day, and there has been widespread economic hardship. president biden has ordered flags on federal buildings to be flown at half mast for five days as a mark of respect to those who have lost their lives. just before he and the vice president led a moment s silence, he had these words for americans. as we all remember, i also ask us to act. to remain vigilant. to stay socially distant, to mask up, get vaccinated when it s your turn. we must end the politics and misinformation that divided families, communities in the country. it s costing too many lives already. it s not democrats and repub
now on bbc news, hardtalk. welcome to hardtalk. i m stephen sackur. a battle is brewing for the soul of the us republican party. in part, it s about donald trump. will the party continue to tie its fate to his ego? and it s also about the nature of right wing politics. how blurred are the lines between some republicans and the peddlers of race, hate and extremist conspiracists? my guest is elizabeth neumann. a former counterterror official inside the trump administration now intent on purging the republican party of the enablers of extremism. can she succeed 7 elizabeth neumann, in virginia, welcome to hardtalk. thank you for having me. let me ask you this as an opener, how much soul searching have you done in recent months? because of the best part of three years you are a top counterterror official inside the trump administration when it seems for much of that time, you saw donald trump as a man who was fanning the flames of extremism and terrorism. well, i d say that i was
nasa has released remarkable images of its space rover landing on mars, the first ever of their kind from the planet. it shows the final minutes of last week s tense descent with clouds of dust and grit being blown around as the vehicle is lowered to the floor of the crater. the rover, called perseverance, was sent to an ancient crater lake to search for signs of past life. our global science correspondent rebecca morelle has the story. the parachute has deployed. from the release of a supersonic parachute, to the shedding of a heat shield. first look at the surface. an out of this world view mars as never seen before. as the rover nears the surface, the dust is kicked up, then a change of camera as perseverance is lowered on ropes before touchdown. touch down confirmed. perseverance safely on the surface of mars! ..and the landing system is jettisoned away. we can t test it on the earth, so this is the first time we ve had a chance as engineers to actually see what we desi
this week, military training in vr. cardboard computers. and, you coming round to the clubhouse? it s time to find out what everyone s talking about. hey, welcome to click, hope you re doing 0k. lara, how are you this week? good, thanks, just about managing to stay entertained. i keep going through phases of what i m actually doing this week it s been all about live radio. do you know, me too! i m listening to more and more live radio these days. i feel like ijust need to hear a live human voice coming through the speaker rather than a song playlist. i feel like i need the company. do you stick to just uk stations or have you gone further afield? funnily enough i used to use tunein to listen to antarctic radio when it was a thing. it was cool and it was folky. really? there s also radio garden which allows you to listen to over 30,000 local radio stations from across the globe. fancya spin? yes, please! it s almost like peeking through the window at someone else s party! a
now it s time for a look back at the day in parliament. hello and welcome to monday in parliament. coming up: borisjohnson sets out his plan to reopen england stressing a cautious easing between now and the end ofjune. a wretched year will give way to a spring and a summer that will be very different and incomparably better than the picture we see around us today. labour says this has to be the last lockdown and welcomes the data driven approach. i am glad the prime minister spoke today of caution, of this being irreversible. of assessing the data and following the evidence. those of the right guiding principles. also on this programme: a call for more help for those living in homes with flammable cladding. and: a conservative peer reckons the govenrment s wrong to say a maternity bill can t talk about women. i respectfully say to my new friend the minister that this is garbage. but first. the prime minister has set out the steps to lifting england s coronavirus lockdown. in