Record high temperatures across Western Europe

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Hello and welcome to News Hour from the BBC World Service. Coming to you live from London. I'm Regini Vyidyanarvan. Now in twenty fourteen in France a weather presenter named Evelyn Deliat did a weather report predicting the weather in august twenty fifteen.

Demain matin, les températures seront déjà très élevées, notamment à Paris.

And tomorrow morning temperatures will be high with twenty six degrees in Paris, Pépinon and Nice. In the afternoon temperatures will reach or rise above forty degrees forty one in A, forty one in Strasbourg. Forty in the capital, forty two in Lyon, and up to forty three degrees expected in Nin. You may say, come on, this is just fiction for twenty fifty. Well this weather report is not a product of my imagination. It's been developed with great seriousness by Meteo Franz.

Indeed, well, France has already hit those high temperatures that she talked about there twenty four years before those predictions were due to come into effect. Now the country's recorded its hottest ever night Monday into Tuesday, and the heat has led to a number of deaths in the country. We'll be live in France in a moment.

Here in London, the city of Dickens, it is clear that our world is facing a tale of two crises. A climate crisis pushing us deeper towards higher temperatures and closer to catastrophic tipping points. and an energy crisis exposing the folly of a world hooked on either carbon.

Well I'm joined now from Nice in France by the BBC's Pierre Antoine Denis. Uh good to talk to you, Pierre. Um I've just seen that the Eiffel Tower is going to be closed because of these soaring temperatures. Um, just tell us how this is all affecting the country.

Yeah, it's been uh affecting the country massively, Regini. Um, especially since the weekend when this uh heat waves started and temperatures started to soar. We've had forty people that have uh died as a result of drowning since uh Saturday. The uh the big Feed Fed de la musique music day on Sunday was impacted with authorities trying to enforce an alcohol ban, which didn't really work.

Yeah, you mentioned deaths uh we did hear from the Prime Minister, didn't we, about the number of people who've died in heat related deaths.

Yeah, absolutely. Yes. Uh so forty so far and uh which were as a result of uh a drowning or other incidents we've had, uh for instance the tragic situation where an eleven year old boy started the drow was drowning and the thirteen year old his friend wanted to save him and both of them uh drowned as a uh in the center of France.

Okay, Pierre Antoine Denis, thank you very much for bringing us up to date on that heat wave in France.

Nuclear cannot operate without uh cooling water and discharge of cooling water. And so basically what we're seeing now is the it's like a canary in a in a coal mine. It's the beginning of what will happen. The rivers with climate will uh low flow, they will heat, and the reactors will increasingly have problems both with getting river water because that water may be wanted elsewhere, but also also essentially discharging that heated water back to the river because it would kill the river.

How unusual is it then to see a nuclear plant shut down because of a situation like this?

Well it's happening more and more. It's it's it's happened over the last few years and we're beginning to see it uh more and more. So at risk would be uh reactors like Bougie, uh Saint Alba by the Rhone. Trickistan. Basically what we're seeing is the beginning of this happening. This is the start of what will happen to inland uh nuclear, both in France and elsewhere.

And are there no ways to mitigate this, to protect from this given that temperatures are rising? What can be done?

Yeah.

You know, you see you see these large cooling towers emitting what is essentially just uh steam. You know, people think it's smoke, it's not, it's steam. And so there's some potential to to build larger cooling towers and to try to sort of get around this. But essentially No, there's no

Thank you.

real technical way round it. There's no uh solution to this problem, and all that implies for inland uh nuclear uh going forward.

How serious is this given that more than sixty percent of France's electricity is generated by nuclear power?

It's hugely serious. The problem is almost one never can never say never uh insoluble. And that goes for inland reactors. And of course, by the coast, what we know about the coast is that the coasts are receding. We know the climate is impacting sea level rise, which we hope will be stepwise, but the real problem with the coast.

That's Paul Dorfman there.

Uh the well the yeah, the temperatures we're seeing now that they're highly unusual. We're going to in the UK, we're going to absolutely smash the June temperature record, uh which was set all the way back in nineteen seventy six. Um and we're gonna break that by about three or four degrees over the next few days, which is a pretty extraordinary event.

How dangerous are these kinds of temperatures?

Mae'n dweud yn dweud yn dweud yn dweud yn dweud yn dweud yn dweud yn dweud yn dweud yn dweud yn dweud yn dweud. Um, especially uh if you're trying to be productive at work, for example, or if you're trying to take exams in stifling exam halls at school, uh your your concentration will not be what you might hope it would be. And if you imagine trying to recover in a hot hospital ward also these these heat makes it much harder to do.

And what's driving these rising temperatures?

Rydyn ni'n ymwneudol. Yn ymwneudol ymwneudol ymwneudol ymwneudol ymwneudol ymwneudol ymwneudol ymwneudol ymwneudol. Uh and if we do not act to reduce our emissions drastically to to net zero over the coming decades, temperatures will just get hotter and hotter and hotter and hotter and hotter until we do reach net zero emissions.

And in terms of uh some of these governments we heard from uh the Prime Minister of France earlier, for example, I mean how are governments responding to this challenge? Um particularly when In some of these countries, they're not as accustomed to such high temperatures as other parts of the world perhaps.

So, you know, in in the UK we have to do two things. We have to adapt, um, you know, our um our society and the infrastructure on which it's uh you know, is based. um is built for a climate that no longer exists. And so we need to adapt, we need to install air conditioning, for example, in our hospitals and our schools and our homes and our workplaces.

And how much time do we have?

W well it it's all about if the quicker we do it, the less bad it gets. As I said, you know, the heat waves will just continue to get hotter and hotter and hotter until we reach net zero. And so it's entirely in our hands how hot things get. It's all about our choices that we make over the coming decades.

And when you look at the um the rest of the world of course, because we see other countries also experiencing high temperatures, um what do you observe that's perhaps different from this particular heat wave in Western Europe?

Well I I mean we we as you say we're we're seeing heat waves um all over all over the world. We're breaking temperatures in every part of the world every year, it seems. Uh it is a global problem. Uh you know, we are seeing countries like China step up. You know, they are building more renewable energy than the rest of the world put together. There are solutions to tackle this problem we and we need to enact them.

What are those solutions? I mean we often talk uh about these summits and leaders, you know, promising to reduce net zero and and those kinds of things, but are they drastic enough?

As I said, you know, it it's all about our choices. The quicker we reach net zero, the less bad things will get. And so yes, we do need to scale up our renewable energy production. It provide every country with energy security a and cheaper energy as well.

And just one last um question. What can we do ourselves as well to protect ourselves from this intense heat when many people don't have the luxury of saying, Well, I'm not gonna go at home I'm I'm gonna stay home or I I'm not gonna go to work.

So if you're at home, then you should close your curtains.

Thank you very much. Uh lots to get through there, wasn't there? Uh Ed Hawkins, a professor of climate science at the University of Reading, thank you very much for joining us here on NewsHour.

Coming up, a newly discovered manuscript by Mozart.

This is really amazing. Uh this is one of the most important discoveries of the last decade. Mozart, when he was in Paris in seventeen seventy eight, composed a piece for harp and flute with an accompaniment for the orchestra. And uh we have a letter by Mozart from this time to his father where he talks about this.

That interview with the director of the Salzburg Library coming up in a few minutes from now. A reminder of some of the other headlines we're watching in the newsroom here. Lebanese media says Israeli soldiers have opened fire on a group near a bulldozer clearing a road in the south of Lebanon, killing two people. And Kenya's government's compar complied with a court order to immediately halt the construction of an Ebola treatment facility intended for American citizens.

Now let's take you to the United States. And in recent months the Trump administration's been on a bit of a renovation spree. His team have paved the famous rose garden, redesigned the White House interiors, and done up the ballroom, and very recently, given the iconic reflecting pool, the long body of water in front of the Lincoln Monument.

Um the people who were arrested were for varying reasons and they haven't really released the charges, but uh it looks like they were even touching the pool, uh kind of taking a little bit of a souvenir potentially. Uh but Trump has said yesterday, oh, these people had brought knives and fertilizer to mess up my project, and we haven't seen any evidence of that yet.

And just tell us about the renovation of the reflecting pool. I've seen it, I know it well, um but I haven't seen it since he's had this refurb. So what does it look like and why so much controversy over it?

So what's interesting is that the reflecting pool has long had issues with algae uh for the last hundred years, because this is a shallow pool of water. Uh it bakes in the sun. uh and the piping and drainage uh and plumbing system has really not uh been upgraded for uh a very long time. So Trump uh ahead of the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the uh country. He wanted he painted this all blue on the bottom.

And he's been quite vocal about this. I mean he's got a lot on his plate, but he's had the time to comment on this, hasn't he?

Yeah, this is in line with his uh adding trying to add the White House ballroom, uh doing the big arch uh on your way into DC from uh Virginia, uh but Of course, Republicans would rather have him talk about the economy uh and get on the road to sell his economic agenda, uh, because they know most people are not going to vote based on the ha the color of the water in the

Daniel, I mean, just looking at some of the arrests, I've seen reports of people who say they were arrested um just for walking past uh the pool and weren't actually vandalising it. So have you got to the bottom of any of that?

Yeah, these seems to be like trumped up charges uh on some of this stuff. They even arrested a former Olympian, uh and so uh if they touch the water they c consider that vandalism, I guess.

Yeah, he said he touched a piece of the peeling paint uh and uh was detained as a result. For five hours, I think.

I this is uh kind of a question of the law enforcement priorities in the in the Trump administration because we thought they were gonna focus on violent uh criminals uh and not people touching a pool.

Indeed. And um just a very quick final thought on all of this. I mean, this is all, as you say, part of the build up to the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of America. Um how much is all of this playing into the wider debate over w how it should be marked?

I I think it's a a part of that. Uh but also y one of the big elements of the story is uh some of the money ties where one of the contractors uh for this pool project was a big Trump donor. Uh and so Uh that's kind of where you see uh you know, follow the money. Uh and of course it's not a democratic uh donor getting this uh project and so that that it was kind of ironic.

Daniel Littman, thank you very much for taking us through all of

Francois sent that discovery to his colleague Armin Brinzing, the director of the Mozart Library in Salzburg in Austria. I've been speaking to him about it all.

with this manuscript. There's no name written on it, no title. So it was in the shelves for many, many years and my colleague just went on cataloguing it thoroughly and so he discovered that there's Mozart involved in it.

I mean that's incredible, isn't it, Armin, that this notebook was just kinda lying around in the dusty archives and this goes back to a twenty two year old Mozart.

Yes, exactly. Yeah. This is really amazing. I I'm yeah, really sure this is the one of the most important uh discoveries of the last decade. Um yeah we know that Mozart uh when he was in Paris in 1778 uh composed a piece for harp and flute with an accompaniment for the orchestra. And uh the person who commissioned this work. uh account de Guin, he uh played the flute himself and his daughter played the

A hop.

And so he commissioned this work, and this work is very well known, K two hundred and ninety nine, a very famous piece by Mozart. And uh we have a letter by Mozart from this time to his father where he talks about this. And it's really fascinating uh here in this letter he writes about uh his compos composing lessons he gave to this lung young woman, Marie Louise Philippine de Bonnier de Guine.

And so on.

And so it's a mixture of Mozart and his pupil. Yeah. And it's really exciting to compare the two handwritings and to see what he writes in his letter. This is, by the way, also the the earliest document we have of Mozart being a composition teacher. We only knew of other manuscripts from his time in Vienna, but this is the earliest one.

Imagine just finding that notebook in that dusty library. That's Armin Brinzen, the director of the Mozart Library in Salzburg, in Austria.

The Signal Awards recognize the podcasts that define culture, and being honored by the Signal Awards sets your production team apart with recognition. The industry's top experts and access proof that your work is a standard bearer for podcasting worldwide. By entering your work is heard by the Signal Awards Judging Academy, an invitation-only body of podcasting. Podcast professionals from acclaimed organizations to

Welcome back to NewsHour. Disabled people are the most unfairly treated minority in Germany. That's according to one former Member of Parliament there who says it's especially the case in the world of work. The unemployment rate amongst disabled people is twice that of people with no disability, and when they do find work, they tend to be paid less than the minimum wage and work in places without the usual rights and protections often.

This is a small group, and we have here people with severe disabilities and a very high need of assistance. So, right now you see

This is what in Germany we call a Werkstatt für behinderte Menschen, a workshop for disabled people. Some three hundred thousand disabled Germans work in places like this one in Paderborn. The boss, Carla Bredenbalz, shows me their gardening project.

I think this project is a nice project because it shows that for us it's not always about working, it's about developing people.

But these workshops are controversial in Germany. The disabled people who come to work here are often making goods for commercial companies but are paid less than the minimum wage.

Det er ingen gruppe.

There is no group that experiences more discrimination than people with a disability.

Hubert Hooper is one of the most prominent critics of the workshop system and of the way disabled people are separated from the rest of society. He says this separation begins early.

Ein Grundsatz ist, wer einmal

In principle, once you become part of this segregated system, you never get out of it. So you'll go from a special kindergarten into a special school and then into one of those sheltered workshops.

Mm. The workshops are supposed to prepare people to work in the mainstream economy, but only one percent of people in workshops ever make it to what we might call a regular job. Carla Bredenbals acknowledges that this is too few.

I know that the critics are there that there's only one percent of people going back to the first market and I do think also that that's way

too low.

Here in Dortmund they are holding what they're calling an Inklusionsmesse. It's a trade fair for inclusion companies. An inclusion company is one where thirty percent of the workforce is made up of disabled people. The director of the authority behind this event is Georg Lunemann. He told me that at a time of economic difficulty in Germany, disabled people were an essential resource.

Also der Bereich von Menschen mit Behinderung, den Sie in der Welt.

We see a real opportunity in the labour market for people with a disability in terms of skilled workers because a huge number of businesses are looking for people and we're trying to get a foothold in that market.

The German government says that it's working on legislation to reform the workshop system. This, it says, would enable more people than today to move into the mainstream economy.

Well you can hear from Amy Zayad on this week's edition of assignment. That's here of course on the BBC World Service.

You're listening to News Hour from the BBC. I'm Regenie Videnarthan. Now, do you remember this?

That's the uh result of this referendum which has been preceded by weeks and months of argument and dispute and all the rest of it. The British people have spoken and the answer is well

But I...

That was of course the moment the Brexit vote was announced by the BBC. It followed a lively and divisive campaign. The UK voted to leave the European Union by fifty two percent to forty eight. That was a decade ago. Well, Sarah Hall is an economic geographer at the University of Cambridge and Deputy Director of UK in a changing Europe. That's a think tank. I asked her first how she thinks things have changed economically since that vote.

Very shortly after the Brexit vote, the Office for Budget Responsibility, which monitors the UK economy, estimated that they thought Brexit would have a long term negative effect of around four percent GDP. And interestingly they haven't changed that opinion. They continue to think that that's what the impact has been. But it didn't happen overnight. It's sort of an ongoing process. The UK economy has really struggled for growth.

Another key talking point around the Brexit campaign was migration. What has changed on that front?

The UK has seen quite a sizable reduction in EU migrants coming to the UK. There was definitely a concern amongst Leave voters that taking back control of borders was a key part of that rhetoric. I think what's really interesting is that on the other hand you've seen quite a significant rise in non EU migration to the UK, um particularly from India, um Nigeria.

What we've seen in the last couple of years is the rise of the anti immigration party reform UK. What would you say uh is the current conversation in British politics around all of this and how is Brexit fueling that at the moment?

straight after the referendum and in the early period of the Labour government, politicians didn't really want to talk about Brexit. They didn't want to talk about the negative economic impact. Rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n

Sarah Hall on ten years since Brexit.

Now let's bring you an update on the latest with the US and Iran. Iran's president Masood Pazeshkian is in Pakistan a day after opening talks with America, produced a roadmap towards a final peace agreement. Pakistan, of course, has been acting as a key mediator. Well in a social media post, Iran's president said progress depends on sticking to precise obligations. He said statements outside the agreed text would not help.

We have the Iranians allowing weapons inspectors, nuclear inspectors, into their country for the first time in a long time. We're obviously gonna bolster those inspections that inspection regime to make sure they can never have a nuclear weapon.

And just a few hours ago, President Trump posted something similar on Truth Social also saying that those talks are going well, but Tehran has denied that they will allow inspectors in. Well, I'm joined now from Washington by the BBC's Bernd de Boosman. Um Bern, the US administration seems to be quite confident uh on the issue of allowing inspectors despite what we're hearing from Tehran.

regime then these talks would stop. Uh President Trump's repeatedly signaled a willingness that he would walk kind of walk away from the talks if the nuclear issue more than any other issue in this conflict uh wasn't being addressed to a level of his satisfaction. Uh but for now he he seems to be kind of very insistent that Iran will allow these inspectors. He said in the post that

Yeah, it was interesting because we obviously have heard from Iran saying that any statements outside the agreed decision. won't help. But of course, we often do hear from the US administration beyond the boundaries of what we're hearing in diplomatic settings.

I think that's one of the more interesting aspects of this conflict is that many of these statements, both from the US side and from the Iranian side, have also in a way been framed by observers as being focused on a domestic audience. Um Of course we we don't know exactly where these talks are, but I think it'd be very difficult for the administration to argue that this conflict has been a success if that issue

Yeah, and what's the reaction then to the fact that the Trump administration's temporarily lifting oil sanctions on Iran? How's that going down?

Well, I think many Americans are still concerned uh about the price of petrol. It's still not gone back down to pre war levels. Uh President Trump supporters, of course, the the hard MAGA base. Uh many of them are are simply happy that this war ended without the sort of prolonged foreign conflict that he campaigned against. Of course we don't know what'll happen in the future. I think many Americans are very concerned that this negotiations process is essentially just a

Indeed, Bernd Boostman from Washington, thank you very much for that update. Well let's stay on that story and speak to Ali Vyez, the Iran Project Director at the International Crisis Group.

It's great to be with you. Uh look, it's inevitable that there are going to be different narratives of victory and interpretations of this deal because the domestic uh political requirements in Tehran and Washington And are just uh fundamentally incompatible. Uh this happened in twenty fifteen. It will happen with every deal and it's just inevitable.

Indeed. And I wanted to ask you about um I think it's point eleven on that document between the US and Iran, which is relates to Iran's frozen assets, which of course Iran wants to be released. Um what where where do you think things stand on that?

Well on that front, um my understanding is that half of Iran's uh um part the partial release of frozen asset, half of it was supposed to happen upfront, given Iranian experience uh with the United States in general and President Trump in particular of reneging on commitments. Uh and then half of it would be paid as progress payment as the Strait of Hormos opens up and traffic goes back to uh pre war level.

Yeah.

Um and in in that sense I imagine that uh already some of uh these assets have become accessible to Iran, some of it's just for purchase of uh humanitarian goods which are exempt from UN US sanctions, and it is also possible uh that Iran has uh earmarked them to be uh only uh uh US agricultural products uh in order to uh uh further satisfy President Trump.

Marco Rubier, the Secretary of State, is heading to the Gulf, reportedly to defend what's been agreed with Iran. Who's he likely to be talking to and what are the biggest challenges on that front?

Well, in the region he would be pushing against an open door because although a lot of these regional countries uh are very angry at Iran for targeting them uh given that they house US military bases. Uh but they also wanted really wanted this war to end and the straight of foremost to open. And what the MOU does is that it basically uh addresses the uh essential and differs to some of the substantial issues. And that is something that most regional countries, except Israel of course,

And just very briefly, how does the issue of Lebanon still play into all of this? We have seen some activity there, haven't we?

Well it remains the biggest point of vulnerability of this agreement, uh, especially because as long as Israel occupies southern Lebanon, uh there is going to be uh clashes between Hezbollah and Israel and that would undermine US Iran diploma diplomacy without any doubt.

Okay, Ava is Iran, project director at the International Crisis Group, speaking to us from Geneva. Thank you very much for that. Just a reminder that we do have more on that story as well on the BBC News website. Uh we continue to bring you analysis on all of the stories and of course you can uh join the NewsCa NewsHour Podcast family. You can go to wherever you get your podcast normally. Or you can go to the World Service website and sign up that way. I'm Regini Vydenarvin. This is News Hour.

Now Belgium's issued five visas to a Taliban delegation to attend a European Union meeting on migration in Brussels. It would be the first time the EU has hosted the Taliban since the group seized power in Afghanistan five years ago. Well Anbarasan Eterajan is our global affairs correspondent. And Barasan we're seeing reports that those talks have now taken place. First of all, how did this happen in the first place?

Well, we have to see what is happening in Europe at the moment. There is a big debate about uh illegal migration and also about pressure for many countries to send back some of those who could not obtain documents on the emergence of right wing or conservative political parties in European countries.

But of course it is controversial and there are many who feel that this meeting risks normalising normalising the Taliban, especially given their positions on women, banning girls from school beyond the sixth grade. erasing women from public life and that continues years on.

Uh more than sixty human rights groups, including Human Rights Watch and others, have issued an open letter uh criticizing the European Commission for holding this dialogue with the Taliban, saying that at the moment First of all, uh the Taliban have taken away all the rights of women. Basically they are away from public life and they have to come completely covered.

And just going back to that central point, I mean does this risk legitimising the Taliban government, which is minimising the rights of women?

In a way European Union says we are not recognizing the Taliban. In fact, even the meetings today they can't be held in any of the EU official buildings. And at the same time any of these uh EU officials you know, talking about in their own buildings or premises about with the Taliban. So

Okay, Ambaras and Etherajan, thank you very much. And of course, let's not forget the fact that women's rights have been virtually erased in the country. Uh really interesting developments though, of course, uh from that meeting in Brussels.

Now they've become the unlikely heroes of the World Cup, gaining fans and followers the world over. Cape Verde, a group of islands in the mid Atlantic off the coast of Senegal, is the second smallest country to qualify with a population of only four hundred thousand, but the team's already defying the odds in the early stages of the tournament. It's achieved draws in its group games against the much larger and former World Cup winners Spain and Uruguay.

I'm at one of the many fanzones with big screens that have been set up throughout the city of Praia and the excitement here is on another level. We're just minutes away from the beginning of their first World Cup game ever against one of the tournament favourites Spain and everyone is really excited.

Very confident because for the first time they will see KBAT playing a so big game like this.

How do you feel about today?

I say that she feels very proud because the Cape Verde already won. It doesn't matter what happened there.

The Cape Verde team is known as the Blue Sharks and it's the second smallest country in this year's World Cup. Most of the squad are from the large diaspora. That's probably why a country of less than 500,000 people. Punches way above its weight and has qualified for the World Cup. I'm with Paulina Dias, who's one of the country's best-known economists and also a huge football fan. Paulina, tell me, how does the country feel today?

But I never saw something like this that we are witnessing uh today. This feeling of pride, of unity will have a huge impact at the economic sites, I would say forever perhaps, because it there will be a caveat before today and a cavert after today.

And of course Cape Verde's economy is largely dependent on tourism. I've come to the sea.

front.

in Sidad Vaya on the Cape Verde Island of Santiago and I'm with Paulina Diaz again. What are the short term benefits that you think qualifying for the World Cup finals will have

For the first time everyone in the world is talking about Cape Verde for free. So everyone is trying uh to come to Cape Verde to know who is the who the hell is this Cape Verde? This will attract for for sure more investors to the tourism sector. And and we we also have the impact in the consumption.

You'll see.

crowd of people just buying flags, buying t shirts, you know in the restaurants, bars, small shops, everyone is happy and I mean w when everyone is happy you are more likely to consume. And this is an uh positive impact uh on the economy as well.

As you can hear, excitement is at fever pitch as the game ends in a 0-0 draw. Cake Verde, the second smallest country in the World Cup against one of the favourites, Spain. The party is only just getting started here on this group of islands in the middle of the Atlantic. I'm with Kenny Andradi who manages one of the bars on the city. Kenny, tell me roughly since the World Cup started, you have doubled the amount.

People

I would say triple. I hope I get to see more tourists coming this way, you know? Stanley the islands where we make a lot of noise.

They do indeed. Well, many of us are rooting for them, aren't we? That's Rachel Wright reporting from Cape Verde. That ends this edition of News Hour. I'm Regini Videnarden from the team and myself. Thanks to you for listening.

The Signal Awards recognize the podcasts that define culture, and being honored by the Signal Awards sets your production team apart. With recognition from the industry's top experts, and access proof that your work is a standard bearer for podcasting worldwide. By entering, your work is heard by the Signal Awards Judging Academy, an invitation only. only body of podcast professionals from acclaimed organizations