tv News Al Jazeera May 11, 2014 1:00pm-1:31pm EDT
1:00 pm
... good afternoon to you. and welcome to al jazeera america live from new york city. i am morgan radford. here are the top stories we are following for you right now. pro- and antiprotesters really across ukraine as voters decide on independence. the search cons for the missing nigerian girls but now military experts are worried about what else boko haram might have done. and a dispute over painting. a community debates the nazi art work is too dangerous to be display
1:01 pm
displayed. >> the ukrainian government and the west are condemn, the voting that took place today in parts of eastern ukraine. separatists in the region of donetsk and luhansk held a vote and it is said the vote is the illegal and could result in the self destruction of those regions. turn out was high despite attempts by ukrainian forces to block election workers from carrying out that vote. donetsk and luhansky have a combined 6 million people but only areas living under separatist rule went to the polls. today's vote went ahead despite calls from vladimir putin for postponement. more from the refer endsum from donetsk. >> hastyly arranged, low budget, the referendum drew large numbers of voters to a small
1:02 pm
number of polling stations in towns and cities across the east of ukraine. this was the regional center of donetsk, would-be seat of the people's repuckp publicblic of donetsk. the ballot asks whether they agree with the proclamation of the people's republic or not. the word something vague on how much autonomy they should have. most here want little more to do with the central government in kiev. >> well, big crowds have turned out to vote. just one question on the ballot paper, a simplier than. the problem is there are multiple different interpretations of what exactly it means. >> we want to live with russia in friendship says this man. this woman isn't entirely sure what she has voted for. >> translator: i voted for our national republic, she says.
1:03 pm
>> i want peace in this country. i don't want this horrible mess that they created in the maidan, a war, the killing of people. and it continues heretran. >> it isn't easy to find a voice in opposition of all of this. to do so, we traveled to the town of horlifka in anti-governmenthands. bin man was prepared to talk to us. he didn't want to be identified. he didn't want to be identified. >> a lot of people who are against it and more people who are for it, in general, they have not understood what kind of a threat it poses and what can happen as a result. it appears russia doesn't want us and we are parting from ukraine. left on its own, this region will head towards catastrophe. >> are you afraid here at the moment? >> it's difficult to say. i am tired of being afraid, but it's very tension. after several killings of innocent people who are simply against this movement.
1:04 pm
>> the referendum has gone ahead in defor instance of calls by russia's president putin for a delay. the government in kiev says its illegitimate and warns of a d decent into the abyss. some feel that has already happened. to further discuss the referendums, i am joined by david amdomin. thank you for being with us today? >> thanks for having me. >> what are your thoughts? >> today's refer endum, probably not a lot but to get people excited in the eastern part, of course. what this really means is that probably 30% of the people in that part of the world are going to suggest that they want some kind of not index but self determination. okay. >> that's very important to understand did he have and beca even vladimir putin doesn't want a fullly independent part of eastern ukraine. it means that way, he owns it basically.
1:05 pm
he can't afford it. >> the responsibility? >> not only responsibility. too much of an economic burden because that is the -- probably the poorest part of all much ukraine is eastern ukraine. and, you know, you break it, you own it. >> what's also interested about putin is that he called the supporters in eastern ukraine to postpone this. why the sunday turnaround? >> he understands he has a -- it's a delicate balance. he is actually waiting for the may 25th e leningsz. it's a very patient man. he didn't want to necessarily force events. he wants events to evolve and he wants to be able to, in some fashion, push them perhaps in a direction that will work for him. >> it doesn't seem like crimea evolved? >> no. crimea was very important, very different animal, if you will. crimea is something that at a time russian military desperately needed. it needed to control a warm-water port for its naval forces. and that was why that was very important to russia, that they own this. they don't have to own ukraine. they just have to in some fashion be able to not control it but at least be able to push
1:06 pm
it in directions that it would like to see happen. >> you mentioned the may 25th elections that are coming up. how do you think today's vote will xwaimpact those elections? >> i don't think it will have much impact on those elections. as i said, probably 30% of the voters in that whole region went to the polls. it was just in two polka-dot jersey of that, dondon and luhan luhansk, the only two where people went to the poles. a lot of the people skeptical about becoming part of russia never even went to the polls at all because they would have voted "no" and that probably would have not been very good for their health. >> let's talk then in terms of solutions. the acting president said he was willing to grant eastern ukrainians more localized control and to grant the ethnic minority more power. so, is that the solution, perhaps, for solving all of this? >> it's probably the most immediate solution. ideally, the country could split in half, have two countries but probably putin doesn't want that because if that does happen, remember, western ukraine could very well join the eu.
1:07 pm
it could very well join nato. >> that's the worst nightmare for him. he then then owns the eastern part, which as i said is the biggest economic load on russia. >> why would that be his worst nightmare? >> because it would be a little bit like when east germany joined west germany. west germany had to worry about a very underprivileged deprived area of germany that it still has not brought up to the standards of western germany. >> that's the same thing that would be troubling putin. he would have a very economically deprived area of eastern europe that he would then have to take care of. >> what about the reaction? if so many partners in the west are saying, look. this is completely illegal. we want nothing to do with that, can the results of today's vote even really stick with any weight? >> it probably doesn't. remember, the actual vote is not whether to become independent. it's self-determination. >> is to say, we want some say in our future, whether it's within a ukraine as a nation or whether it's outside. and the vast majority of
1:08 pm
ukrainians, 70% according to recent pew poll, they say they want a unified ukraine and that includes people in the east. they want to be part of ukraine. they don't want to be part of russia. they don't want to be ruled by putin and his men from the kremlin. >> those who are pro-russian, are they also pro-putin, or is there an interesting distinction there? >> not at all. i think they are pro-culturally russian. they speak the russian language. they worship in the russian orthodox church. they use the cyrlic alf better but they are not necessarily one. they don't want to be ruled by t the. it was ruled by the kremlin in which they had very little say. >> david andelman thank you for joining us, editors of wat coordin policy journal". a nigerian military expert says boko haram may haveplationed land mines in a forest where teens are -- teams are searching for 276 missing
1:09 pm
school girls. the search for the girls has largely focused on the nearby forest which is a known boko haram hideout. despite this, the demand to find the girls has not wavered. churches and mosques all across nigeria have been holding special prayers and fasting for their release. al jazeera has those details. >> almost a month after the abductorn, nigerians are praying for their savory lease. the catholic church called on its congregation to hold special prayers. many responded to the call at the holy rosary church in abjuja. >> it's important to pray for the girls because affection ploring all options in terms of a government and trying to make attempts to rescue the girls, we also need to go spiritual. >> the nigerian catholic church has urged all nigerians irrespective of their faith to pray instead of trading blame and accusations >> reporter: at this mosque,
1:10 pm
clerics say worshippers have been praying for the girls after every scripture class. the govern of the predominantly muslim state where the girls were kidnapped called called for three days of fasting. >> this has brought a sense of unity, solidarity, togetherness regardless of people's faith, people's tribe and people's geographical location. it's our concern, you know, all of us. >> many nigerians have welcomed the arrival of technical and law enforcement experts from the united states and britain to assist nigerian authorities. but the protesters say they need to keep the pressure going. they want to ensure the government does not relent until the search and rescue efforts finally, yield results. al jazeera, abuja. the 300 girls who were initially kidnapped, nigerian officials say about 50 of them escaped. now, two of those girls are finally, speaking out. kaelyn mcgee has their story >> reporter: for these mothers
1:11 pm
in northern nigeria, desperate to get their daughters back, the grief is raw and matched by raising anger. they came together to press the government to find the more than 270 school girls snatched by boko haram nearly a month ago and to hear some of the girls who managed to escape revisit a harrowing ordeal. >> translator: when they came in, they got us together and started asking for the location of the engine block. we told them we did not. they threatened to kill us if we didn't tell them. >> another girl gaven an emotional account of how they decided to run for their lives. >> translator: when we got to the bush, they asked us to get out of the cars. i told my friends, it is better to be killed than to be taken to a place we did not know. we got out of the car and started running. >> the families still hoping to see their daughters return home are calling for more government
1:12 pm
action. . >> this woman asked the crowd what they want. the chorus answered: please help us. we want our children found. the head of the organization for islamic cooperation, the word's largest block of muslim countries describes the kidnapping as barbaric saying groups like boko haram disavow islam. for nearly a month, the families in borno state have best left to wait with anguish. now with boko haram threatening to sell the girls into slavery, their desperation cannot be contained. katelyn mcgee, al jazeera. >> coming up next on al jazeera america, art that is too controversial to display. >> that's the argument folks are taking up as nazi paintings of propaganda are being questioned.
1:14 pm
1:15 pm
became the first openly-gay n.f.l. draft pick. al jazeera jessica taff is here with this landmark moment in sports? >> it was a huge win. he is not the first or the last athlete to come out. his election on saturday made him the first openly gay player selected to the n.f.l., one of the most popular american sports in a bill yon dollar industry but on draft day, the rams said when they drafted michael sams with the 249th overall pick, they got a good football player, plain and simple. of course, we all know that it's not that simple. notom often are the cameras waiting for the a 7th rounder. but when he got on the phone, the moment wasn't lost on either of them. fisher saying he was honored. the rams continue to diversify and able to exhale at the realization of the lifelong dream. he got to share it with his boyfriend. >> as for the dust settling, the sesc reaches out to the new
1:16 pm
n.f.l. family tweeting a picture of himself wearing a rams hat and thanking the team and the city of st. louis and pledging to use every ounce of this to achieve greatness, he said. meanwhile, teammates were quick to twitter as well, open arms with robert quin being the first, welcoming to the squad hash tag dline. >> and former ram eric dickerson sending out a congratulatory tweet saying welcome to the rams family and kurn families weighing in, pro-guard tweeted a fellow gamer throwner, long the brother of chris is chris long who plays for the rams. not all of the reaction, of course, was positive. miami dolphin safety announced sams name, omg and horrible. safe to say jones isn't the only one with that type of reaction and no doubt, will get more scrutiny for free speech but when it comes to anyone in the
1:17 pm
dolphi in. s organization has proven it lacks sensitivity with the bullying scandal. they will look at thcloser than anybody else. it will be interesting to see how we move forward on this. >> speaking of moving forward, why are the rams a good team? >> it makes them a good team at least in this situation for mike sams is the fact that it's right in his backyard. he played at mizzou. he has a built-in fan base. it's a team of veteran players, mature players, coached by geoffi fisher and he said this is a guy that can play, plane and simple, and if he can't, he won't. >> is it also a political move? this has been getting a lot of attention. >> yeah. they say that here is the difference with this thing. if he doesn't make it at camp, if he doesn't cut did -- and there is going to be a lot of cameras, as you know, at these camps, especially right there. they are going to see it on tape. they are going to see it on film and he will have plenty of people weighing in on this. if he doesn't basically make the grade and we see him on the team, you know that's the case.
1:18 pm
but this is also a franchise that -- an organization that signed the first african-american player back in 1946, a year before jackie robinson was actually -- >> they have a history? >> they have a history of dye versefying. so, it's nothing new to the franchise. but we will see if he is not playing as well as he should, if he is still on the team. time will tell in this situation. >> it sure well. thank you so much. wedding bells ring out at same-sex maryland where david butcher and steve motes made history with their special day. the two got married in the first same-section wedding ever held city u.s. naval academy in annapolis. >> for me, it's about breaking barriers and making it easier for those who come behind us. i also recognize those who have gone before us and in other ways. >> about 100 guests attended the ceremony performed by a navy chaplain. >> the daughter of cuba's president marched in support of gay rights on saturday. she joined the protest in havana as one of cuba's most prominent
1:19 pm
gay rights activists. before her father became president, gay pride praised were banned. >> almost 70 years after the end of world war ii, a u.s. collection of nazi art is causing a stir. it's considered too dangerous to return to germany but art historians say making it public could help viewers better understand exactly how propaganda is used. al jazeera s ha-ha d ratansi has more. >> these are the sort of paintings you would expect a u.s. army to have in its vast collection, commissioned by the military to record the u.s. war experience abroad. a few steps away, the subject matter transforms. >> one of the main issues with this particular piece is that you look at the skull and crossbones and you look at the individuals' collar badge that signifies the ss. it's a very direct message, glorifying the ss. >> this piece is one of 456
1:20 pm
german works held at a u.s. army base just outside washington, d.c. under the terms of the potsdam agreement on german de-nazification. >> parentsings weren't returned if they were considered overt propaganda or depicted nazi leaders. >> they contrast the art work. >> it is not what you are seeing in the painting of the gis on blow the american b-17 coming in, engines on fire. it's firing flares. they indicate that there is wounded on board. >> the u.s. authorities, the champion oning of artistic freedom was the message, not the specific work. a strategy that continued into the cold war. >> for the allies, i think it was important to show the
1:21 pm
difference between these regimes, what they stood for. >> the u.s. holocaust memorial museum organized exhibitions of nazi art, in some part of its ferment collection. seen as theho of nazism. the curator says some work retains value? >> it's important for these objects to be preserved and available for display in the proper circumstances. you have to look at the consequences that caused the deaths of 55 million people. when you look at this art work, you have to examine: what role does it play? >> nonetheless, german authorities in the united states don't seem too concerned about getting any of it back. when contacted about the collection, the german embassy in washington declined to comment. the official consensus appears to be that this cache of historical artifacts should remain locked up in a virginia warehouse. al jazeera, virg. one of paris's most famous museums is getting a slight
1:22 pm
makeover, the iconic entrance to the louvre will under go the first major upgrade in 25 years when the giant glass consult tour first opened to the public back in 1989, it was actually designed accommodate 4.5 million visitors a year. since then, attendance has more than doubled. coming up on al jazeera america, we are able to see images like this one all because of the environment in the chilean desert. we will show you a brand-new telescope that will allow us to see so much more. if i told you that a free ten-second test could mean less waiting for things like security backups and file downloads you'd take that test, right?
1:23 pm
1:24 pm
chile's desert is one of the best places in the entire world to observe the universe. it's also soon to be home to the biggest telescope on earth. al jazeera's nick clark has more. to explore the kosmos you need to capture star light that could have traveled billions of light years. to do that, you need a clean mirror. it's made from seven tons of glass but the surface film of aluminum 1/10th of a millimeter thing. in six years time, the imagine he willan telescopes will be overpowered what will be the most powerful telescope on earthly being built 250 meters higher up, right over there. >> the pace of astron omcal discovery depends very much on our ability to peer deep into the universe. it knows no bounds. here, a mountaintop has been
1:25 pm
blown apart and flattened in our quest to answer those pressing questions like the nature of dark energy and dark matter, the story of black holes and how stars and galaxies evolve. this is how the giant imagine he willan telescope will look. it's approaching $1,000,000,000 of mirrors and cosmic engineering. it will produce images 10 times sharper than the famous hubble telescope, an incredible tool for stellar archeology. >> the gmt magellan telescope is going to open up the sky for us, and it will allow certainly myself to go after really feint stars and for example, little dwarf galaxies and this southwesterlying out and about, the milky way which we have trouble observing. >> the imagine he willan chefs are hard at work. you need to be well if he had if you are going to turn star light into spectra. as t anna frebel:
1:26 pm
>> to combine my research work and the data that often looks not very appealing but gives us real information about the cosmic object with the beautiful images that that same sky gives us. . >> this is a fairly nearby galaxy. >> fellow astronomy mark phillips is on the hunt for super novae tracking back 3 or 400 billion years? >> we are able to see the super nova the way it was back then because it took the light 3 million years to get here. we can also ms. you're the expansion of the universe at that point through these kinds of observations, the super nova, it was discovered the expansion in the universe is accelerating instead of decelerating as what we expected. >> a few hours later, more incredible pictures of our home galaxy. >> we have a nice movie clip
1:27 pm
here of the rising milky way, especially the galactic center. this is the spiral, backlit by the big galactic center where there is a lot of gas. it's very bright. >> that's what makes the milky way special in the southern hemisphere. >> another night's observations are over. more data, more spectra, more knowledge. bit by bit we build on our understanding of the universe and our place in it. nick clark, al jazeera, a 26789 akarma, chile. good after be to you. i am meteorologist ebb oni dion. tornado watch across iowa. we have been watching this band all morning long, a cluster of stormy weather. earlier this morning, we were watching for a few severe storms but now, there is a threat of a tornado within these -- within this area.
1:28 pm
we have a tornado watch that will remain in effect stretching across iowa until 7:00 p.m. local time. it's this area shaded in red we are we have the tornado around osceola. that's where you need to take shelter. >> storm is moving slowly at 30 miles per hour, heading to the northeast. this is what we are dealing with. >> batch of storms not really in the warmest of the air mass so far but we have that warm front lifting northward helping to increase the instability, area of low pressure will continue to lift off to the north and east. on the back side of it, we have the much colder air. a clash of the air masses are what we are dealing with here across much of the midwest. when we take a look at the big picture, many areas around the central u.s. have been quiet and dry throughout the day. we are getting warm southerly flow coming in. >> that's helping to heat things up. areas not dealing with the severe threat now, that will change. we are expecting to see conditions continuing to deteriorate across extreme northern areas of missouri into
1:29 pm
parts of kansas and eastern nebraska. we will continue to monitor this area very closely because, as you can see, high temperatures are going to be heating up. we will have low-level winds from the south, but upper-level wind energy from the jetstream. >> will allow the tornado winds. >> will allow some of those storms to rotate. >> that's why we have that threat for toranados. now, as far as temperatures go, take a look at denver. we are just at 33 degrees but then you get out ahead of that system, we are in the mid 60s around minneapolis at 76 degrees in chicago. the heat will continue, especially along the west coast of california over the next few days. morgan? >> eboni, thanks so much. check this little surprise out at sydney's famous opera house. this man climbed one of the buildings iconic sails and stayed for over an hour. that was before two police officers finally, convinced him to come down. despite earlier reports, this wasn't a protest but rather a case of public intoxication. >> that's according to eyewitnesses.
1:30 pm
thanks so much for watching al jazeera america. i am morgan radford. 101 east is coming up next. for news updates throughout the day, go to argues.com. >> the wonder of the world's force is often found in the creatures that live in them. but the rare and precious of animals are increasingly falling prey t to poachers. equal only in scale to the illegal drug trade. so vast and lucrative is this black market under world its driving more species than ever into extinction. while there have been seizures
114 Views
IN COLLECTIONS
Al Jazeera America Television Archive The Chin Grimes TV News Archive Television Archive News Search ServiceUploaded by TV Archive on