sto ♪ >> this is al jazeera. welcome to the news hour. i am sammy in doha. in the show, u.s. air planes launch strikes againstis lammic state rebels in northern iraq. a face-off as unrest returns to the streets of ferguson. british police launch an investigation after the death of a man among 35 people found in the shipping container. >> i am andy richardson with the sought sports as louie van hal gets off to the worst possible

start as manager on the opening day of the new premier league season. ♪ the united states has launched more airstrikes to try and drive back islamic state fighters from northern iraq. fighter planes pounded targets close to iraq's largest dam seized earlier this month by the group. there are reports that more than 80 men were killed and hundreds of women taken prisoners in the yazid ivillage. the islamic state group controls 90% of the area. live from erbil. where is the fighting in the north leaving control of that strategic dam? >> reporter: well, it's still in the hands of the islamic state group, like you mentioned. the united states carried out a number of airstrikes around the dam in the sinjar mountains. we understand that up to 15

islamic state fighters were killed but that area is still in their hands. from our sources, peshmerga forces, they are telling us that they are hoping they can exploit these airstrikes, take advantage and try to recapture that territory. this will not be an easy fight. we have to point out that the u.s. air strikes, the objective of the strikes, is to defend the kurdish region as well as to protect minorities. in no way has the obama administration said that, you know, their military objective is to dpef feet the group. they are trying to weaken the group so they can advance further. last week, the islamic state managed to seize a number of towns and villages in the north. the peshmerga were able to recapture one town but the rest is under thes islamic state. not much is change can on the ground as u.s. air strikes, they are not even protecting the minorities wh reports of new attacks against the yazidi

community. >> tell us what we know about what happened to the culture. >> ko. cho is a small village approximately 300 families live there. what we understand is the islamic state fighters stormed the village. they executed up to 80 men and captured and unknown number of women and children. this is what local sources on the ground have been telling us. the islamic state group gave them an ultimatum. five days ago, they told them to convert or die. at a time community did come under attack in the sinjar mountains a week ago. this is not the only minority has been targeted. the christians were given the same ultimatum a few weeks ago. thousands were forced out of their homes. and so, as a humanitarian crisis is growing on the ground, up to 1.2 million iraqis, displaced iraqis live in the kurpdish region. officials are struggling to cope. they are appealing to the

international organizations to help those people. so, a growing humanitarian crisis as the war continues. >> all right, zeina chodr, thank you. the security national council has held a news conference for which they called for the united states to launch airstrikes against islamic state rebels in syria as well as iraq. we will hear from them in a moment. but first, this is zeina hodr's report. >> more territory captured by the islamic straight group, but this is not iraq. the group is advancing on more than one front and in more than one country. this is a syrian town in the northern country side of aleppo, a region under the control of rebels fighting the assad government. >> the village is under siege by the so-called islamic state. they are not an islamic state. they are an unjust state in iraq and syria. >> the islamic state group already controls large areas in

the east of syria, all the way to the iraqi border. they have been moving freely between the two countries. syrian rebels from the islamic front are struggling to hold on to the aleppo country side, losing this region means losing a main supply line from turkey. for years, the syrian opposition has appealed for military assistance from the international community. on saturday, they renewed that appeal and called for direct military, calling for targeted airstrikes, backed up by intensive train and equip programs. in iraq, the u.s. is already caring out airstrikes against the itslamic straight group but the pent pe penned gone says at this mission is limited to defending the kurdish region. a third of iraq is ubldz the control of the islamic state group. the international community has expressed alarm about the growing strengths. but so far, there is no plan to defeat that group. the islamic state fighters are

in urban centers and live among the local population. they are well armed. they have taken u.s.-made weapons from the iraqi army and have seized military equipment from syrian army basis. even the u.s. acknowledge airstrikes won't be enough. >> airstrikes will target the positions that the peshmerga, the iraqi army and seasoned rebels need to fight to get rid of them. >> it has been weeks since the iraqi army was pushed out of "the sun"ni hartland. it has tried to retake those cities but failed. the sunni friebz who helped america fight al-qaeda are refusing to take on the is group unless the iraqi government respects their groups. i.s fighters have effectively erased the border 2010 iraqi and syria. it will take an international effort and cooperation from partners on the ground to prevent a permanent redrawing of the mediddle east.

>> the director of the legal office of the syrian national council joins us via skype from jeda in saudi arabia. first of all, you are calling for a renewed international intervention. have you been given, though, any specific new promises of aid from any international powers? tr tran. >> are you at all hopeful or do you expect at all to have a positive -- we have some here, saying he has not received any sort of new promise for international aid whatsoever from any international quarter. we apologize there for the loss of translation. anyway, we will try to come back to that later.

we do have translation, i am told. let's try again then. so, what are your expectations after making that plea today from the international community to intervene? do you actually expect that you will see air strikes on islamic state positions inside syria? tran please go ahead, sir >> translator: as a matter of fact, what i want to say, that this resolution and according to it, according to the positive points and the solution in facing terrorism, but it was a late resolution, a late

decision. and as a matter of fact, it didn't state...... [translation transpires ] >> okay. so i am afraid we have lost translation. some there what he was saying, he was mentioning there the arrival into syria of, as he put it, terrorist organizations. he mentioned hezbollah, the lebanese hezbollah, as terrorist groups, as he put it who have come to syria, need to be confronted by the international community alongside other groups, a reference perhaps to the islamic state group. thanks so much, mr. shamadawa

there. let's bring in shihab retinsi, our correspondent from washington, d.c., a plea from the syrian opposition that the u.s. should be striking targets inside syria if it's serious about going aver the islamic state group. what sort of messages are you getting from the u.s. officials there about how far they would be willing to go in targeting the i.s.? >> twe asked the department of defense whether airstrikes on syria were being considered. i can actually read you the full response actually because it isn't very long. i cannot confirm that. i am not aware of such discussions. to make that what you will, certainly last week, the state department spokesperson said that they were not considering syria, or at least at the very least, thought that syria and iraq were very different scenarios and that the u.s. capability might not be appropriate given the information zeina hodr was giving us. between fighters and the risk of

civilian casualties and so on. the general thinking here is, you have to run through various questions as in any military intervention. those appear to be what are being considered right now. first of all, obviously, legalities. it seems a little quaint to talk about but under what authority would the u.s. stop bombing security if it hasn't been a u.n. security council resolution. what will they achieve? generals of the penitentiarygon say there is no point in bombing somewhere if there is no plan. thirdly, what intelligence would you use for targeting? especially given the next tour of fighters and civilian positi population in many of these areas. there is no clear battle ground. might that not solidify the obvio opposition. a week or so president obama was telling the "new york times" there had been quite a fantasy to think that you could arm moderate syrian opposition members to fight against the

syrian government. what next? would there be the risk of missions being drawn further? apparently that's not what the americans wants. i guess the difference between with syria and iraq and iraq, the administration seems to think it has a plan. they are dangling the prospect of further military intervention to precipitate a change in leadership and hopefully get the sunni communities of iraq to coalesce with the government to fight the islamic state. whether that will work is another matter. what would be the plan be in syria? >> that's a question. thanks so much for posing it for us from washington, d.c. still to come in the newshour in eastern ukraine, asking pro-russia separatists why they look to moscow and not kiev for leadership. and using on thers to fish. this bang ladesbangladeshi trai be the past. a recordbreaking win against australia? ♪ ♪

police in the united kingdom have launched an investigation after 35 people, including children, were found inside a shipping container. the group were discovered 12 hours after arrive from belgium. at least one person has died. the survivors are being treated for dehydration and hypothermia. police are treating the death as unlawful unlawfully. >> it is a homicide investigation. in terms of due diligence and what we need to achieve, we will be looking to see where the origin and the gangs are, whoever may have been involved in this conspiracy to bring these people in this way over to this country, you know, clearly we need to try to bring them to justice. >> italy's interior minister is calling on the european union to help deal with the record number of my grants arriving on its shor shores. the efforts can't go on for a second year.

more than 100,000 people have tried to reach italy. not fleeing syria's civil war and violence in north africa. more unrest in the u.s. state of missouri. there was a tense stand-off with police after some people threw bottles and malatov cocktails during a night of protest. one attacked a shop that unarmed teenager michael brown was accused of robbing just before he was killed by police. the latest from ferguson. protesters were standing off with a line of armored police vehicles over on this street right here. they backed up all of these protesters. a large number of them came through and started breaking into the beauty shop. they were running out with armfuls of supplies. scan some people went over here to this liquor store and tried to break in there. some people started going in. another group of people tried to

keep them from doing that. >> we are protecting our community, this store, everything, to let everyone know that everyone here is not criminals. everyone outed here came to peacefully protest. >> these people came to loot the store. don't do that. >> that's not what it's about. this is a civil rights movement. my name is antoine smith. i came out here to stand up for my rights. >> the police have slowly advanced and continue to give verbal commands, telling people to disperse. they are saying disperse. we don't want anyone to get hurt. >> glass bottles. they threw smoke bombs, maced the crowd and quickly left. they came back and i think they were pointing guns at the crowd. >> that's when the looting started. >> we are also seeing a police helicopter above. it's coming around and circling the area and continues to drop a spotlight on the crowds. so far, no firing yet.

>> rashan johnson joins us from ferguson. he is the executive director of color of change, the largest online civil rights organization in the u.s. good to have you with us. looking at the history of policing and police tactics there in ferguson, has that contributed to some of the anger that we are seeing now on the streets? >> well, absolutely. he specially over the -- over the previous couple of days. not the last -- not the last two days or three days. but early on, sort of the highly mil tarized reaction from the local forces, you know, really sort of led to sort of a situation where the community and the police were not on the same page. there were many local leaders who were really, you know, trying to kind of keep the crowd, you know, calm, trying to keep them sort of focused on, you know, standing up for their rights, on sort of ensure that they were raising their voice around the issues.

unfortunately, the police came in sort of in a way that they were not trying to be in partnership with the community, which was which was an extension of the feelings people had for the police based upon what happened to michael brown. >> what do you make of the way the police have handled the release of information in this issue? >> you know, i think it's raised a lot of concerns for folks who are watching. you know, everyone from sort of a local civil rights leader to a national civil rights leader to just independent sort of observers of police behavior and journalism. you know, the police went days and days and days before providing more information on what could have bena the alleged sort of crime that will as they are saying led to, you know, the police pulling over michael brown and we are getting competing results. but as more information sort of trickled out slowly, not in a

really clear direct way, it really does underscore the fact that the local police, the local officials, are simply not ready for prime time, that, you know, over and over again, they sort of missed opportunities to build good will with the community, to sort of elevate that there might be a sense of justice here, that they are sort of on the side of finding anon est pursuit of the truth. and for every day people that are watching, i think there is like really deep concerns about the police continuing and particularly the local police continuing to have any role in this case. >> all right. as you put at a time there, local police not ready for prime time. but of course they have called in now the missouri state highway patrol to take over. >> still doesn't seem to have calmed the situation on the streets. what posture should authorities -- are you calling on authorities to take when it seems there are some, not all, but some who are using the things like loot shops and so

on? >> well, you know, i do think that, you know, for folks who are looting, for folks that are using sort of this tragedy as a moment for bad behavior, they need to be held accountable, like plain and simple. we have also seen through this, that the community is working really hard to police itself. you have seen sort of, i was out here last night. you saw many folks in the community standing in front of shops, really saying, no. this is not why we are here tonight. we are here tonight to stand up for civil rights. you saw that sort of time and time again. when big moments happen all around the country -- and this is not just something that happens here in ferguson. we have seen this after big games on college campuses. we see this after big sporting events all around the country, that sometimes folks use those moments of high energy, of high intentiontive youty to execute on behavior.

theses of a few shouldn't deter us from the fact that justice needs to be served. we have a lot of unanswered questions here in ferguson. we have a highly mil tarized local police that really got this out of hand in the first place and the state officials and federal officials that are now trying to work to sort of calm this back down, trying to put this back in the bottle. the fact of the matter is, that local officials did not do them a service yesterday. are a they started to trickle out more information that seems to have nothing to do with the actual issue at hand. you know, whether or not michael brown should have been murdered for jay walking. >> all right. thank you so much for, rashan johnson, the executive director of color of change. as many as 21 million school children in the united states are classified as poor. to get new atrocious food, they mostly rely on the government's meal plan. during the two-month long summer break, those smooelz meals aren't widely available. tom ackerman reports from

material maryland. for kids in baltimore, it means more chances to run free in the sunshine. many miss the meals they have become accustomed to receiving while school is in session. some 44 million american children get breakfast and lunch there under the federal school food program. they qualify for the free or reduced priced meals if their family encloses fall below the government's poverty lines. only one in every seven of those children who get school meals participate in the summer food program. in baltimore, the city housing department and the school district serve the food at more than 400 neighborhood locations like this community center. >> we understand just from the numbers that we see walking through the door that families need support. we are here to sport them wherever we can. >> in many other places around the u.s., too few local agencies are willing or able to run summer programs. that will shortfall, say child nutrition advocates, is another factor contributing to high

obesity rates among children. >> children are more likely to gain weight during the summer months. we think those things are caused by the fact that most kids don't have access to school lunch and breakfast any more. >> they must which a balanced variety of milk, fruit, grains and protein. >> by offering whole foods in varying options, we are changing their pal at and their lifestyle. they are going home and asking their parents, can i get a papaya or can i get a fresh pineapple or orange. >> here in the city of baltimore with one of the higher jobless rates in the country, the number of kids taking free summer meals is actually slightly down this year, perhaps a barometer of an improving economy. yet the government estimates that in 2012, 10% of american households were unable to provide enough nutritious food for their children. tom ackerman, al jazeera, baltimore. >> the international red cross is urging all sides to make a deal to allow russian aid convoy into ukraine.

280 trucks are being inspected on the border near russia. emma hayward joins us now from the ukrainian port city of maroupol. how is that inspection process going? what are the red cross saying? >> we are expecting to hear from the international committee for the readcross any more now from donetsk on the russian side of the border, but it looks like that cargo will be spending a third night over on that side of the border on friday, border guards crossed over from ukraine to start the inspection process. we heard that some of the trucks were partially empty, bthere wee supplies on board. ukraine is very suspicious of why russia is sending this. it believes it is a pretext to sending in supplies for the separatist fighters. russia totally dismiss dismisseses that saying they are sending a humanitarian aid convoy into those areas that have been so badly hit by the fighting and aid wherever it's coming from we know is needed.

the international committee of the red cross says the situation in cities such as lundqvist is critical -- lundqvist is critical. we know there has been more heavy fighting and there has been no water or electricity more than a week. >> thank you for that. people in donetsk say they are in desperate need of that russian aid that's being held up at the border for fighting has displaced tens of thousands of people. moshiri in donetsk reports on how the conflict is affecting the demands of the separatists and the general public. >> he shows me where a ground rocket almost killed him. like many ukrainians who live in donetsk, he has strong ties to russia. his grandmother fought for stalin during the second world war. he blames the region's dark history for what is happening now. >> at one point, we were one country with 14 republics. politicians divided these

republics and provided the seed of war between us. i think what's happening now is absolutely wrong because our ancestors took part in a war where they had the same ideals, values, and beliefs as each other. >> the separatists beliefs are more murky. some see ukraine as part of an old imperial russia. others embrace the power of the soviet union. when you ask pro-russian separatists what if is they want, some say they want freedom from kiev's rule. others insist they are fighting fascism. most people want to get on with their lives and don't understand why ukrainians are taking up arms against each other. kiev recently proposed a peace plan in the southeastern region which includes more political and economic autonomy and protection of the russian language. separatists say this is not enough. they have local people's support. >> but in one suburb of donetsk, we meet arena.

she says most people are like her, afraid to speak out. >> i feel like my life is now just a black cloud. every morning, i hope that this is all just a bad dream that i will wake up from and things will be as they were. the ukrainian army is closing in. separatists are calling for more ukrainian and russian volunteers to join their cause. but they've already lost men p and many people here will now be asking themselves whether they are worth dying for. donetsk. . >> some news just coming in to us here in al jazeera. kenya has announced a series of emergency measures to stop the spread of ebola from midnight, all passengers from liberia, sierra leone and begini will be prevented from entering the country. the only exceptions will be kenyans returning home.

they will be strictcally screened. all flights to and from those three countries will be suspended. we will bring you more on this as soon as we get it. pope francis is continuing to attract huge crowds on his visit to south korea. hundreds of thousands turned out for an open-air mass which featured a beatfication ceremony. harry fawcett was there. >> moving steadily through the thousands of people who had come for this moment. this was the center peace of pope francis's 5-day visit, a huge open-air mass in downtown seoul. a chance for catholics, young and old, to see their holy father up close. he reserved a special honor for families of those killed until april's ferry disaster walking up to the tented village where they had been demanding an independent investigation and e bestowing his blessings. >> he makes his way through, there is month mistaking the scale of this event. nothing has been seen like it for more than a decade near

central seoul. it's for the catholic church in asia. . >> so, although this mass was very much about the history of the corps ian catholic church, beatifying catholics killed for their religious beliefs, pope francis was keen to tie their story to the church's present day valve vance in a region where catholicism is growing. >> their example has much to say to us who live in societies where alongside immense wealth, dire poverty is silently growing, where the cry of the poor is seldom heeded and where christ continues to call out to us asking us to love and serve him by tending to our brothers and sisters in need. >> the pope's message is, his very presence resonating with 170,000 catholics invited here from churches across the

country. >> even though i saw him far away, i was so overwhelmed. and my heart was pounding so hard. i am so grateful and indescribably happy. >> our country has been going through numerous hardships and there are many people suffering in poverty. just by the fact that the pope is here in a divided country, we are so blessed. >> later, in a part of his visit that has attracted some controversy, pope francis went to a care home south of seoul which has been accused of old-fashioned practices and financial irregularities. but in embracing the poor and disabled, the pope continued one of this visit's main themes emphasizing the plight of those left on the margins at an uncreasingly unequal world. harry fawcett, al jazeera, seuol.