to keep me from being infected. a huge search is underway in northern france for the two brothers accused of the charlie hebdo attacks. ♪ this is al jazeera live from doha. also ahead. ♪ >> paris stops for a minute of silence to honor the dead. and in other news suffering through the storm, how syrians fleeing war are now facing a battle against the elements. ♪

a huge search operation is underway in france to find the two brothers suspected of carrying out the attack on the office of charlie hebdo. the manager of a service station north of paris says he saw them around 10:30 this morning local time. there are heavy police presence and swat teams in france. here is barnaby fims. >> reporter: to the north of paris an under search is underway for the men who carried out wednesday's attack. after a reported siting in this village northeast of the capitol. they are hunting for two men. the prime suspects. the french police they sharif and said kouachi brothers of algearian decent are armed and dangerous. cherif has a previous conviction

of helping send jihadist fighters to iraq. but meanwhile france is grieving and not just for the dead. the french are in grief because they know their country will struggle to recover from these wounds and they fear what will come next. this is the center of paris, but the silence was observed across the country, a long poignant pause. but even as the country mourned there was another attack. just south of the center two police officers shot. and shortly afterward, they heard the news one of those shot, a policewoman had died of her wounds and yet again the killer got away. we don't know that there is a direct link between this attack and wednesday's attack on charlie hebdo, but we know the gunman used an automatic weapon

and deliberately targeted officers in uniform. and all of this ads to the sense of crisis in the capitol. the president says this is a time for national unity. >> translator: france has been instruct directly in its heart, the capitol in a place where the spirit of liberty and resistance breathes freely. this spontaneous gathering out throughout france show once again our great france knows how to come together and defend the ideas of the republic. >> reporter: but despite the president's words many on the streets feel numb. >> i feel empty. at something so unbelievable and they were like my family and like me they -- they liked too much laughing and -- and

against the -- the silliness in the world. >> reporter: whatever -- the eventual consequence will be there is a truce in france. jacky rowland joins us live from paris now. the president declared a national day of mourning in france. what is happening there now? >> reporter: well i'm in the traditional place for public assembly and rallies in the french capitol, it was of course here 24 hours ago that a spontaneous vigil was held for a couple of hours, by people -- thousands of people a

huge crowd who came here to stand somberly and sometimes in lines have sometimes chanting slogans in support of defense of the journalists in defense of the cartoonist and in defense of the principal of freedom of speech. and now 24 hours later another rally. this time called by the mayor of paris to express unity and solidarity in the face of the threat. obviously people are very anxious that the two men accused of purpose taiting that attack on wednesday are still on the loose even though we hear that police are apparently pursuing them, and a second attack just a few hours ago in the south of the capitol, no indication as barnaby philip said in his report that the two traction traction -- attacks are linked.

but the police are treating the second shooting as a terrorist act. but also a sense of defiance symbolized by the kinds of banners and slogans. one of them says not afraid a real message there to people who are trying to drive wedges within french society, and trying to put communities against each other. >> and i know you spent a great deal of time today in that particular area but what can you tell us about the armed presence else where in the capitol as the defense ministry has brought in more soldiers on to the streets as the search for the suspects continues and as i suppose as the french prime minister was indicating there are concerns about what could happen next about further possible attacks taking place? >> reporter: well the authorities have told the french people that they will be mobilizing all forces at their

disposal, and in fact we have been using what i would call probably a dynamic policing because it's not just paris, which is on a heightened state of terror alert, but the whole of the country, so it's not a case of bringing in police forces from elsewhere, because other cities and towns also on alert, particularly bearing in mind the suspected perpetrators are no longer in paris as far as the hunth seems to indicate. so what we're seeing is armed police moving around as their commanders deem the situation -- determined. so for example, when there was the minute of silence at noon the two-minute silence, here we saw a number of quite heavily armed crs riot police wearing body armor who were here. and tonight as well we're seeing a heightened security presence but they are not here all the

time. clearly there is a limited number of soldiers. they have to send them around they are dynamic, they are moving as their commanders see the threat changes and the focus moves from place-to-place. so that seems to be the kind of policing which is very much being implemented across paris on thursday. >> thanks very much jacky rowland live for us in paris. people across the world have been taking to social media to give their reaction to the attack. >> reporter: ever since those murders on wednesday what happen at charlie hebdo's office has been dominated social media. take a look at what is trending on twitter. we're seeing all of these different hashtags all paris related. at times this one is leading the list, other times it drps down, but it appears to be the one

that most people are tweeting towards. it is incredibly difficult to monitor because of the sheer number of tweets thousands every moment. the majority are pictures like this one. down here quite a simple message, we are not afraid. then this one. just says sweet charlie. and then there are the professionals news rooms around the world holding silences just like this. this one at the afp news agency in paris. this shows all of the other topics that are spawning as a result of charlie. here we have the word support, down here hashtag liberty of the press. these are cartoons at the heart of this. and cartoonists are pretty defy defiant about this. take a look at this one.

the message here he will be fight back. and then there is this one. showing a pencil in three different guises. at the top a complete pencil today a split pencil and tomorrow well that is a pretty poignant outlook. i'm joined by an assistant professor of public policy good to see you again. >> pleasure >> we were listening there to the reaction we have seen on social media. what about the response within france itself? we know the french council of the muslim faith has been calling on muslims in the country to support upcoming rallies, to make an appearance at these demonstrations. how important is that? >> it's a first and it is very welcome. i mean it's very important that the eventtives of the muslim faith show these actions were

not representative of muslims worldwide. so their decision to support the march. they are calling for the preachers inside mosques to condemn these events. essentially. because if you don't have this different countries will use this against the muslim community, which with 99.9% very peaceful in europe. >> are there signs that that is happening? >> yes, i was looking at different interviews from members of the muslim communities condemning this all around the board. you can definitely see that there's hope inside the muslim community that they will not be targeted or stigmatized. freedom of the press is a universal value. it is also dear to everyone in the world, and that's why it's so important that the muslim communities inside of france support it. we have seen a rise of

far-right groups across europe. certainly marine lapen's party has enjoyed victories over the past year. how will she seek to capitalize on this? >> it will be an essential question. the war against the muslim faith [ inaudible ] more than anything. she has refused to support that march, very important march on sunday in paris. >> why? >> she is definitely trying to capitalize on this for political gain. the event that happened yesterday are playing right into the party, hoping they will win further and further elections. there's no radical change in terms of support. it's more than average citizen that does not turn out to the ballots anymore. hopefully the march will be a

change in having more people turn up to the ballots and showing these are you -- universal issues. >> the fact is that you do have commune tease and groups of people a across the region but let's speak specifically about france now, who are feeling marginalized, who are not integrated who are suffering from economic disen franchisesment, is that something that you see the public and politicians are they likely to reflect on that in the coming weeks? >> the discourse has always been there. the economic situation in europe hasn't been the best for the last couple of years, and those communities have not been the ones that have benefited from

it. there has been more and more personality, there are the sons of immigration that was born outside of france that managed to get in the media and -- >> are they making an impact? >> they are making an impact. we should not been angel conference call will begin momentarily. but -- angel call about this but this is also what [ inaudible ] was working for. >> thank you. >> it's a pleasure. now still to come for you on al jazeera this half hour counting underway in sri lanka after the nation votes in a snap presidential election. more on that shortly. ♪

>> it's a chilling and draconian sentence... it simply cannot stand. >> its disgraceful... the only crime they really committed is journalism... >> they are truth seekers... >> all they really wanna do is find out what's happening, so they can tell people... >> governments around the world all united to condemn this... >> as you can see, it's still a very much volatile situation... >> the government is prepared to carry out mass array... >> if you want free press in the new democracy let the journalists live.

♪ welcome back. you are with al jazeera, let's take you through our top stories. armed police are searching towns in northern france for two brothers accused of killing 12 people at a satirical magazine. crowds are gathering in paris to remember those who die. earlier the bells at the north cathedral rang for two minutes. and people continue to converge on the capitol to pay their respects to the victims of yesterday's attack. and the killing of a female

police officer in a separate attack is being treated as a terrorist attack. moving to other news and it's just been announced that egypt will hold parliamentary elections in two phases starting on march 22nd. that news is just in from the electoral commission. we're going to have an election taking place in egypt parliamentary elections at the end of march. now we're getting news from nigeria that at least 100 people have been killed by boko haram, in the northeast of the country. this is close to chad. it reportedly happened last weekend. let's talk to our correspondent on the phone. what more can you tell us about this news 100 people killed in the northeast of the country? >> reporter: well basically this is another suspected boko haram attack in the northeast of the country.

remember like you said over the weekend they attacked the town. hundreds of people according to to -- residents, hundreds may have drowned. they also launched an attack on wednesday night, and there people are talking about dozens of people killed in that attack. in addition to that they have raised a number of towns and villages in that area. the town is under boko haram control at the moment. >> thanks very much indeed. at least 100 people killed in the northeast of nigeria. so thanks very much for bringing us an update. let's bring you more on our top story now, of course the attacks that took place in paris. the search for the perpetrators continues. we know 12 people died in the attack. police have issued a witness appeal for cherif and his older

brother said is also -- is also on the run right now. they are suspected of being the two men who carried out the shootings at charlie hebdo on wednesday. there is also a third suspect who drove the get away car. all three are believed to be french muslims of north african decent. sharif was arrested in 2005 for being connected to a criminal cell. he went on trial in 2008 the court heard he had become radicallized hearing of the mistreatment of muslims by u.s. forces in iraq. sharif was handed a three-year suspended sentence which he already served in the pretrial years. just want to bring you some live pictures coming us from paris where you can see people are gathering to pay tribute to the victims of the attack at the charlie hebdo office. this is really the scene we have been seeing not just in the

capitol, but elsewhere in the country. the president declaring this a day of mourning that has seen thousands paying tribute, paying their respects to the victims of yesterday's attack. flags have been flying at half mast. and the -- the lights at the eiffel tower are going to be in darkness symbolic act of mourning if you would like so very much a sense of grief, a sense of sadness in the country, but also perhaps anxiousness, nervousness, because as we have been saying the search for the suspects of the attack yesterday continues. i want to discuss that a little bit more now with the director of international security studies at the royal united studies institute. good to have you with us. as you were saying security forces are still searching for the attackers, the operation seem tos be focusing on the northeast of france. why is it taking time to locate the suspects and apprehend them?

>> well i think we don't necessarily know that they have apprehended them yet. but it increasingly looks like that's where the investigation is going. i think what we have to remember is there clearly is an operation that had been well thought out. these individuals knew that the -- the sort of the the -- editorial board would be meeting at a certain time they knew who they were looking for to shoot. this is something they prepared for. in that suggests they would have all thes prepared an escape route. they had a get away car and probably some route they were going to take to take them out of the city. the security forces don't know their plan. they have to pick it up afterwards. and that's a sort of difficult question of piecing together various pieces of information to try to understand you know, which part of paris they went out of and which direction they seemed to be going in.

so it's understandable it would taken from. forces a little bit of time to track these guys down but it seems a day later they do seem to have identified where they are. >> there have been several sightings. now they haven't been obviously they are not in custody, that's not though case but just going back to my earlier question do you think it's possible that -- that security forces are now aware of a precise location? are they taking time to move in? what do you think could be going on there right now? >> well again, we don't really know. i mean we can speculate in all sorts of directions. there could be some fort of con frontation happening. they are clearly keeping this area sealed off from the press. so we don't have independent perspectives. i think that you know, it could be we're dealing with a large area where they believe they might be. we don't really know but one would imagine that they are -- they are treading quite

carefully in trying to con front these individuals if this is where they are, given that we know these are individuals that are quite hardened and have weapon preuponry to use as well. >> we footage suggests there was some level of organization involved. the attackers were comfortable using automatic weapons, and indicates they had some containing. how important will it be for police to extract intelligence from them in terms of discovering a bit more about their identity and who they are. >> i think with all of these sorts of things catching them alive, and being able to interrogate them subsequently is important. it helps you understand the picture of who supported them and what their motivations were. but at this moment if they are dealing with the situation of some sort of standingoff or trying to figure out if these guys are there and how they can

confront them i'm sure the primary concern is these are individuals that have demonstrated the capacity to shoot people. and security forces want to minimize their casualties to them and the danger maybe to people who are around so they are clearly try to bring the situation to a close. >> thank you. >> thank you. three syrian refugee children have died after a snow sfoerm destroyed their tent. record-low temperatures across the middle east are adding to the struggle for hundreds of thousands of refugees living in makeshift tents on the syrian border with lebanon. jane ferguson reports. >> reporter: if the snow keeps coming their tents will collapse. syrian refugees try to avow being entirely submerged. they are running out of everything necessary to survive. >> we don't have bread or heating oil. look at me.

we don't have socks. everything is in these tents. no relief aid, no food no water, nothing. just absolutely nothing. >> reporter: snow usually hit this area but a storm that began on wednesday has been particularly cruel to the hundreds of thousands fleeing war from syria. but sickness is setting in. the cold hits children the hardest. the united nations have handed out food and heating supplies but lebanon has no formal camps for syrians, they are scattered throughout a huge area and reaching everyone in the snow is difficult. >> refugees are scattered over 1700 locations. this time last year we estimated that 3% were living in insecure dwellings, this year it's around 50%. people are living in these informal settlements which can have maybe four tents or 50 or

100. plus they live in unfinished buildings, animal sheds, and storage facilities. >> reporter: the storm is affecting multiple countries across the region. but sin yar refugees in lebanon are the most vulnerable. having endured war and homelessness now they must battle nature for their survival. jane ferguson al jazeera, beirut. staying with the winter storm in the middle east syrian refugees living in jordan have had their tents destroyed by strong wind and snowfall. temperatures usually average about 13 at this time of year but this week they have dropped to zero. about 70,000 syrian refugees live in jordan. in syria, the al qaeda-linked front has stormed two villages in aleppoaleppo.

egypt's military says it is doubling the buffer zone along the gaza strip. the area in the north sinai peninsula will be widens to 1 kill only meet. egyptian military officials say it will stop the fighters. the need shan navy released underweather footage showing the airasia jet lying on the seabed. attempts to find the plane's black boxes have so far failed because of poor conditions. thailand is set to start an impeachment hearing against its foreign prime minister. he could face a five year ban from politics. he was removed from office in may after a court found her guilty of abuse of power.

well the polls have now colliesed in sri lanka after a day when voter turnout remained well above expectations. the president is seeking a third term in office. he is credited with ending a civil war in the country, but his opponent has posed a formidable opposition. mourners continue to converge on the capitol of place to pay their respects for the victims. people continue to come together a somber mood similar scenes we have seen right across the country, but also very much a mood of defiance people determined to stand up for their values. so that's the scene right now in central paris. this as a search for the suspects of the attack on the

charlie hebdo offices continues. we understand security forces are focusing their attention in a region northeast of france. for that and everything else we have been covering go to our website, aljazeera.com. everything you need to know right there. to check it out. ♪ hi, i'm lisa fletcher and you are many the stream. what if instead of proeffect thing civilians they are protecting each other over crimes as serious as murder. >> what happened to tease guys. why are all all okay with this team. >> we will talk about the kiln team, that may inhibit soldiers about speaking out against injustice. plus, millions of dollars spent on anti-bullying programs with little to no evidence that they work. why it may be time for a new approach.