♪ the standoff continues in the yemen capitol and surrounding presidential compounds. hello i'm darren jordan and watch ing this live from doha and ghani introduces nominees to the parliament. they choose a new president following the death of michael satta and anger in argentina after the death of a prosecutor who accused the president of being involved in a cover up.

welcome to the program and breaking news out of central african republic where armed men have kidnapped a u.n. peace keeper in the capitol bongi from the reuters news agency and keep you updated as more comes in on that story. fighters from the rebel group are surrounding the prime minister and the palace and yemen capitol sl largely quiteet on monday when this broke out between fighters and the army and expected to hold an emergency meeting on the situation and we are live in the southern port city of aden and omar we understand the president is having a meeting with all parties following yesterday's dramatic events in the capitol sanaa, what are we expecting to come out of this latest meeting?

>> well, let me tell you the latest update i have with regards to the meeting, the government's spokesperson told al jazeera that that meeting didn't happen instead a meeting between the president and his advisor advisors did happen, now who are the advisors? the advisors represent different political parties including the houthis. now what is likely to come out of the meeting is some sort of a roadmap to end the crisis now when the government called for the meeting to be chaired by the president with all the political players including members of parliament and the drafting committee to form a new constitution that gave an indication that perhaps the president and the government will bow to the houthi pressure because they don't want it in six federal regions so that the speculation while it came from that the meeting, the

constitution and changing it so clearly the government may well bow to the houthi pressure. >> omar what has been the diplomatic reaction to those dramatic events we saw yesterday in sanaa? >> well we know now the u.n. security council will be holding a meeting, a closed session meeting and i spoke to a diplomate in sanaa and clearly worried and said yemen is facing dangerous times with regard to security situation, political situation as well as the economy. now the british ambassador through her twitter account on social media says she hopes the meetings between the president and the political parties will lead to some sort of a roadmap to end the violence to bring back services and she called also on the houthi leader to have a speech and readout to the

country. >> many say the president's authority has clearly been underminded over the past few months and many say he is a weak president and what is the next step can they do a deal or is this the beginning of the end? >> probably if they reach a deal darren the president will emerge even weaker and now the president has no authority over his military the military is deeply divided into different loyalties and tribal and regional loyalties as well as loyalties from loyalties to the former president and i don't think president haidi has the power to do anything really. he has some sort of loyalty with regards to the guards protecting him outside that presidential palace other than that i don't think he has anything in his hand because remember he is facing a big alliance between houthis and supporters of the

former president and those two when they join forces they become perhaps the most powerful force in this country and i think the president is banking on perhaps the regional backing of the gulf countries who over see the transitional period and met to the topple of the president and perhaps banking on the backing of the u.n. and international community, other than that i don't think he has a real means to stop anything in this country. >> we are in aden and thank you. prime minister demanding i.s.i.l. fighters immediately release two japanese hostages and in a video that al jazeera is choosing not to show i.s.i.l. demanding $200 million for the release of japanese men and the group has threatened to kill them in three days in a demand is not met. speaking in jerusalem the prime minister said he would do all he could to save their lives but wouldn't give in to terrorism.

>> translator: it is an unacceptable act to threaten us in exchange for human lives and feel angry about it and told them to release the hostages without harming them. israel deployed an iron dome antimissile units to the northern border with lebanon and security is tight at the resort in the occupied golan heights and air space shut down and tensions high after his hezbollah fighters killed on sunday and recently threatened israel with long-range rocket attacks and a court in bahrain will talk about a trial with a human rights activist and charged with insulting the government on twitter and faces six years in prison if found guilty and already spent two years in prison for taking part in protests. afghanistan's president is facing tough opposition to cabinet nominees and ghani presented the ministers to

parliament on tuesday morning and jennifer glasse has more from kabul. >> reporter: the nominees for afghan cabinet ministers have been introduced to parliament but confirmation procedure is far from straightforward and at least 11 of the nominees are believes to have dual citizenship, that is prohibited in the constitution although parliament does have the latitude to over ride that provision, several of the nominees there are apparently questions about their educational credentials and at least one nominee is alleged to be under the age of 35 that is how old you have to be to be a government minister here and two of the nominees did not appear in parliament and all the nominees for finance minister and nominee for agricultural minister and nominee for agricultural was on interpoll's most wanted list and says the charges against him are false but did not appear in parliament today, this complicated procedure is not what afghans want and has taken ghani the new

president three months to introduce nominees at all and the government has been paralyzed not only for those three months but in the five months leading up to it that were part of the presidential election period and anxious to see a government in place here without one the economy has slowed down many of the ministries are working slowly if at all and cannot get basic things done and would like to see ghani's government in place and working and ashraf gone ghani is ruling with abdoullah-abdoullah and never been done and watching to see if it will work and so far it's working very slowly and president ghani in parliament today making ambitious speech saying he plans to make a lot of changes and needs more time and wants to make a lot of reforms and new ministers accountable to

people and parliament and waiting for when the government will be installed and what kind of government it will be. >> reporter: voters in zambia choosing the next president following the death of michael last year and vote expected to be a close race between candidates and ruling front and opposition united party for national development and we report from polling station in the capitol. >> reporter: this election was not made to happen now but michael died last year in office and people have to come out and vote for a new president and have come out in big numbers waiting in long lines and very excited about casting their votes. when they get to the door they have the idea of the check and go in and cast ballots and people are very excited and saying they are hoping it will will usher new zambia and they are concerned and live with less than a dollar a day and want a better zambia especially for the poor. >> what we want is good roads,

schools and hospitals with medicine medicine. >> we have waited enough. we have waited enough. we don't want somebody who is sick. we want somebody who is young and good looking. >> reporter: most people say the process is fast and simple with registration book and here they come to the booth and cast the booth and no one should know who they voted for and we go to the box and the lady in front of me is putting in her vote in the box and it will be counted later. people are saying this could be a very very tight race between the ruling and the opposition up and because of that they say the result also be quick and sworn this very fast as well. politically leaders are appealing to stay calm and expect the results because they say they don't want violence on

the streets. >> reporter: protesters demanding answers from argentina government after a prosecutor accused the president of being involved in a cover up was found dead. government officials say an autopsy on alberta showed no signs of foul play and we have more. >> reporter: demonstrations and calls for justice in the capitol and gathered in at least three locations and protests in the provinces as well and a small standoff with police outside the presidential palace. crowds started gathering shortly after officials announced preliminary results of autopsy on prosecutor alberta's body and said there were no indications that anyone else was involved in his death, his body was found with a single gunshot wound to the head and less than 24 hours before he was due to testify before a congressional hearing on his allegations the president

had obstructed justice over the country's worst terror attack. but protesters are not satisfied by the president's denial of any wrongdoing and a judge's assertion that he had been miss guided in the way he had made the allegations. for a demonstration organized at short notice this protest is big, whatever the circumstances of alberta's death there is a discontent and frustration with the justice system a lack of faith. >> translator: i don't want a country stained with blood and corruption for my children and grandsons, that is why i'm here. >> translator: i'm demanding justice, it's very grave what is going on and working all over us. >> reporter: no one has faced justice for the bombing of a jewish community center in 1994 which 85 people died and iran denies involvement and he alleged he had evidence

including phone taps which showed the president along with foreign minister hector and other officials were offering to drop moves against iranian suspects involving grain exports to iran in exchange for oil and opposition parties say h he had no reason to commit suicide and what happens next in the political crisis no one is sure but questions are piling up with few clear answer. not rising as fast as it was china suffers a blow to becoming the world number one. ♪ under attack in paris and on the internet thousands of french websites are hacked and more on that stay with us. ♪

>> "consider this". the news of the day, plus so much more. >> we begin with the growing controversy.

>> answers to the questions no one else will ask. >> real perspective. "consider this". monday through thursday, 10:00 eastern. only on al jazeera america. ♪ welcome back quick reminder of the top stories on al jazeera, gunman in central african republic kidnapped a u.n. peace keeper in the capitol bongi. a ceasefire seems to be holding in yemen capitol with gun battle between houthi soldiers and they are storming the home and presidential palace in sanaa. voters in zambia choosing a president following the death of michael last year and elections will be close between candidates and the front and united party for national development. the world's second biggest economy suffered the biggest slow down for 24 years, but

economic growth in china is still the envy of the world and brown has more from beijing. >> reporter: no number matters in the world right now more than china gdp, gdp is the best way of measuring a country's economy and now new data has come out showing china's economy grew 7.4% in 2014. now that is not what the government hoped for. they had been hoping for economic growth of perhaps around 7.5% which is essentially what it has been for the past two years and this represents really the slowest economic growth in china in almost a quarter of a century. why? well a housing bubble effecting 40-50 cities and lingering belief that banks are under estimating the extent of bad loans on their books and they are loans that the government encouraged them to make to stimulate growth after the global financial crash in 2008.

>> if we have a disruptive slow down and that is what would happen if we ran out of debt capacity limits and if we ran in debt capacity limits that could be quite bad for china and quite bad for the world and i don't think that is going to happen so far it looks like we are going to have a stable adjustment. >> reporter: while china's gdp is slowing it's still the envy of the world but this remains an economy that is transforming, for instance retail sales in december were up by almost 12% from a year earlier. industrial output for the same period was also up by almost 7.9% both were better than the government had forecast but the danger remains china's property bubble and since the real estate sector accounts for a third of china's gdp and one of the reasons the international monetary fund is forecasting economic growth for china of 6.8% in 2015.

economist warn anything below 6% could spell danger for china, job losses and what the government here fears most instability and it's a reminder that what happens here has the potential to effect lives around the world. >> sri lanka government is pressing ahead with an ambitious 100 day plan of reform and president said it will bring in new political culture and we report from columbo. >> reporter: she is a retired teacher, like many people she has been feeling the pinch of spiralling costs. >> translator: we are finding it difficult to put food on the table so the new government must reduce all prices and not just on a limited number of items. >> reporter: after ending the country's brutal civil war the former government began a major development drive and people were faced with increasing prices.

the rising cost of living is just one of the issues new president has promised to address in an ambitious 100-day plan and says his other top priorities are abolishing the executive presidency electoral reform and setting up independent institutions to ensure transparent and effective governance governance. for those who supported the new president things are on track. >> the government is not going to do something silly to show a little play for the gallery so that is not likely to happen and that means there is a forward thinking but with a serious thought process at the moment. >> reporter: sri lanka new leader made it clear he means business warning his new cabinet that any wrongdoing will not be tolerated. many people voted for change here in sri lanka say they were unhappy with the way politics crept into every aspect of life and the country foreign service

not spared and one area the new government says needs urgent reform. >> to put the foreign ministry on tract and to restore the credibility of sri lanka within the eyes of the international community. >> reporter: the new government has begun work on the broad reforms it promised. later this month it will introduce a mini budget which many hope to bring the hope they need al jazeera, columbo. haiti president has sworn in new government ministers and michelle is yet to reach a deal with opposition and holding new elections and they were named a week after parliament was dissolved and months of protests and calls for his resignation because of allegations of corruption. in guatemala a former police chief guilty of ordering soldiers to set fire to spanish

embassy while protesters were inside and he was sentenced to 90 years in prison and al jazeera's david mercer has more from guatemala city. >> reporter: it was a ruling that many people have been waiting for decades to hear. former guatemala police chief pedro garcia sentenced 90 years in prison for ordering the burning of the spanish embassy during the guatemala civil war, 37 people died in the fire including the father of nobel peace prize winner chu. >> translator: i think that my dad is a man whose name has stayed in the history books and this makes me very happy but i always feel sadness for my brothers and sisters because their suffering is not recognized in this country. >> reporter: in 1980 guatemala shocked the world when the country's national police attacked the spanish embassy. officers set fire to the

building which had been occupied by peasant farmers and student and now seeing military repression against communities. in a country still struggling to put a bloody civil war behind them this case is a test for a fragile justice system and not because of the trial. this is the same court to decide if the former president is guilty of genocide. the retired general is accused of ordering the deaths of more than 1700 people in the 1980s. while he was convicted of genocide in 2013 guatemala top court later struck down the landmark conviction the trial is currently on hold. legal experts say this culture of impunity is created by a system where high-level judges face intimidation, threats and bribes.

>> translator: the guatemala executive government is committed to doing everything in its power to prevent transitional justice cases from taking place. its aim is to protect military allies against possible future trials to hold them accountable for human rights violations during the war. >> reporter: in a country trying to step out of the past a guilty verdict that has brought relief to the families of the victims. one small but important step along guatemala's long roads to justice, david mercer al jazeera guatemala city. in ukraine at least two people have been killed during artillery fire in the eastern city of donetsk and intestified in the last few days as the battle over donetsk airport continues and army claimed on sunday it had seized it back from pro-russian separatists and the economy is badly hit and

shoppers in kiev are finding out how they are coping. >> reporter: from the high-end retailers to the street market in the suburbs is less than ten kilometers but it may as well be 10,000 a woman samples a bottle top of milk to test for freshness, every spending decision here is carefully pondered, as inflation erodes the meager income and all the cash is precious. >> translator: definitely yes, everything has become more expensive, utilities, food everything. the wages are the same. but everything else is more expensive. >> reporter: 12 month inflation to the end of december was 24.9% and ukraine gdp dropped 7% in 2014 and the currency is worth 15 to the u.s. dollar just half of what it was a year ago. before being ousted a year ago the president yanukovich enjoyed extraordinary opulance and this

is outside kiev and is the worst accesses of the former regime but economic recovery here in ukraine depends not just on ousting a president and officials, it needs cultural and systemic reform. the staff tried to destroy incriminating documents on the river on the edge of his estate and helped retrieve the paperwork and he works for the anticorruption watchdog. >> we have advances and new legislation which is waiting for implementation but it's too slow. >> reporter: economic and political reform is underway driven by young dynamic people brought in from the business world, one of them is an entrepreneur and former microsoft executive, among his tasks to balance the spending cuts demanded by the imf with the need to recruit and routine

good people. >> if we expect the civil servants to know a foreign language and work with the lords and work with the contemporary technology and communicate with technology and run negotiations et cetera and that person is going to get 50 bucks, that is not going to fly. >> reporter: back in the market discussion of the economy provoked a heated row. we are in a war and thousands being killed and you worry about the economy, the economy is fine, it's not fine says the milk seller not fine at all. paul brennan, al jazeera, kiev. now countries all across africa are looking to increase their use of renewable energy to try and help pull millions out of poverty and egypt has fans to supply 20% of the leads over the next five years and the

environment editor nick clark has more from the summit. >> reporter: we are on the cusp of big change here as traditional energy suppliers are having to adapt and as renewables gain more and more momentum and getting a bigger and bigger share of the energy market. >> we are absolutely sure we are at the cusp of the third industrial revolution. we are transforming the way we produce and consume energy. technology is enabling change at a pace we have not seen before. >> reporter: transport sector and not power grids around the world and the price drop has not effected the growth of renewables and actually it has helped it a little bit because it reduced the cost of building the components. there is big interest here in africa, home to six of the world's ten fastest growing economies. >> we are also one of the countries in the continent

because we are on the saraha and we promote energy for mixing. >> reporter: this is a display with a robot cleaner that uses the water for manual labor and bringing millions out of poverty and here 9% of the population have access to electricity. >> so we are looking at an energy mix which is currently very much dependent upon wood fuel so if we looked at the future we believe that we have to look at all energy resources that will give this to the country. >> reporter: with panel discussions and workshop and climate change is constant refrain but rise in renewables is a big positive as the world seeks a global treaty on climate in paris at the end of the year

nick clark, al jazeera. now a quick reminder you can keep up to date with the news on our website, the fate of the two japanese hostages held by i.s.i.l. and on going events in yemen and al jazeera.com, that is al jazeera.com. >> it's a name americans are still learning, but if epidemiologists are right, it's one that we'll know all too well. chicken gunia. that's inside story. >> hello, i'm ray suarez.