>> confusion over president hadi's where abouts as houthi rebels converge on aden's airport. i'm lauren taylor, this is al jazeera live in london. paying tribute to the victims of yesterday's plane crash. and residents still scared after mudslides kill nine and wreck hundreds of homes in peru.

>> hello, houthi rebels are closing in on yemen's president in the yemen's southern city of aden. earlier houthi fighters captured an air base in the south defeating president hadi's troops. yemen's foreign minister has echoed hadi's call and asking arab countries to help fight the rebels. the president's exact whereabouts are unknown. saudi arabia has amassed troops on its board with yemen. we have more on the fight for yemen. [ gunfire ] it shocked many people that houthies have advanced this far south. taiz yemen's third-largest city, every day they've taken a stand, chanting for the rebels

to leave. >> we swear that we'll drive out all houthies from taize and teach them a lesson they'll never forget. >> houthi fighters reply with gunfire and tear gas. several people were killed. many more injured. paramedics say some of the shooters worry police uniforms. other reports say that the internal security officers themselves the ones meant to be keeping the peace could join the houthies. these forces are said to be loyal to yemen's long-time ruler ali abdullah saleh who now' now appears to be backing the houthies. people here are no longer sure who they are trust. the houthi rebel unit has morphed from a small unity group

to a large force. president abd rabbuh mansur hadi has escaped to the south and it's in the south that most of the fighting has taken place right now. the tribes hearsay they're protecting their region against the rebels. saudi arabia has sent soldiers to protect its border with yemen. the saudi foreign minister had this to say. >> we hope that this can be done. peacefully. if it is not done peacefully we would protect the region from their aggression. >> right now the houthies are fanning out across the country. they insist they're fighting for a fair distribution of wealth for everyone, not just shias.

some people in the south don't believe them and aren't taking any chances. these volunteers are grouping in large numbers to take on the houthies with guns, tanks and ammunition. >> former adviser to the last three yemeni prime ministers, he joins me now. let's talk a little bit about this. they're moving heavy equipment to the borders there might be an intervention, how likely do you think this will be. >> i think the message is not at all--the message could have been sent by imposing enough liaisons or hitting the air strips of the

military taken by the rebels. if these people wanted to push these people towards dialogue table as expected, i any now withi think now we've got to see the gcc. unfortunately, they have been a little bit cut because of their hesitancy in taking a measure like that. >> so you think that they were taken by surprise by the speed of which the houthis could move, is that what you're suggesting? >> also, by the international reports. when they say that everybody has agreed to talk in doha, and then when indicators are pointing we're going back to the dialogue. no we're not. we've been saying all this time that ali abdullah saleh is a

master of mischief. he's causing chaos. they will never allow stability. they are a minority, even if they represent the whole of the demography still they're a minority. >> president hadi, if it turns out he has gone, the state department said he has left his compound but they cannot confirm where he is, if he has left the country where does that leave the people who supported him? do they still rally around-- >> there is still a lot of resistence in many pockets everywhere. the whole situation will not be stable. yes then is a very large area.

they could decide pull them from the stronghold. >> thank you very much. >> leaders of france, germany and spain have been visiting the french apples close to where a passenger plane crashed on tuesday. the recorder has been recovered and it is now in paris. investigators say they've been able to recover some information from it, but they say it's too early to draw conclusions from the recordings. so far searchers have only been able to find parts of the flight

data recorder's casing. >> they have come to pay their respects to the victims of the plane crash and to get the latest on the investigation. their presence here underlines the international die mention of this disaster. >> we need to understand what happened. we must do so. we owe this to the families of the victims and countries involved. >> all day long helicopters have been ferrying search teams to and from the mountainside. it is a massive operation involving hundreds of police and other emergency workers. the wreckage is scattered over an area of about four hectares. shards of twisted metal nothing that could be recognized as a plane. it may take up to a week for investigators to examine the

whole of the crash site. because the plane crashed here in the french alps, france has jurisdiction. nevertheless there is an international dimension to the investigation, and officials from france, german, and spain are asking that the airline provide detailed information about the maintenance of the plain, and--plane, and also the conditions of this flight. it's still unclear what caused the fright to plunge from the sky, but this shattered black box may hold some clues. it's the voice recorder from the plane's cockpit. >> there has been some difficulty reading the data, but it is great we have found this. we have been able to extract some information from this, but it's early to say what happened. >> 150 people were on board the aircraft at the time of the crash. no one survived. retrieveing an identifying their

bodies is a grim and pain staking task. >> the community is now preparing to receive families of the victims. this will be a grim pilgrimage, but some may find it necessary in order to understand better how they came to lose their loved ones. >> we go live right now to jacky rowland. jacky, i suppose as you suggested not knowing what happened is one of the galsy things about this. it seems that the information is coming up reasonbly quickly isn't it? >> yes, in fact, it was very

much a lucky stroke for the investigators that they found that black box so quickly. as you say despite the fact that it was broken in pieces, as you saw in my report, nevertheless they were able to extract recordings, and analyzing those recordings now. even though it's too early yet what they might mean, nevertheless they'll have evidence. this is really the first concrete evidence that they've uncovered so far. news as well that they've received--they retrieved rather, the covering the outer case of the second recorder. that one is a data recorder that tracks speed altitude, various technical data that has tad with the performance of the aircraft. just the case so far not the box itself. but nevertheless there is indication after 24 hours of searching this vast site investigators seem to be piecing

together a few tiny clues that could lead them to provide answers to the questions that everyone is asking. and, indeed, the ceo of the lufthansa, the parent company has said that at the moment he is still quite be which will derred about what could have caused the crash. >> lufthansa has never in its history lost an aircraft. we cannot understand how a plane in perfect technical condition with two experienced and trained lufthansa pilots was involved in such a terrible accident. after taking care of the relatives and friends of the victims, the next priority, of course, is to find out how this accident could have happened, and how we make sure that this can never ever happen again. >> jacky, you mentioned some of the families may want to visit

the site. how difficult is that given how remote it is? >> well, it is remote, but it is reachable, and in fact local people and the community here who has opened up local facilities have indicated they would be willing to host some family members if they wanted to visit the site. of course, we hear the headline figures of 150 dead, 72 germans 51 spaniards. but it's only numbers. when you start to hear the human stories, the 16 high school students and their teachers, and the students entered a ballot, there was a draw of names for people to have the opportunity to go on this trip. the opera singers that we heard about, we've also heard about three generations, the spanish grandmother the spanish mother and the baby who were killed on the plane. it's when you hear the

individual stories that you start to understand the human impact and how it's affected hundreds of families all across the world. >> jacky, thank you very much, indeed. still ahead celebrating freedom in europe's last dictatorship. and the mexican farmers who have abandoned their fields to demand better paid paying conditions.

>> the houthi rebels appearing to closing in on the yemen city

of aden and houthies have captured its airport. the location of yemen's president is not known. french investigators released an image of the badly damaged cockpit voice recorder saying they have been able to extract information from it. nigeria will close its land and sea borders from midnight on wednesday until midnight on saturday. nigeria's president goodluck jonathan said it is for the election.

we're live on the line from the capital of abuja. what will these closures mean? >> well, lauren, this is very significant, going ahead with the planned timetable of these elections. people were afraid. people were jittery that it could--the elections could be postponed again. they were supposed to take place in the middle of february and the end of february. they were postponed for six weeks because the security services said that they wanted more time to fight boko haram. this announcement is an indication that everything is on course. the election for president--the presidential election will take place on saturday. there is also another election on april 11th to elect 26 state governors and local parliaments. it looks like because of this decision, it came with the

approval of president goodluck jonathan, will go ahead. in the statement there was also a line about making sure that they would take part of the elections. there is a lot of cross-border migration, and the nigerian authority wants to guard against that. it seems that everything is on course and the election will take place on saturday. >> what can you tell us about the effort to stop the opposition candidate interest running? >> well, this saga has within going on for absolute hazard. to cut a very long story short what opponent have within saying is that he was thought able to row dues his secondary school certificate when he decided he wanted to run as.

the thigh jeeran constitution requires a candidate for any you believe office tinning secondary school. thou he says that his certificate was this the ocean of the hilt authorities. he had within a soldier his whole life and when he started this the hilt he gave over all his certificates. the hilt came out to say that they don't have the certificate and the result of that opponent say that he was thought quality tied to run. they went to court to try to stop him legally interest running. the court is wakely saying that they're adjourning this hearing that he will be able to compete on saturday, and that the court will hear the evidence again at the end of april. what the ruling party is saying and what opponent are saying if he does, indeed, win the election then he's disqualified

disqualified. the saga is not quite over. it's to resume at the end of april. >> thank you very much, indeed. the pentagon has confirmed it has carried out surveillance flights over the city of tikrit for preparation of possible airstrikes. iraq had asked u.s. air support. the iraqi government forces and shia fighters backed by run have been fighting to push isil out of tikrit for the last three weeks. 31 the rebel forces have seen the ancient city where battle has been waging for four days. the trial of two al jazeera journalists in egypt have been adjourned until april 22nd. mohamed fahmy, baher mohammed

have already spent 400 days in jail with their colleague peter greste. they're now out on bail, but they have been charged with helping the banned muslim brotherhood, charges that they and al jazeera deny. a suicide car bombing in the heart of the afghan capital have killed seven people and injured others. it comes after president ashraf ghani met with president obama regarding the slowdown of withdrawing of u.s. troops. two top ukrainian officials have been arrested during a televised government meeting. the ukrainian police officers entered the meeting and handcuffed the emergency chief and it's deputy. they're under suspicion of extorting bribes. the arrests are part of a wideer anti-corruption crackdown. it is freedom day in belarus

belarus. the country has been called europe's last dictatorship. and with presidential elections expected in november, rory challands has been gauging its opposition. >> reporter: the young the idealistic the discontented and the hopeful belarus' opposition is not much different now than it has been for the last 21 years in power. it's just shrunk. tens of thousands protested the elections. and elections loom once more and only a thousand attended this freedom day rally. >> there are not dozens of people attending. but knowing that people would participate. many people are working so i believe it was quite successful.

>> he may have been happy with the turn out but with no clear government plan to fixing the economic slump you would expect the opposition to be making ground. this analyst explains what is happening. >> the regular traditional was basically saying that if we don't get fair and free elections we're going to call on the people to guarantee these trades. >> it was made harder by disagreements between the frack

shoes array of the platforms and parties and several years of government crackdowns. >> it's also strengthened their hand to promote security ahead of democracy. most people think that the elections at the end of the year are a forgone conclusion. >> at least nine people have been killed by a series of mudslides in the peru highlands. hundreds of homes are damaged in the country's main east-west highways are blocked.

>> people run in every direction not knowing where to go. >> there is an alert right now. authorities are telling people that they have to leave because there might be another mudslide coming this way. >> this woman and her children run for safety. they're terrified. >> they are saying that the reservoir has collapsed and it is heading this way. >> the police guide residents to go up the hill. >> we're telling people to go in that direction. >> but then calm returns. a police patrol rolls by saying it was a false aliving alarm. residents here are on alert way into the night carrying shovels and picks people are beginning to clean up the ravine. they are afraid that homes left on the ravine may collapse.

>> power lines went down. look at this hole here, seven meters deep. >> the mudslide has destroyed many homes in central peru. to save their life people ran and climbed on trucks after the water levels from the river rose. many say that there are children among the dead. they're sending tents water and blankets for the victims. and in some areas drinking water has been cut off. power lines are down, and several people are still missing. government authorities say the main food supply root for the capital will be blocked for five or six days. you police and army units have been deployed in the region. dozens of instruct remain stranded throughout the night. the alarm is far from over. >> this has happened before. with all the rumors we're

hearing we are alarmed. >> many like him remain on alert. forecasters say torrential rains will continue to fall until the end of the week in ten provinces of lima, leaving this area especially vulnerable to more mudslides. >> striking farm workers are holding talks with farmers in one of mexico's most agriculture regions. the workers are demanding better pay and conditions, but the owners say that their hands are tied. we have more. >> this is an important moment for hundreds of farm works in san quentin valley. these farm workers are paid $8 to $10 a day. and live in cramp conditions. what they are demanding is $20 a

day and better working conditions and they say they can't afford to wait any longer. >> they're the same thing that thousands of us have been asking for for years. but no one has wanted to find an answer. no one is worried about us. now we're tired of going hungry low wages. that's why we decided to rise up up. >> tons of produce grown here are sold to the u.s. but they say they do not eastern enough for the fruits and vegetables that they're selling. but is in the interest of both sides to come to an agreement because the harvest here is currently going to be a loss, and there is no way of knowing which direction this protest will take if there is no resolved. >> a move that will create the fifth biggest food and beverage company. heinze owned by warren buffet

will be buying kraft. for more www.aljazeera.com. you can catch up but watching us live by clicking on the "watch live" icon. www.aljazeera.com is the address again. managers and traders. the gender apartheid imposed by >> this is al jazeera america. i'm david shoes center new york. sergeant bowe bergdahl, the soldiers recovered in afghanistan last spring, is being charged with desertion and misbehavior. let's listen. >> good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for