♪ tear gas and tension on the streets of johanesburg as migrant workers arm themselves against more attacks. ♪ hello i'm with al jazeera live from doha also to come on the program the u.n. calls for a ceasefire in yemen and launches appeal to help those suffering in the war plus. >> in the mediterranean and those in africa is in chaos and full of terrorists and europe cannot be safe.

>> reporter: chaos in syria is leaving europe vulnerable to attack, a warning from president assad and memorial service for the victims of the german wings plane crash in the alps. ♪ first to south africa where street bats have been fought through the night as anti-immigrant violence spreads to downtown johanesburg. police have fired rubber coated steel bullets to disburse a group of migrants who armed themselves with machetes that was a series of break-ins on foreign-owned shops, 12 people arrested overnight. [gunfire] south africa hit by a wave of attacks against foreigners over the past two weeks, at least six people were killed in the eastern city of durban and

hundreds forced out of their homes and sheltering in camps and police stations. and south africa is a country of more than 50 million people there are thought to be around 5 million foreigners but it's hard to be precise because many are living and working illegally there. most around 3 million are thought to be from zimbabwe and the jobless rate is 25% and more dramatic is the youth unemployment rate young people are 40% unemployed so not surprisingly many local politicians are arguing that people from outside the country are putting more pressure on what is already a difficult job market. and speaking to professor chris landsburg charmaine of the department of african diplomacy at the university of johanesburg and says the recent events are a legacy of apartheid. >> no doubt a mob culture and a mob movement and yesterday they

called a third force at work here but i think what south africa should really be more upfront about and government in particular is that it appears to be foreigners or let me be more specific africans from north have been targeted and more than xenophobia and afraid to say we will see a domino effect and spill overs from durban and johanesburg and maybe other parts of the country and i think the government is really under pressure and is at pains to show its hands at the very least to condemn it if not to take firm action and even deploy military troops in these hot spots because i think the government has intelligence to prove there are hot spots where they are

playing against fellow africans from elsewhere in the continent and no doubt the ghost of apartheid is haunting this country and never actually confronted it. the u.n. says it needs almost $275 million to meet humanitarian needs in yemen over the next three months. the situation is getting worse with food supplies running short as the violence traps many people inside their homes. the world food program says it will need to distribute food for over 100,000 displaced people in the city of aiden over the next few days. before the fighting began in yemen, the wfp recommended 10 million people were short of food and now says the escalating violence has left more than 12 million yemen people in need of help. ♪ well, we have a senior spokesperson for the middle east division of the world food

program and says yemen air space and sea ports need to be opened up to allow aid to get in. >> we saw this coming so we have positioned food in different parts of the country so our warehouses have some food that is ready to be distributed immediately to many parts of the country. however, it's not going to last for so long. we appeal to all the parties to the conflict to start, you know opening the air space and the seas and the ports so we can replenish food stocks, in addition the fuel that we have inside the country is just allowing us to move food to a very small number of people so it's going to be an extreme challenge. yesterday and actually over the last two days we started the distribution of food to the people in aiden through our partners on the ground through our staff and it has done well people need the foods.

i think in terms of the street fighting in aiden we were able to carry on distributions like small amounts so we can reach many places without risk to drivers and to these tasks that is monitoring the process. but there is a bigger problem, if we don't remrenish food stocks and no fuel to run the trucks then we can never meet the urgent needs. >> reporter: as al jazeera have learned that the u.n. has lined up a new special envoy for yemen. ismael ould cheikh ahmed is the man and worked 28 years in u.n. and middle east and expected to succeed jamal benomar after criticism of failure to broker an end to the fighting. on the military front tribes fighting on the side of president hadi received reenforcements in the city not far from the capitol sanaa the

president supporters have also been making gains in aiden and the most populated city and jamal has the latest on the fighting on the ground. >> reporter: pickup trucks full of fighters descend on the town east of the yemen capitol. they are reenforcements for the popular resistance committees and fighting houthi rebels and their allies. both sides have been battling control of the area which is around a two-hour drive from sanaa. >> translator: we are the sons and reject the houthis. we will not leave here except with victory and fighting and willing to sacrifice our money and all of our belongings to defend our land. >> translator: the graveyard of every invader and not let down our yemen brothers who will defeat the houthis.

[gunfire] yemen's biggest city the birth place of up rising that ousted the president in 2011 houthi fighters are stationed on the main roads. together with soldiers loyal to the deposed president they have been trying to consolidate their control of the city which is seen as a gate way to southern yemen. but further south it's the opposition who appear to be gaining momentum the popular resistance committees loyal to president hadi are making gains everyday particularly in aiden. street to street battles continue in the center of the city with tanks and heavy shelling as they try to force the houthis to retreat or surrender. air strikes and gunfire and heavy bombardment means the streets are practically empty. [gunfire] except for fighters on both sides. rubbish is piling up everywhere

because there are no government services and some young are risking their lives to clean the street to make sure diseases are not added to the long list of challenges that yemen people already have to endure. jamal, al jazeera. now the syrian president assad has given interview to a swedish t.v. network and friday is a national day and the country is bitterly divided and no end to the civil war inside and assad said terrorism is a global issue and not just a regional problem. >> as long as you have terrorism growing in different european countries sweden cannot be safe it's the backyard of europe and mediterranean and north africa and in chaos and full of terrorist and cannot be safe. >> reporter: meanwhile government forces stepped up attacks in aleppo and idlib killing 40 civilians including

20 children activists say the syrian regime have packed the eastern side of aleppo city with barrel bombs. the air raid killed at least ten people in the neighborhoods and idlib the government reportedly dropped bombs containing toxic gas according to a human rights group and have been over 100 strikes in the area over the last few days. russia says the arrival of 300 u.s. troops in western ukraine could seriously destabilize the situation, the u.s. ambassador to ukraine posted a photo on twitter showing american troops arriving in liviv and going to train 900 ukraine national guards over the next six months as fighting continue with pro-russian rebels in eastern ukraine and we will go to rory and why is the kremlin so upset

as it seems they are given these troops are on a training mission, nothing more? >> well, the kremlin is upset because that main thing that russia has tried to avoid throughout the entirety of this ukrainian crisis in many ways you could say once russia tried to avoid by its involvement in the whole ukrainian crisis is the avoidance of nato troops in ukraine and that is what seems to be getting right now so although we got from the kremlin spokesman the usual kind of disappointed announcement basically saying that this was counter productive and this was destabilizing the situation in ukraine further and it was not in keeping with the discussions and the decisions that were made in minsk and minsk protocols you

can property tell that the kremlin and russia in general, the government here in moscow is more concerned about this than they are letting on. >> it was only yesterday, wasn't it, rory that president putin took to reiterate the fact with russian troops have no presence at all in eastern ukraine? >> yeah, that's what he said. the phone interview but that is not believed by washington d.c. it's not believed by kiev. i can read you some comments that were after dinner in a press conference at the u.s. state department i think late last night from the state department's press spokeswoman and said that no amount of propaganda can make true what is not russia has command and control elements in eastern ukraine to coordinate military operations there and russia established training areas in

eastern ukraine to train separatist fighters in gun and artillery fighting and what they said for many months now and that is believed by washington is believed by kiev and the reason that poroshenko requested from western governments military training and military assistance and not just coming from the united states there is already a rotating force of british military advisors in ukraine, 75 of them and dealing with issues like intelligence and battlefield medicine and logistics. the u.s. force is going to be bolstered and going to be more than doubled in the coming weeks and also by the beginning of the summer there are going to be some 200 canadian military advisors in ukraine as well so as i said earlier this is exactly what russia wants to avoid at the beginning of the whole crisis and nato troops are

on the territory of ukraine, they specifically didn't want this to happen but it does seem to be happening. >> rory live in moscow thank you. still to come on the program thirsty for more water, the brazilian town struggling to survive years of the drought plus one movie maker looks back at how the film festival helped him fulfill his dreams. ♪

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hello again and let's look at the top stories at al jazeera. police in south africa fired rubber coated steel bullets to disburse a group of migrants that armed themselves with machetes and a series of attempted break-ins on foreign-owned shops and 12 people were arrested overnight. the u.n. says it needs almost $275 million to meet humanitarian needs in yemen over the next three months on thursday yemen new vice president called on houthi rebels to end offensive on the port city of aiden. the syrian president assad has given an interview to a swedish t.v. channel and said terrorism is a global issue and not just a regional problem, he also blamed europe for i.s.i.l. advance across the middle east. u.n. security council members have been moved to tears by graphic pictures of suspected chlorine gas attacks in syria

and heard firsthand accounts from doctors who treated the victims, many of them children and u.n. says it will try to identify and prosecute the attackers and a warning this report by our diplomatic editor james base contains disturbing images. >> reporter: this was filmed in the aftermath after the chemical attack in syria last year the pictures of doctors trying to revive young children was shown to security council ambassadors, they were shocked, many were moved to tears. >> the video in particular of the attempts to resuscitate the children, if there was a dry eye in the room i didn't see it. it was -- it's just devastating to see the facts of what this regime is doing so people were visibly moved. >> reporter: some of the worst stuff i had to watch i have to say, there were moments when all i wanted to do was look away and then i realized that the people we were seeing actually had to

live through this and regrettably had to die through it. >> reporter: as well as watching the video security council members heard evidence from two syrian doctors and from a survivor of a chemical attack they later briefed reporters. >> translator: in the video you can see that the patients were one on top of the other and that is because we received many sick people in a short amount of time. as far as my feelings of course it was very disturbing. every time i rewatch the video i remember the events that occurred which are very upsetting. >> reporter: and he says he was one of the victims of an attack in 2013 at one point doctors thought they lost him. >> gave up on me and i was placed between the dead bodies for nearly 45 minutes and until a friends of mine noticed i was still alive, they called the doctors again and gave me more medicine and for some reason i came back to life. >> reporter: the video was filmed just ten days after the

security council vote a rare moment of unity on syria with condemning the use of chlorine was passed and u.s. among members condemning what they say is a clear act of defiance by assad government but actions are unlikely and russia would block condemnation of the syrian government in the security council and the obama administration remains reluctant to take any military action james base al jazeera, u.n. a memorial service is currently underway for the victims of the german wings plane crash, relatives, rescue workers, airline employees and top politicians are in the cathedral. all 150 people were killed in the french alps last month, copilot lubitz treated for depression is taught to

deliberately crashed the jet after locking the captain out of the cockpit. ♪ italy is appealing for help to cope with an unprecedented flood of new arrivals as migrants continue to make the dangerous journey across the mediterranean, hundreds arrived in italy on friday and it is thought more than 40 others may have drown after the boat they were on capsized, over the past week more than 7,000 people mainly from africa and middle east have braved the journey to escape poverty or conflict. now the authorities have said italian coast guard vessel conducted six different search and rescue operations in two days in international waters off the coast of libya and took on board 500 migrants who attempted to cross the mediterranean on six different boats and paul brennan reports now from sicily on how italy is struggling to cope with the unprecedented number of

arrivals. >> reporter: at the port of augusta the coast guard ship delivers human cargo nearly 600 migrants rescued from a variety of stricken boats off the libya coast from the past few days and guided by shore by people in protective clothing men, women and children risked death for a better life and teams of volunteer doctors now work alongside the ship's medical staff. what they have seen pulled from the water in resent weeks is harrowing. >> sometimes we see people in the sea. they swallow water and guzzling and it's awful. >> reporter: some arrive with little money for their new life and others arrive with no shoes

to wear and come from somalia and others and no sign of slow down and unprecedented numbers seen in resent days and the eu add admits solutions are needed but don't have any at the moment. >> the eu cannot alone do it all, yes, we are putting all our energy into the developing a new comprehensive approach on managing migration which i said many times we will be coming with in may moved up from july but no we do not have a silver bullet or any kind of panacea that will make the situation go away like that and no amount of finger pointing is going to change that. >> reporter: in the next few days this coast guard ship will put to sea again and more migrants lives will be saved as a result. the question of how to stop them risking their lives in the first place goes unanswered. paul brennan, al jazeera, augusta, sicily. a chinese court sentenced veteran journalist gao-yu to

seven years in prison and convicted of leaking state secrets to foreign news organizations. our reporter has more now on the sentencing from beijing. >> reporter: the conviction of a 71-year-old journalist comes as no surprise to those watching here as the state itself also controls china's courts. she was first arrested nearly a year ago for divulging state secrets, the secret in question here is internal party memo known as document number nine in that document it is revealed that the chinese party leadership is concerned over what it sees as the potential infiltration of western ideals such as democracy which could corrupt and eventually lead to the disintegration of china leadership. now, because of this it basically came out that the intended political reform that the chinese president has been talking about is possibly not true that he intends to keep

things exactly as they are and the human rights violations that are seen by advocates as being perpetrated against those who are having different ideals will continue and gao-yu conviction is the late nest the growing list of violations perpetrated by the communist party in china and gao-yu intends to appeal conviction. doubt in brazil is devastating cities, towns and villages and the government is about to announce an emergency plan allen fisher reports. >> reporter: today is a good day here the water truck came. that means she can fill her buckets, do her washing and feel for a few hours that things are getting better. >> translator: we are saving water and using it to wash our clothes, to water the plants and to clean the floor. >> reporter: 56 tons of cities

in northeastern brazil are suffering severe drought and another 49 are critical. this is the rainy season and have been enough to keep things green but not much more and not for sometime. three years ago this reservoir would have been full,, in fact, where i'm standing the water would have been above my head and gives you an idea of devastation that is caused in the region and what is left of what was once a very large lake. fields lay abandon and growing grapes here but not enough water to produce a crop and farmers like antonio walked away for an area that relies on agriculture the continued water shortage is killing crops and jobs and killing hope. >> translator: there is hope only if god helps us or the government without water we have nothing. >> reporter: when the water truck ar appears it pumps 20,000 and should do 90 families for three days but locals know this is not a long-term solution. >> translator: if the course of

the river could be changed it would help farmers not only here but in other towns where creeks are completely dry. >> reporter: the government will present an emergency plan in two weeks to how it will tackle the drought but for villages across the region there is no quick fix or immediate solution for a problem years in the making and years in the suffering. allen fisher al jazeera, northeastern brazil. the film festival in new york has opened for the 14th year and chance for the up and coming directors to showcase their work last year al jazeera met film maker who was making his first appearance at tribeca and caught up with him to see how he has benefitted since. >> i am the director writer and director of a movie called apple sauce and i was here last year with a movie called summer blood. ♪ winning the festival last year

with a low budget and almost no budget film and no one knew about it and no press person and no movie stars in the film i enjoyed being at the festival and enjoyed presenting the film, it's always exciting and important and imperative to get an audience. >> do you like this? >> we had a red carpet event which was exciting and fun but then again i get self conscious about things like that because when you're on the red carpet you see the cameras flashing there is a moment of panic and reporters are saying who are these no names we don't want to shoot these people. so it got reviews and attention and ended up selling the movie which was fantastic. >> you flatter me what is the worst thing you ever done? >> never told anyone this story. >> reporter: apple sauce is about the past coming back to haunt you. what is really wonderful about having a little bit more money to make a film is that you can be more ambitious and cast

people who are recognizable and making the film more viable in the market. >> ron is in the middle of some kinds of domestic dispute. >> the big cop and small cop right there, this scene, this is the first time i've had a distributor write me a check and say make this movie and go make the film and i guess i was nervous because contractually they own the movie and can take the movie away from me at any time. once you establish relationships at film festivals it lube kates the way of getting your next film in the festival and doesn't guaranty it but people know your work and every now and then i will get stopped on the subway or new york and summer blood, i like the movie and it tears you up, it's like i have to admit it's kind of exciting you know but at the same time i don't know if i would want it and i don't think i will ever have a problem with it and the idea of being you know somebody who is

really recognized i mean i think that could be very irritating maybe possibly. >> reporter: you can find out more about the day's top stories and get a lot of background and analysis as well on the al jazeera website as ever al jazeera.com. >> got we go, u.s. troops rave in ukraine prompting a stern warning from moscow. >> another iraqi major city may be falling to isil. why coalition say that's not a big deal. >> there is still cleanup that needs to happen. >> five years after the worst oil spill in u.s. history we take you to new orleans for a