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tv   News  Al Jazeera  August 21, 2015 7:00am-7:31am EDT

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♪ south korea warns the north to stop making provocations as kim jong un puts his troops on a war footing. ♪ i'm in doha and also ahead macedonia police fire tear gas to stop thousands of refugees crossing border from greece. the ruling party splinters in greece following the resignation of prime minister alexis tsipras. >> the terror, the confusion, it was something unbearable. >> reporter: it's two years since chemical attacks in syria
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killed hundreds, we speak to survivors still waiting for justice. ♪ we start on the korean peninsula where the south korean defense ministry is now urging the north to stop its provocations, tensions increased between north and south between exchange of fire on thursday and both countries say they put their military on high alert and support leader kim jong un had a meeting late on thursday and according to state media there he told the army's front line troops to be fully ready for operations and said to take action first and to report it later and harry faucet reports. >> reporter: south korean president visited a military post on friday with the national security advisor defense minister and senior commanders and the message being conveyed
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the personal command of the situation as north and south korea engage in a military face off. >> translator: the military should be for further provocations, if the situation occurs i want you to take action first and then report later. >> reporter: it followed a late-night meeting of the ruling party central military commission which kim jong un said the areas get in a quasi state and surprise attacks against the south. >> translator: the general staff of the korean people's army sent ultimatum to the defense ministry saying the people's army would launch strong military action unless south korea stops broadcasting to the north within 48 hours. >> reporter: these loudspeakers are the border and source of the war far and started broadcast of propaganda two weeks ago for the first time in 11 years and it's in response of what happened
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earlier in the month of the zone and northern forces planted land mines that maimed two of its soldiers. and the village is a few kilometers south of the border and the civilian area where the first north korean projectile was fired on thursday and at one point hundreds were told to leave their homes at the border and here the advisory is still in place. >> translator: north korea provocation is likely to continue so we are advising residents to stay in shelters and there are some who went out to carry out their daily business but advise them to come back to the shelter this evening. >> reporter: inside it's mainly the elderly and young who stayed behind. >> translator: living in this area i've seen many drills and heard explosions but this time the sound was louder and there was an announcement asking us to evacuate compared to the past i'm more concerned. >> reporter: seeking refuge in
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this shelter is starting to feel like an uncomfortable habit here and last year north korean an antiwar shell was fired here and carrying balloons launched by south korean activists, this time residents have a deadline ticking down and south korea says if a military strike follows it will counter attack strongly and harry faucet, al jazeera, south korea. police in macedonia have fired stun grenades and dispursed thousands of refugees trying to cross the border from greece and declared a state of emergency on the southern and northern borders on thursday and 42000 entered the country in the last two months and many escaping conflicts in iraq, syria and afghanistan. >> translator: we expect the involvement of the army will bring two desired effects and increase security among our citizens in the two regions and allow a comprehensive approach to people applying for asylum
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according to capacity and international obligation signed by macedonia which we want to respect. >> reporter: greece's ruling party, the ruling party has split, 25 members of parliament say they will form their own movement and dissent since the leader accepted a bailout program with eu creditors which related to more austerity measures and the split is hours he resigned from prime minister and called for more elections and john has more from athens. >> reporter: two dozens parliament from the party have broken away from the prime minister's line and said they are going to form a separate, far left wing group. they have said this is going to be called the consolidated antiausterity front or united antiausterity front and this is a play on words because it is an echo of the communist resistance
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during world war ii which after the war fought a civil war against national forces and that was called the national freedom front. there is no coincidence here. the far left wants the name of its new party to sound like the continuation of the communist fighting formations of old. it wants to suggest to voters that they are the true leftest and true inheriters of the world war ii communist generation and they are the ones that will carry the torch forward against austerity in this case in the upcoming election. in syria 15 people have been killed in government air raids over eastern aleppo and medical sources told al jazeera the planes targeted a town in the aleppo countryside. it's under i.s.i.l. control and a regular target and opposition activists say the syrian
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government is deliberately targeting civilian neighborhoods. two years ago up to 1500 people died when rockets filled with saran gas struck the syrian town and the government denies being behind the chemical attacks and survivors are worried they will never get justice and zaina has a story and a warning that some viewers may find some of the images in the report upsetting. >> reporter: the dead and the dying, there was no blood on their bodies, no visible injuries and the attack was different from what they have seen before, chemicals landed there on the morning of august 21, 2013. >> it took like seconds before i lost my ability to breathe. i wasn't able to breathe or even to scream to alert my friends so i have to like pound my chest really hard just to try to take a single breath.
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i felt like somebody was tearing up my chest with a knife. >> reporter: 29-year-old survived, hundreds of others didn't. two years later he has a new life in the united states but he remembers that day clearly. >> it was a scene from judgment day. dozens of people, men, women, children running and falling on the ground, suffocating, the terror, the confusion it was something unbearable. i just didn't know what to do. >> he did, at the time he was a photographer working in syria. he wanted to document the evidence of a crime he believed the world should see. >> i asked the doctor about what i need to know so he showed me, he showed me the dark blue or the color that had been changed. the eyes and the things that are coming out from their mouth. >> reporter: even though he had covered the war for many years he said he can't forget what he saw that day.
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>> i'm a war photographer and for me to see a dead body with blood it's normal. when you see them you think they are at the first thing you think they are sleeping. then you realize after like one or two seconds your reality becomes facing what is really going on after the shock. >> reporter: reality faced years before, he was an activist where he used to film the suffering of people who continued to live under siege. since the attack he has trade to raise awareness, even at the u.n. and u.s. congress but he says it has all been in vain. >> honestly i feel like i did nothing. i feel like after all this talking and all the people that i met and not just me like thousands of syrians here and we felt like there is no hope. >> reporter: the u.n. did conclude that saran gas was used in the attack but didn't have the mandate to blame anyone, there is now a new resolution, to investigate chemical attacks in syria but attacks before
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april 2014 won't be included. yet again denying justice to the people here, beirut. australia considering a request from the u.s. to carry out air strikes against i.s.i.l. in syria and australia is already involved in an air campaign in neighboring iraq and tony abbot says he will carefully consider the pentagon's request and a decision in a few weeks. the army killed four members of the group islamic jahad in an air strike and the t.v. reported a car was targeted near the village and five civilians were killed, it was the second straight day of israeli strikes inside syria and carried out a series of attacks on thursday after rockets from syria landed in northern israel and the occupied golan heights and israel said it was fired by islamic jahad and one of the soldiers was killed in one of
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the israeli strikes. we will take a quick break now but when we come back here on al jazeera silencing critics, journalists in ecuador accuse the government of a witch hunt. plus the home of one of communism's founding fathers goes on the free market. ♪
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>> al jazeera america, weekday mornings. catch up on what happened overnight with a full morning brief. get a first hand look with in-depth reports and investigations. start weekday mornings with al jazeera america. open your eyes to a world in motion. ♪ hello again you are watching al jazeera and our top stories, south korea's president has ordered military to take action first and report it later. that is after a escalation of
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tensions of exchange of artillery fire on thursday and north korea ordered troops to be ready forward. police in macedonia fired stun grenades to dispurse thousands of refugees trying to cross the border from greece and declared a state of emergency on the southern and northern borders on thursday. greece's ruling party has split, 25 members of parliament say they will form their own government and that is just hours after alexis tsipras resigned as prime minister and called for new elections. britain's foreign secretary phillip will formally reopen the uk embassy on sunday and london will be reopened at the same time. britain withdrew its ambassador to tehran in 2011 after they stormed two diplomatic compounds to protest sanctions imposed by the uk and reopening of the countries is a sign of warming relations after iran and world powers signed a deal on iran's
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nuclear program and we have an author and journalist and earlier he explained what the warming of relations will mean for iranians and the british people. >> generally for iranians is they will have better access to britain because there are lots living in the uk and would like to come to uk and have access in terms of getting visas rather than going to turkey and the bay for getting the visa and so forth but also i think the british business community is very keen to go to iran and establish their old relations again and investing in iran and having better trade with iran and these are the immediate and the third factor is as iran's relations with the west is gradually open britain would like to have a warm relationship, sorry they would like to have a warm relations with britain. iraq's iotola warned the country faces possible partition and says government needs to be
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introduced immediately and this is one of several made by the clecc this month and played a role in the anticorruption drive-by prime minister abadi. more protests are expected in iraq after friday prayers to keep the pressure on the government to follow-up its promise of reforms and people are sick of power cuts and food short analyzes as well as violence and as mohamed reports from baghdad the health system is also failing. >> at the hospital the doctor doles out medical care and dispenses hard truths. >> tough challenges and living in a city with violence, daily violence and living in a city with low infrastructure and trying your best to give the best to those patients, it's not easy. >> reporter: while this government-run facility is cleaner and better stocked than my other hospitals and clinics
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in iraq's capitol it's not immune to the crisis spreading to the healthcare system here many consider decaying and diseased. the shortage of supplies and well-trained staff is nothing new in iraq but things are getting worse. even storing medicines at the right temperature is difficult. the medications stored inside here must stay constantly reference refrigerated and why the cooling units need to keep refrigerated and at a time when there is power cuts the hospitals and others are relying on back-up generators and back inside patients find on a relatively slow day wait times are long. >> translator: if i had a critical condition and needed immediate surgery, i'd have to wait a month to get my turn and that's not practical at all. >> reporter: going to a private hospital would be far too expensive for this couple. the ministry of health isn't the
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only institution in the country struggling to deliver medical aid. the united nations recently announced a funding gap forcing 80% of front line services in iraq to shut down. one million people are affected. >> it means that all the kids who are going to be immunized are not going to be immunized and means all the pregnant women who needed help during birth and before birth and afterward are not going to receive that as cyst answer. >> reporter: three million people are displaced inside iraq. >> it's painful, it hurts and the people who need us most right now we are walking away from them. when you are in a clinic that yesterday was providing antibiotics and today it's closed because we don't have the funding you have nothing but shame. you are ashamed. >> reporter: another blow to a country whose people need more help but are receiving less and less. mohamed, al jazeera, baghdad. sri lanka has been sworn in
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as prime minister and party won 106 seats in monday's parliamentary election, seven short of majority and made a deal with opposition to build a coalition. and former u.s. president jimmy carter is being treated for cancer. the 90-year-old reflected on his life and his future in a frank and open news conference to discuss his resent diagnosis. patty reports. >> reporter: former u.s. president jimmy carter has not shied away from criticism since leaving office and visiting the countries the u.s. considers unfriendly and strong reviews of allies and that continued as he briefed the press on his cancer diagnosis saying in the time he has left he would like to see peace between israel and palestine but he won't. >> right now i think the parts are dismal more than the last 50 years and the whole process is indolement. the government of israel has no
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desire for a two-state solution which is policy of all the other nations in the world. and the united states has practically no influence compared to past years and this is israel or palestine. >> reporter: he said he would like the last guinea worm to die before he does, and his foundation had great success combatting and the tiny parasite found in water is being killed off and facing melanoma that spread to his sprain and the brain and he was surreal. >> i thought i had a few weeks left but i was surprisingly at ease. i've had a wonderful life. i've had thousands of friends and i've had an exciting and adventure and gratifying existence and i was at ease much more so than my wife is. >> reporter: that is his
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greatest accomplishment marrying his wife of 69 years rose lynn and what he wished he had done differently was regarding the hostages in iran. >> i wish i sent one more hold helicopter for the hostages and i would have been reelected but it may have been fe interfered with the carter center and if i had to choose i would choose the carter center. >> reporter: promoted peace, human rights and better health across the world. the former president says he will now focus on his own, beginning treatment soon after leaving the stage, saying he is not angry or sad but grateful and looking forward to this new adventure. pat patty, washington. speaker of lower house of congress and the former president charged in the country's largest corruption
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scandal and accused of taking a $5 million bribe on oil and the first sitting politician to be charged in a multi-billion dollar bribery scandal. ♪ on thursday thousands of supporters and opponents of ruseff marched across the country and approval at the all-time low and unemployment the highest in five years and the economy is sliding into recession. the scandal may not be limited to brazil, service providers connected to the oil company may have conducted business in at least seven latin american places and in venezuela four companies under scrutiny in brazil has many contracts and we reports. >> reporter: in the capitol caracus this metro seems to be well only its way but following
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delays the exact due date is unknown. the infrastructure project is to become one of the stations of the line five of the caracus metro and according to the president it should have been completed by 2011. delays could be taken as normal in a country that suffers from chronic shortages from toilet paper to scement and because it got money it raised eyebrows. >> put it in progress because congress granted them additional credit and these are works already in progress and we passed the scheduled dates and it's for emergency projects only. >> reporter: these five projects, three metro lines and two bridges, are in the hands of them and one of the construction people in the heart of the corruption scandal. and they have completed some of the projects in venezuela like this cable line, inaugurated a
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couple years ago but others like a third bridge over the river remain unfinished. >> translator: the scandal is particularly significant because it is not just about a few individuals getting rich on bribes. it's a network that systematically distributed contracts with them and inflated budgets and had a huge impact on politics. >> reporter: no wrongdoing from the construction companies associated with it in venezuela but there are questions to be answered and if corruption along with engineering were exported it could come at political and economic costs, virginia lopez, al jazeera venezuela. ban journalists reporting on a volcano that erupted in more than 70 years to guaranty public safety but as we report journalists say the ban is one of the many restrictions on
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press freedom in the country. >> reporter: after 31 years in the news program he says he now watches every word he says on air, afraid his radio station will be fined by the government says his son. >> translator: if the government disagrees with our content we have to publish a ratification exactly as they send it to us with their vision on the issues and that includes saying we are liars. >> reporter: their station could even lose its operating license given by the government regarding the president. >> translator: they are shameless, sick, clowns and psyche to dishonest. >> reporter: they have limited the reports on corruption for
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criticism and prevent punishment. >> translator: there is censorship applied to the law, you are punished even if you don't violate the law and telling the truth does not exonerate you from penalties. >> reporter: since its creation the law has gone after and fined 143 news organization, only one of them is public, the rest are private. any information aired or published is subject to scrutiny by a panel named by the government. she directs a government-sponsored radio station and says the private media responds to private interests, the end game now is to make journalism independent and rigorous and responsible. >> translator: there is no persecution and the private media likes that type of control over content and the law doesn't prohibit publishing information but if you want to publish you
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have to do it well. >> reporter: critics say the communications law has not helped improve journalism, instead they say community radios and small newspapers are disappearing or being used as propaganda tools by the government. the fines and post investigative magazine and newspaper forced them to close and journalists say the new regulations mean their outlets is be discredited or immediately punished even if they can prove they are telling the truth. al jazeera. haiti is holding legislative elections again in about 20% of its districts. violence in the first round on august 9th left at least two people dead, dozens of voters centers forced to close and another vote in late october. 75 years since one of communisms famous revolutionarys was
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expelled in 1929 and took refuge in several countries but made his first home in a sprawling mansion near istanbul and we have been to the island he called home. >> reporter: surrounded by the mansions of capitalism's millionaires is the crumbling former home of one of communism's great revolutionarys. newly exiled from the soviet union he arrived here in 1929. now his former refuge on an island near istanbul is up for sale for $4.4 million. but in a twist that might make an old communist smile, whoever buys this prime real estate won't be able to use it as a private home. >> translator: the owners wanted to restore the house as a private residence but four years ago designated a cultural facility and maybe they could
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buy it but it's a difficult restoration for whoever takes it on. >> reporter: the restoration would cost a million dollars and he chose this because of the assasin he knew moscow was sending and he was here before traveling to mexico and it was there he was murdered with an ice pick on stalin's orders and he is a historian and expert and follower. >> translator: he was not the kind of person to get sad. we however should be upset at the state of this beautiful mansion. he did consider coming back in a letter to turkish authorities when he left he writes upon my return. i'm sure if he did come back and saw it in this state he would be saddened. >> reporter: and it has changed little since he was here and cars are ban but elsewhere in
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the world life has moved on like the political philosophy he championed, his house could soon just disappear. bernard smith, the island in istanbul. much more on our website of course, al jazeera.com. >> a plea for help at wildfires burn more ground in the northwest and more are ordered to evacuate. now international crews are headed into assist. >> markets tumbled after wall street's big selloff. uncertainty spooks investors. president obama reassures fellow democrats in hopes of securing a nuclear deal with iran.