the question is whether it and its kind can survive here in the future. jake ward, al jazeera, see area national park, california. there is much more on our website, and the address to click on to is aljazeera.com. hope francis heads for the u.s. after wrapping up his visit to cuba. security is unprecedented. volkswagen emissionest crisis gets bigger in . and china's president arrives in seattle. as technology and cyber security concerns threaten to overshadow his trip to america.

this is al jazeera america live from new york city. i'm randall pinkston. pope francis is on board a jet heading for america right now. he wrapped up his visit in cuba a short time ago. during his final mass, he asked cubans to pray for him. the pope also called on them to rediscover their catholic heritage, and live, quote, a revolution of tenderness. david it had been a whirlwind of a few days for pope francis, how does his visit and messages received by the cuban people? >> reporter: it has been a whirlwind, he was here in

havana, then traveled to the east and then in up to santiago, and now he's on his way to the united states. he has been trying to promote the faith. get this church more involved in cuban, which has a tenuous relationship when it comes to religion. one of the things that pope francis has said is that cubans need to be ready for change. and many cubans essentially are ready for change. it of course is the change that he has help brought by brokering this new relationship with the united states and cuba. and pope francis sending those letters back and forth between both leaders, and now we start to see the opening here. there's a note of caution in the sense that cuba can't change too quickly. and that's one of the reservations that people have here. this is a system that has been in place over the course of the last half century, as we libe l

liberalize this economy, there is a fear that it might move quickly, as the same time they are looking for those new dollars and chances for work, so this is an economy and country in flux in large part because of pope francis. >> david while you were speaking we showed some of the video that was recorded earlier of the dissidents who were attempting to reach pope francis. there has been criticism of the pope's reluctance to speak publicly about any criticism of the castro regime. any incite that you can offer us on his strategy there? >> reporter: you know, the closest this pope came to offering criticism really came in the beginning in havana when

he said the service has to focus on the people. that was perceived as potential slight towards the cuban state. but all of these have been couched in church sayings. he was approached by a child at one point, and the child essentially said he doesn't quite have the freedoms he might have elsewhere, and the pope responded every child within the country has to have an opportunity to pursue his or her dreams. but that's really the closest that this pope has gotten. it's something that many people in this country, the dissidents in this country who -- many of whom were rounded up during this trip, about a hundred of which were detained or arrested throughout the course of his travels in three cities or even those in the united states who say this is old cuba, a country that still has a very tenuous track record of human rights. but pope francis didn't make any

mention of the embargo, this was certainly something the castro government would have liked. the vatican has come out in prior tripping saying that his office is opposed to the embargo, but he didn't say that here. so the two sides it really remains to be seen what is going to happen next as he travels to the united states. >> thank you. an unprecedented show of security be greet the pope's arrival in america. prompting what has been called the largest coordinated security efforts in u.s. history. paul beban has more. [ cheers and applause ] >> reporter: this is what makes protecting pope francis such a challenge his habit of breaking away from his security detail, to be with the people. on his visit to the u.s., the vatican security force, the swiss guard, will be beefed up by a battery of u.s. agencies. the pontiff begins his tour in

washington, d.c. where streets within a three-block radius of the capitol will be shut down for the pope's speech to congress. after washington the pope travels to new york city, where throws of police are preparing for the popes visit and at the same time, for the u.n. general assembly. >> we believe this will be the largest security challenge that the department and the city have ever faced in that in addition to the pope will be have 170 confirmed world leaders in this city. that's 90% of the world leaders in this city at one time. >> reporter: major streets will be shut down during the pope's two-day tour of new york and the pontiff won't be riding around in his normal pope mobile, instead he'll be in a modified jeep wrangler. the last city will be visit is

philadelphia. security fences have already been put up and extra surveillance cameras put into place. security experts say every tool available is being used. >> philadelphia is the venue where there is going to be the most people. it's the venue where if things can go wrong it will be here because it will be outdoors and there will be millions of individuals. >> reporter: in all three cities flights are restricted and drone flights are banned. paul beban al jazeera, new york. earlier al jazeera spoke with the president of catholics for choice. he says there is symbolism in the pope's trip, starting in cuba and ending in the united states. >> i think this pope is someone who wants to bring people together. it's no secret the vatican did play a role in cuban american relations that lead to the current thawing of the

situation. and there's also something between the gap between rich and poor. we are very fortunate here in the united states. i think this idea of unity is definitely a central theme. i think catholics are very excited and with the visit of pope francis to the united states. i think non-catholics are excited if not even curious about what this man who has great simplicity in his message, i think people are very curious about it. tomorrow he meet's president obama in the morning. on friday he addresses the united nations. and on thursday, interestingly, he talks to the u.s. congress. what is interesting here is that i think that on that political level, some people have been asking the question, so what is pope francis going to tell congress about policy, and i think that this is a huge mistake. the reality with pope francis is

he's speaking less about political points than he is about pastoral issues. >> he says despite the pope's very political statements about the environment, he thinks the message to congress will be more about caring for the planet and less about policy. china's president has arrived in the united states for his first state visit. you are looking at live pictures from seattle where his plane touched down a short time ago. but he tackled one contentious issue head on before leaving for the u.s. in an interview in the wall street journal, he denied that his government or chinese businesses are behind cyber attacks on the u.s. allen schauffler is in seattle. >> reporter: the president is on his way to washington, d.c., it's his first-ever formal state visit to the u.s. but before he meets with president obama, he is going to spending three days here in the seattle area. why the state of washington as a

fist stop over in it boils down to high-tech trade, airplanes and money. here is gary locke talking about the challenges of engaging with a powerful trading partner like china. >> obviously a big concern about cyber security, the lack of level playing field for american firms in china, discrimination against foreign firms as well as the -- the lack of a rule of law, and inadequate protections of our inth property, our trade secrets. >> reporter: the president is following the example of past chinese leaders. he is the fourth to make a point of putting seattle on the e itinera itinerary. we'll have more tonight about this visit. allen schauffler al jazeera seattle. today we're learning more about a u.s. silt sin who has been in chinese detention for six months.

security forces secretly detained the woman in march when she was in southern china for business, but did not formally arrest her for stealing state secrets until sunday. her husband said he kept quiet about the case until now, because he was trying to get her released behind the scenes. david petraeus made a public apology today. >> as such i think it is app ole rate to begin my marks this morning with an apology. one i offered before, but one i want to repeat to you and to the american public. four years ago, i made a serious mistake. one that brought discredit on me, and pain closest -- to those closest too me. it was a violation of the trust placed in me, and a breach of the values to which i had been committed throughout my life. he faced the senate armed services committee a short time

ago. he resigned in 2012 after having an affair, and acknowledging he had shared classified information with her. he called the scandal a very difficult chapter in his life. a price hike that cost the u.s. economy billions. how reaction to one drug's price tag sent investors running.

>> once again ben carson is doing damage control. he said sunday he would not advocate having a muslim as president. he spoke in ohio today, to clarify what we meant. >> there's no question that our constitution and our traditions have a judeo-christian base. there's no question about that. and i don't think there's any reason we should deny that. but the first amendment is very important, freedom of religion. the majority of people in this country, you know, do believe in judeo-christian values, and there's no way that we should suppress their beliefs, and they should be able to live according to their faith, but we never should have a theocracy. yesterday on fox news he explained that he would support a muslim candidate who denounced

sharia law. several muslim groups have called on carson to drop out. the ceo of volkswagen is offering another apology as the company struggles with an emissions test scandal. >> translator: i sincerely apologize to all of our clients and the authorities and the entire public for our wrongful behavior. >> today they revealed that 11 million diesel cars worldwide are effected the epa says it used software that tricked division equipment. rick newman a columnist with yaw mee finance puts those billions in perspective. >> $7 billion that's probably in line with what general motors is

going to have to pony up with its own problems. that problem lead to several dozen deaths. we're not even talking about a safety issue, really, with the volkswagen scandal, and yet volkswagen has set aside an amount of money equivalent to a huge safety scandal at general motors. this is kind of an incredible story. it's incredible this company could have been so stupid and look what it is doing to the company's performance and its bottom line. >> france today became the latest country to launch an investigation. more trouble today for kentucky clerk kim davis for four couples say she violated a judge's order by removing her name and the name of the county from marriage licenses. instead the documents say the licenses were issued, quote, pursuant to a federal court order. pharmaceutical firm is on

the defensive today responding to the anger that followed a 5,000% price hike of a drug used to treat infections. john henry smith is following the story? john? >> reporter: the drug is called daraprim, it has been around for more than 60 years. the pill used to cost just a few dollars before it was sold to a new company looking to make a much bigger profit. shortly after purchasing daraprim in august, the ceo raised the prize from $13.50 to $750. people suffering from conditions like aids, malaria and cancer depend on the medication to fight a pair siddic inflection. when the huge price hike was revealed monday there was wide-spread condemnation. hillary clinton tweeted: her

comments almost immediately sent u.s. bio tech stocks plummeting losing an estimated $15 billion in dollar. the ceo responded by taking on his critics on twitter, at times using aggressive language in one tweet he wrote: but during an appearance on bloomberg news the former hedge fund manager struck a less aggressive tone explaining the price hike. >> this drug is from the 1940s. we can make a better drug for this disease. we're spending tens of billions of dollars to make a better version of daraprim. this is a very toxic drug. >> reporter: a few points here. for people using insurance to buy daraprim, the hiv medicine association says it will still cost consumers $150 per pill,

but martin also told bloomberg his company will make sure people in need who can't afford it will get it for free in some cases. european union leaders have voted on a plan to relocate 120,000 asylum seekers across all states. the plan likely will face push back from eastern european countries. thousands of people are still flooding the serbia, croatian border. they are trying to make it to germany after being shut out of hungary. jacky rowland has more. >> reporter: for the first thing that is significant is that the decision was not reached as a con census, that's really the way in which european union decision making is generally made, the idea that everyone will agree together. it was clear they were not going to get a consensus decision, so in the end they decided to go

for majority vote. we understand that the countries that voted against it the proposals were the czech republic, slovakia, hungary, romania, and finland apparently abstained, but the other countries voted for it. the political implication of this clearly is yes, they have got this decision, however, on the other hand there will be more bitterness felt by the countries of eastern europe who will feel that they were bullied and strong armed into a decision to take refugees that they don't necessarily want, and in fact they are arguing that knows refugeesing don't want to be in their countries either. a decision, yes, but at the expense of yet more e.u. division. jacky rowland in brussels. the dutch foreign minister said today think only way to stop the european refugee crisis is to end the war in syria, but that war, plus the battle

against isil show no signs of ending any time soon. a new group of u.s. trained syrian rebels is now back in syria. the u.s. military trained rebels in turkey. the obama administration has been under criticism recently about his strategy to combat isil. last week, general lloyd austin admitted only handful of rebels contained by the u.s. for millions of dollars were still fighting in syria. gentle giants under threat. our climate change and drought are taking a control on california's treasured sequoias. ♪

>> i've been asked to keep my voice do

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fire crews are reporting major progress today battling two huge wildfires in northern california. the blazes are now 75% contained. but close to 3,000 structures were destroyed and thousands of californians are still staying in makeshift shelters. the governor has asked for federal help to pay for the damage and recovery. climate change and drought may be taking a toll on california's giant sequoia trees. the ancient trees are losing limbs and needles like scientists have never seen before. jake ward explains how they are trying to find an answer to keep the trees alive. >> they were losing their older needles, their older leaves in amounts that were -- i had never seen before. >> reporter: giant sequoias like this are very, very special.

they are the largest organisms on earth and they are ancient. but after four years of drought, and the warming effects of climate change, researchers are now worried about their future. at roughly 2,500 years old, this one predates christianity and islam. but more importantly for today is how tall it is. it is over 75 meters, more than 240 feet tall. scientists are going to try to go up to take water samples, and god help me, i'm going to follow them. anthony ambrose leads a team from berkeley. he climbs to the top of these trees to test them for signs of stress. he has been do doing this for about 20 years. this is my first time. i thought i could hear somebody playing house music in the parking lot, and i just realized that that is my heart. eventually i made it.

and the climb taught me a new respect for the tree itself. to be up in this massive thing, you can just tell -- you can feel the weight of history in the weight of this tree, so it's exer troerd neir to be here. here is the view. check this out. wave to the fox. warmer temperatures mean the trees need enormous amounts of water. >> typical giant sequoia of this size might use anywhere between 5 and 800 gallons of water in a single summer day. >> the snow pack which provides water to trees here throughout the summer as it melts is now at a 500 year low. the sequoias seem to be the healthiest of the bunch as much as quarter of the population of other types of trees are dying. >> the sugar pine is suffering the most.

cedar has been dying back at a rate that people in the park have never seen before. >> reporter: i'm going to show you something i have not looked at yet, ready. unbelievable. and now i'm going to try to come down. that was by far the scariest thing i have ever done. i have never felt so insignificant. this may be the last time that scientists climb these trees. part of this is to test the accuracy of a fly over observation of whole forests at once. >> typically in the past we have missed most of the forest and tried to make an inference about the forest from samples from a few trees and with thissed

invention this allows us to collect samples that we wouldn't have gathered in the past. >> reporter: the combination of drought and rising temperatures unprecedented. >> now that we're in the fourth year of this severe drought they still seem to be holding up pretty well. if we had another year as severe as this one, i would say all bets are off. >> reporter: this tree was a seedling during the roman empire, an adolescent when mohammed was live. the history of the united states is a tiny fraction of its past, the question is whether it and its kind can survive here in the future. jake ward, al jazeera, california. that's it for us. thanks for joining us, i'm randall pinkston. the news continues next live from london, and remember for the latest headlines go to our website at aljazeera.com. ♪

eu ministers push through a plan to relocate 120,000 migrants despite opposition of four member states. hello there. you're watching al jazeera life from london. also coming up. as fighting continues in his country, yemen's president returns from a six-month exile in saudi arabia. angry crowds gather in the capital after the deadline passes for coup leaders to stand down. these massive degrees have