>> i will fight for me and i will fight for fifa. >> two of football's most powerful men vow to fight for their names after being band from fifa for eight years. hello there i'm barbara serra, you're watching al jazeera live from london. also coming up on the program. the taliban gain control of a key district in afghanistan as six u.s. soldiers are killed with an attack on an air base. why this area could hold the key to power after spain's

elections. plus. >> i'm andy gallagher, in haiti, 200,000 children in slavery, we'll be covering a radio program that aims to tackle the issue head-on. >> i will fight for me and for fifa. those are the defiant words of sepp blatter the president of football's governing body after he and fellow high ranking official michel platini were banned for having anything to do with the organization for eight years. $2 million payment made to uefa boss platini eight years ago. >> sepp blatter once again the center of attention. the 79-year-old swiss fighting to get into a press conference as he fights for his very future in football. on monday the suspended fifa president and the uefa chief

michel platini were given eight year bans over a $2 million payment made by blatter to platini in 2011. the swiss isn't going quietly. >> i will fight for me and i will fight for fifa. suspended eight years for what? >> reporter: for years the two big figures at fifa had a plan. long serving blatter would pass the job to his friend uefa president michel platini. now a gentleman's agreement from the past has returned to haunt them. platini supposedly carried out work for blatter with no contract and in 2011, the ethics committee set up by blatter delivered the ban. >> the adjudicatory committee

last can banned mr. sepp blatter for eight years and michel platini, vice president of fifa and president of uefa from all football activities. >> be blatter refused to even attend the hearing, the committee already decided he was guilty and seeking a long ban. he clung on despite half of his executive committee being exposed as corrupt. after may investigation he finally resigned. he wanted his own allies decided oarotherwise. he needs oclear his name before the deadline on january the 26th. now that will involve going through both the fifa appeals committee and the court of

arbitration for export before he can begin that process he needs a full written statement of the decision from the ethics committee, a process that in itself could take weeks. one is a footballing legend. the other fifa's great political survivor, both brought down by a scandal. en. rockets were brought down in afghanistan's capital kabul. three more soldiers were injured in the attack near bagram air base. that's the largest u.s. military facility in afghanistan. afghan officials say a suicide bomber on a motor bike targeted a joint u.s.-afghan foot parole outside the base. well the taliban has been staging an offensive that has seen it take control of a district in afghanistan's southern helmand province. that came a day after a senior

local official was on the brink of falling. in the recent months, the taliban has gained territory in the north, west and south. al jazeera's imoku molu reports. >> fixed target when it's the taliban afghan soldiers and police are outgunned. >> we are fighting to remove the taliban from this area. therefore, we need support from our own army to help us. right now area is controlled by taliban. >> this is helmand province, once controlled by the taliban. it's also the place where most of the world's opium is produced. on sunday the province's deputy mayor used facebook to plead with the afghan president. posting your excellency, helmand is standing on the brink and there is a serious need for you to come. since last night, sangen

district sensor is almost completely under taliban control. >> hundreds of billions was used to develop an army and that was misused and you see taliban taking advantage of that. >> would months ago its fighters took kunduz in the north for two weeks crippling the city. but now they've moved south, to sangen in hell mandate province. the deputy governor says the whole province will fall into their hands unless help arrives soon. imoku molu, al jazeera. spain's prime minister says he will try to form a new government, following elections that close no clear winner. he will have to put together a coalition, or try anyway.

barnaby phillips reports from madrid. >> reporter: here is the man of the moment, pablo iglesias, head of podemos. he says he's ready to talk to anyone but the old parties must recognize the changes that have taken place in spain. >> so today is an historical day for spain. we are very happy for the fact that in spain, the turn, the two party system has ended and we are happy because we are starting a new political era in our country. >> but awkwardly for those who want change it is the incumbent people's party that came first. and mariano rajoy wants to remain prime minister. >> the popular party consider

they have responsibility and the mandate in order to explore the possibility to give the necessary certainty both in and outside spain. >> parliament will sit on january the 13th. that's when the king felipe rm 6 should announce the new prime minister. if the decision can't be by the middle of february then spain should hold new elections. barnaby phillips, al jazeera, madrid. >> at least 85 people are still missing beneath a giant flow of mud and construction waste which buried 33 buildings in southern china. it happened in the port city of shenzhen which is home to a building and construction boom that has developed in the past years. china correspondent adrian brown reports. >> reporter: at times like this, manpower is not a problem

in china. 1500 rescue workers are now searching for signs of life. hoping survivors may have found an air pocket. if people are alive they're in damaged buildings, trapped under mounds of mud. it is hazardous work. the ground is wet with hours of rain. 24 hours after the landslide there was though still hope. >> translator: since 2:00 a.m. on monday we have regulation cued search trapped people and relocateover 900 residents. at 3:00 a.m. the field command decided to reenforce the rescue work with machinery.. >> damaged, compacted, testament to poor materials used in their construction. the mud spill is covering a vast area. equal in size to 14 football fields. >> an area of around 380,000 square meters has been covered by the mudslide disaster.

the thickness of the mud and debris ranges from between a few meters and tens of meters. >> reporter: and many people here know where that mud came from. a vast tip in a local quarry. waste from construction sites had been dumped here for years. according to chinese media reports it was at least 100 meters high and apparently legal illegal. this was china's latest man made disaster. it's only four months since a huge explosion at a storage area for dangerous chemicals in the northeast city of tiengen. they were kept in a warehouse just a few hundred meters from a residential area. now investigators must find if any laws were broken here as well. adrian brown, al jazeera, beijing. >> russia says it's unable to retrieve enough information from

the black box of the military jet shut down by turkey last no. it will now turn to specialized scientific experts to try and salvage information. nearly 36 million people around the world are thought to be trapped in modern day slavery including one in 10 children in haiti. as the caribbean country looks for solutions, one radio show has taken a novel approach to educating its listeners. andy gallagher reports now from poarpts. port-au-prince. >> in a quiet neighborhood of port-au-prince, actors are going through their lines. this team of writers, actors and directors produced more than a dozen radio shows every month that mean to entertain and generate their listeners.

recording scenes both powerful and disturbing. >> i had goose bumps listening to that, that is horrible but that's why we are here. to realize how hard it is. >> in haiti, radio is a dominant yeem anmedium. the show reaches many thousand visitors. it is working. aactress martine fidel. in a country where childhood slavery is a huge problem, that may just save lives. it is estimated there are almost a quarter ever a million child slaves in haiti, many of whom were sold by their own families. thankfully there are places of refuge for people to be safe. for those who do manage to break the bonds of slavery there is an

obvious sense of relief. but the lives they've left behind is constant reminder of a shameless problem. >> child slavery is very hard, you have to do all of the domestic work, cooking, cleaning, everything else. they treat you badly. if one day you speak out you get cursed out. >> this kind of serial drama has never been broadcast in haiti before. it is hard to quantify the success of a show that's only been on for a couple of years, but producers now say they have a loyal audience in the fight against childhood slavery. antigallagher, port-au-prince, haiti. >> much more to come. we look at a mother in aleppo struggling to put food on the table to feed her family.

and the oil boom in the united states. when you're on hold, your business is on hold. that's why comcast business doesn't leave you there. when you call, a small business expert will answer you in about 30 seconds. no annoying hold music. just a real person, real fast. whenever you need them. so your business can get back to business. sounds like my ride's ready. don't get stuck on hold. reach an expert fast. comcast business. built for business.

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platt. >> now a reminder of the top stories on al jazeera. fifa's ethics committee found sepp blatter and fellow official michel platini guilty of crimes against fifa. six u.s. soldiers have been killed in a taliban suicide

bombing in bagram air base. spain's prime minister mariano rajoy says he will try to develop a government. as many as 12 million people need immediate help in syria. paul tradergian introduces us to a victim. >> her name is um ahmed. she looks for things to burn when there are no jets dropping bombs. she gathers tuition twigs, leav. >> and even garbage, anything to burn so i can make a fire to heat water to clean my children.

even wood we can't find, heating oil is too expensive everything is to expensive. >> um's husband abandoned her and her kids. every day she worries about how to put food on the table. these are desperate times for millions of syrians like um ahmed. in another neighborhood devastated by bombs dropped by government forces another bonfire. this one keeps these neighborhood kids warm. >> we were at home but it was freezing there. we came up to warm up with the fire behind us. on the way we found nylon bags, paper, just to keep the fire burning. at home we have no blankets or anything to warm us up so we come here until the fire goes out. >> aleppo is one of the longest continuously inhabited cities in the world. this fire hasn't gone out for

5,000 years. the five-year-old civil war has turned brother against brother. it has permanently changed many lives like this man's life. an air strike has just steroid the home he lived in for the last 40 years. >> i came back home four days ago, and found it destroyed by strikes. i picked myself up and i'm just roaming. >> more than 2 million lived in aleppo, many homeless, loss. >> it's the regular people who are helping me to survive. every once that while i get some aid and scream, realizing my situation is so dire. >> drones flying over what was once a famous tourist destination shows the destruction. cultural and financial capital of syria threatens its future

and its past. those who have been able to leave, have left. those who have had to stay behind don't know how they will survive. paul tradergian, al jazeera. >> the united nations security council has received a broafg og on the humanitarian situation in syria. >> over the past month violence does continue to escalate and intensify across syria. indiscriminate attacks by all peashth to the conflict resulted in loss of life, destruction of infrastructure and the denial of access to basic services for thousands of people. >> for more on this let's speak to al jazeera's kristin saloomey. what else was in this briefing? >> reporter: the u.n. is very concerned about the contents of

this report. in addition to the syrian air force you have russians, united states, nato and allies dropping bombs. the u.n. secretary of foreign affairs mentioned an attack on idlib on sunday where 43 civilians were killed. now, the united nations doesn't name which country are responsible for a specific attack. they are not in position to confirm who would be responsible. this this case it has been widely reported that russia was behind the bombings but all sides in the conflict have been accused of hitting civilians in their air strikes. and the u.n. very, very concerned about the air strikes. among the 43 civilians that were killed were five aid workers and one ngo shut down, since the

beginning of the month five ngos have shut down have stopped delivering aid to people there. so the situation just gets more and more desperate. >> more violence, ngos shutting down. it's no surprise that people continue to leave syria. so what's the u.n. or what's been said there about the orn going refusintheongoing refugee? >> people displaced within syria in the last month, 121,000 more displaced. some of them, second and third time they were displaced as a result of fighting. we're also learning that as a result of the 1 million refugees to reach europe's shore in the last year half of them are syrians. so the united nations again making a plea for more governments to accept refugees and settle them. antonio gutierrez is the high

commissioner for refugees, used the appearance as an opportunity to plead for more aid to refugees. they are not perpetrators of terror that obviously seems to be response to some of the rhetoric out of the united states and european countries where there's talk about banning syrians and banning muslims from coming to the country. he said that yes, terrorists could try to infiltrate refugees but that's a very small likelihood and that you need the refugees to be on your side and to help in the fight against terrorism in the end. >> kristin saloomey, thank you. india has upheld the release of the youngest convict, serving the maximum sentence of three years for a juvenile.

after widespread proaftd protese bill is expected to clear the upper part of parliament. arrest wart for blaise compaore. fled to neighboring i'veary coast after being forced from power in bufs i burkina faso. sankara's death certificate lists natural causes but several bullets have been found in his body. their dream is to reach the united states but for nearly 5,000 ceu5,000 cubans, their drs come to a stop in guatemala.

alessandro san pieti has the story. >> another makeshift home after the wind pulled down their previous one. >> we have been here a month and a few days. more than 30 days. >> they are part of roughly 5,000 cubans who have made it to nicaragua from e ec ecuador. >> we are running out of money and have to be creative to survive. >> while a few still hold out at the border, most migrants have been put up at schools churches and community centers in nearby

town. costa rica has been helping them with food and clothes but can't serve as help for long. >> our sets of have been strengthsenned to capacity. >> cold war era law, known as the cuban adjustment law allowed cubans to reach the u.s., many have been tempted to trying to dangerous journey over land and there is another reason. more than 30,000 cubans have made the trip in 2015 alone. that's more than double the previous year. they say with improvement to american-cuban relations, america may put an end to its open door policies. this is one of them.

she left hoping to reach the u.s. while the policy is still in place to help her parents back home. >> translator: the message i have to those who are doing this to the people of nicaragua of guatemala, please help us solve this problem. we don't want to hurt anybody. all we're looking for is to be healthy and have a better future. >> reporter: for now that solution is far away, fob now flouncing it will require visas, for cubans, promise new restrictions the future of those already here in the meantime remains in limbo. allesandro san pieti, al jazeera. >> americans are enjoying the cheapest petrol in more than six years but the drop in revenue has drastically slowed down oil drilling. tom ackerman has more. >> reporter: less than two years ago, the oiled oil fields

ever south dakota were problem offing to bproblemprovingto be . >> after this time next month no more construction. >> the number of active drill rigs in north america has declined. oil glut has taken a toll on those that weren't able to cover their capital costs. dozens have filed for bankruptcy protection and in 2016 the can't count could outnumber the drillers who fell. >> the average production this year will still be above 9 million barrels per day.

so the dropoff is not viewed as precipitous. presumably the expectations are that over time we will probably see slows reversal of that dropoff. >> for more than 30 years the u.s. has banned all crude oil exports often the grounds of national security. but president obama signed legislation that would allow u.s. crude to be sold on international markets. not only giving u.s. producers a new outlet, by lifting the ban the u.s. can help offer our friends a chance to diversify their energy supplies and enhance their energy security. and avoid people like vladimir putin, the opportunity to use oil and gas and energy as a weapon. >> yet even while the u.s. is the world's top crude producer it still depends on imports mostly from canada and saudi arabia to satisfy all its needs. so long as those countries keep

their taps wide open, the glut is expected to reap big savings for american motorists and make life even more difficult for its consumers. >> much more on aljazeera.com. >> it is a video that is extremely personal. >> our fears are dancing between us. >> yeah? >> a woman's private pain examined for scientific research. >> it's so healing. >> instead of holding us down. >> she's on one of america's most popular party drugs. forget what you've heard about "molly", "x" or "mdma". >> it makes you feel euphoric, happiness, love.