i'm just going to cut you in just the but. i need. to feel that some people just get out. full a man has decided to break with tradition and trying to sound competitive you maybe not that we want to present a positive image and change this to your typical expectation of women for them it's about more than just racing yes you can still be a good woman and also a very talented sailor going off around the world showing everybody how strong people are al jazeera world meets the first female same crew in the guns sailing stars at this time on al-jazeera.

as russian and government forces pound the last pockets of territory in syria yeah so what's next for the country after years of war. i'm richelle carey this is al jazeera live from doha also coming up conflicting reports of an earthquake and north korea as china limits fuel exports increasing the pressure on leader kim jong un. heading for a rare fourth term in government and new zealand a strong election result for bill english his national party. you in the auction burns through three d. cameras a turntable i remember not to talk too much about a reporter becomes fair game to see how he's transformed into an avatar.

yes back coalition of kurdish fighters says the city of raka declared capital and syria has been ninety percent retaken remaining eisel fighters are reportedly concentrated in a small area within the city expected to fight to the death syrian army says it's also making good progress in its fight against iceland ours or but as the torah gate b reports the city is fast becoming a potential flashpoint for wider geopolitical tensions. syrian government forces target eisel fighters on the east side of the euphrates river commanders say place too in circling the enemy in. their fate as hell and the. operation step by step toward any. good news for the situation and arizona highlights the complexity of the battlefield in syria as russian backed government forces advance on i so say moving closer to territory

held by u.s. backed kurdish fighters they say they've been able to make rapid progress against eisel and take in large parts of the countryside. province regime forces continue to hit their targets from the and on the ground several civilians have been killed in the area over the last few days and the russian submarine has fired cruise missiles at fighters from the former al nusra front now calling itself jabot fattah. unexpected striking province has destroyed important control points training bases and deposits of the terrorists who took part in the attempt to capture twenty nine russian servicemen to the north of hama province. the syrian government is making gains on the battlefield while at the same time inflicting most suffering on civilian populations in an area that came on the chemical attack earlier this year strikes

destroyed a civil defense headquarters. several military aircraft targeted the civil defense center with the air strikes destroying it completely it's no longer operational all of the centers causing the instruments necessary for search operations have been destroyed. it's yet more misery for people who've already suffered so much victoria gates and b. . the future of the city of raka is also uncertain despite being all but pushed out of itself a clear capital has more on the many political forces at play. it appears that it's only a matter of time before is cleared of all i saw fighters that's according to the united states military as well as the kurdish group the syrian defense for the democratic forces or the wiping their known on the ground who've been leading the fight against ice or backed by the us led international coalitions airstrikes on

that area according to the us ninety percent of the city has been cleared of vital fighters there are only a few remaining pockets which are expected to come in the coming few days however even if and when i saw is cleared out of iraq that doesn't necessarily mean that there will be some sort of peace and stability established there because if it was the kurds who are ruling or in control of the city that is there is a lot of resentment directed towards them from the arab population in the area who've accused them in the past of trying to change them a graphic make up of those areas in order to pave the way for future kurdish autonomous entity if it was bashar assad's troops the government troops who are in control but obviously also there is a lot of opposition to him because this seven year bloody civil war started with a revolution erupting against him and obviously the opposition factions themselves who are opposed to both the kurdish groups and. its forces aren't exactly united

amongst themselves so whilst there will be a lot of celebration amongst the other some sections hailing the victory of iraq on expelling i saw that doesn't necessarily mean that it will usher in and immediately right or a more stable more peaceful situation in that area of syria. china suspects a magnitude three point four earthquake in north korea was triggered by an explosion previous quakes there indicated nuclear tests a nuclear watchdog says the seismic activity took place around fifty kilometers from the site of the previous tests but south korea's assessment so far is that it was a natural occurrence so with more on all of this kathy novak joins us live from seoul so kathy tell us where this happened and what do we know so far. well as you mentioned we're getting conflicting reports of the minute richelle about what the

cause of this earthquake might be we're having reports that it did happen from various agencies here in south korea in china and the united states reporting a magnitude three to three point five quake in the region near where the last nuclear test happened in north korea the concern there of course that if this is a artificial earthquake that is a sign that it could be another nuclear test but what south korea is saying we spoke to the weather agency here in south korea and they use many methods to determine whether or not it is an artificial quake or whether it is indeed a natural quake and one of those measures is to detect acoustic seismic waves and what the weather agency has told al jazeera is that a sound wave is generally is usually generated in the event of an artificial earthquake and in this case south korea says those sound waves were not detected so the presidential office at the moment is saying that south korea is sticking by that assessment that it believes this was

a natural quake but analysis is still ongoing and as you mentioned we're getting different reports out of china of course this all comes after the rhetoric was raised between kim jong un and donald trump and we had the north korean foreign minister warning that one of the measures that north korea might take in response to donald trump's threat to totally destroy north korea might be to detonate a hydrogen bomb over the pacific we're also expecting to hear from that north korean foreign minister at the united nations so this is a tense time here indeed on the korean peninsula we haven't had any reports from north korean state news it is just continuing to report that rare statement from the leader kim. in which he threatened to donald trump will pay dearly for his remarks and we're being told by north korean state media that high level officials from the workers pay. already in from the military have been holding rallies in north korea in support of that statement from kim jong un or shell ok kathy novak

live for us in seoul cafe thank you let's talk more now again about the relationship between these countries what's happening on the korean peninsula and china now china has moved to limit oil exports to north korea and line with the latest round of u.n. sanctions shipments refined petroleum and liquefied natural gas will be affected china will also ban textile imports one of north korea's last main sources of foreign revenue that follows an announcement by president donald trump that beijing has ordered its banks to stop dealing with pyongyang the chinese government has tonight that north korea responded on thursday with more threats saying it could conduct a hydrogen bomb test in the pacific ocean is kathy mentioned there so let's go to adrian brown now live fresh in beijing in a journal get to these sanctions in a moment first are we hearing anything out of china about what this this potential earthquake was. well state controlled

media here in china in particular the evening news on chinese television is calling this a suspected explosion that says far as they're going you know they haven't confirmed whether it was an artificial tremor or indeed a nuclear detonation they're still calling it a suspected explosion they say it happened at about four twenty local time here in china it was detected by seismologists in china of course china's seismologists have been paying really close attention to the testing ground where north korea tested its or said it tested its hydrogen bomb in early september but i'm sure that this news that there has been a suspicious quake let's call it that on the north korean side of the border will certainly rattle the nerves of chinese communities in the area on china's side of the border people there really do worry that one day there could be an accident and

that radiation could spread across the border into china the last detonation in early september rattle buildings rattle windows and people really are very anxious in those areas and in fact i could say that the attitude of chinese people in those areas is starting to harden you know in the past they felt pity and to some degree sympathy for north korean people but now they're feeling much their feelings towards the leadership in north korea are certainly hardening very much and when i was in the dandong area just a few weeks ago people there were actually calling for much talk much tougher sanctions against north korea than the ones that china has now signed up to so let's talk more about there's sanctions on china as i said it's moved to limit or oil exports in north korea can you put that in a sense water perspective for us how big of a move is that. well china

doesn't want to do anything that's going to tighten the economic news surround north korea too tightly for instance is not going to cut off the oil completely that's why it agreed to go along with this latest round of sanctions what essentially happened on saturday richelle is that china announced that it had begun implementing what it had agreed to at the united nations security council so on saturday a statement appeared on the website of china's commerce ministry saying that as of now china was no longer importing textiles from north korea those textiles of course provide a vital source of hard currency for the regime and also as of saturday china was no longer exporting things like liquefied natural gas to china and it was going to cap the amount of oil that it pumps across the border to the north that will now be capped at some two hundred million barrels a year now we don't know actually how much oil china actually gives sells to north

korea because there's no official data on that but one figure i've seen reported a lot is that the amount is around about six hundred million barrels a year so if china is now capping it at two hundred million barrels then that could potentially have you know a dramatic effect on the economy but as i say china wants to ensure that it does nothing that adds to the suffering of north korean people also of course here in china the foreign ministry of friday has been reacting to president donald trump's pronouncement the chinese banks have agreed to shut out north korea he repeated that assertion again on friday china though continues to insist that that's not necessarily the true picture so once more rachele we have you know confusion and contradiction which really have become the hallmarks of sino u.s. relations once more it has adrian brown live in beijing adrian thank you. state

media in iran have released footage of what they say is a successful test launch of a new a list that missed solve the crime shahr was launched just a few hours after it was unveiled at a military parade and tehran follows threats by u.s. president donald trump that washington may withdraw from the two thousand and fifteen nuclear deal of sense china has a senior lecturer and international relations a middle east policy politics at the university of preferred it says that while iran remains committed to the nuclear deal it is telling the u.s. and israel that it stands ready to defend itself this is happening at the time that the pressure from the united states is increasing. iran and been my puppini and what happened just yesterday is a manifestation of a new type of terror and of course you have to remember that from the beginning of the nuclear negotiation iran remains very determined that it is not prepared to

negotiate its defensive mechanism and it is not prepared to negotiate. account of ballistic care program and over the last year we had at least two new regimes of sanctions declared only wrong one in january and one in july which is specifically targeted at their missile program so in brief iran basically is sending two different messages at the same time guess we are still committed to the nuclear deal but at the same time we take our self-defense extremely seriously and as president rouhani said on friday iran doesn't see any permission to defend itself. amnesty international says were henges villages are still being burned in myanmar and that contradicts government statements that military offer ations have ended the group says new satellite images and video shows smoke rising from or henge of villages around four hundred thirty thousand refugees have fled since the

latest outbreak of violence began less than a month ago the details were released as doctors without borders told al jazeera that otherwise healthy adults in camps are on the brink of death because of dehydration still ahead on al-jazeera the number of people killed in mexico's earthquake rises as rescue workers refuse to give up hope of finding survivors. welcome back now look at the weather across asia in northeastern areas we've got this frontal system it just got a little ways on a sunny all way down towards the southwest so it's a given some very heavy rain across parts of japan there's still the chance of some rain coming up across southern areas and maybe even up into tokyo for a time further north looking dry and russia quite sapporo and look at my sort of

twenty two degrees so as we head on through into monday that system should just move away so dry weather across southern japan more rain though coming up across the icy river valley into shanghai the korean peninsula looking fine beijing should be dry and bright with highs of twenty nine into southeastern parts of china and taiwan you see a few showers but the bigger showers across indochina certainly for vietnam we've got wanted to have the showers and those extend into laos and miramar but generally not as many as there have been but notice this circulation just to the west the philippines will eventually push in towards hong kong and towards heinen as well sums have free reign expected here so it is head on through into monday heading into southeastern parts of asia we've got to scattered showers across borneo but we have got some rain pushing into parts of java and bali could be weights here so some showers likely in jakarta with highs here of thirty two.

the world's primary could change producing nation. is at the forefront of the war on drugs with them so we're talking about serious sloganising crime as a country we're reaching a critical point while some have made fortunes many others have suffered at the hands of this multi-billion dollar industry who through this business will go on forever it will not change almost global policies do who are the winners and losers of this illicit trade snow of the andes this time. watching al-jazeera let's recap the top stories at this hour a u.s. backed coalition of kurdish and arab fighters says the city of rock i still self

declared path all of syria has been ninety percent retaken mading i saw fighters reportedly concentrated in a small area within the city expected to fight to the debt china suspects a magnitude three point four earthquake and north korea's kill age or area was triggered by an explosion previous quakes there and decayed at nuclear tests but south korea's initial assessment is that it was a natural occurrence. iranian state media have released footage of what they say is a successful test launch of a new ballistic missile across its launch just a few hours after it was unveiled at a military parade in tehran. and mexico are refusing to give up hope of finding survivors three days after an earthquake killed at least two hundred eighty six people their rescue efforts in the capital mexico city continue the search has been extended and foreign crews are helping to sift through the rubble alan fischer

reports from mexico city the man who do support neutral but each hour is a fresh agony each minute feel so much longer families of the missing can do little but hope and pray they stay close to the office block in the condesa neighborhood of mexico city which collapsed in choose these quick there may be spaces where people survive watching for us was them as those there's a lot of misinformation we are very upset by the authorities to do something and fast because a long time has passed and even if they are alive each day that goes by the chances get slim out. take ologist own hand to help the families that they don't even want to talk it's like at this point they just want to be left alone which is normally the more time passes the less hope they have. mexican rescue workers have toiled through the wreckage for days refusing to give up even when exhaustion makes that the easy option but no american and japanese teams have arrived with fresh

muscles. and better technology what we do we bring in highly skilled and searchers and rescuers we bring in. technical equipment and we bring in a lot of it i mean where it could sort of type one heavy team which means we can breach breaks concrete we have search dogs we have search cameras we have a variety of instruments that allow us to do highly technical skilled searching it's no more than seventy two hours which struck in not to the fore. thank you because stories of rescue become what we tend to become stories of recovery but the people here are looking at the building behind me and the what is going on there. that somehow this time it may be different. for mexico may have ended its official three days of mourning for the victims of the quake many families still have their own personal tragedies to remember and more may find themselves facing that heartbreak in peace to come alan fischer makes a good city and as

a final day of campaigning and germany ahead of general elections on sunday the poll suggests chancellor merkel has a wide lead over other candidates her main rival martin cells of the social democratic party appears to have lost support in the last month analyst on late he really even has an outside chance of pulling off an upset john mccain joins us live now from berlin so what are the candidates doing in the last hours of campaigning. well rachele they are both trying to shore up the vote that they hope to receive tomorrow anger merkel the chancellor was a christian democrat headquarters her party's headquarters here in berlin a short time ago speaking to young activists who are going out there today knocking on doors trying to get votes and she was saying to them well look this election is about your future is about the economy which hopefully will bring benefits to all

germans that they will all be able to share in the prosperity of this country her main rival you were referring to in your introduction martin short's from the social democrats where he is addressing a rally in his home state in the city of aspen where he is pressing his his claims that germany needs more social justice that there is need for a change in society a change in government but as you were saying the opinion polls well they suggest that he has very little chance of being chance of becoming chancellor after tomorrow's election three polls came out yesterday and in all three of them the social democrats were on barely twenty two percent of the vote for a single american christian democrats had perhaps thirty six percent one other factor to point out here the race for third place in this election is a very close fought race and it's important because the party that finishes third usually is the one which the leading party would choose to form a coalition with or right now that party is the far right alternative for germany

party which is polling somewhere around ten ten and a half eleven percent the problem is that no other party will work with them because of their far right agenda so if the polls are accurate and it's a big if then it suggests that engler merkel is likely to win tomorrow's election handsomely but the question will be who might she govern with all right that is a big question dominic a live presser violent i mean i think you. and new zealand prime minister bill english is a national party looks set for a fourth term in government will need help though there's or at live pictures nearly all of those have been counted this personally and for the main opposition leader let the labor party pardon me there's been a strong performance from just into our den who took over as labor leader just weeks before weeks from the election now neither the main parties has a majority so a coalition government is likely and this president has called the open a crisis

a national emergency bowing to ramp up government efforts to combat it as ministration points to recent high profile arrests as proof of action but there is also calls for a pharmaceutical companies to share more of the blame kristen salumi house for its a street drug so deadly law enforcement officers wear special protective suits when confiscating it fentanyl used to increase the potency of heroin is blamed for a twenty two percent increase in deaths by overdose in the last year sixty four thousand americans have lost their lives this recent police raid in new york the biggest ever in the city recovered a staggering sixty four kilograms of the drug. bridget brennan has been new york special narcotics prosecutor for almost twenty years we're not making any headway right now every year it gets worse and we need to do something law enforcement historically is focused almost exclusively on removing the supply of drugs and

that's critically important ultimately you want to decrease the demand president trump has said lax border security and fewer drug prosecutions under the obama administration are at least partly to blame so they looked at this. let it go by and we're not letting it go by with four out of five heroin addicts believed to have started their habit with the prescription the justice department is going after doctors and pharmacies as well as dealers. but state and local officials believe pharmaceutical companies also bear responsibility for the nation's opioid epidemic appoint the trump administration has yet to weigh in on forty one states including new york have joined forces to investigate and some have already filed lawsuits against the companies alleging deceptive marketing. or subpoenas and letters seek to uncover whether or not there was deception involved if manufacturers misled doctors and patients about the efficacy and addictive power of

these drugs who examine their marketing practices both in the medical community and the public ironically the trump administration is partnering with some of the very same companies being sued to come up with alternatives to opioids a new treatment options the only entity that really profited from the pill epidemic where the pharmaceutical companies and it's clear to me that there's is culpability there somewhere brennan would like to see more funding for educational campaigns like this one and more treatment options forty six percent more people have died from overdoses because while prosecutors like her applaud the administration's efforts to tackle the epidemic she believes it will take more than a rest to get the job done kristen salumi al-jazeera new york. there's been a setback in the u.s. for congressional plans to repeal health care laws brought in by former president barack obama senator john mccain declared his opposition on friday to the

republican party's latest proposal he says the bill is being rushed and is demanding more details on what it would cost and also how it would affect insurance premiums. farfel reality is the biggest attraction at this year's tokyo game show a quarter of a million are expected to check out the latest in gaming and computer technology around the pride went along and became part of the experience. it's still all about the goggles but a whole lot more ever bigger hardware to enhance the virtual reality experience making it so real there seems to be very little that's virtual about it they're not but you know. it really felt like you were moving and you felt the wind in your face. but what you do normally don't know but i think people will expect experiences like this well out of the like one. hundred or so real you wonder if it wouldn't be better doing the real thing like cycling apparently not. boring

reality is boring i've got you know yes with more than six hundred exhibitors covering multiple darkened holes the tokyo game show is bigger and better than ever one of the fastest growing areas is e-sports online gaming by teams in professional leagues attracting big online audiences. south korea and other countries in asia and europe have been developing and japan is the only country without a big east port industry but that's changing with the value of the market expected to double by twenty twenty and talk of e-sports becoming an olympic event the japanese government is now promoting its growth much as south korea has done we actually see similar things in japan now where the government is reeling seeing a way to push the sports such as new tech hip thing and then for those wanting the

total immersive experience there's m r all mixed reality to turn you into an avatar putting you in the action thanks to three d. cameras a turntable i remember. not to throw too much this is a rule. you can use. to your favorite it. in the. load. no matter how ridiculous that my blood flow to the mcbride al-jazeera as an avatar of the tokyo game show oh wow the. moment. we need proof that he can really pull off those dance moves that are now going to get a chance visit our website for more of the day's news al-jazeera dot com that is al jazeera dot com we're going to break out the headlines so do keep it here.

says al jazeera and these are the headlines the u.s. backed coalition of kurdish and arab fighters says a city of raka course eisel self declared capital in syria has been ninety percent retaken remaining eisel fighters are reportedly concentrated in a small area within the city expected to fight to the debt. china suspects a magnitude three point four earthquake in north korea's kills you area was triggered by an explosion previous quakes there have indicated nuclear tests but south korea's initial assessment is that it was a natural occurrence iranian state media have released footage of what they say is a successful test launch of a new ballistic missile was launched just a few hours after it was unveiled at a military parade in tehran amnesty international says for a hinge of villages are still being burned in me and mark contradicting the government statements the military operations have ended the group says new satellite images and video shows smoke rising from

a henge of villages around four hundred thirty thousand refugees have fled since the latest outbreak of violence began less than a month ago the dick tells were released as doctors without borders told al jazeera that otherwise how. the adults and camps are on the brink of death because of dehydration and new zealand prime minister bill english national party looks set for a fourth term in government they will need some help or nearly all of the votes counted it's firmly and front four or a front of the main opposition labor party that is but there's been a strong performance from dissent and who took over as labor leader just weeks before the election either the main parties has a majority though so a coalition government that is likely it's the final day of campaigning and germany ahead of general elections on sunday poll suggests. chancellor angela merkel has a wide lead over other candidates her rival and shells of the social democratic party appears to have lost support in the last month analysts don't believe she has

a chance of even pulling any type of upset off the search for survivors continues in mexico city three days after a seven point one magnitude earthquake at least two hundred eighty six people have been killed more than fifty buildings collapsed in mexico city when the quake struck on tuesday workers are sort of clearing away some of those buildings were no lie has been detected those are the headlines news continues on al-jazeera after inside story keep it here. shocking scenes in st louis missouri this week when an apparent. acquittal of a white police officer accused of murdering

a young black man and these kinds of incidents.