in such a putin's russia at this time on al-jazeera. they thought they were americans until they broke the law are now they're deported to cambodia for life. when the family is fighting for their loved ones at this time on al jazeera. it's not just phones contributing to samsung bumper profits if we look at the u.s. economy the moment it does seem to be in pretty good shape up until around two thousand and five greek debt levels were basically stable we bring you the stories that are shaping the economic world we live in counting the cost at this time. after a landslide yes vote and i session referendum the government in iraq kurdish region refuses to hand the airports to baghdad.

alone down jordan says al-jazeera live from doha also coming up catalunya says it will defy spain's government with a referendum vote on sunday. president plans to cut the number of refugees entering the u.s. to the lowest level in nearly four decades plus. where there is increasing concern about the survival of un contacted tribes living in this remote part of the amazon rain forest. hours after winning a landslide in the session referendum the government of iraq scottish region has rejected baghdad's demand to hand over control of the airports ninety two percent of said yes the result has been announced despite a last minute appeal to council by the iraqi prime minister reports some at

a bill. celebrations on the streets of the bill up to ninety two percent of voters said yes to secession from the kurdish region of northern. the referendum is very important it will for my future and i hope at least that baghdad will eventually to be independent. of the federal government in baghdad is called a referendum on constitutional and he's refusing to even recognize the result that alone start negotiations with the kurdish regional government ok allergy of the future independence for iraq. events of the last few days here can only be described as some of the most momentous in this region's history but the political ramifications are massive the threats continue from the baghdad governments and neighboring countries and there's a sense here of great uncertainty as to what could happen next. the federal

government has threatened to close the region's international airspace it could heal thor it is don't hand over control of the two main airports by friday deadline turkey is threatening to cut off the kayleigh g.'s oil pipeline and close the land border turkey is the biggest supplier of goods and food to the k r j we can. feed ourselves. we don't have that much power. and threats that a body is making are the same as the saddam regime but the kurds don't have a life if they stay with baghdad. they may be determination among the people who have wanted a country of their own for generations but the celebrations here may not last long . but al-jazeera has built catalonia says it will go ahead with an independence referendum on sunday despite spain declaring it illegal the government in madrid as promised to stop people from voting call penholder reports from barcelona. last

thing at night activists stay up late campaigning for catalonia to break away. the first thing in the morning there are get up early morning for spain to stay. in. the spanish government has declared. illegal but catalan interior minister forn explained why. we're pressing ahead. with the unique i mean the. government is not just trying to stop a referendum. deciding his political future things have gone beyond the simple call for self-determination and what we're also debating here is the defense of democracy and of the most fundamental freedoms. dritte is stepping up efforts to

stop the referendum many schools are going to be closed like potential crime scenes to stop them being used as voting centers and. into the area. madrid has also said it will take command of the capital police force that is the source this. cathal an authority is a resisting that order. from the most us of the security force of catalonia the responsible for law and order their role should be to permit people to vote in peace we don't want a confrontation but we will defend our rights and responsibilities as. the referendum is planned for this sunday. see. thing would have been like in the scottish referendum both sides to debate the alternatives that's been impossible in spain. on the streets of barcelona.

loud and not in the mood measures they would like to see spain remain united and for the catalan government to be completely shut down. the. pen or al-jazeera overspending. senior officials in the trump administration have briefed congress on the president's plans to cut refugee numbers donald trump wants to cap the numbers next year at an all time low of forty five thousand a white house correspondent kimberly hellcat reports. donald trump first announced he would seek to permanently reduce the number of refugees entering the united states as he addressed the united nations we offer financial assistance to hosting countries that will seek to host refugees as close to their home countries as possible this is the safe responsible and humanitarian

approach now trump secretary of state is meeting with lawmakers to formalize the goal of capping the number of refugees entering the u.s. to around forty five thousand this is an historic reduction in two thousand and seven more than forty eight thousand word mid under president bush under barack obama almost seventy thousand refugees settled in the united states but this year under donald trump the refugee cap is set to fall to around fifty four thousand and by twenty eight thousand the president hopes to reduce that number even further its fury aiding activists the trumpet ministration says the lower cap on refugees is for national security and safety it's just based on fear and on facts and because of that we're turning away people that could die if we don't let them in and the white house claims that even with the lower number of refugees being admitted to

the united states it says it still takes in more refugees than any other nation kimberly hellcat al-jazeera washington the us government has sent navy ships to puerto rico to help with the growing humanitarian crisis caused by hurricane maria more than a week on the u.s. territory is still without power food and water supplies are running low trees about reports in san juan. even then cool is still trying to recover her belongings from the damages caused by hurricane madea she lives in san juan puerto rico's capital because having only see her i didn't want to leave my house when the hurricane came i stayed inside with my two sons and tried to protect the little we have just like in the rest of the capital in this neighborhood there is still no water or electricity and this is one of frank ones poorest neighborhoods as you can see many of the houses here have been completed this troika mostly because they

were built with metal and wood those who are living here had to seek refuge in a shelter and that's where they remain in days after the category four hurricane hit this u.s. territory in the caribbean the united states government says aid is on the way to address the growing humanitarian crisis in some parts of the island the federal emergency management agency has said badly damaged airports and seaports are making it difficult to get aid in personnel so puerto rico has tremendous problems with floods and with damage and collapse we're still looking for people who are still looking for people but i'm going to be going there are tuesday may also stop at the virgin islands the governor there is done a terrific job on the streets of san juan people are lining up for hours to get fuel and cell phone towers have not been fully restored. people like my p.s.a.

aid is going to slow. down when i when i you know i still haven't received any help do you see much going on around the city it's like nobody kid is many here feel the same way as they struggle to get by every day. i just see it at some point puerto rico. israel is hosting a lavish ceremony marking fifty years of jewish settlements in the occupied west bank and golan heights the prime minister benjamin netanyahu has vowed that the settlements will never be reversed they are illegal under international law that that's disputed by israel are a force that reports. it was branded a state a vent produced as a t.v. special a celebration of fifty years since israel in his government's language liberated the west bank in the golan heights territories it is occupied ever since and the celebration of settlement construction in that land staged inside the illegal

settlement block of goo shits young it's a project that israel's prime minister for the second time in a month vowed would never be reversed last year your. i'm saying this very clearly we will never operate settlements in the land of israel it's not only a matter of connection to the homeland it's not the way to make peace. for the palestinians it's a vital part of any future deal and a fading hope for farmers like even him. he turns his crops in the fields around. but his family's land has steadily shrunk he says he lost more than a this year alone and struggles to access land now behind settlement walls that have no known for what are the best of the muscle and when we are prevented from entering our lands it affects the harvest i prepared to lend it cost me around ten thousand dollars but they did not allow me to plant the saplings. ibrahim's town of our hunter is part of a wider picture nearly six hundred thousand israeli settlers live in the occupied

west bank including east jerusalem in a meeting with a representative council earlier on wednesday the prime minister reportedly promised another three thousand three hundred new units would be approved next month which would make more than seven thousand this year the residents of all how to talk not just of having lost their land but of continuing to lose it the israeli prime minister recently promised that not a single israeli settlement will ever be uprooted any time in the future the reality is they continue to expand. this and that's what makes this is danceable historical commemoration a charged and divisive one israel supreme court declined to send a representative to what its president called a political event israel's pro settler right remains at the center of power its prime minister doubling down on his commitment to the settlement project sorry force at al-jazeera in the occupied west bank town for a short break here in al-jazeera when we come back. on the page it wasn't from the

south. like strike. for the president jacob zuma down. south korea shows off its military muscle as it celebrates another armed forces day more on that stay with us. from. flowing i mean when it's to an enchanting desert breeze you're. we've got more wet weather just around the black sea which was the caspian sea the line of cloud here just getting pulled out says to keep pushing across georgia armenia into azerbaijan elsewhere across the love ants across well in part of the middle east generally stays dry northern parts of iraq could see one of two showers that area of cloud as you can see making its way up towards you might even see a little bit when she weather over the higher ground here but elsewhere it's

generally got to be settled with will warm sunshine kuwait about thirty celsius and that's the sort of temperature we're expecting in doha over the next few days right across a very good potential well so of hazy sunshine a little more cloud just a bit was the southern end of the red sea but nothing much to speak of it a bit of cloud into south africa right over the next dial so certainly a looking a little disturbed just around the southern cape that's a possibility but for most i think we might see a few showers into central areas thursday going on into friday and a little drier advised to put shad was a possibility just about botswana into eastern possible south africa could see some showers there still into ethiopia maybe into uganda into south sudan should stay dry for kenya will see a few showers just around uganda but a possibility of further showers for much of the gulf of guinea. the weather sponsored by race. i just want to make sure all of our audience is on the same when they're on lying to us citizens here and what puts people of. one in the

same joining us now as never. before. is a dialogue. and one of your pitches might make. join the global conversation this time. at the top stories here on al-jazeera was after winning a referendum the government of iraq's kurdish region has rejected. the control of.

the u.s. congress has been briefed on president donald trump's plans to cut refugee numbers from the numbers and twenty eighteen at an all time low of forty five thousand. and the u.s. government has sent a flotilla of ships to puerto rico to help with the growing humanitarian crisis in the area. personnel to help distribute. tens of thousands of people in south africa held street protests against president jacob zuma they say corruption has become endemic under his leadership the marches organized by the country's largest workers' union china pages more now from johannesburg. miners teachers and laborers are among the thousands of workers taking part in a nationwide strike against corruption. and the man they say is to blame for it is president jacob zuma they say he's been compromised by private business leaders have captured control of the state the president has indicated that he was not

willing to go and we know the reason is because he has been the brain of. the president. since ninety members of the. campus then. the demonstrators switched through the city delivering their demands to government the banks and big employers like the mining industry. because it was pressure on the president. and then. lions with the african national congress and the south africa. yesterday. tell us. it's deeply divided. the a.n.c. says its partners are free to protest but it can't be happy at the level of corruption being uncovered by the opposition democratic alliance which won control

of johannesburg at the last election. not far from the dogs protect an almost empty construction site there's supposed to be a new power station here where we. are just one example where almost five million us dollars was paid to to a contractor without doing any job i mean if it were. around here you can see that nothing has been done keenan lost his job at the site and now his community south has frequent power cuts because the upgrades have stopped. something. keenan is the victim of corruption that cost south africa about two billion dollars a year but it's far from certain that it will cost the president his job no matter how loud the call is from one of the n.c.s. oldest partners for him to go tony a page out of their johanna's. the u.n.

has met to discuss the humanitarian crisis in syria so there's that russian led airstrikes have destroyed hospitals and killed dozens of civilians but. provinces have come under heavy bombardment this week but russia says it only struck i sold fighters our diplomatic editor james bays has more. after more than six years of bloodshed the un security council has heard about so many atrocities in syria the latest attacks bombardment of civilians including the targeting of hospitals acts of escalation by the syrian government and its russian allies in what's supposed to be a deescalation zone british and french diplomats have described it as an acceptable and the palling yet the words of the un's own special envoy were markedly less harsh for the first time the things april some airs today some allegedly hitting three millions and theory than infrastructure including health facilities human

rights groups say there's nothing allegedly about it i think there should always be talk about what happens after the conflict ends but it's not ending right now what we saw last week as i said was direct hits on hospitals as the start of intense have been apartments and civilian areas so what that tells us is that this looks like a strategy to punish the civilian population and take out the hospitals first so that health care is impossible the u.n. is trying to reconvene talks in geneva the man who many believe torpedoed previous rounds of negotiation by refusing to discuss political transition was in the council chamber syrian ambassador bashar al jeffrey is his country's chief negotiator mr de mistura put pressure on him but his toughest words were reserved for the opposition no one is asking the opposition to thunderous dubbing of people but we are urging their belligerent to realize that it is most credible and

effective when he stands together and show the radian is to negotiate which with give and take the high negotiations committee position is that they are the only legitimate representative of the opposition and it's definitely true that some of the other groups that call themselves opposition. i have in the past had close contacts with the assad regime in a famous quotation winston churchill once said history is written by the victors and it may just be that's what's now happening in syria the russian military help the syrian regime turn things around militarily and it seems there are some who now want to give them the opera hand in the diplomacy to end the war james. the united nations a lebanese military court is due to deliver its verdict in the trial of a controversial sunni cleric linked to a shootout with government troops in twenty thirteen fighting between supporters of . lebanese soldiers led to dozens of deaths he's been held in solitary confinement

for the past two years and just reports from beirut. it was one of the earliest bloodiest spillovers into lebanon from the civil war in syria named after the town in southern lebanon where it happened the battle of signed on between the lebanese army and supporters of a seer lasted for two days described by the government as a sunni militant cleric a list here led the confrontations in which forty fighters loyal to him eighteen soldiers and two civilians were killed alessio was relatively unknown before the syrian war started six years ago he rose to prominence quickly before his fiery speeches on t.v. criticizing hezbollah for its support of syrian president bashar al assad and praising the opposition including what was then the group known as joe but on this or a link to al qaeda i think serious connection to the syrian. values

in an extremist. militant groups is kind of is this is a kind of banking it was capitalizing on this on this rise in order to and investing on that in order to create his own own his. supporting your support base in he was successful to a certain extent into about after going into hiding here was arrested two years later at beirut airport while trying to board a flight to cairo then there was little doubt he faced serious charges but his trial in a military court along with thirty others has been repeatedly delayed and human rights groups have questioned how some of the evidence was obtained despite the doubts this year is expected to be sentenced to death for his role in the battle but whether he's hanged is unclear under lebanese law any execution order must be approved by the president but capital punishment hasn't been used here since two

thousand and four and although a year has very little support across lebanon president michel lone likely doesn't have the sort of political backing he needs in order to carry out such a punishment n.p.r.'s al-jazeera beirut south korea is marking it's sixty ninth day with a show of military might some of the strategic weapons are put on display including ballistic missiles tensions have been high on the korean peninsula for months as north korea ramps up tests of missiles and nuclear weapons are going to. be i would you know our military possesses defense capabilities capable of overwhelming north korea based on the strong so career u.s. combined defense posture to government has been tightening military readiness and also making efforts to manage the situation in a stable manner so that escalating tensions would not lead to military confrontations kathy novak has more from salt. this is

a commemoration all of south korean troops it happens every year it marks the day that south koreans broke through the border with north korea in one hundred fifty during the korean war but of course the timing this year is significant and it's an opportunity for the south korean military to send messages to the north it's taking place for the first time in a very important strategic naval base that is responsible for patrolling the western waters where there have been in the past conflicts with north korea along the sea border and it also as you mentioned earlier is an opportunity to display to the public for the first time some strategic missiles that south korea has at its disposal we've seen shows of force using those missiles in a recent days and weeks when north korea for example launched a missile over japan and south korea responded by launching a missile of its own into waters off the country but in that case the distance that it traveled was significant because it displayed to north korea that it could

target the launch site from which north korea launched its missile so this is all as we talk about often messaging shows of force messages to the north that as i mentioned south korea says it has the power to overwhelm north korea it doesn't want to have to use that but it's this message of deterrence that south korea together with the united states has the military might to take on north korea if necessary fourteen people have been killed in a mass shooting at a drug rehabilitation center in northern mexico prosecutors say thirteen people died at the scene and a number in hospital there's no clear motive for the attack yet but drug cartels have been known to use rehab centers to recruit addicts. brazil's investigating the reported massacre of up to ten members of an isolated amazonian tribe it's believed the indigenous people were killed by a gold mine and some later bragged about the attack al-jazeera as a team was the first to be given access to the air as it happened a lot in america editor of the sea and human as part one of our exclusive two part

series from the jafari valley. the jabba the valley indigenous reserves. eight million hedge pairs of brazilian amazon the size of australia it's home to the largest number of non contacted tribes in the world photographed only rarely from the air and it's here that ten indigenous people were reportedly massacred last month by illegal gold miners who roamed these rivers we flew four thousand kilometers from sao paolo to menow sea to travel. and there by boat to. their we met leaders of the reserves indigenous tribes who agreed to take us there . this is the reserve along the giovanni river that borders per contacted in non-contact the tribes have lived here for centuries. on our seven hour journey up the river we learn that the reserve is being increasingly invaded by outsiders

cattle farmers loggers hunters fisherman and miners. the latest reported massacre on this reserve is said to have taken place when members of a non-contact and tribe men women and children were looking for turtle eggs by the river the alleged killers are said to have boasted that they cut up their bodies and threw them in the river making it difficult if not impossible for prosecutors to find the evidence oh we go to meet the chief of the mio luna tribe which was contacted about fifty years ago around fifty five hundred people belong to the reserves six contacted tribes but it within a minute before speaking any further chief tommy insists on putting on his ceremonial paint he says his father used to kill the white invaders but was persuaded by four ny state indigenous authority to move the tribe into the reserve for protection maybe. it is better but not good we

have people dying from diseases we didn't have before i wish we could move back inside the forest where our ancestors lived the outsiders are sure killing people. he shows us how he is prepared to fight the outsiders he believes are again trying to take their land and resources incursions by poachers and man grabbers have soared since brazil's president more than half of the budget of the authority in charge of protecting and policing the reserve. the reported massacre of the. isolated ones as they're called here are just one result says power of my rule we study. the state keep saying that what happened recently is not true but how can they say that they haven't sent anyone to where the massacre happened they just overflew the area in a helicopter weeks later. in my mouse the prosecutor for amazon a state concedes that government is leaving indigenous tribes especially the un

contacted almost defenseless. if you don't place a barrier and effective policing of the area which is not happening now the danger of these tribes becoming extinct is huge. and investigation into the massacre is underway but there's no guarantee there won't be more as the pressure increases from outsiders who believe they too have a right to the land and resources until now reserved for these amazonian tribes the sea and human are just on the job ready reserve brazil finally hugh heffner the founder of playboy magazine has died at the age of ninety one the men's magazine was founded more than sixty years ago hefner quickly rose to fame after its first issue was published in december one thousand nine hundred fifty three which featured a nude man in monroe family member say he passed away at the famous playboy mansion .

top stories here now just hours after winning a referendum the government of iraq. has rejected baghdad's demand to hand of the control of course in the region several airlines say they'll suspend flights to kurdish cities well despite threats from the government in baghdad. reports. good. despite the sense of joy. the great. great. great. joy the joy. of the people who. will tell you great for the future. about. the u.s.

congress has been briefed on president trump's plans to cut refugee numbers wants to keep the numbers in twenty eighteen at an all time low of forty five thousand that's far lower than the one hundred ten thousand limit set by president obama last year. the u.s. government has sent a flotilla of ships to puerto rico to help with the growing humanitarian crisis caused by hurricane maria the ships are bringing thousands of extra military personnel to help distribute aid more than a week after the storm hit the island is still without electricity food and water are also scarce. so africa's largest workers union has organized marches to protest against president zuma it claims corruption has become endemic under his leadership tens of thousands of people took to the streets. catalonia says it'll go ahead with an independence referendum on sunday despite the tearing the vote illegal the government in madrid has promised to stop people from voting. and south korea is marking its sixty nine forces day with

a show of military might some of the strategic weapons were put on display including the ballistic missiles tensions have been high on the korean peninsula for months as north korea ramps up nuclear tests but those are the headlines the news continues on al-jazeera after the street. where. it's one of the richest countries in the world yet ireland has what campaigners are calling a crisis. in the stream live on al-jazeera and you tube in

january we had an overwhelming response we did on this issue take a lot.