police van and. this is an indication that although the government has managed over the last few months to expand its control around the capital damascus and seat of the last remaining stronghold for the rebels it on hold on these the parts of the capital damascus but still the rebels had managed to moles attacks in the heart of the capital damascus this is of it no claim of responsibility so far but in the past i said and they had to be a show. responsibility for that took place in the capital damascus and of course syria is a country that is fractured and still at war so what does this particular attack tell us about the status of other areas that are still in conflict. we're talking about fighting that has been different parts of the country and in particular talking about how that went where i had to hit a shot he's launching an attack to break up so some of the territory lost over the

last few months of the some parts of the country this is wasted remained the same which is the international the u.s. led coalition backing the s.d.f. is launching its campaign to effect i said from its last stronghold in. india and also in that this is creating a humanitarian crisis thousands of people are reported to have fled the fighting today particularly in india also dozens of families being the fighting in iraq because of the situations situation remains quite difficult in the lot of parts of the country as you know so having turkish military is paving the ground for a major military operation to try to control the southern. part of a destination agreement that was signed. between turkey and russia.

thanks very much of course we'll come back to you as that situation develops let's move over to europe now and to spain where the prime minister's asked catalan leaders to clearly state if they have declared independence before taking any measures on tuesday catalonia as leader charles ship stepped back from announcing full independence and signed a symbolic declaration instead to allow for negotiations with madrid and of course is inside the parliamentary building of these vanished parliament in madrid we are expecting the prime minister to speak and we will go to that statement and speech when it does happen the speaker of the house of course allowing the three members of parliament to speak individual get the circumstances in catalonia let's join lawrence lee who is just outside that building and of course what president a mariano rajoy wants lawrence's complete and utter clarification about what the catalonian leadership actually declared on tuesday only then can he make

a decision i presume about how he's going to move forward. yes that's right i mean in this in this game. you know barcelona last night said we want independence but we clear independence but also we're going to suspend. mariano rajoy is about to take the podium let's just listen to what he has to say we'll come back to you lawrence thank you. ladies and gentlemen. where the cabinet has formally requested the catalan government to confirm whether or not they have to clear the pendant of catalonia. regardless of whether it's going to come into effect or not this is the previous two articles bonafide fife antics to provide. security to the citizens of a significant issue. based on the response from the catalan leader. will

decide the following steps one which. forwards in time and they don't want to return to normality to restore the constitutional normality. or otherwise he can continue for something and. i sincerely hope that he will choose the right decision we are. very clear from the outset. is kind of experiencing some of the most serious issues it's not at this period between incompetent or. it's not even public order. unfortunately that's not the case today in catalonia spain and. has nothing to do with. the usual political scuffle. i mean

we are actually facing. that go beyond political clout that we may see in the civilized society. principles so to the. court of law and how enormous comes the. respect of the law being defined. these are the foundations of the democratic society the clear ality legality. forty years ago visual culture democracy. and the spanish. have been able to find a space for. that includes different which is an agreement and where we are

infiltrate presented this is in trying to in our constitution and this united nations and territories in a common project that has converted in one of the best countries in the world. and this is what is currently at risk. the spanish prime minister mariano rajoy speaking there in parliament to out what he expects certainly from the council and leadership he said he does want the leadership to clarify the status of. you know to know. that they have declared independence it is a precursor legally for them to then the set into motion article one five five which would bring back powers from catalonia back to madrid let's just join lowers the is also listening in to what the spanish prime minister has said and that is the case really is it not it's it's about procedural. scenarios that the spanish

prime minister has to go through before he can actually take any action at all. well yeah that's right i mean it's exactly the same as what he said earlier which we expected he was going to go off message speaking to the parliament because legally they want to do things exactly by the book and as you say that is to say that if the catalan say yes we are actually declaring independence the precursor to that. is that confirmation and then legally they're allowed to trigger article one five five and take back the autonomous powers and so yes it's true it's a procedural thing but it's also an exercise in bluff calling because he knows. that the catalans are splits there's a section of the independence movement that wanted to. get full independence yesterday and they that they didn't get their way there's a whole other sector the independence movement is much more nervous about it and wants to wait because the population doesn't want any of it at all and so what he's

trying to do is basically to call their bluff. and see how far they're prepared to go now interesting lee even before he made this announcement in parliament after he gave this statement earlier on for the benefit of the world's media the catalans have already been asked over and over again including by us what's to going to be you know what's going to say is he going to go full independence or is it not because it's the precursor to what might happen next at the moment their response is to say we want mediation and they've said this to us we want to cut to lands and to spanish. mediators and this at the moment is our position now on one level that's no good at all for spain because they've said no mediation we don't want a little mediation at all we don't need the european union a little but crucially what it also says is we're not announcing independence and so to that extent roy has already got his way because we call their bluff at the moment the catalans are not going down they find we're going to do it line which you know. potentially exacerbating the divisions inside their own movement and so

many people in madrid think that that has been his advisors have been very clever by basically pushing it straight back to boston and saying you need to tell us not exactly what you intend to do because you know you. can't actually say that because of divisions inside society to begin the moment indeed for them and we'll leave it there and we'll wait to see if we get more reaction either from madrid or from barcelona as well thanks lawrence. the united nations is accusing me of security forces of torture killings and the rape of children as part of what it says were well organized coordinated and systematic attacks against the rangers described attacks carried out by me and while security forces often in conjunction with armed individuals aimed at preventing the ethnic minority group from returning to homes more than half

a million ranger have fled to bangladesh since august. yeah. pocketed joins me now from the international rescue committee joins me from new york good to have you with us mr kitchen let's just begin with how you want to manage to collate the information in your report and how surprised are you at the findings well this is as you said the largest fastest exodus of refugees crossing an international border that the world has seen in twenty five years since rwanda half a million people moving in less than ten days is a big thing that the international community needs to take seriously over the period of the last two weeks we've conducted a detailed assessment going shelter to shelter interviewing families and key stakeholders to understand the violence that people have seen the rangar has seen as they fled from their homes to save their lives and the needs that they now have

now that they're in bangladesh of course the report is compiled on the experiences not the eyewitness testimony that your workers can actually see for themselves or look grow old i mean there are huge challenges ahead i mean first is to look after those that have managed to escape as you say but also the much larger question of what to do with them in the long term. absolutely so we heard terrible stories of violence that women and children had faced as they were awoken in the middle of the night and forced to run from their homes we heard that now that they are in bangladesh more than one third of the population have no access to a toilet which brings on huge public health risks and three quarters of the refugee population are hungry and having to cut down on the number of meals they eat a day so as to make sure that there's an offshoot for their kids to eat it's

a huge task to look after this number of people and while the government of bangladesh have been very welcoming the capacity on the ground of international national n.g.o.s and u.n. agencies isn't currently up to the task of keeping these people alive and safe how important is that your evidence that you believe to collate is you might take it higher up the political ladder to actually see those that are the decision makers around the world actually take some action. is your report good to have that sort of impact can it have any impact we hope so the international rescue committee staff on the ground as you said are experts we've spoken to many hundreds of people to understand the situation and we've put forward our best understanding of the situation the challenges and humanitarian needs that the people face we're going to be talking to governments around the world we're going to be talking to the government of bangladesh and the un asking the government of bangladesh to keep its

borders open so people can continue to make the trip to safety safely we've heard stories of minefields we've heard stories of people drowning as they try to escape by sea the government of bangladesh need to keep their borders open and then register the refugees as they arrive in their country so they can gain access to assistance for the. like so much for joining us from new york. india's top court has ruled that sexual intercourse with underage wives will be deemed as rape it's a landmark decision in a country with the highest rate of child marriages in the world the legal age of consent in india is eighteen but an exception was made for sex between husband and wife who are between the ages of fifteen and eighteen it's a verdict that will affect millions of child brides in the country at least one in four girls in indian villages are married before the age of eighteen can use political future has been plunged into crisis after a court ruling and parliamentary vote brought fresh uncertainty to its presidential

election rerun protests broke out after parliament passed a controversial of a into the electoral laws and his top court ruled that all candidates who ran in the initial poll cannot stand in the new vote on tuesday opposition leader raila odinga withdrew his candidacy for the river citing a lack of electoral reform. is a political analyst he says the political uncertainty in kenya is likely to continue. what we are witnessing in kenya at the moment is a state of political confusion and that in a day because of the positions being taken by the main are the leading political players these are specifically a president who are going out to lead the. party. and. opposition who leads. a coalition of parties and this and that image at the moment

is being orchestrated by the farm position that has been taken by. and is nothing. have been put forward as a third of the demand that must be met on their part with the of. discipline minimums bred to heading into the pressure election. was determined by the supreme court. now the death toll from logan california's wildfires continues to rise so far at least seventeen people have been killed thousands will have fled from their homes but many of it's having to find their houses no longer exist jacob or that one couple as they sifted through the rubble. adam and lydia gediman were the last people to get out of their neighborhood i thought that i could attempt to save save our houses with this house in a down so i attempted for another fifteen twenty minutes just hosing down the whole the whole fence line everything and everything at the touch of the hose and until i

couldn't see anymore. the disaster in northern california claimed at least fifteen lives and more than two thousand buildings and at this point fire officials offer no predictions as to when they might have the fires here contained it wasn't just the speed of the flames or the incredible heat that devastated this community it was also the fact that in the age of the smart phone people here say that they seem to have almost no warning at all adam and lydia say they got lucky their baby woke up at one of the morning and you could hear explosions in the background we don't know what it was but it was the trees never exploding and you didn't receive any kind of warning now you know along there is nothing so i right now at times messy there is nothing now the gammons are tallying the cost i had a baseball card collection point about twenty thousand dollars worth. of my five thousand star wars collection of my five dollars and that's all gone that's right here

a scene repeated throughout the state today as residents return to sift through the ashes jake aboard al-jazeera santa rosa california. an entire neighborhood in northern california has also been destroyed the extent of the damage in santa rosa can be seen in this before and after image on google earth hundreds of firefighters for the blazes in what was one of the most destructive fire emergencies in the state's history most of the homes are businesses that have been turned into rubble or wall street journal has denounced a jail sentence handed to one of its reporters by a turkish court judge's sentence to. iraq to a prison term of two years and one month on terrorist propaganda charges the court ruled that she had shown support for the outboard p.k. k. group in an article in twenty fifteen. finnish turkish is currently in the us and will appeal the conviction al-jazeera is demanding the release of its journalist mahmud hussein who's now been imprisoned in egypt for nearly ten months he's

accused of broadcasting false news to spread chaos which he and al-jazeera strongly deny or thirty's have refused to allow him to be transferred for specialist treatment on a broken arm and injury he's received while detained he was arrested in december while visiting his family. two days of fighting between rival gangs in a prison in mexico killed at least thirteen inmates police say the situation is now being brought under control as some have been to vote has a story. gunfire is rival gangs battled it out inside cut the rate imprisoned in northern mexico. guards were taken hostage and some were seen on the roof being beaten by prisoners. the fight started as one of the gangs who were kept separated began protesting on monday night it was relative calm and tuesday morning but fighting restarted when one of the prisoners were killed reports see his body was burnt. to guarantee officials say lethal force had to be used to control the

situation after several attempts at negotiations failed. there are concerns that the number of dead may rise north and. we can't rule out that the number of deaths might increase eight people have suffered serious injuries in addition to the thirteen who have already passed away there are many more with less serious injuries from the fights those who lost their lives have not been identified yet officials are doing the counting and investigation is underway. outside the prison gates anxious relatives demanded information and struggled to comprehend what was happening. this woman says she only wants confirmation that her relative inside is dead this is the second and rest in the streets in this year following a series of riots in their jails. mexican prisons are notorious for gang activity criminal networks running drugs kidnapping extortion and human smuggling ring their rivalries to prisons many of which are overcrowded reforms in the criminal justice

system before next year's election have been proposed but with deep rooted corruption and political intervention there seems to be no easy or quick fix some of the job they're counting is underway liberia's election results to determine who will take over from president ellen johnson sirleaf the vote is seen as a crucial test of stability in the country marking the first democratic transfer of power in more than seventy years voters had twenty candidates to choose from to replace sirleaf africa's first elected female leader now the impact of the kobe steal scandal is starting to be felt one of japan's largest steel makers has lost more than a third of its stock value after admitting it falsified product data from tokyo florence lu reports on the far reaching implications. made in japan and now these brands share one more thing in common their customers of kobe steel the company has

admitted employees fabricated data about product quality to meet customer specifications the government says it's following the case closely and although this was an agreement between private entities we think that kobe still is misconduct was something that has shaken the foundation of business transactions the ministry is taking the situation very seriously kobe steel says two hundred customers in japan and worldwide including manufacturers of trains and planes have received falsely certified materials customers are checking whether they used substandard products and whether there are safety issues or not and yet more revelations mean the scandal could be wider than initially thought kobe steel at mit's that fabricated data affected not only copper and aluminum products but also ion powder which is mainly used in making automobile components kobe also admits that it's launched an investigation into a subsidiary company which is reported to have shipped material used for making

semiconductors to customers without inspecting them the kobe scandal is the latest to hit corporate japan faulty abbots made by takata problems at the largest safety recall in history of the auto industry in june a japanese company has filed for bankruptcy misandry called one point two million vehicles last week after admitting unqualified stuff carried out factory inspections. the scandals are seen by many as a further blow to japan's reputation for quality manufacturing that reputation has allowed japanese companies to charge higher prices compared to cheaper competitors such as china not all analysts think the scandal is a disaster for japanese brands japan tends to have a lot of over spec right you know they really if you want to have the last three percent of perfection you have to go to a japanese company because they're the only ones doing that while everybody else you know whether it's korea whether it's germany whether it's india you know

operates on a minimum viable standard kobe still said the misconduct involved dozens of employees in as many as four factories and possibly going back ten years the full financial impact is still not known but it could be huge of customers request replacements the company's share price has already taken a beating on the stock market lawrence louis al-jazeera tokyo the south sudan is holding an international oil and power conference to deal with its fuel crisis petrol stations run dry on a daily basis despite the country having billions of barrels of oil in reserves with no functioning power grid fuel from the black market is the only option but at a cost when he really called ford have a good report from the capital juba. this may not seem the best way to prepare for exams but now i think peter says it's the only way her brothers them study she says fuel is too expensive for her family. because there's no power in the house so we

use candles we can't pay for the fuel that is used to run the generator in our neighborhood fuel is expensive and comes from the black market it's cheaper to get candles be used but for a day south sudan has the largest oil reserve in africa according to experts but it has no means of processing its own oil instead it relies on its neighbor sudan to do so but two years of war and low oil prices last here has damaged the economy this has resulted in hard currency crisis making it hard for traders to bring in fuel most suppliers now prefer just of private sectors leaving many stations in the country empty despite the shortage of fuel at michael station you can find info on the sea from recycled water bottles but at a price eight dollars a gallon about four meters that's nearly ten times more than the official price of seventeen cents at petco face. there are government subsidies on imported fuel but because the black market is more profitable subsidies along with other issues are contributing to the country shortage future to just it's because. they're

subsidizing his expression you know the fuel is being subsidize. that is one issue that we are facing. every three months i give them said to me. smiling feel part of the country and there are people who are actually taking the fuel to the black market so that they make more money and this is the work of the police and the national security to address it so that they stopped not it's those who are actually doing illegal activities by trading with your lawmakers have recently proposed lifting the fuel subsidies but some analysts say if the government does this the short term impact will be damaging could have an impact on you know income . because the transport skyrocket although it is still very good it because the view is not available by the subsidy at least keeps it down and

automatically the food items and other essential supplies may also increase in prices now i think knows she can't afford the cost a few but she hopes it doesn't soon extend to do one thing that lights her home at night and force her and her family to live in darkness he will morgan argues there are juba now the world health organization is warning that the number of obese children in developing countries is soaring it says rates are worst in the middle east north africa and parts of asia while levels amongst children in rich countries appear to have peaked research as you stated from the past forty years predicting that by twenty twenty two they'll be more obese children and adolescents than underweight ones you know the seventy five there were one hundred million obese adults around the world but that number jumped to six hundred seventy one million by twenty sixteen by the end of last year there were fifty million obese girls and seventy four million obese boys in the world the study was published to coincide

with world obesity day researchers are calling on countries to introduce taxes on unhealthy food and drinks to tackle the issue majid ezzati from the imperial college in london was the lead researcher on the study. i doubt and especially children are being targeted by by large companies with unhealthy foods advertising price and placed in the stores in a way that it actually encourages them to use it and the tools that governments have it they have used in the past for things like tobacco tax it regulate it and limit advertising especially to children and make sure that those foods become harder and harder to get to. your children there over the whole realm of these roll top stories syrian state television is reporting that there's been a suicide attack in the capital damascus at least one person was killed and six injured have to three suicide bombers stage an attack near the police headquarters

to the attackers were killed on the spot while the other detonated his suicide vest spain's prime minister has asked catalan leaders to clearly state if they've declared independence before taking any further measures on tuesday catalonia is lead. to more stepped back from announcing full independence and signed a symbolic declaration instead to allow for negotiations with madrid. i mean. we've held a cabinet meeting and we've decided the cattle and government in moscow whether or not they have declared independence regardless of whether it's going to take effect or not this is a requirement necessary before any other measures can be taken by the government including invoking article one fifty five kenya's parliament has passed a controversial amendment to its electoral laws bringing fresh uncertainty to a planned a presidential election we run protests broke out in support of opposition leader rollo dingle who withdrew his candidacy on tuesday citing

a lack of electoral reform the united nations is accusing me and more security forces of torture killings and the rape of children as part of what it says were a well organized coordinated and systematic attacks against their hinge or describes attacks carried out by me in moscow the forces often in conjunction with armed a buddhist individuals aimed at preventing the ethnic minority group from returning to their homes india's top court has ruled that sexual intercourse with underage wives will be deemed as rape is a landmark decision in a country with the highest rate of child marriages in the world the legal age of consent in india is eighteen but an exception was made for sex between husband and wife who are between the ages of fifteen and eighteen it's a verdict that will affect millions of child brides in the country those were the headlines the al-jazeera news with the dream of a gator is there in half an hour to stay with us the stream is next.

we understand the differences and the similarities of cultures across the wound. so no matter where you call home i'll just bring in the news and current affairs that matter to. al-jazeera. it's world mental health day and today on the strain we will be talking about of morning mental health crisis among syrian refugees but first what people are discussing online and on the day itself. there's been an outpouring of personal stories and messages of support online under the hash tag w m eighty seven teen one in four adults and one in ten young people will experience a mental health problem kara tweets be kind while matt sends a reminder that mental health problems are not luxuries nor first world problems

and it's a point made clear by the international rescue committee which tweeted this video of displaced iraqi children recovering from trauma by using breathing meditation techniques and though mental health effects everyone some on line pointed out persistent stigma in many cases involving men and in others simply due to a lack of understanding and it's a challenge some are addressing head on one of those people said the con the mayor of london has spoken about his plans to reduce stigma. we've seen over the past few years the difference. training. branch people physical ill health and how we respond to that i'm helping having better. few people sort. those that do they would feel stigmatized receive the help they needed. the stigma just mentioned around mental health is just one of many barriers to treating syrian

refugees many have experienced or witnessed atrocities during the war in syria now in its seventh year that war has created a staggering number of refugees more than five million many are risk of psychological trauma and in need of mental health services to cope with off to brutal memories from home and the difficult journey to escape and start life in a new country turkish authorities have estimated that fifty five percent of the three million syrian refugees there need mental health care while half of those families believe they need psychological support in germany which is taken in almost two hundred seventy thousand syrian refugees one study estimates fifty percent have mental health issues and have been victims of violence resources to address mental health scare us but experts say immediate treatment is needed to avoid long term damage is one way a syrian child expressed the trauma he experienced in war have

a look. so just how difficult is it to receive treatment well here to help us discuss the challenges in helping refugees cope with trauma doctors i had a son who is the founder of madd global and former president of the syrian american medical society. director for them maya foundation and i have met shah happy is a peer counselor with the international psycho social organization it's good to have you here everybody let me show you what a hair has as he's fit a profile picture it's a picture you've just looked at that's a hair tell us the story behind it you have an amazing picture of tell me what's

here was a picture i put this picture on my twitter feed four years ago when i met this child in aleppo doing one of the missions and he was second grade and when you ask a child to draw something you usually draw pictures of happy children playing rivers and son and this child through helicopters dropping barrel bombs and houses on fire and children who are mutilated and crying and that's to me is very painful so i kept this picture to remind me of the reality in syria because many times we talk about numbers and statistics but we have to focus and we just did that we just did that like half of two hundred seventy thousand and ten gas three million and we did statistics but we didn't draw down into individual personal stories this is one of a set of pictures that i want to tell our audience about you the carrots to jaw life before the war in syria life after the war have a look at the video because look very carefully. at the different stops here talk

us through this while children are smart and they don't lie and what they draw is basically the reflection of reality and they draw pictures of happy life before the war of them playing off sawn off rivers of green trees and then after the war that has changed completely and this is the basically the reflection of the war on themselves on their psyche many many times children cannot express it by wards but they can express this by drawing and art therapy is one way to deal with the psychological trauma and this is one way to make them express what's happening to them so we used our therapy and the syrian american medical society and other n.g.o.s to treat children with psychological trauma among other things so here's someone who's that picture really struck them this is mine saleem a doctor on twitter who wrote pick drawn by a refugee training says this tweet others have been quick to point out the success of the u.s. women's team here wild cup champions the u.s.

soccer handles currently exclusive only for the men's team but why i don't understand the ridiculous if you ask me so as you can see the world cup clearly a game of highs and lows just wait for the tournament itself in russia next year but let's finish on a high because these are pictures from panama city where the fans were celebrating off to reaching the wild cup finals for the very first time panama's president declared wednesday and national holiday here's how the locals on t.v. celebrate that moment. was was was. was. was. don't forget you can share your thoughts with us the hashtag is a.j. news great i'm on twitter and i am tatyana but a hundred back to three. to tanya thank you well before we go we thought we'd check in on the grueling three thousand kilometer solar car race that's happening right

now in the australian outback so forty two cars are competing there crossing the continent from north to south starting in darwin and finishing in adelaide and they reach speeds of up to one hundred kilometers an hour at the moment the dutch team is in the lead followed by the u.s. with another dutch team and third place in that race started on sunday and is expected to take about a week for most cars. on that note that'll do it for this newsgroup remember to keep in touch with us on social media all the ways to do so are right there just a reminder to always use the hashtag a.j. news grid for the city bar and the team in london take over now with more of the day's news we'll see you back here on thursday.

well is it alison whether online we were in hurricane. almost like thirty six hours these are the things that u.k. has to address or if you join us on saturday. but we've got a relationship is a dialogue tweet us with hash tag a.j. stream and one of your pitches might make the next show join the global conversation at this time on al-jazeera.

where ever you. what are you seeing like how i might a suspected terrorist people of all faiths fell victim to a suicide bomber in manchester but if the bomb was indiscriminate was the placing of blame this is nothing to do with us this is about an individual who psycho you know nobody could do this unless they were completely unhinged how much just as muslims responded to challenging questions in the aftermath of a deadly attack people in power manchester united at this time want to just say you know. this is the opportunity to understand a very different way were there before and we don't.

protest break out in kenya after it's part of an office.