celebrations on the streets of liberia with the announcement that football legend will become the country's next president. and i welcome to al-jazeera live from our headquarters in doha. also ahead.

and as an attack in the afghan capital kabul at least. killed at a shia cultural center donald trump accuses china of secretly selling north korea violating un sanctions against pyongyang and thousands marched through leave out to protest the pardon of ex-president alberto fujimori for murder and human rights abuses these are live pictures from over. he was once the world's top football player now george way has become his country's leader after winning liberia's presidential election where defeated vice president joseph in a runoff taking just over sixty one percent of the vote he will succeed ellen johnson sirleaf next month in the country's first democratic transfer of power

since line forty four he strongly campaigned on lowering the poverty rate in liberia more than eighty percent of people live on a dollar twenty five cents a day muhammad the reports now from the capital monrovia. celebration in the streets of the libyan capital. with repeated music. victory in tuesday's runoff election with song and dance you was broke down in t. is a soon as that as old swan asked he's seen he have been consulted by his running mate he will take that who is an ex-wife or former liberian president charles taylor who's currently serving a fifty year sentence in the u.k. for war crimes committed in neighboring sierra leone. told me any supporters it's a dream come true a struggle they say that started we back in two thousand and two us pointed to

succeed if i saw. that during the years that the kids would be to pakistan then a trip the two of them to the left was such a chance we had a president talk here at the electoral commission had just announced the preliminary results it won't as individuals are c.d.c. thank you mr president is sixty one point five percent for his e.d.c. and thirty eight point five percent for the unit body and now he's opponent and current vice president joseph block i says he has had deep misgivings about the elections from the beginning he contested that is also the fuss around on supported a case taken to the supreme court by the county they took him out in the race we've gone into an election that we knew from stopped it had a lot of problems we were not satisfied with where that night they had structures of the supreme court will follow. we were. constrained to go

into it but what we want to see. what we wanted we had all hoped for a free fair transparent election. i doubt seriously. if that is where we're going to get the vice president and his unity party have not say whether they will challenge the results in court judge where is set to succeed ellen johnson sirleaf africa's first elected female president who led liberia for the past told he is she is credited with presiding over the longest period of uninterrupted peace in liberia since one thousand nine hundred eighty nine. where played fostering all football clubs including s.c. milan chelsea and parties and german he's the only african football to have worn the feet for world player of the roadway as victory in the presidential race is attributed mainly to his support base within the country's youth who are calling

for up to sixty percent of the population he grew up in want to be a slums and he success against all odds appeals to many in what is one of the world's poorest countries. where and the politics of the his retirement from football in two thousand and two and is currently a senate a liberia's pilot. will be the first time since one thousand for two full plate be founded by freed u.s. slaves in the mountain center will have transfer of power from one elected president to another. one groovy liberia where near crater is an independent african policy analyst and he says although where joyce plenty of support there are many challenges ahead. on the one hundred you have to say he's coming and it's a big surprise you know a stock in stock who has come you know done his due diligence and be able to winnow by the majority of the voters the support for you is pretty and to the asti

so that is on the positive side and on the other hand the as you have mentioned the problems on liberia faces pretty stock you know you mention the bush this civil war even. you know poverty and then of course there were allegations of corruption so will he be able to tackle them yes i think he has a lot of good will and support in the country but will his son all of them i don't think any one leader no law no matter how long they stay consol the problem so it's a matter of how much progress we will aspecting to make. let's move on to other news now and as a general who led efforts to push robert mugabe out of power has been sworn in as a vice president constantino will share the role of the long serving state security minister todd from the military last week meanwhile former president mugabe has

been granted full diplomatic status and a staff of twenty three on to his pension settlement in line two three year old stepped down last month. but these forty one people have been killed in the afghan capital kabul loft a suicide bomb a storm to share cultural center and a news agency another eighty four people were wounded many of them suffering burns has claimed responsibility as reports. explosions followed by a rush to assist the injured and count the victim. it's become a familiar ritual especially in kabul where the afghan capital has seen its share of bombings this year this time the target was a shiite muslim cultural center and the neighboring afghan voice news agency. we heard a huge bang and smoke rose from inside the hole my face was burning i fell down from my chair and i saw my colleagues on the ground the smoke was everywhere i

don't know what happened next the interior ministry says suicide attackers set off an explosion outside the center then stormed it and set off more explosives in the basement it was midday on thursday and a group had gathered to commemorate the anniversary of the one nine hundred seventy nine soviet invasion of afghanistan. when the explosion went off we skipped from the room where we were working and went to the roof to. inflame is coming from the basement the taliban immediately issued a statement denying involvement. and analyst tells. given that this attack was a. neighborhood this appears to be the work of eisele. he says the armed group has been targeting the shiite community this year as well as media outlets the isis you know what is on in order to make a mark media has not been providing them enough amount of coverage that they have

been seeking juliet activities and so they have been targeting the media outlets as yet in capital kabul as well as in the region in order to make sure they get wisely seized. in may a truck bomb killed more than one hundred fifty people in kabul in what has been described as one of the worst attacks in recent memory afghans are trapped by violence from eisel and the taliban and what critics say is the inability of security forces to protect them. anger has led to protests and calls for resignations in the government analysts say what i saw lacks the numbers it makes up for in tactics. orchestrated by the sophistication of the operation and the amount of exactness impreciseness in the operations that do usually target with little strength or little amount of. it create

a lot of their jobs achieving good strategic objectives the people at the cultural center were looking back and remembering a dark time or black day as it's called in afghanistan when the soviets invaded for the families of the victims thursday's attack has become another black day natasha . down egyptian officer and five soldiers have been killed in an explosion and north sinai the egyptian army says it was carrying out a military patrol in outside the town of when a roadside bomb hit their vehicle gyptian security forces have been fighting and sign off a seventy is a november suspected i said. has carried out a bomb and an attack on a mosque in north sinai that killed more than two hundred and fifty people. but for now a thousands of demonstrators have taken to the streets of lima to protest against the pardon of former leader alberto for him or their live pictures from lima

a decision by embattled president had republican chance he has prompted his culture minister to resign as the silver ports it also attracting international condemnation. peru is being forced to revisit a painful a not so distant past the presidential pardon of alberto fujimori who led latin american nation with an iron fist from one thousand nine hundred ninety to two thousand has sparked outrage in the country and beyond a group of un human rights experts has joined the critics calling it a slap in the face for the victims and witnesses who stier less commitment brought fujimori to justice through an apology from the bed ridden seventy nine year old former president has done little to ease the sense of injustice. the more he killed my son in this very cowardly and cruel way now president powdrill public could chimpsky has finished killing the entire family with this pardon of fujimori. they have called for more protests and inter-marry can court of human rights to examine

the legality of the decision all we can do that of the pardon which has the appearance of a humanitarian pardon to be a pardon of a political nature. president. he has justified the christmas eve pardon on medical grounds but the timing of the decision has caused deep suspicion that's because just a few days earlier fujimori loyalists in parliament prevented a vote on could use skees impeachment and allegations of corruption. the former president has served twelve years of a twenty five year sentence for corruption and human rights violations these included extrajudicial killings in. forced disappearances and kidnappings as he use death squads in a ruthless war against the maoist shining path remade by the group's leader abu male guzman now eighty three has been serving a life sentence on terror charges and in a sign that proves too fresh wounds may have just been reopened his lawyer to me is

now asking for a pardon from the silver are to zero. still ahead on the bulletin want to tell you why scientists are about to send these underwater drones far below the ice and antarctica and it's called a cyclorama the nineteenth century imax as being transformed into a modern work of art. through tranquil radiant can you. imagine on can feel intense and if in the shade gondola. welcome back the weather across much of central and southern china is looking fine at moma the same goes for taiwan taipei there but the brightness and twenty four degree summer temperatures in hong kong for indochina we've got politicians for more central parts of vietnam but across much of laos and miramar weather conditions are looking pretty good as we head on into

saturday not a great deal of change here a bit more rain around parts of southern china otherwise all of drawing finds let's move on down into south asia where we've got some showers affecting the philippines at the moment across more central areas and we have got a circulation out wards a switch going to continue developing as we head through the weekend and by new year's day we could see some pretty heavy rain affecting southern portions again cemented now northern areas could be in for some really heavy rain unfortunately for says showers for java jakarta picking up wanted to and then as we head up through the malay prince the singapore and kuala lumpur could see some showers at times but bangkok for the north should be largely dry. across into the indian subcontinent here it's looking fine plenty of sunshine opposite misty murky at times across northern areas as they head on into saturday it should remain dry and delhi high is here twenty one degrees. there with sponsored boycotts on race.

traitor or drug struck unlikely. for some good news for the true strength of the. documentary but this time. it's good to have you with us on al-jazeera these are our top stories liberia's election commission says former football star george way has won the country's

presidential runoff he defeated vice president joseph and will take over from ellen johnson sirleaf next month an attack on a shia cultural center in the afghan capital has killed at least forty one people and injured more than eighty all those people had gathered at the center to mark russia's invasion of afghanistan and mounting seventy nine the site is also home to the news agency afghan voice iceland has claimed responsibility for the attack and protesters and marching through the capital lima against the pot and granted to former president alberto fujimori had been serving a twenty five year prison sentence for corruption and crimes against humanity. u.s. president dollar trump is accusing china of violating u.n. sanctions against north korea by continuing to sell oil to pyongyang his comments follow south korean media reports that satellites have spotted chinese ships transferring cargo to north korean vessels well trump said on twitter cortright

handed a very disappointed that china is allowing oil to go into north korea they will never be a friendly solution to the north korea problem if this continues to happen. but i was house correspondent committee how could has more from washington d.c. china's denying the accusations that the president made on twitter you have to sometimes decipher why and what has prompted donald trump to go to twitter and often this is when he feels that an issue isn't being covered adequately in his view in the media he will tweet knowing that then in turn we will take a look and see what he's talking about and this is a really good example of that if you go back to the u.s. treasury website last month you'll see that it first called attention to these satellite images that said that it had of chinese ships applying oil to north korean ships in the west seen apparently these satellite images put out by the u.s. treasury department were taken october nineteenth but again it didn't get

a whole lot of media attention even though the united states says that this is in violation of sanctions that were put in place specifically speaking to this by the u.n. security council in september so perhaps it's a little bit of frustration on that level and frustration too by the president that he's tweeting this given the fact that when he first came into office in january he immediately began to address the situation of north korea's nuclear program by investing heavily in the relationship with chinese president xi hosting the mar-a lago speaking enormously about the investment that was being made in the hope that china would use its economic leverage to limit the north korean program but in recent weeks and months we've seen some frustration with that while the treasury department says there has been some success with china helping to isolate north korea from the global financial system again there is some frustration by the united states with examples like this of these satellite images so well china is denying these charges saying that there have been no u.n.

security council violations as far as it's concerned the u.s. sees it differently and now we see the frustration playing out on twitter by the president donald trump. now the u.s. embassy in ankara says it's lifted all restrictions on visa services there ending a two month between the u.s. and turkey it says turkey has met all assurances that the local us embassy staff want to be detained or arrested the us stopped issuing visas in turkey after to start their staff members were detained at the u.s. consulate in istanbul during the state of emergency in ankara turkey has responded by left in the restrictions put in place on u.s. citizens but denies giving any assurances an israeli military court has extended the detention of a balanced indian teenager who was filmed kicking and slapping israeli soldiers earlier this month a sixteen year old army was arrested by israeli troops last week along with her mother and cousin and are being held for an additional five days on thursday

a court looked into several charges that the mimi and her mother are accused of including assaulting soldiers disrupting their work humiliating them and participating in acts against israeli forces our forces reports from the often military court in the occupied west bank. we're inside the often military prison compound inside which are the prefab buildings which make up the military court rooms here and we spent the last few hours inside one of those listening to arguments in a case which has gripped palestinians and israelis for very different reasons it's the case of a head tell me her cousin or and her mother mary man they've been in custody since december the nineteenth after the emergence of a video which showed i had on a cousin challenging two israeli soldiers near their village in the occupied west bank ahead slapping one of those soldiers the palestinians for many palestinians it's an act of defiance against military occupation for many israelis the debate has been about the apparent lack of reaction by these heavily armed soldiers to

such a challenge inside the courtroom the lawyer in the diff on the defense side has been arguing that they should be released i had in particular presenting the danger of being a minor being well known not a flight risk and also arguing that the military prosecution which has been trying to find other things in her past with which to charge her shouldn't be acting in that way but that is that those potential crimes should have been dealt with at the time and that what they're doing now in retrospect is purely in reaction to a video that went viral on the after. video went out in the fire and and it's very sad to tell that and that it is then they decided that in the rest them so the real reason is because these young women and. was able to bring. the other patients to everybody's house and this case isn't just being seen in isolation just on wednesday another young teenager. he was released from custody on nearly three

thousand u.s. dollars bail he was the young man who was pictured blindfolded being surrounded by more than twenty israeli soldiers as he was detained his lawyer is has released his testimony in which he says he was beaten. both during that arrest and in private afterwards he suffered a broken shoulder as a result and so his legal team is now mounting a challenge against the israeli military and it's also being seen in the context of the very large number of detentions of young palestinians both regularly and particularly in the last month since that the the declaration by donald trump about jerusalem being viewed by the u.s. as the capital of israel in the protests that have followed there been one hundred seventy young palestinians miners who've been detained. now the israeli parliament has approved a law in limiting police powers but its critics say it's intended to shield prime minister benjamin netanyahu from being investigated of alleged corruption and even

education stops police recommending to prosecutors whether to indict suspects once the investigations have finished it also aims to stop leaks to the media from investigations an issue which has affected netanyahu his corruption case critics say the law muscles police and other institutions akiva eldar is a senior political columnist at al monitor and he says the attacks essential parts of israel's democracy. the law the new bill will not apply to the prime minister or people who are now under investigation because in israel you cannot pass a law that applies retroactively it will be relevant only to people especially politicians and public figures that will be under investigation in the future but you have to see this in the broader context and the timing first of all it comes after an attempt to pass the so-called french law that does not

allow the police and the attorney general to investigate and to indict a sitting prime minister and this has failed now this new bill is also kind of the last draft is a compromise because they wanted to go all the way that it will apply to the sitting prime minister and the they will not be able they were not able to convince members of the coalition from other parties other than the likud to to support it and the border context is. is in the term the image of demise the police the attorney general the media it's sparred over a complaint against the pillars of the israeli democracy. now saudi arabia has released two sons of the late king abdullah had been arrested as part of

a purge by crown prince mohamad mom who says he's targeting corruption they sell the attorney general approved of a lease off the princes saying they had reached financial settlements with the government they were among around two hundred businessmen the ministers and voyles who are being held in the very outset let's count and hotel. ukrainian troops have been welcomed home after the government and private rebels completed a swap of hundreds of prisoners on wednesday about two hundred thirty people were sent to rebel held areas and returned for seventy four prisoners held by pro russian rebels the deal was mediated by the orthodox church in moscow fighting in ukraine began more than three years ago after pro russia separatists took over parts of the east. room on their marks it will put out all their greatest efforts the maximum into pulling out at the ones relatives or loved ones as soon as possible this is very important. when ukrainian soldiers. being freed and refuse. to go i feel joyful at the fact that we are finally home that i will be

able to hug my relatives and close ones i will hug my little son i really wanted st nicholas to bring him home for the new year. i can't believe it at the same time i can and can't believe that we were still there in the morning and now we're at home i want to say thank you to all relatives and everyone who participated in a release and i want to say that our guys are still there and they have to be rescued. to brazil now with a top prosecutor has launched a legal challenge against pardons made by president michel tema just before christmas the traditional pardons are applied to criminals meeting certain conditions but temper has been criticised for broadening the rules to include those convicted of corruption related crimes the prosecutor general has requested an injunction to stop parts of the presidential decree from going into effect the brazilian city of rio de janeiro has held a memorial to honor the one hundred thirty two police officers killed there this

year it was attended by friends and relatives of the slain officers the place plants with the offices names along a popular prominent and displayed uniforms stained with red paint the city has seen a surge in street violence and as the state government struggles with a financial crisis. this is a way we can to say the following to society the quiet be human rights has no side we cannot be selective this is a white rice the police corp and express our solidarity to the relatives of the victims. now scientists are sending robots under the ice and antarctica on a mission to discover more about the impact of rising sea levels the drawings designed by the university of washington will get the new information about antarctic as a vulnerable western ice shelf the three c. gliders will spend the winter gathering information under the ice before finding their way to open water and here warmer temperatures have already caused major

changes in ice shelves in the region. the hope is that we least get one of these incidents back out from underneath the ice shelf so we get some scientific data ideally we get we get all of them back but i think we're certainly comfortable with losing a couple of these instruments of that's what happens in the hopes that we get some data back so that will be a success because it will be data that's never before been obtained by the scientific community now finally this bulletin a new art exhibition at the hair shop. museum in the u.s. features a mix of civil war history and political commentary artists mark bradford was inspired by a painting called the final battle at gettysburg to create a modern day cyclorama al-jazeera speaks with the curator of the exhibition. a cycler was actually one of the most popular forms of entertainment in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in the united states and europe before cinema would be around and then there would be a dire rama running on the inside and visitors to

a cycle rama would come up through the middle of the cyclorama and they would have this immersive experience marc came to the hirshhorn which was built by gordon bunch after and it's a unique building we are essentially a donut and so the center of the building actually makes it impossible for us to actually be a cycle raman he was looking specifically at a cycle that was made in one thousand nine hundred three by philip toto and it depicts the battle of gettysburg which is considered to be the turning point of the american civil war he got images of filipinos painting from i'm guessing from the internet it's a piece of un stretched canvas one piece about twelve feet high and forty five to fifty feet long and then on that canvas are multiple layers of paper colored papers burned papers papers that he soaked in water to give them this very different material effect and he glued together for mark he has decided to disrupt that idea by the materials that he uses so what he is using is just pieces of colored paper sometimes posters that he finds on the streets so what you have is not only this

juxtaposition of figurative imagery and abstraction but also different layers of history so things that have been embedded in the kind of the base of the painting and then you get put on top and it's kind of this metaphor i think about how history comes back over and over again and i think it's a comment on how some of the issues that we we faced as a nation when the battle of gettysburg kind of relevant today they still haunt us today and what you get a sense of as he went back in and disrupts the imagery is the sense of history and how history is never transparent there's never one version of history and that there are always these filters through which we all view history. time again all of the problem and with the headlines on al-jazeera liberia's election commission says former football star george where has won the country's

presidential runoff he defeated vice president joseph and will take over from ellen johnson sirleaf next month and other news an attack on a shia cultural center in the afghan capital has killed at least forty one people and injured more than eighty others people had gathered at the center to mark russia's invasion of afghanistan in one nine hundred seventy nine the site is also home to the news agency afghan voice eisel has claimed responsibility for the attack. protesters in peru are marching through the capital lima against the pardon granted to former president alberto for humanity had been serving a twenty five year prison sentence for corruption and crimes against humanity. u.s. president all trump is accusing china of violating u.n. sanctions against north korea by continuing to sell oil to pyongyang these satellite images appear to show chinese ships transferring cargo to north korean vessels china has denied the accusations. and egyptian officer and five soldiers

have been killed in an explosion in north sinai the egyptian army says it was carrying out a military patrol outside the town of beit added when a roadside bomb hit their vehicle. the u.s. embassy in ankara says it's lifted all restrictions on visa services ending a two month well between america and turkey it says encore has met all assurances that local u.s. embassy staff want to be detained or arrested. the israeli parliament has approved a no limiting police powers which critics say is intended to shield problem this to benjamin netanyahu from being investigated of a corruption the new legislation stops police recommending to prosecutors whether to indict suspects once the investigations have finished ukrainian troops have been welcomed home after the government and rebels completed a swap of hundreds of prisoners on wednesday about two hundred thirty people were sent to rebel held areas and returned for seventy four presidents held by pro russian rebels. as of the headlines on al-jazeera but do stay with us inside

story is coming up next. race to the red sea china israel u.a.e. the us are just a few of the countries building overread bases in the region now turkey is the latest to that group so why the growing interest in the red sea this is inside story.

welcome to the program.