last month north korea's kim jong un has invited the south korean president to pyongyang for talks monday in hosted kim sr in seoul on the sidelines of the winter olympics it's the latest sign of warming relations between the two governments after a tense period over the north's nuclear weapons program votes are being counted in sri lanka after its most peaceful elections for decades it's the first vote since electoral laws changed allowing a record number of women to campaign for a seat in local government. thousands of demonstrators are rallied against racism in the italian city of much about a week after six africans were injured in a drive by shooting protesters warned of a revival of neo fascist sentiment during the campaign for next month's national election and he racism rallies also took place in roma land and. the irish republican party should faine has elected a new leader to replace gerry adams who announced he was stepping down in november mary lou mcdonald says she's committed to pushing for a united ireland those are your headlines the news continues here on al-jazeera

after upfront also use a bubble. al jazeera is a very important source of information for many people around the world and all the cameras are gone i'm still here go into areas that nobody else is going to talk to people that nobody else is talking to and bringing that story to the forefront. he's been called one of the most wanted political fugitives of twenty nine team and former georgian president mikheil saakashvili faces possible extradition to his home country from his new country ukraine i'll ask him if he's prepared for life behind bars and later i'll talk to the somali refugee turned u.s. politician about life in trump's america.

really thanks for joining me up front you were twice as president of georgia and governor for nine years and yet you're now a wanted man in georgia you've gone from president to fugitive how does it feel. i mean i've finished my presidential. with quite the. reverend well we you know georgia has been the most. transformation case in this part of the world but then we had the government out there peaceful transition of course there were peaceful transition in this region which from the very beginning said our main one of main goals is to indict second street going no matter what so in the end they said let us look for at least something a plan and they. gave me a sentence for a presidential pardon for pardoning prisoners well that's the only case in more than a world where president had been tried not for corruption not for other abuses but

for right hold on pardon although it was in the pardon it was the cover up that they alleged was associated with the pardon but just for the benefit of our global audience you could face up to eleven years in prison in georgia for multiple charges dating about your presidency there including abuse of power you've already been sentenced to three years behind bars earlier this week an appeals court in ukraine rejected your request for protection against extradition to georgia you're in ukraine right now it does look like you're on your way to prison doesn't it regardless of what how how accurate you think the charges are i have to say nobody in georgia is expecting the georgian government despite their formal and nels meant are very scared that if i ever get extradited to georgia then there will be just wiped out by unhappy populace we are where their present government is extremely unpopular and i am a creator of more than georgia state we have very strong support among the people but also when you say you have a well you say you have a lot of support amongst the georgian people will come but not

a moment before we do just to be clear is it correct to say that as of now as of today this week you are currently a stateless person because you gave up your georgian citizenship in twenty fifteen to pursue a career in politics in ukraine and then last july you were stripped of ukrainian citizenship for allegedly providing false information on your registration form so you will know the ukrainian or georgian right now. this person but. in the. courts and so i'm going to get right to that of course present legal system there is a slim possibility i can do that because the president certainly can control the courts and or humans are very very important but you have to wonder if you've had this big crowd you mention the president you had this big round with president poroshenko of ukraine who is a former friend and ally of yours but just on this issue of you being in ukraine you're sitting in front of a ukrainian flag what made you a former president of one country georgia moved to another country ukraine and try

and become prime minister of that country many would say that's pretty unpatriotic of a former president of georgia to do first of all there are historic press on the there was such great historic figure was president the leader of five american countries but on the other hand if ukraine fails if ukraine breaks up if russia ukraine the georgists which is ten times smaller will just might disappear from the map that's one big motivation i have second i already had spent thirteen years of my adult life in ukraine and there been not only participant of two ukraine and i don't ukraine revolutions or uprisings i was one of their organizers or group first my done so i've been heavily invested emotionally in ukraine and i have strong feelings for this country and also. people when you say you have you say you have strong links with the country but ukrainians don't seem to support your poll last december by the international republican institute showed that seventy five percent of ukrainians three out of four people in that country how do they somewhat whole

very unfavorable view of you want to just move on and let more viable popular candidates run for office in ukraine you know popular look look look i mean first of all presence of ukraine according to sample is even more unpopular second if you look at the poll numbers every politician is doing rather bad. that's the that's the political crisis in this country that basically the entire political class is hate your policy was appalling. one percent at the end of last year ukrainian party the movement of new forces the one place here at present that has really gone up. between one and seven and eight percent depending on the course their current president's party is not much better either the problem is that our political spectrum needs to reshuffle and needs to be changed and that's exactly what we are to stand up for the idea of modernized democratic european crain with open economy of oligarchs free of corruption because corruption is killing the economy and if you're a condom is being you know if. it will just disappear. entire region will become

and you said earlier in the interview that you said earlier in the interview that the criminal charges against you in georgia oral politically motivated they're made up and you also face criminal charges in ukraine where you are right now in fact you were supposed to come to a studio to do this interview but i believe you were so worried about being arrested we've had to do this via skype is it a problem for you that wherever you go for the georgia ukraine you're being accused of crimes the ukrainians don't want to arrest me to just try me i told them if you want to try me try me because there is no evidence of any crime so commit you know they don't want to try me they want to expel me from the country they want to get rid of me and that's entirely different game and there is no way they want to get through it will mean is that because they don't have a real case against me because i really. crossed the all the guards that want for plunder to come to the country as a profession of the wealthiest country in europe because of resources and the right notes poorest country in europe to do what g.d.p. was because someone oligarchs whole hostages the entire wealth of the country and

their whole so there i am there and they regard me as their main enemy so you say you are the enemy of the all agog and yet you quit as governor of the corruption ridden odessa region in southern ukraine after just eighteen months and twenty sixteen without really making any dent in reducing that corruption or going after the oligarchy and in fact back in georgia one of the main charges against you relates to massive embezzlement of public funds by you. or wait a minute let's go to george in charge not public funds but presidential office expresses the fact that they can fight any personal benefit from me no personal accounts no personal wealth which is extremely rare in this region where everybody still like everybody else and we were the only case where absolute president had zero i can with the same amount of wealth or whatever essence of left with the same ones i've never been reach and i'm not rich no i mean a core and then i would be for presidency so if you all so innocent why not go back to georgia and make the case to your making to me in

a court in your own for the country which you ran for nine years. it was european court of human rights york they used preliminary detention for the purpose of and former mikhail saakashvili do you know how old it is to hear you quoting the e.c. h.r. against your own country's court system when you were president for nine years they criticize you and the court system you locked up hundreds of people and you did have a problem with the georgian court system then. you looked up your own defense minister on charges of money laundering extortion and abuse of power and the court never supported this case and supported the government first or second yes i'm proud that we locked up corrupt officials of my own government when i became president the country was absolutely corrupt and it was a failed state when i finished my presidency stayed but it went up eleven times economy went up four times georgia became the best place to do business in the world georgia is number eight sixteen in terms of economic freedom index when you with respect that's nothing to do with what i asked about the judicial system and

it's all about transparency it's all about government it's all about the legal system in fact our judiciary is not ideal and right now being controlled controlled control what's the biggest private goal of shareholder oppression gus brooks with a clear goal to jail me so the fact is that he had clear goal to put me in pretty limited attention of course many years we document trying me because this whole trial and i understand your argument all i'm asking is do you understand anyone watching this interview might find it odd that when you're accused of corruption by a georgian court you say it's all biased but when you accuse others of corruption you look them up and you were criticized by human rights groups earlier the united states department said the charges were biased you know your opinion it's the same consulate they also criticize your arrests of people you were criticised by the e.c. h r n twenty eleven when you were president you were criticized by human rights watch you were criticized by canadian various groups. so what if we put him into a hypocrite also want. to know. this is what many would say looking at the double

standard. should select their words more carefully because world bank wrote the loan wrote the book went so that the only case of successful transformational will work in the ga was world number one performer reformist country ok under the i'm not i've been questioned you told me a lot of people we looked up criminals georgia that was one of the most criminal in the world you say you long to work out you said you locked up criminals you say you locked up the criminals right and i see gee the international crisis group said they were worried about your increasingly authoritarian behavior human rights watch said your government forces use violent excessive force to disperse peaceful demonstrations in the capital the international committee to protect journalists pointed out you shut down two television channels these are not all criminals because i could deliver or not and there was one really went because they were going to influence money and their. security forces were not ideal and we couldn't

have turned georgia into a liberal democracy non-existing country was trying to do the best for example in eurasia no country no country great national so well in one year's time and this is a well known fact that's why i was and why did you create that's why we feel strong support among the best young people among young reporters among well educated ukraine as well as georgia that's how if you were you mention that i'm a putin you're best known in the west in the wider world for being president of georgia in two thousand and eight when you were then country went to war with russia and in just five days nearly a thousand people died more than one hundred thousand people were displaced and exhaustive one thousand page report commissioned by the european union published in two thousand and nine alternately blamed georgia they blamed you not russia will putin for having started that war many would say therefore you have blood on your hands. it's told to look they never bloom doesn't especially not in iraq what they said is that russian troops were first to enter georgian territory and indeed our military response to other countries troops entering my territory or territory was

regarded as part of the war with respect to the law they didn't say that it looked like i've got the report quotes here they said it was georgia this is the diplomat who led the investigation it was georgia which triggered off the war when attacked in south ossetia with heavy artillery it could not be verified that russia was on the verge of a major attack as you claimed that's what the report said. before read it very carefully they said russian troops where we come from there or of the georgian territory and then what you're caught as well but went psycho as well the quote says it was georgia which triggered off the war that's you you triggered a war that killed almost a thousand people in order to enter it when they enter your response i would see that any president who doesn't respond to a foreign army is a traitor and a president who doesn't use military force when you are being get there the report says you overplayed your hand and you acted in the heat of the moment with heavy

artillery or blood stake small condor time small country was invaded by a hundred times bigger. enemy we were attacked one by two hundred russian planes we were attacked by hundreds of people army and you didn't want us to human. in the i'm not mean i'm quoting that easy i'm quoting an evil commission report which says open hostilities began with a large scale georgian military operation the question is whether it was justifiable and the international law it was not says the report is not my words because i was really just about an independent report commissioned by the e.u. and we have all are well meaning that we want one expert i mean several several as well on that we were responding and sometimes it is also people who like to blame the weekend when you don't want to say well we can behave or as well i'm sorry we will. leave the swiss diplomat who led the investigation was biased against georgia i believe that the facts are very stubborn we were in there we were attacked you cannot be blamed for being attacked we were attacked and this is the fact of life

we protect our summer to they went towards our capital they couldn't get to our capital because united states intervened because our army was here or because six president leaders of european countries came and stood under the russian bombardments we dollar people in this is just to be clear they are their country just a big no we're very just a big let no one on this show or in this interview is defending the russians of putin and the report criticizes russia very heavily you're right about that but it does say that you started the war in defiance of international law you can reject that conclusion but that's what the report says don't shoot the messenger i would say that. forbes and then somebody so we way that initial i'm sort of but i'm international or i mean you are a lawyer ok right now just before we finish right now you have not the ukrainian nor georgian citizenship so what's next for you because i can tell you we're going to be a year from now two years from now i'll be fighting together with people of ukraine and georgia against. europe or liberation of our country from russian then

a missile program hostile armies but as well as from domestic oligarchs and corrupt elements that seize power in our countries and our prospects for our population i think ukraine will become superpower of europe and georgia will be again once again be shining example of success and the reforms worldwide as it was under my brothers because i really thank you for joining me on that front. well. hers is a remarkable journey from a refugee camp in africa to a state legislature in the united states in twenty sixteen or became the country's first elected somali american lawmaker last year time magazine put her on the front cover calling one of the women who are changing the world so does the future of the u.s. look at her or trump she joins we know we'll have a thanks for coming on up front you were elected aged just thirty three to the minnesota house of representatives in november twenty sixth seem. that was of

course the same the donald trump was elected president of the us how did you feel that was a happy note for you a sob a bit of both i think was bittersweet i joked with my campaign staff and campaign supporters that we stayed a little too long at our party. because if we sell out of crying a lot of people were upset but when the reporters asked me how i was feeling i told them that i was actually optimistic and hopeful because i believed that this was going to be the awakening of our nation people were going to be walk a walk in from their complacency and we were actually going to get to work in not only resisting but reshaping and restoring this country's promise and within just a few days of taking office president brought in his infamous travel ban the muslim by. not just a muslim immigrant to the united states you're a former muslim refugee who's from one of the countries on the banned list somalia

so do you think president trump doesn't want people like you in the country because he says it's not personal it's national security. i mean i think you know if if if we were really being honest about what could be masquerade as. national security issue we know that no one from any of these countries is ever posed a threat. within this country and so we know that for for him and his supporters this is just political football and they're using. our communities and people who look like me as as leverage you talk about him and his supporters more than a million people in your state of minnesota voted for trump you only lost i think by a percentage point and a horse do you feel cut off disconnected from a lot of your own constituents who clearly don't see trump's islamophobia immigrant

rhetoric as disqualifying i mean i think what we are seeing in minnesota is people actually coming to terms with the kind of rhetoric that they thought was just that rhetoric. now actually becoming policy i don't think a lot of minutes so and sent a lot of the people in this country actually thought that he would implement the food it because there was that economic anxiety they believed this guy was going to be part of negotiating this country into better election analysis which we all knew was. not cultural racial anxiety yet i don't feel the love of a try i don't think a lot of people understood that the what the ones the people that he was talking about the policies that he was talking about on the campaign trail were going to have an effect on on the members of their community the people that they have grown

to appreciate to be part of their communities when you hear reports of your president referring to countries in africa including your own country of birth somalia. whole countries do you think that makes him a racist is donald trump a racist in your view. i mean i think there isn't a debate about whether. trump is a racist i think he he he fits into every every ism. what is important is for people to actually understand the implication. of those kind of descriptions that he attaches to countries. in africa in hedy in el salvador when we are having a conversation about what will ultimately make our country safe it is about showing strong and principled leadership it's about. being the country

that has been known it to foster or been an inclusive society you so there's no debate about whether terms or race is a lot of people would agree with you all now and in fact there's been an explosion in the number of muslim far right white nationalist groups in the u.s. over the past couple of years your own state of minnesota experience a record number of muslim incidents in twenty sixteen you yourself i believe just a few weeks after election victory i think got a cab driver called you filthy and threatened to remove you his job how much do you hold trump on the rise of trump responsible for this explosion of u.s. islamophobia. oh i would actually come very short of holding them exclusively responsible for for their rights i think when you demonize. and they humanize it is easy for people to to to to commit acts of violence

against those those individuals because they no longer see them as as a person as someone who who has feelings was worthy of respect and i think that is where we are moving away from the idea that we are supposed to be a welcoming nation a lot of conservatives in particular would say that the rise in islamophobia is a result of hate but of fear a legitimate fear of quote unquote jihad is terrorism whether it's for sunburn a do you know with a recent truck attack in new york what do you say to them. i would say our country should be more fearful. of white man across our country because they are actually causing most of the deaths within this country and so if fear was the driving force of policies to keep america safe americans safe inside of this country we should be profiling monitoring.

and creating policies to fight the radicalization of wait men but most of the funding of attention even on the obama or he went towards muslim communities one of those communities in minnesota the somali american community in minnesota where i think over the past few years more than twenty young somali americans have left to go and fight for. one of these quote unquote jihad is groups abroad that's a real threat obviously no one's pretending it's not a threat so what do you do about it but i mean i think like i said the focus of our. policies should should be about keeping americans safe keeping us domestically safe and and where we actually find a solution it's looking at our foreign policy looking at how we are engaging

with. the members of these communities and the kind of rhetoric like that is being spewed out of leaders within our city halls within our state capitals and within our nation's capitol some would say that's true there are some really bad rhetoric coming from politicians security leaders but also a lot about rhetoric coming from muslim community leaders. or is that for. i think . both of those statements could be true and i hate and i think you know it just goes to show what happens when you have a segment within communities that are using fear and hate to more belies their base. it is important for us to actually have a conversation about what kind of communities we are trying to build and what this

nation actually stands for in an interview last year you said your campaign for state office was about more than new it was about shifting quote the narrative about what is possible for those outside of the u.s. we have a global audience watching who look at the current u.s. president maybe think he defines to us his anti immigrant minority. sentiment do you see you all story as a kind of counter-narrative to that or you personally the un to trump what i represent is is is an america that still allows people to fulfill that american dream that you can come here at the age of twelve only knowing two phrases in english. have the opportunity to put yourself through school and all timid lead to feed the forty four year income pent to win. a seat at the table now only representing people that

look like you but a district that has a seventy percent white population. what i wanted people to know throughout my election was that this dream isn't closed off to people that the idea that a person of color or women could only win and run in districts that looked like them. was was was something that we needed to move away from a lot of our thanks for joining me on outfront thank you that's our show outfront will be back next week. it's like the wild west they can do anything and the really hard for them to get

the powerful internet is both a tool for democracy and a threat somebody who controls ten thousand people at home following a hundred thousand voices and they distort the debate in the echo chamber world of fake news in cyberspace the rules of the game have changed there are no precedents people and out investigates disinclination and democracy part two at this time on al-jazeera. discover a willful would winning programming from the world. challenge your perceptions if you were to design a propaganda system you could not build a better plan than facebook. documenters debates and discussions this country that was once the wealthiest in the region what went wrong how did we get to this point. news has never been more available it's a constant barrage that they put out every day but the message is

a simplistic you have been trained good logical rational person crazy months and misinformation is rife dismissal and does not well documented accusations and evidence is part of genocide the listening post provides a critical counterpoint challenging mainstream media narratives at this time on al-jazeera. this rolls in iraq and its syrian post responsible for today's aggression. and israeli fighter jets used after a raid targeting iranian assets in syria.