al-jazeera. and for you. at least fifty civilians including children and friends have been injured and a gas attack in syria. i'm richelle carey this is al jazeera live from doha also coming up florida politicians approved restrictions on rifle sales from response to

a school shooting that killed seventeen people. said arabia's crown prince gets the world treatment on his first official trip to britain but also a poor reception from protesters plus a curfew is alan place in sri lanka after days of violence in its central district . there's a video of what activists say appear to be phosphorous bombs being dropped on a rebel held enclave in syria the pictures emerged after eighty eight people were killed in another aerial assault on eastern ghouta that's one of the highest number of casualties in a twenty four hour period since pauses and fighting began ten days ago syrian activists released a new video of the phosphorus bombs they say this happened in a residential area in the town of a maria syrian civil defense says there has been a gas attack and how maria and the town of saka at least fifty civilians including children. have been affected government forces appear to have seized more territory

with a step closer to being split into warning. report disturbing. civil defense volunteers are appealing to the un security council to make this stop they are calling what is happening in eastern a bloodbath. the rescuers are responding to cries from underneath the rubble in this case from a child. young mother something like you get me out of here this boy says. he survived. oh. my god but at least eight hundred syrians many of them women and children have already been killed in almost three weeks of relentless airstrikes and men throughout the besieged and claim. but any we are the free people of eastern little

we want to freedom and the downfall of this murderous regimes which has committed crimes against the people there are extremists and terrorists here they are the ones who are killing children and god willing we will remain steadfast. pro-government alliance is pushing ahead with its air and ground assault they have reportedly sent reinforcements hundreds of soldiers to join the battle rebels have lost territory but remain defiant. one of the main factions. says the people and the fighters in eastern will defend their land. the faction is also denying negotiating a withdrawal proposed by the russian military the russian defense ministry says some groups in eastern are ready to accept the amnesty offer and leave with their families the ministry did not name those groups and so far none have expressed readiness to leave even. civilians have. taken up the russian offer to evacuate

many of them are afraid to cross into government controlled territory and many are afraid of permanent displacement western nations have criticised the attacks on the densely populated opposition held territory but they have done little to stop them the united nations yet again using strong words against the syrian government and its backer russia this month it is used which is in the words of the sector general hell on earth next month so the month after it will be somewhere else where people face an apocalypse an apocalypse intended planned and executed by individuals within the government apparently with the full backing of some of the foreign supporters it is urgent to reverse this catastrophic course and to refer syria to the international criminal court hundreds of thousands of syrians are trapped in a war zone many are on the move as pro-government units advance further into the

enclave the central town of misrata is the next target government forces are approaching the town from the east and the west just a few kilometers of territory is separating those forces capturing mr obama will cut the enclave in half making it more difficult for rebels to defend their territory senator beirut. politicians and the u.s. state of florida have passed laws raising the minimum age for buying rifles to twenty one it comes after seventeen people were killed in a high school shooting in the state last month and gallagher has more from tallahassee. i in florida state capitol building student staged a die in this was a last ditch effort to persuade florida's politicians to ban assault rifles and not school staff on the chamber floor emotions run high representative jarred moskovitz is from parkland it was seventeen people were killed you don't need to stand with me. i don't need you to stand with me. i need you to stand with the families push

the green button the bill bans bump stocks raises the minimum age to buy rifle to twenty one and imposes a three day waiting period for all gun sales such measures were unthinkable in the republican controlled legislature before the park and school shooting controversially the bill proposes that some teachers and school staff who carry out the required training can now carry firearms the concept is to for those schools and those communities that opt to do this as they have in texas and have the as they haven't pulled county in other places around the country to have people who are expert in being able to defend and having lots and lots of training in order to do so in part when students return for their first full day since their classmates and teachers were killed the alleged shooter nicholas cruz was formally charged with seventeen murders but for many the proposals don't go far enough we wait to

see what happens and angie gallo is a legislative chair for florida's parents teachers association and says the bill potentially puts children's lives at risk if we lost you know seventeen and park one seventeen people wish never last we lost forty nine impulse that we shouldn't have lost and we didn't act after that we've had that nashua thing in las vegas where we've seen too much carnage and i think we'll continue to see unless we come up with some common sense gun laws the bill also provides almost four hundred million dollars in funding for increased security in schools mental health counseling and child welfare investigations the bill will now go to florida's governor rick scott if he signs it the proposals will become law within fifteen days for the survivors of the park one school shooting there's a grudging acceptance that this is a step in the right direction but ultimately they're disappointed that assault rifles weren't banned and that some teachers will be armed and to go across tallahassee florida china's foreign minister has called on the u.s.

and north korea to hold talks. as soon as possible when he made the comments during the annual meeting of china's parliament in beijing it follows weeks of diplomacy between north and south korea which has raised the possibility of talks between john young and washington adrian brown joins us live now from beijing so adrian the foreign minister did he give any indication as to the role he sees china continuing to play and all of this when it comes to stabilizing the korean peninsula. well the foreign minister was speaking on the sidelines of the national people's congress once a year he meets the press the media face to face it's a carefully choreographed affair because questions are submitted and screened in advance to avoid any embarrassment but as you rightly pointed out the the dominant theme was north korea he said that he wanted both united states and north korea to hold talks as soon as possible but he said china was also working unremittingly to

try to bring about peace on the korean peninsula although he didn't really clearly define what sort of role he saw for china but his message was very clear a show he said the time for talking was now which are make sure that we call on the parties particularly the u.s. and north korea to engage in dialogue sooner rather than later we encourage them to follow a jewel track approach of remaining committed to the goal of do nuthin arrives ation and working actively to establish a peace mechanism on the peninsula this is china's longstanding position and the vision will set forth by the u.n. security council resolutions. well as you might expect relations with the united states also came up and when you wanted to make the point that any suggestion that china wanted to replace the united states as the world's number one economic power was in his words fundamentally wrong he wanted to point out that china rise had been peaceful but the rejuvenating of china he said was also

unstoppable and what was also very telling throughout his. his question and answer session with journalists was the repeated references to she thought that came up not just in the questions from chinese journalists but also in the answers that came from the foreign minister and it was a reminder that in some ways foreign policy now is very much she jingping policy overall the message that i think the foreign minister wanted to give out today was to reassure the world that china did not want to get involved in any sort of trade war or prolonged trade war with china he said that would be unhelpful not just to beijing and the united states but also would also have a huge impact on the rest of the world he said that china and the united states have to learn to be partners rather than competitors but overall yes it was it was trade it was north korea the dominant themes we also spoke actually about the south

china sea dispute and gave a very strong hint that china's island building program in the south china sea is going to continue he said quoting a chinese proverb that the green hills cannot stop the river advancing into the ocean in other words china is going to continue doing what it's doing played a quote adrian brown i think they're saying adrian thank you. british prime minister theresa may has defended the red carpet welcome given to saudi arabia's crown prince it's the first month's three day trip to the u.k. aimed at developing economic ties between the two countries but critics say the british government is turning a blind eye to human rights abuses in saudi arabia. reports of london. been some man started off as you can trip with a visit to the queen who hosted the young prince of buckingham palace a sign of just how eager the u.k. used to bolster its ties with the saudi kingdom children from the saudi king crab

academy work busking to cheer on the palm prince a continuation of the massive p.r. campaign that included huge adverts across london announcing been ten months visits human rights groups however chose to focus on children by highlighting the killing of thousands in yemen by the saudi military an army under the direct command of m.p.'s as he's known but eleven million children in yemen who are dependent on humanitarian aid that's the entire population of belgian this is the world's worst humanitarian disaster so for the trade deals for the niceties we have to remember that saudi arabia is a key player in this conflict the crown prince's visit is a very controversial one in parliament the leader of the main opposition party question the prime minister what message he would become bringing to the americans and man tomorrow is international women's day a chance to both celebrate how far we've come on equality for women but also to reflect on how far we have to go not just in this country but around the world

later today mr speaker the prime minister is due to meet crown prince mohammed bin solomon as she makes her arms sales pitch will she also call on the crown prince to hold the shocking abuse of human rights in saudi arabia her response to the link that we have with saudi arabia is historic it is an important one and it's saved it has saved. the law it's a potentially hundreds of people. and i will be raising concerns about human rights with the crown prince when i meet him can i just say is the right honorable gentleman started on the issue of international women's day i welcome the fact that the crown prince will be sitting down with as the guest of a female prime minister to build on that relationship the prime minister left parliament to meet with m.p.'s at downing street prince my mother when will you stop bombing innocent civilians in yemen when will you stop killing innocent civilians in yemen bridge behind me. as you can see this trip is not just

a high profile one but it's also a very controlled trip with the both the british government and the saudis not wanting to have clear access there is no press conference that took place this is the closest we've had to access to the crown prince and the big reason behind that is the widespread opposition and criticism that has been accompanying this trip. part of the opposition was demonstrated in this protest outside downing street organizers here say the u.k. government should not be turning a blind eye to saudi human rights abuses no matter how much the crown prince pledges to invest they want their politicians to demand real change and reform in saudi arabia and not to cheer on what they consider to be propaganda aimed at punishing the image of a man who's knocked up many of his political opponents. al jazeera london.

still ahead on al-jazeera philippines top charge in a starched critic of the president step closer to impeachment. plus stealing itself for future losses for a report from the canadian town brace for proposed u.s. tariffs. welcome back look at the weather across the levant and western parts of asia this time from a cloud across some of these eastern areas but turning weather conditions are drawing fairly benign stana there in kansas down high as of nine degrees fine around the caspian sea sunshine for tehran and back and then run the eastern side of the mediterranean more unsettled across turkey we've got some my brace of rain the snow at higher elevations elsewhere the flows still coming in from the size of quite warm but as we move the forecast through to friday more westerly so get the

wind coming over to the sea so nineteen degrees as a high in beirut at that stage and you see the area of snow developing across the caucasus and the circulation here for back resulting in temperatures of just eleven degrees celsius having tenth arabian pynchon not much to say that the weather is fantastic here thank you very much thirty one degrees in tow on the other side the french is warming up a really has been very mild all way through this winter and into spring temperatures rising quickly thirty eight is the high in mecca on thursday as we start our weekend still up at thirty five degrees celsius down into southern portions of africa we've got some showers for the eastern cape of south africa cape town south looking dry and fine geria draw a picture across much of zimbabwe with sunshine expected in harare and a maximum temperature here of twenty eight.

hold the benefit of people. so they see being polled and. witness documentaries that open your eyes. at this time on al-jazeera. you're watching al-jazeera let's take a look at the top stories this hour syrian activists have released video of what they say appears to be phosphorous bombs being dropped on eastern ghouta apparently

happened in the town of hama ria eighty eight people were killed in the region on wednesday and another day of aerial bombardment the minimum age for buying rifles will be raised to twenty one and the u.s. state of florida it's part of a package of gun safety performs approved by politicians after seventeen people were killed last month and a school shooting. foreign minister has called on the u.s. and north korea to hold talks as soon as possible follows weeks of diplomacy between north and south korea which is raise the possibility of talks between pyongyang and washington. and nato has signed an agreement with qatar to cooperate on military and security issues qatar samir is in belgium for talks with the alliance and the european union shake to me. it was welcomed by e.u. foreign affairs chief fredricka more careening as a visit to brussels follows continuing tension in the gulf nine months ago saudi arabia the u.a.e. bahrain and egypt cut ties with qatar. has more from brussels. qatari officials

say they are expanding their partnership with key international institutions like nato to and the e.u. with the e.u. chief the qatari emir shift to me but how much of that he has been talking about the latest developments on the g.c.c. crisis but also about regional issues as you know qatar and the key players in the conflict of syria for example on the share similar views about how to move forward and what kind of world should the opposite syrian opposition play in the future with nato the qataris have signed an agreement paving the way for nato pass nail to . get into qatar used a qatari military base of date will for nato operations in afghanistan but also in their. push against i sell in the region and that's quite significant because as you remember back in june when saudi arabia these are lies start of the embargo

on. the accused qatar for. sponsoring extremism accusations strongly denied by qatar and now this partnership with no don't have a target perspective is clear indication they are able not only to break the embargo but also to break any attempt by the saudis to put more isolation of qatar . a curfew imposed on sherlock a central district is being lifted after police managed to contain a wave of intercommunal violence the government eclairs state of emergency earlier this week and the candy region follows days of attacks by buddhist mobs on towns and villages targeting muslim homes and businesses bernard smith is in the sri lankan city of can be so this curfew i think it was originally has been ten days it's been lifted earlier why. well rachele there

was a twenty four hour curfew originally imposed for this period of supposed one to four o'clock this evening but they've reduced it they ended it just about fifty minutes ago here though in the center of county where you've got this large statue of buddha looking down over the city it's still much quieter than ordinarily would be these streets these roads would be normally ordinarily packed clogged with traffic and you can see that because they only got reason to late notice of the lifting of the curfew many of these shops are all still shots of books because it seems to have been comparatively peaceful overnight we do understand that the homes of two muslim families were burned and attacked but otherwise the curfew seems to have been observed that's because it was rigorously enforced by a heavy military and police presence hearing condi and not seem to have kept a lid on things on our show so is there a concern of more violence. well

i mean the curfew will return again at four o'clock sorry six o'clock this evening when the streets will be clear again they're trying to balance the need to keep the economy going with the need to enforce the peace this is a very tourist reliant part of sri lanka where there are concerns that the violence will continue what they've done to keep a lid on it is they shut of access to facebook that's up nationwide in sri lanka they restricted access to what's up slowed of their internet sites down a lot to stop what the government says the spread of extremist material but the longer term issues why these things keep flaring up this sort of belief among some similes but it's nationalists that the muslim minority have too many businesses have too much power and these are these nationalists of sinhalese nationalists have been fueling this resentment to create so to encourage these attacks on muslim

businesses these are the underlying issues that sri lanka still has to try and deal with the show all right bernard smith life press and candy share locker thank you. the philippines lower house of congress has voted to impeach the country's top judge rail order serranos accused of corruption and her supporters say she's being targeted for criticizing president not bigger that her ties policies to male alynda going to ports from manila the trip just supreme court chief justice lawyer dissident all was the first woman to ever lead the country's judiciary. in two thousand and twelve she was appointed as the new chief justice of former president been ignore keno just a few months after her predecessor was removed from office after being convicted in an impeachment trial her supporters say it has always been a hostile court she joined a group of supreme court justices who are appointees of former president gloria macapagal arroyo and i know no political rival or even of every one.

of the institution that we are all trying. and that is the. among the accusations against certain though is the non-disclosure of some of her earnings and she's also accused of taking unilateral actions which were not sanctioned by other supreme court justices but her counsel say these are baseless accusations and are not impeachable offenses under the constitution president but there have been eyes he's behind the move to oust said rendel but a few months ago the tear to challenge sidenote and another government official or blitz month conchita carpio morale is to resign morales leads an independent agency that investigates corrupt government officials many here say that efforts to remove them may be part of a plan to intimidate the judiciary so the third to can wield more control as early

as two thousand. already many. government would buy. congress and the. constitution mean there ought to be resistance. we are after all a democracy and. best we can despite the challenges. we are doing what we can to be able to step up and act as a check and balance on the overarching overreaching executive department it is not the first time going to a government official has been subjected to such proceedings and their dictator the staunchest critic senator lie little lima is accused of protecting the illegal drug street she's now in their police detention. and joins us live now from manila so what are what is the latest with this n.p. chairman. well to the original what happened is that the

panel voted to basically move forward with the impeachment complaint about thirty eight members of the forty member panel of the committee that had been looking at probable cause all see that there is there are reasons to move forward with the impeachment complaint against chief justice moore disarray no these see she has committed corruption in the buz to her power as being the supreme court chief justice but as you know she's not only embattled in congress richo hughes also facing a very hostile court from within just last week thirteen justices thirteen justice of the supreme court voted to put her on indefinite leave the forest her to go on leave saying that she should instead focus on their impending impeachment trial something that the supporters actually deny they see that she's just going on the wellness leave from the very beginning since she took this position as the first judicial supreme court chief justice female chief justice she had already faced

a hostile court and critics say cyrano feel to galvanize support outside her already group of supporters she has failed to reach out to other justice says other justices have apparently complained that she is not cool legal in nature so she's facing battle on so many fronts what's going to happen now is that on march fourteenth the same panel will then percent this complaint to the plan there and congress and then they will in fact vote the entire congress whether to proceed with an impeachment trial and then soon maybe perhaps months from now the senate will start its impeachment trial on chief justice there discern of skis to be allowed ogunleye for us in manila thank you. the white house says mexico canada and other countries could be spared from proposed u.s. steel and aluminum tariffs president expected to announce details of the plan later on thursday canada which exports more steel to the u.s. than in the other country has been pushing for an exemption kristen salome reports

from hamilton in the province of ontario. at the nikkei metal processing plant owner bruce relies on the steel industry to make his living just as his father did before him his workers processed steel coils from nearby plants for sale to manufacturers many in the united states or more customers as a result of the twenty five percent there are quite likely. a lot of the stuff we supply here is automotive. furniture construction tiptoe has just seven employees but they're among the forty thousand who work directly or indirectly for the steel industry just in the city of hamilton alone ninety percent of canadian steel and forty one percent of its aluminum is sold to the united states so it's not surprising that canadians are resisting trump's plan to impose tariffs because of the threat to business and jobs hamilton chamber of commerce

argues the cost of the tariffs will get passed onto american consumers were highly specialized and so it's going to take a long time for any u.s. company to below find domestic steel that will compete against the steel that we produce right now. china may be the target of president trumps tariffs but canada is the number one supplier of steel and aluminum to the united states and the amount it comes in the midst of efforts to renegotiate nafta the north american free trade agreement which governs trade between the two nations and backs a path we've had a very bad deal with mexico very big deal with canada girl nafta after announcing the tariffs trump suggested canada could get a waiver in exchange for concessions on nafta but canada has threatened to retaliate sparking fears of a trade war the threat is well maybe we'll negotiate an exemption if you give us everything which you want on the nafta agreement but mexico was and can are serious

they might walk away well that leaves steel in a black hole steel processor tiptoe doesn't know what to expect you want to be a win win situation and right now it looks like it's. u.s. looks like they want to win anybody else's cost and without a waiver the cost of tariffs could be steep for canadians kristen salumi al jazeera hamilton ontario. recap the headlines right now for you on al-jazeera syrian activists have released video of what they say appears to be phosphorous bombs being dropped on eastern libya that happened in a residential area in the town of hama riyadh eighty eight people were killed in the region on wednesday and another day of aerial bombardment politicians in the u.s. state of florida have passed laws raising the minimum age for buying rifles to twenty

one it comes after seventeen people were killed in a high school shooting in the state last month legislation of course is a three day waiting period for all gun sales and allows for the arming of some school staff and a gallagher has more from tallahassee for those survivors of the park one shooting of course seventeen people died three weeks ago there was a grudging acceptance that is this is a step forward and better than nothing of course what they wanted more than anything else was a complete ban on assault rifles that didn't happen this is a house controlled by the republicans but this bill will now go before the state's governor rick scott on friday he's not expected to put up any changes his so i think for the paul survivors this is a step in the right direction to change with a little bit of disappointment china's foreign minister has called on the u.s. to north korea to hold talks as soon as possible when you made the comments on the sidelines of the annual meeting of the chinese parliament in beijing follows weeks

of diplomacy between north and south korea which has raised the possibility of talks between pyongyang and washington. a curfew imposed on sri lanka's central district has been temporarily lifted after police managed to contain a wave of intercommunal violence the government declared a state of emergency earlier this week and the candy region follows days of attacks by a small towns and villages targeting muslim homes and businesses. the full plains lower house of congress has voted to impeach the country's top judge to surrender is accused of corruption her supporters say she's being targeted for criticizing president are bigger titter to his policies. and british prime minister theresa may has defended a red carpet welcome given to saudi arabia's crown prince had been solomon is on a three day trip aimed at developing economic ties between the two countries his first trip officially to the u.k.

those are the headlines news continues here on al-jazeera witness is next. too often on the streets. are victims but a new force is that plain. female police officers are combative sexual assault and domestic abuse. but changing society is a challenge and so is life behind the badge for india's lead. coming soon.