and secure the nation's technological sovereignty to. rebel geek the citizens network at this time because you know. we understand the differences and the similarities of cultures across the world. so no matter where you call home al-jazeera will bring in the news and current affairs that matter to you. al-jazeera. as turkish forces close in kodesh fighters say they'll form a human shield around the syrian town of a free oh. and amid unrelenting bond bodman syria's army completely surrounds duma cutting the rebel held parts of

eastern into. a low i'm maryam namazie in london you're watching al-jazeera also coming up. china removes term limits for its leader from the constitution allowing paying to become president ally. marine le pen seeks to shore up the national front flagging fortunes by rebranding it the national gathering. of people to wash their clothes and possessions if they visited a restaurant in pog in the english city where a russian former spy and his daughter were poisoned. we begin in northern syria where codes are reported to be mobilizing to form a human shield around the town of freeness turkish forces advance turkish troops

and free syrian army fighters have surrounded a friend and a warning that the tree is imminent kurdish y.p. g. forces say civilians are volunteered to protect the town and are on their way to form a human shield around it elsewhere in syria state media are saying the army has now completely surrounded the town of duma in eastern guta that leaves the main area still held by the rebels cut into a made intense as strikes pro-government forces broke through rebel lines to establish a corridor through the enclave on issues and activists say more than a thousand people have been killed since the government ramped up its offensive to take back the area over three weeks. and the white helmets are reporting that several people have been killed in a barrel bomb attack on a residential area of the rebel held town of been in eastern guta they also say government forces have hit the town with chlorine gas phosphorus bombs and napalm u.s. defense secretary jim mattis has warned the syrian government it would be unwise to

use weaponized gas. let's get more on this from alan fischer on the turkey syria border allan what more are you hearing about the situation in and around the east and their region. but it was almost expected that they would circle one of these towns dimmers the one that appears to have been through lee encircled it is a tactic that has been used in the past by the syrian government forces and by doing this they feel that they can put a military and then a political solution into this area we're hearing talks that there is the possibility that some fighters know that they are completely isolated from other groups may well consider giving up their weapons and moving out of the area we saw that before in other parts in syria as well though those on the ground see that is not being considered but certainly it's what's happened in the past in the past we heard it wasn't being considered in those fighters did move out of that area know

that encircled them of the look at other tones as well by doing this they're cutting off supply routes cutting off communication cutting off the main roads it gives them strategically the upper hand right across this area meanwhile in northern syria kurdish y.p. g. forces are saying that civilians are volunteering they say to protect the town of afrin they're moving to form a human shield around it what are we hearing about their movements. well the white p.d. asked people to come forward and act as human shields to place themselves between the y. p.g. and the free syrian army and the turkish forces that are moving towards a free and that has been. an offensive that has moved and incredible piece over the last seventy two hours or so certainly in the last few hours we're hearing that a number of towns and villages both in the north and south of frame have been taken over but it's not just cut this groups that are responding to this appeal for people to come and be human shields we're also hearing that women's groups and also a number of socialist groups in turkey are offering their services as well and

according to local reports they are on their way to our friend no just yesterday on saturday the president of turkey said that turkey would could possibly have soldiers in our freedom in just three days if they acted like every other country when it came to the question of syria if the ignored the humanitarian needs if they ignored the risk to civilians being caught up in the conflict then the two could easily push in but they were aware of all these issues and that is why they would take this assault much more carefully much more slowly but it is moving with a great deal of peace from a friend itself we are hearing that there is no water there anymore that the internet has been cut that in many houses there are three four five families all because people who moved from this assault in the first place moved into affluent city itself and are no looking for shelter particularly as we're hearing there are some airstrikes in that area to know there are suggestions inside turkey that the

assault on our friend could come within days but essentially what the kurds are saying with this human shield is that we dare you to do exactly what you said you were going to do and consider the humanitarian issues and on that front we know that one of the council leaders in africa has called in the united nations to investigate and to intervene i am thank you very much alan fischer bringing us up to date with all those developments in syria. now kurds in other countries have been protesting against turkey's actions in syria train services at one of the u.k.'s busiest stations have been hit with delays and cancellations after a group of activists climbed onto the tracks at manchester piccadilly ankara launched its offensive in the african region in january to drive out the syrian kurdish y p g militia i. china's national people's congress has voted to abolish term limits for the

president and vice president to change the constitution paves the way for changing paying to remain in office beyond twenty twenty three there is adrian brown has more from beijing. an army of chinese legislators came to the great hall of the people knowing what was expected of them from their display of uniform loyalty to the man who could now be china's leader for life for the constitution is in accordance with our country's reality and the wishes of all the people. this is a big event a very memorable moment in our political life. and historic and controversial moment as world view almost three thousand delegates had been told the amendments were needed because the challenges china faces require a strong leader and a united party. in china's version of legislative government

new laws and constitutional changes are always passed unanimously. and so it proved to be the case again on sunday when delegates approved twenty one constitutional revisions including the scrapping of term limits for the president and vice president but there was perhaps token opposition to votes against and three abstentions congress officials insist this process was transparent. the chinese people have had no say in this historic moment critics accuse president xi jinping of building a personality cult indoctrinating the masses with his political philosophy just as chairman mao once did it was done shopping the other towering figure in recent chinese history who'd insisted on two term limits for the president he wanted to avoid a repeat of the cultish devotion that had surrounded mao but analysts say one party

rule is once more turning into one man rule the fact of the matter this seeming has hijacked the end tie a communist party in the country so we are back to just one person doing the talking one person making the decisions for the entitled party in the entire country we are back to the period of the so-called one wars echo chamber. the president's influence is now felt in many aspects of life here she jean ping thought is now required reading for all party members study groups of spread to businesses and universities parliament also voted to expand the president's campaign against corruption joining a five year purge more than one and a half million party officials have been punished analysts say the campaign is a guys for getting rid of potential rivals for now at least though she would appear to have none adrian brown al-jazeera beijing. u.s.

president donald trump says his planned talks with north korea could either fail or bring about a greatest deal for the world to ease nuclear tensions between the two countries speaking at a rally in pennsylvania he said he believes north korea wants to make peace but president trump want he could leave the talks quickly if it didn't like progress for nuclear disarmament could be many ways meanwhile to south korean officials who met north korean leader kim jong un last week are said to be briefed the leaders of china and japan one of the officials will meet china's president xi jinping on monday the other will see japan's president on tuesday the meetings are designed to update leaders on the progress of nuclear talks with north korea the two envoys returned from the u.s. on sunday after that meeting with president trump well now to france where the main far right party the national front is to be renamed the national gathering party leader marine le pen but for the proposal on the second day of the national front's congress make over is designed to revive the nationalist party after le pen lost

the french presidential election to emmanuel mccrone last year a pair has sought to distance from her estranged father and the former leaders on marine le pen he called the main change a betrayal they've also. we are the defenders we are the last defenders of the french republic. the french republic has been stripped of its content which you figure is becoming less and less democratic and less and less social the political leaders are speaking in english our flag is being replaced by the european flag marked by agendas that avoid over any substance. david joins us live now from that congress in the mail and so the party has now changed its name but it doesn't necessarily mean any substantial of a change in in substance or ideology. no i think it's been pretty clear from what i've been hearing during the course of this day and

especially during the reign that the ban speech that the policies broadly are going to be much the same very similar to what i heard from on the campaign trail now that actually helped them reach something like ten point six million votes in the twenty's and dean election but she didn't drop the ball in the one to one debate with the manual macro so that the real question is can she take this name the national gathering and take it out in the countryside as a whole and will this toxified the ground a lot and not allow her to start articulating the policy and spreading it within the body politic of france more effectively than she did last time and that's a big question over that it was she was playing here and she got warm responses of course and lots of the pools to a home crowd these are the the crowds in those it knows how to please exactly but can she actually make inroads into say the ten million unemployed and the huge pool

of unskilled labor which is losing its place in french society as the march towards growth and globalization goes on i think those questions are still very much in the air and also cause the name national front still exists despite me giving it a bit too in the course of this day it will only be changed when the members approve the membership at the moment fifty two percent only in favor of changing it so that's a large number of people within the party who still have this attachment to the national front name to it maybe even some of them to it's warm up on re. president and its founder marine le pen's father john the lead in the pan of course is just in the middle of writing his autobiography in the first volume has turned out to be a bestseller here in france and despite. the national front of the national gathering now going to be called moving away from his toxic brand he has said in

that first volume that he supports the regime who collaborated with the nazis in the second world war that adds to the anti semitic remarks he's made calling the holocaust just a mere detail of history i don't think marine le pen can really ever get rid of her father's legacy people will always remember this troublesome family and yet because she is i guess as many would say a skillful political operator this is clearly what we see in this congress is some kind of attempt to do just that what is the sense there about her future prospects . well at the moment most eyes are on one of her rivals because steve bannon was here the former white house strategist on saturday he said. charlotte then was one of the courses in the pens nice. in the aged in her twenties at the moment is

a rising star and she's been in the united states saying all the right things as far as the right wing are concerned america britain first and france first she says that that is great now she's supposed to be out of politics of the moment but in the end it looks pretty clear that she's shaping up to take on marine le pen a marine le pen has admitted to journalists in the course of these last few months that if she needs to step aside before the next election presidential election she will step aside for somebody younger everybody assumes that will be home nice thank you very much david chait a nail. you're watching out there much more stealth tell you about a billionaire takes back the reins from a socialist it's chilly day and operates its new president. cutting through the ice we report from antarctica on a proposal to time it's a rich scenes in told wildlife sanctuary.

how the weather is lossy fatless a spring sunshine across a good part of china temperatures getting up to the twenty's once again in shanghai twenty three celsius there for hong kong a little bit of cloud over to the southwest of china's towards john do i was a sink a little further south woods and this was as we go through tuesday but for many it's not too bad it's all southerly winds still getting those temperatures up into the low twenty's for many some pleasant conditions over the next few days president off warm enough across much of south asia largely clear skies here you can see the showers started to show there had now across the southern parts of india and also more especially into sri lanka's of lot of the south was a possibility before much of india was going to be fine and dry warming up thirty four celsius in new delhi and will see will still as we go on into choose delaval

cloud there into southern most pos but for many it will be fine dry and sunny fine dry and sunny too across the web and it's not quite as hot as it has been recently but pleasantly warm nevertheless we'll still see a little bit of cloud just around that eastern side of saudi arabia close to us here in doha will stay fine ads right temp just getting up to about twenty nine degrees as we go on through choose they perhaps still want mccain appraised little but a lifted dust a sad but fine dry and sunny. as poverty and desperation sweep across for him just settlements women and girls are being bought and sold and given away in refugee camps one on one east investigates yet another dark side of the real hinge a crisis at this time on al-jazeera. al-jazeera

. where ever you. welcome back a quick recap the top stories for you now kurdish forces in northwestern syria say civilians plan to form a human shield around the town of offering to protect it from an expected turkish incursion. china's national people's congress has voted to abolish term limits for the president and vice president to change the constitution paves the way for being to remain in office beyond twenty twenty three. and france's far right.

has proposed changing the name of her party from the national front to the national gathering she was speaking at the party's annual congress. on other stories we're following sebastian pinera as been sworn in as chile's president for the second time and you're a billionaire entrepreneur vowed to revive the economy which is slumped on the outgoing center left leader michel bashir leg this is the second time pressure lay has turned over the presidency to piniella crowds gathered exits are many involved but he is so latin america and human joins us from there now and some people gathered there behind you tell us about what they're doing and just the general mood and atmosphere. well marian these are supporters of the new presidency by stamping out i was actually a former president and there greeting one of his ministers they're waiting around is you who else will come and take selfies with them they're very excited of course about this new change in the government begin to himself is now at this summer

presidential palace greeting visiting dignitaries they will hold a lunch here in modern the city right next to vote primary so where we are right now this is where the congress is this is this is the seat of the congress where he was sworn in inside the senate building but from here it goes back to santiago and he will be visiting a very well known chilean slum the reason for this of course is that he wants to start off his new administration by making it clear that while he is a billionaire and why he is replacing a socialist president who did a lot for poor people he too has that on his agenda you may remember that in his first administration he was it was marred by street protests and by accusations that while he was very good at spur economic growth which he says he'll do again unfortunately the impression was that he did it only for the rich for the business sector of which he is a part mariam and so we see now coming back could these two characters bash

laimbeer as you say they've sort of traded this position haven't they for over a decade now one of them to kill the challenges that have been the era now. exactly actually for sixteen years we had bachelor than piñera then by chile again in our campaign yet outspent back and forth with them this will be probably the last time the chili will be dominated by these two who are on very different sides of the political aisle his main challenge apart from spurring economic growth and doing it in favor of the dispossessed is also to try to get his legislation passed through because he will not have a majority in the upper or the lower house which is going to have to make deals hopefully with a part of the center left which is which believes that the now opposition coalition has moved too far to the left that is certainly what president pinera is betting on but we'll have to see if he's going to be able to pull it off thank you very much the man latin american editor lucien human with all the latest from both parties

thank you c.-a. well coming to heading to the polls to elect a new congress where former fog rebels will take part for the first time political debut comes after they lay down their arms ending fifty two years of fighting with the colombian government is guaranteed to win a minimum of ten seats under the terms of the peace after meant that many colombians feel former fighters should be in prison rather than congress center on party reports from bogota. or you know what will get more from us under a little bit later on meanwhile cubans are voting to ratify a new national assembly a key step towards choosing a new president on the communist front caribbean island nation eight million cubans are expected to turn out to ratify more than six hundred candidates for an equal number of seats in the national assembly the new members of the national assembly will choose a successor to president roh castro a new president will be the first in almost sixty years from outside the castro family. supporters of catalonia independence have staged

a protest in barcelona this comes after elections in catalonia had to be perspire and when spain supreme court ruled that candidate georges sanchez would not be allowed to leave jail to attend a parliamentary session planned for monday. bubbly girls authorities in the u.k. a warning that as many as five hundred people might have been contaminated with the nerve agent used to attack a former russian spy last weekend so i guess cripple and his daughter yulia remain critically ill in hospital after being attacked for brennan reports. families enjoying a pizza drinkers socializing in the pub hundreds of people may have been unknowingly contaminated as a consequence of the u.k. spy poisoning the revelation that traces of toxic nerve agents have been found in both z.z.z. and the mill pub in seoul very approach a startling message from the u.k. top health food drives are i am confident that this is not home to the health of

anyone who was in the middle of all this is restaurant however some people are concerned that prolonged long term exposure to these substances may over weeks and particularly months give rise to health problems the advice is to machine wash clothes use baby wipes to clean any personal items such as phones and items which can't be washed should be securely bagged and sealed the authorities insist the risk is minimal but caution is essential. the trail of nerve agent contamination is being followed backward from the park bench where sergei script and his daughter yulia were found collapsed the former spy's house is also sealed off for forensic examination and specialist officers have even been examining the cemetery where mr scruples wife is buried among several priorities for police or the questions of how and where scripts and his daughter came into contact with the nerve agent had they already been contaminated by the time they visited z.z.z.

in the mill or where the traces of toxin found at those locations left by whoever was trying to kill them. in two thousand and six when former k.g.b. dissident alexander litvinenko was murdered by russian agents using radioactive polonium the killers left a trail of radioactivity at several locations in london and fortunately it's happened again it means something was not done and a lesson what is saved after the murder of my husband was not learned. and his daughter remains critically ill in hospital twenty one other people have also been treated for possible exposure but the instruction for hundreds of people to cleanse themselves of possible contamination is a worrying a school ation. brennan al jazeera. more than fifty thousand indian farmers are marching towards india's financial capital known by their demanding financial support from the government and better crop prices five day march set out from nashik city which is one hundred seventy kilometers from mumbai to reach the city

on monday many of the farmers are falling into debt because of drought and increasingly erratic weather patterns. meanwhile the indian prime minister narendra modi and french president manny a lack of officially launched the international solar alliance at a summit in new delhi they want to reduce the world's dependence on fossil fuels by expanding the availability of solar energy and adding a thousand gigawatts of solar power by twenty thirty but that comes with a price tag of a trillion dollars president macron took a subtle swipe at u.s. president donald trump for pulling out of the paris climate agreement as he praised a group of females at the launch they didn't wait and they didn't stop because some countries decided to leave the floor and leave the british agreement. because a decided it was good for them for the children the grandchildren they decided to act. and keep back. and that.

while we are here in order to act three completely. the antarctic has been described as one of the most remote and treacherous places on earth much of its rich biodiversity has yet to be fully documented in the second part of our antarctic series we look at the european union's campaign to protect the desolate region under there is nick clark joined a green peace scientific expedition through the wet elsie. the captain's eye view of the voyage as the ice breaker arctic sunrise pushes through into the remote waters of the weddell see a vast unknown territory few ships venture this far. has already made an attempt this antarctic summer but was foiled by ice because right now we are way through. to get it down into the wealthiest tried region before we give you what would

be protected looks like opening at least for. yes probably just. a long war and. finally we break through into the isolated area of the proposed site tree at the moment i checked on the. satellite charts this morning and there's someone of the ship in this entire space as another ship about there and that's it and the whole whole area that's slightly scary terrifying. exciting but exciting kind of just makes the case that this is pristine this area is not developed is not called industry it's never had industry . we take our charts and it's rare window of weather to take to the air and look down on the mesmerizing scene below. the western edge of the would be

protected zone breath taking the rule power of land and sea and ice constantly reshaping on the move this is nature on a planetary scale so what we're looking at here is melting ice and great icebergs. sweeping off. the. way to a distance over that proposed area pretty much all touched by human activity. scientific research is taking place back to base the arctic sunrise standing by for a return alongside a giant tabula ice pack perhaps a kilometer long the next helicopter sortie is to the very top of it the expedition team making a dramatic landing to spread the sanctuary message around the world this iceberg thousands of years in the making now adrift in a process that has been going on for hundreds of thousands of years appraises it seems may be changing because of global warming and

a day of scenic wonder the antarctic day ends with a spectacular show above this apparently a reverse sunset phenomenon while simultaneously the clouds more in shape and color into fantastic unworldly painting across the evening sky at the ends of the. nick log al-jazeera until ticket and part of our ferries nic will be taking a look at the multiple threats wildlife and antarctica facing ranging from climate change to terrorism so. also there's more on his voyage on our website. top stories now kodesh forces in northwestern syria say civilians plan to form a human shield around the town of a friend to protect it from an expected turkish encouraging turkish free syrian

army forces have surrounded the town warning that their entries imminent they've been fighting to drive out the kurdish y p g from the area. meanwhile a state media says that the army the syrian army is now completely surrounded the town of duma in eastern that leaves the main areas still held by the rebels come in to meet intense as strikes pro-government forces broke through rebel lines to establish a corridor through the enclave. china's national people's congress has voted to abolish term limits for the president and vice president the change the constitution paves the way for judging paying to remain in office beyond twenty twenty three. and now moving to france where the far right need a marine le pen has proposed changing the name of a posse from the national front to the national gathering to make over is designed to revive the nationalist party after le pen lost the french presidential election to emmanuel macron last year

a strange father. who co-founded the party in one nine hundred seventy two called the name change of betrayal they've also. we are the defenders we are the last defenders of the french republic. the french republic has been stripped of its content which you figure is becoming less and less democratic and less and less social the political leaders are speaking in english our flag is being replaced by the european flag marked by agendas that a void of any substance. and police in the u.k. city of souls pray have issued a warning to members of the public who visited a restaurant and a pub where traces of a deadly nerve agent have been found a poison we used on a former russian spy and his daughter both of whom remain in a critical but stable condition the police say that although the public health risk is low anyone who was in the location at the time should now wash their clothes and

longings erupt right with all of our top stories more news coming up in twenty five minutes time that's after one hour one east. hundreds of thousands of raw hinge of muslims escaped the military crackdown in mean more most of them women and girls clean violence and rape.

the hope to find refuge in bangladesh instead.