more infrastructure in the pen than some foreign corporation. now a politician and activists are building a homegrown solution. and secure the nation's technological sovereignty. will be the citizens network at this time. the split a rebel territory in eastern goods and three ports of merge of a new evacuation deal for fighters.

and welcome to al jazeera live from our headquarters in doha with me and of the parana also ahead partial results from colombia's congressional elections indicate that right wing parties critical of the fog peace deal a leading. china makes it official lifting the limit on how long can remain in power plus. i'm a clot reporting on the multiple threats the wildlife here in antarctica from climate change to terrorism. syrian government forces have made major and roads into one of the last rebel strongholds east of the capital damascus they have divided east and go into three parts isolating the main town of. and there are reports that rebel groups are considering an evacuation deal and what the government may be on the homes has more . for three weeks the syrian army's bombs have fallen on eastern

good while its troops have moved in easing into rebel territory i just thought it was sort of on the knuckles of a bunch of the syrian arab army continue their operations in eastern guta successfully day by day other areas in vast spaces of eastern ghouta are secured. and the last week rebel held territory shrank and split into what syrian state media saying the army had completely surrounded the town of duma now those same government forces have reported the cuff the way even further into opposition territory splintering the rebel held territory into three the bombardment has been relentless and indiscriminate monitors and activists say more than eleven hundred people have died since the government offensive began the syrian civil defense accuses government forces of using chlorine gas phosphorus bombs in one u.s. defense secretary james mattis one syria against using chemical weapons situation

in eastern good very very powerful and miserable. another rebel held area feeling the bite of syrian government advances is edlund the largest chunk of syrian territory currently held by the opposition this footage shows russian and syrian government gets striking the central bank an adlib city syrian government supporters sit it was the command center for the group in charge of it hyatt studied al shan an opposition tweet described it as the base for a syrian risk you teens. many areas in the province of being targeted al-jazeera arabic scurry spondon to adam abu same witness the bombardment of the town have been nice. were being at the among the targets where these residential areas several people were killed others wounded civil defense units have been trying to get people out from underneath the rubble there have been global calls for cease

fire in syria but syria and russia have paid little mind to the outcry it's a familiar government strategy an intense unrelenting bombardment designed to weaken and ultimately divide the rebel held region and this strategy appears to be working but at an enormous human cost million hand out to syria. now kurdish fighters have called on civilians to volunteer to form a human shield around the syrian city of a plane as turkish forces advance turkish troops in a free syrian army fighters have surrounded a free and one dollar and assume take a lot of offensive in a film in january to clear the area of kurdish y p g fighters alan fisher has more . on the turkish syrian border. enough rain we're hearing that the y.p. g. the kurdish militia are calling on civilians to help form a human shield to police themselves between the y. p.g. and the advancing free syrian army which of course are backed up by the turkish

military no it's not just cards who have responded to this call and we hear that there are buses heading towards africa but also groups here in turkey clearing women's groups and socialist groups over how they will get across the border which is currently closed is another issue entirely in our friend city we see that there is no water no internet and up to three or four families are no sharing a choice because families that move from the early stages of this assault are no seeking shelter with friends and relatives seeking shelter essentially where they can the leader of the council and our friend says the city. is dire and it's called on the united nations not only to investigate but to intervene. let's move on to other news now and right wing political parties have to form strongly in colombia's congressional election the parties have been critical of colombia's two thousand and sixteen peace deal with fox levels it is the first time members of the form of a group were taking part in elections strong when by an thousand farquharson's

could put the integrity of the peace deal at risk alexandra b.s.t. has more from both of them. almost all of the votes have been counted at this point and the results show as you were saying a clear victory right wing parties that have been opposing the implementation of the peace deal and are returning force of former president alberto would anybody who has been the most staunch opposer of this agreement with the fire rebels or. the coalition of right wing parties might have fallen short of an absolute majority in congress but they're definitely going to be the strongest force they're also colombians were able to vote in one of two primary elections on this day and the right wing primary gathered almost double the votes

of those on the left evander look at the candidate of former president alberto levy clearly won that primary with almost four million votes which essentially turned him into the best candidate to become the next president of colombia this means that the coalition the n.c.a.a. a peace deal coalition has a clear shot for the presidency essentially means that it will be very difficult to . implemented many were for that. that were agreed upon and a peace agreement that what we're looking at at this point. to china now with a wooden communist party has paved the way to remain in office and definitely as a voter to abolish term limits for the president and vice president. has.

an army of chinese legislators came to the great hall of the people knowing what was expected of them a display of uniform loyalty to the man who could now be china's leader for life. 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 well the almost three thousand delegates had been told the amendments were needed because the challenges china faces require a strong leader and the 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 thank. 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 entire 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 jingping thought is now required reading for party members study groups of spread to businesses and universities. parliament also voted to expand the president's campaign against corruption during 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. well she is now the most powerful chinese leaders and smiles a doll who really did power over communist china from its foundation in line nine hundred forty nine until his death in one nine hundred seventy six deng xiaoping

emerged as his successor in the years that followed and was recognized as leader despite never formally holding the top job was during the day in error that restrictions were imposed on future presidents jiang zemin took over in nineteen ninety three and was limited by the constitution to a maximum of two five year terms urgent tells abided by those rules serving ten years from two thousand and three to two thousand and thirteen but now the national people's congress has removed that restriction paving the way for xi jinping to potentially hold office beyond the end of his to in two thousand and twenty three well graham web is a research fellow at the institute for defense and strategic studies at nine young technological university and he says that the decision make sure. the long term. the chinese communist party today is a lot more different than it was in the past you have a lot more competent personalities within the chinese communist party all you have

to do is look into the politburo the seven member standing political which is the core leadership of the party and you find the likes of you could young in one want winning and others who are extremely savvy people so you think of course since you came to power and when you the team was able to consolidate that over time by weeding out rivals and getting people who are support him to be on his side having said what i just did i'm not an apologist or supporting the idea the outcome that is that we've seen yesterday i think on balance this is not a very positive step for china we're living in a very complex time a very complicated global economy and it shouldn't be left to just one person any government no matter how small or large to precisely all over the matters of military economics and society and sort of it's all the risks for teaching being have i've grown tremendously he's put himself in this position where he's he's at the helm but really all of it falls on his shoulders in terms of the successful feel as the country has room for fairly six trini let alone if you makes any

missteps and the repercussions are going to be dire for country of the sites i think in all it's going to lead to instability in china rather than most ability to head down the mountain budgets in cuba cost balance and a critical election to decide their future to the fifty nine year old at the cost time brothers and ten months after the week an election long fight national sometimes a new name already voted. from cool brisk north in fuel. to the warm tranquil waters of southeast asia. hello there the still a fair amount of rain over parts of the middle east at the moment the satellite picture showing all the cloud that's marching its way towards the east and some of the wettest of the weather has been over parts of afghanistan through tajikistan on

up into kazakstan lots of rain here and a fair amount of snow to another system is following behind it that all sort of joined together really as we head through choose day more of us are going to see some wet weather and some wintery weather to towards the west well dry for now in beirut but we do have another weather system that's pushing its way in through turkey so things here will be a little bit wet blustery during the day before the towards the south and there's a little bit of cloud just sticking its way through parts of the arabian peninsula but it's not really bringing any wet weather really to speak of what it is doing is it's changing the wind direction so our maximum temperature will be around twenty nine degrees on tuesday there could be a fair amount of dust at times and with an increase in the wind it will feel a little bit fresh than it has been recently found towards the southern parts of africa and here most of our wet weather is in the northern part of our map still stretching down through parts of the in bob way and into parts of madagascar so plenty of showers across this region to the south of all of that plenty of dry

weather to be found here just in the east the just the chance of one or two showers . there with sponsored by qatar airways. we're winning the will of the people hinges on the mass media state p.r. machine let's go into overdrive. just. influencing news. we just don't know yet where the lines will be drawn between what can be said and what comes after. some journalists decided to sacrifice their integrity for our polling the media opinion the listening post at this time on algae.

good to have you with us on al jazeera these are our top stories there are reports that syrian government forces have divided a rebel held east and. three three weeks of heavy bombardment has significantly reduced the size of the rebels' territory and left the main town of the isolated rebel groups are reportedly considering an evacuation. china's ruling communist party has paved the way for paying to remain in office and definitely to abolish term limits for the president and vice president leaves was restricted to a maximum of two five year terms. and right when political parties have performed strongly and colombia's congressional election the groups are critical of the two thousand and sixteen. rebels the elections marked the debut of fox as a political party. now the man expected to be cuba's next president is promising that the new government will be more responsive to its people have been voting to

ratify the national assembly which will choose a successor to president raul castro julia galliano reports from havana. no campaigning just one party and rarely any surprises elections in cuba are carefully managed and this vote the last step before cuba's national assembly chooses a replacement for raul castro was no different. with their ballots cubans essentially confirmed the names of six hundred five assembly delegates and electoral process that began months ago and will end on april nineteenth that's when the new assembly forms the council of state which in turn chooses the next president. it's widely expected this man vice president. will be placed castro is the leader who is government that we are electing today will owe itself to the people the people will take part in the decisions that the government takes that government will work based on its relationships to the people and the people can also remove those who

don't meet their responsibilities. to generational transition that the cuban government says will guarantee the continuity of the revolution and in a country where the political power is largely in the hands of the communist party held castro won't be stepping down entirely he's expected to remain as first party secretary and continue to be a major power behind the scenes there's a palpable sense of resignation in cuba about who the next president will be in fact with only weeks to go cubans know very little about me give the afghani or any of the other potential candidates one thing there's no uncertainty about though is what the next president's biggest challenge will be upon taking office and that is tackling the countries that an economy. over the last decade cuba has made efforts to modernize its economy most notably allowing some private businesses to operate but many here feel they have fallen short of what's needed to improve the quality of life on the island the next president's job has also been made much harder by

the worsening relationship with the united states and you can on the collapse of venezuela cuba's main ally in the region just. you know. there will be positive changes both to our economy and our political because some of the decisions made in the past have become obsolete but what i am sad we have some big economic challenges ahead in particular the unification of our two currencies which creates a lot of problems but we trust those people in this new government will be able to find the best way forward without ever compromising our peace and freedom whether it's the next leader will find it tough to replace these historically recognized figures but despite the challenges ahead many cubans are hoping this is a moment their government can capitalize on for lasting economic reform julia galliano al-jazeera have ana. belen tony and more as a last america analyst and editor in chief of news and news dot com and he says having vice president again vs canal and power won't necessarily bring change to

cuba he simply will not have the same kind of authority as the people who came before him the people who were part of that revolution who were who are going to be icons of a communist cuba so that is going to be an issue for him although again with role castro still there and still backing him up i don't think that that's going to be much of a change the question's going to be whether dissidents and others are more inspired to take action and to protest against the government but i wouldn't hold my breath on that because the tight control that the cuban security apparatus has over the cuban people from the military the police and the this there are things i know who will see on the committees of defense the defense a defense of the revolution which are basically people in your neighborhood who are watching out to see if anything happens in the call the police if they see anything out of line it's just it's so strong and so pervasive that i guess i wouldn't hold my breath that this would be a change in cuba any time sir. the trumpet ministrations says there will be no

added conditions for talks with north korea donald trump and kim jong il on the set to meet within the next two months in the first ever told between the two nations leaders north korea has already promised not to resume nuclear or missile testing during the talks cia director mike palm has says that a first for pyongyang this first meeting i think is between the president is the leader of north korea the two people who are the decision makers who will ultimately decide what arrangements are acceptable but make no mistake about it while these negotiations are going on there will be no concessions made the activity of this administration to disrupt the north korean economy to put pressure on north korea to galvanize the world in a way that you have countries from the middle east to europe and asia placing sanctions on the north korean regime and those will continue and wall see how the talks and then go she actions prosy. well b.j. kemas a former south korean diplomat and he says the u.s.

needs to be better prepared for talks. the white house national security they have who has the professional you know with long experience in discussing having discussion with north korea before but other than her i mean there are other competent professionals but the state department is a problem they don't have a master who south korea here or those so they have several layers of senior and working level not yet appointed so you know this is a diplomatic game we're talking about there or no matter how hard. the national security council at the white house are leaving the games at the state department there is a lot of work to do and they don't have the people so that they'll have more really quickly but in the meantime because of american men power at the state department probably will continue the white house and they're. leading the game for quite some time. now with. the national front is being rebranded in

a bid to revive its image. called the national gathering. the banner wrapped up the river branding of a party with a classic speech. will get the cheers from the crowd. and tough most of all on the effects of immigration. leave us your leg it is legal and illegal immigration are no longer tenable. last year on this the french people's money must go back to the french people first . we no longer have the means to welcome to house to careful or to feed the whole world. but the high point came at the end when she announced her suggestion to rename the

party it was here in existence absolute you know it must signal an absolute demand to unite the country in the defense of its identity its prosperity and its security and freedom i therefore propose that the national front become the national gathering all of. the v.n.d. over some limit on the should not. so the national front is dead but not quite varied yet the members will have a chance to vote on the name change in the next few weeks for what is the most important thing for me was to keep the war national in a thing that the world got going its goal here and now the idea is no longer to be a france but to get a people together and. demonstrators took to the streets of lille to show what they called their contempt for the rebranding of the national front they said it was just another attempt to disguise fascism but back in paris a warning from an expert who knows the party at first and an opposition councillor

it one of the hotlines. let's not forget the national front got the highest score in its history last year the fact she made a fool of herself at the debate doesn't mean the party is finished but. the party's found a pen has now been stripped of his position as on re president of the national front but he can't be written out of history he's just published the first volume of his autobiography and it's turned into a bestseller he said changing the name was committing political suicide david chaytor al-jazeera legal. now cynthia millet address is an associate professor of sociology at the american university and author of extreme mainstream and she says the new name hasn't changed the party's rhetoric i do not think this is really a rebranding at all i think it's just a renaming i think especially coming on the heels of having steve benen speak to

the congress and say you know it's ok to be a racist it's ok to be a let them call it was you know i don't see how this distinguishes you know distinguishes the party at all from from its past but certainly we're seeing you know a much greater acceptability of greg rhetoric of anti immigrant rhetoric of islamophobia rhetoric in political parties across across the continent and we're seeing some of that language show up even in more mainstream parties as you know as an attempt to move and draw some of those voters and so i do think that. we're going to continue to see that happening i don't think that that you know is it distinguishes what's what's happening now from what the party has been in the past. tens of thousands of followers have reached india's financial capital mumbai after a five day march there demanding financial support from the government crop prices and more access to the land and in the farmers have fallen into debt due to drought

and increasingly the vatican where the passion. now and talk to is the largest spoiled will judge us on famous for its wildlife but it's facing multiple threats from climate change to a dramatic rise and tourism that clock is on i'm going piece expedition ship and he looks at the creech is calling the continent home. life of the islands fringing the antarctic peninsula is abundant a place of seemingly endless variety the whole region is richly biodiverse a living example of how things are pretty much free from the influence of man. a place to breed feet and grow. its pristine oceans full of marine species including more than a dozen types of whale about getting to see the astonishing wildlife here is by no means straightforward. the weather makes everything a challenge bit of

a threat on today it's gusting forty to forty five knots we're very very good progress in the night we're not back in the antarctic thought hoping to get back which is where there isn't a hardened time research stations we want to visit that is also a colony of about one hundred thousand. and then by radio the argentine base says the winds have become impossibly strong and it now they have enough in the way things to me yet their mission is aborted and we have to wait another twenty four hours before making landfall on penguin island near the reasonably accessible tip of the entity peninsula a colony of chinstrap penguins territory with a large group of seals one making the most of the comfortable feathers of the molten juveniles of course the environment where these magnificent animals wildlife is living is incredibly fragile incredibly delicate there's all sorts of threats

that they're up against from climate change to cruel fishing and then of course there's this tourism and the tourists come here the audience close to king george in their masses. some are prepared to pay top dollar to have the and all to experience there are some pressures that come from tourism so in the background we have a two hundred person tours ship take the number of tourists coming down here say the beginning of the two thousands was somewhere around four five thousand a year we're now over thirty thousand people a year. two days later we arrive at hanna point on the southern edge of livingstone island here another colony of chinstrap penguins healthy and in good shape they will look a group of gentoo penguins there's the distinctive beak of the southern giant but showing its young. or elephant seals all different species side by side on a grand scale but across the continent the pressure is building it's crazy pace of

change and at the moment colonies like this one seem to be doing ok but all it takes is one bad year and we saw in the east antarctic last year a penguin colony collapsed due to chicks born. and and so that the pace of change is so quick we don't want to add additional threats things like fishing which is gradually expanding and is still in pretty good shape but it's apparent this unique landscape needs to be very carefully managed as multiple threats interludes on the horizon. al-jazeera antarctica. and i get on the there's a problem and the headlines on al-jazeera and syrian government forces have made further and votes into the rebel held territory of east and both are there now reportedly control more than half of the opposition area and have splintered what's

left in rebel hands into three separate pockets rebel groups have appointed considering an evacuation deal with the government. and also kurdish fighters have called on civilians to volunteer. to form a human shield around the city of a free and as turkish forces sort of bombs al-jazeera has heard reports that women's community groups have responded to the calls turkish troops and free syrian army fighters have surrounded the thing and warned they'll and to surrender. colombia's right wing political parties have performed strongly and congressional elections the groups a critical of the two thousand and sixteen peace deal with rebels the elections mark the debut of fox as a political party. the trumpet ministration says they will be no added conditions for talks with north korea donald trump and kim jong set to makes within the next two months of the first ever talks between the two nations leaders north korea has

already promised not to resume nuclear or missile testing during the. this first meeting i think is between the president is the leader of north korea the two people who are the decision makers who will ultimately decide what arrangements are acceptable but make no mistake about it while these negotiations are going on there will be no concessions made the activity of this administration to disrupt the north korean economy to put pressure on north korea to galvanize the world in a way that you have countries from the middle east to europe and asia placing sanctions on the north korean regime and those will continue and walls see how the talks and then go she asians prosy caravans are voting for a new national assembly a case step towards choosing a new president eight million are expected to cost their ballots the six hundred twelve members of the national assembly will choose a successor to president raul castro and it will be the first time since one nine hundred fifty nine revolution that someone other than his brother fidel holds the

office those are the headlines on al-jazeera but do stay with us the listening post is coming up next thank you for watching. it's candidates but only one likely winner. since tight grip on the kremlin is mandate seen is now and when russian people voice on march the eighteenth there is every indication that they will return him to his presidential to. follow the russian elections here on al-jazeera . broken hearts and yet another american town shocked by devastating violence this time at that florida high school about today the survivors of the deadly school shooting in florida say they're turning their anger into action ever again that's the rallying cry of top politicians on the playing or out of my generation as our lives alone richard is but if you're at the listening post here are some of the media stories we've been tracking this week we.