this is where talks happen and what happens here matters. when winning the will of the people hinges on the mass media state p.r. machine is going to overdrive. but just who is going to win saying. we just don't know yet where the lines will be drawn between what can be said and what conduct that. some journalists decided to sacrifice their integrity for access to polling the media opinion the listening post but based time on al-jazeera. a suicide bomb blast in afghanistan's capital at least twenty nine people killed celebrating the persian new year.

has a stake in this is. also coming up at least twenty two people mostly children killed in a new russian ass strike in syria. days before egypt's presidential election i. should not be afraid to speak freely. because people need to have confidence in how that personal data is being used britain's call for an investigation as the face of facebook is due to speak out on a major data breach. at least twenty nine people have been killed in a suicide bombing in afghanistan's capital new year's celebrations there. self up close to a shrine in the west of kabul near the university reports. chaos and confusion on the streets of kabul as a bird see crews rushed to the scene of the latest bomb blast the apparent target

afghan celebration no ruse the persian new year and. even a suicide bomb went off just stood behind the so nothing about the terror. because you know if i was a group of thirty young men celebrating and dancing when suddenly this suicide bomber detonated the explosive there is security here how was the suicide bomber able to get access to this area this suicide attacker detonated his device around two hundred meters from the car to shockey shrine where many afghans gather to mark the start of the new year holiday kabul university is nearby and most of the dead are understood to be teenagers were taking part in street celebrations the blast is the deadliest. hit the capital after weeks of repeated attacks on the number of employees unfortunately once again our enemies are spilled the blood of our innocent countrymen the young men were holding celebrations for nauru's but he's attacked them here far away from their chosen targets which is an important shrine

on saturday a car bomb explosion claimed by the taliban killed at least two civilians several others were wounded in the morning rush hour suicide blast in an industrial area the city government said a private british security company was the target it was the four suicide attack in the afghan capital in the past three weeks a u.s. general in afghanistan has said protecting the capital is the americans main effort but the attacks continue increasing pressure on president assad ghani he offered peace talks to the taliban last month as part of efforts to end the sixteen year war but any sort of negotiated settlement appears a long way off but all of on has continued to grow in strength since the withdrawal of the u.s. led nato combat troops four years ago and most security analysts predicted the annual so-called spring offensive will be more intense this year as taliban fighters respond to repeated u.s. and afghan airstrikes as well as ground assault of wednesday's attack is any

indication of what's to come many more lives will likely be lost if al-jazeera. president. not fear speaking freely. he also said he's not responsible for not facing strong competition in the presidential elections. was responding to a video where gyptian said they were in constant fear of imprisonment and also tough economic conditions and soaring living costs and they are difficult. the reality is we need to think carefully about every word we say sometimes people believe what they have said if someone keeps saying there is no hope ultimately they will live hope free life if someone keeps saying that people are being arrested ultimately they will be convinced that in egypt you can talk freely which is not true and the least that i can say is that no orders have been issued at all to do that. promise only one thing is not allowed for example to violently hurt the

country some people ask about the democratic process and practice when they say that sisi may win the elections but still we wish to see some other competitors yes they are right why not more candidates but you talk to me about something i have nothing to do with i swear to god my wish is to see more presidential candidates for the people to freely select one. sure is a professor of security studies at the doha institute for graduate studies he says given cc's heavy clampdown on content is the election is far from being free and fair most of the serious contenders for the presidential elections were either marginalized or life in prison including the former chief of staff of education army general sami on and you have all those who have been harassed you have human rights watch is talking about fifteen solved and civilians who were court martialed in his reign between october twenty fourth in september twenty seventeen this is

unprecedented number even under mubarak stime. we have hundreds of cases of forced disappearances extradition killings are well documented and that made the human rights commissioner. speaks frankly about the. era of intimidation and terror ruling the country which is also unprecedented for a human rights commissioner to say that never been said before under any of the regimes. egypt has extended the detention of ages era journalist mahmoud his saying by another forty five days he gyptian was arrested while on holiday in december twenty sixth seen as yet to be charged a same was accused of broadcasting false news with the aim of spreading chaos and zeta strongly denies the allegations at least twenty two people mostly children have been killed in a russian airstrike in syria's italy district a volunteer rescue group white helmets says the children were killed when leaving their school in conflict but teeth village and at least ninety three civilians have

been killed in the last remaining rebel held parts of eastern huta in attacks by the syrian military and its allies nearly two thousand people have died in the enclave since the government stepped up its attacks last month in the nearby government held capital state media is reporting another thirty five people died when a rocket fired by rebels landed at a market it happened in damascus is crushed cool area close to the front line of the fighting so hard it has more from beirut. reports of an agreement between one of the rebel factions in eastern the russian military. controls the town of because right now the. divided into three pockets controls one of those pockets and there are reports that it has reached a deal with the russian military those fighters agreeing to lay down their arms in exchange they're going to get a safe passage to leave to other rebel controlled areas in the north of the country

you know there are three rebel factions in eastern talks with the other two have not really made much progress so the deal with this reported deal will undoubtedly put pressure on those two rebel factions which have vowed to continue to fight until the end but their bargaining power really they do not have much bargaining power because their pockets the pockets that they control are surrounded by pro-government forces and according to the united nations hundreds of thousands of people are trapped inside and many of them have been appealing for a way out a lot of the civil defense volunteers as well as media activists who are wanted by the state they have been appealing to the united nations to open poor doors safe passages for them to leave that are monitored by the united nations because they fear that if they cross into government controlled territories they could come arrested or even be executed so there's this fear among civilians who are trapped inside so reports of a possible deal the first such deal of its kind we know what the pro-government

alliance wants and they want a surrender and this is since they they launched this bombing campaign over a month ago. the israeli military has confirmed for the first time a bomb the suspected nuclear reactor in syria eleven years ago it's released previously classified cockpit video of the airstrike mediators during two thousand and seven israel's intelligence minister says it should be a warning to iran that it won't be allowed to develop nuclear weapons. it's been a week the people of facebook would prefer to forget revelations of a major data breach of its users have eroded trust left politicians on both sides of the atlantic fuming and ham of the company's stock price now the social networking giants boss mark zuckerberg is going to speak within the next twenty four hours we're told that four days after the company at the center of it all cambridge analytical is accused of gaining unauthorized access to fifty million facebook users mike hanna has more from washington. the senate intelligence

committee is holding a hearing on capitol hill in the course of the stay weather permitting that is in which it will be investigating election security now as part of this hearing that wants to speak to senior tech officials from the social media companies in particular the founder of facebook mark zuckerberg who is companies in the midst of a massive scandal in terms of its providing data to an analytical company but it's not mark zuckerberg whereabouts not clear at this moment at the space book had an internal meeting in the course of tuesday night the chief operating officer sheryl sandberg or mark zuckerberg himself were present at that meeting and certainly a great degree of public discomfort facebook shares have been slashed on the stock exchange there's also investigations being launched by new york state as well as new jersey and the financial trade commission is now restarting an investigation

that it ended when facebook gave assurances about the security of data and services a few years ago and both the u.s. and the u.k. are investigating the data breach accusations what we have seen in cambridge analytical of the allegations are clearly very concerning as is absolutely right that they should be properly investigated it's right that the information commissioner is doing exactly that because people need to have confidence in how their personal data is being used and i would expect facebook cambridge analytic and asians involved to comply fully with the investigation that's taking place. let's cross now to nadine bomber who joins us live now from london so in a deme have as anyone been able to gain access to the offices of a cambridge analytical. hasn't so far they have no it's been quite a while now on monday evening local time britain's information commissioner said

that she would be seeking a warrant to get into the building behind me cambridge analytic his london headquarters. no it just after that it emerged that. officials or individuals working for facebook had managed to get in then they were asked to leave by the information commissioner and they did so but it. now very unclear when in fact a warrant will be issued so that the information commissioner's colleagues will be able to get in and have a look at the servers at cambridge analytical here many people saying that term it's been far too long questioning in fact the powers that the or forties have here to get things done at the same time we've been hearing from the man who set up the out which were created specifically for facebook back in twenty fourteen he says that cambridge analytical came to him and asked him to devise this method of

effectively gaining access to people's private data through a survey. a personality survey which was taken by he says two hundred thousand people but which led to cambridge analytic or big able to access the data of thirty million individuals in the us he says he has no idea what or he had no idea what the company wanted to do with that information but he says they and facebook are now scapegoating him and he was told back then that everything was legal. that everybody knew it was for a commercial venture and that he didn't get paid himself so there have been questions about his role he's now pushing back saying that he did nothing wrong as of course have facebook and cambridge analytical and we heard there from the british prime minister a little earlier nadine but what's what's been the general reaction from u.k.

politicians there. while i think it two pounds on which side of the house of commons you sit on if you like because although to resume a did give her backing to an investigation calling the allegations very concerning there have been questions that pointed out her party the conservative party in parliament of the last couple of hours by the scottish national party their leader in westminster has claimed that a director of cambridge analytical gave around one million u.s. dollars to the conservative party some people now are calling for a full disclosure or at least an investigation into the links between the campaign for bracks it back in twenty sixteen and cambridge analytical error on banks world known businessmen in britain who put in the millions of his own money into getting

people to vote to leave the e.u. notably through the leave dot e.u. campaign has gone on the record to say that he did work with cambridge and the latika although he says that everything was perfectly legitimate so perhaps they'll be questions asked on that front in the days to come. generally i think all of the parties do want more pressure put on the tech firms mark zuckerberg himself has been ordered to appear in front of a parliamentary committee and they want him to commit to do that by next monday it's not clear whether he will do so but that committee has said that so far facebook have been misleading in what they've told the committee over how they deal with data retention. that they want they want far higher level representatives of the company to come forward and say exactly what they know the dean barber life first there in london thanks dean and also more still ahead here

on a.g.r. when we come back we're late for the families of one hundred nine children ducted by pop bottle almost all of them on alcohol. and me amas first civilian president in more than half a century quits we'll look at where he ranks in importance. welcome back across central southern china and taiwan the weather conditions are looking dry and fine at the moment and the same goes for much of indo china that annoys should be fine maybe the odd shower into parts of laos but otherwise it's all looking good here and it stays that way as we move through into friday slots not do well here let's instead move across into south asia or again is largely fine clear of cloud in sri lanka spite of cloud up across northern parts of pakistan india but

that's clearing away taking that rain and snow with it so fine conditions for both delhi and crunchy temperatures there into the low thirty's elsewhere looking pretty hot no one poor hundred by all in the upper thirty's so moving the forecast through into friday fine conditions prevail katmandu should be dry then appalled temperatures into the mid twenty's here in the arabian peninsula temperatures just continue to rise around the gulf states thirty three in doha despite a fairly brisk beginning to pick up during the course of the day temperatures still thirty two degrees as he had through into friday you notice mecca pushing the forty degree mark now as we head up into the region we've got fine conditions around the caspian sea twenty three in tehran and should be a woman and bite out in iraq with highs here of thirty. the scene for us there on line what is apparent that peace is possible but.

not because the situation is. or if you join us on sat. between. eating this is a dialogue i want to get in one more comment because this is someone who is close to the story join the global conversation at this time on al-jazeera. and again you're watching a reminder of our top stories this hour the latest suicide bomb blast in afghanistan has killed at least twenty nine people including teenagers in kabul university celebrating the start of the persian new year. at least twenty two

people mostly children and killed in a russian air strike in syria's district. white helmet says they were killed leaving their school in a village. u.s. media reports say facebook boss mark zuckerberg will speak out within the next twenty four hours four days after a major data breach was revealed the company at the center of it cambridge analytic is accused of gaining an authorized access to fifty million facebook users. in northern nigeria boko haram fighters have freed all but nine of the one hundred ten girls abducted from their school last month members of the reportedly dropped the girls in the center of the northeastern town of dashi early wednesday morning where some of in germany it has the latest. these are parents and relatives of some of the hundred and ten girls who were kidnapped they've been anxiously waiting for weeks to find out what happened to their children who are on fighters took them last month from their school and up the town in northeastern nigeria ninety one

goals seem a lot more than let me just now i can say even. my many of the. goals of the future that led to the least was being done not to drop in one things along the line up on the road. and. they went back was not directed at various houses have not been asked. to come. to the girls were checked for physical and psychological trauma before security forces and our parents to meet them last month of zero spoke to some who managed to escape and many others including the elder sister of these girls were kidnapped it's hard for them to skip the pain of not knowing where their sister is and also the fear they could have been taken as well there's an isa islands at the girls' school and men dressed in military fatigues entered the school and took the girls away in their truck. and since then there have been media reports that some of the girls may have

died this isn't the first time school girls have been abducted. there was an international outcry in two thousand and fourteen when more than two hundred seventy girls were kidnapped from two broke many have still not been found. nigerian forces have not declared the details of the deal under which these latest girls were released the government made it clear that it would negotiate with the kidnappers rather than use military force. of. nigeria and its allies have been fighting boko haram in the lake chad region for years but brazen kidnapping and drop off of victims indicates that the group is far from being defeated saddam and joey the others there. are police in the u.s. state of texas say the suspect in a series of possible bombings has killed himself they identified him as a twenty five year old white male but says the motive behind the blast is unclear john hendren reports from austin. the confrontation with the main suspect ended as

dramatically as it began police cornering ben firing on him in a hotel car park as he tried to drive away then a deadly detonation police say the twenty four year old man set it off killing himself as members of the austin police department swat team approached the vehicle the suspect detonated a bomb inside the vehicle knocking one of our swat officers back and one of our swat officers fired at the suspect as well he had been a person of interest seen on video and mentioned by witnesses police knew his car the bombs had no set patterns some were random some were targeted five hundred federal state and local police are still scrambling to unravel three mysteries are there other bombers other other bombs waiting to explode and why he did it for weeks austin has been a city on edge the mysterious bombs in the state capital city killed two people and injured four others people are scared. you will be too. you know random package of

explosives. for no reason i'd be scared to on tuesday another package exploded at a courier distribution center in the city of shirts near san antonio f.b.i. agents say a sixth package was sent to a separate fed ex depot police say the eventual destination of that package was an address in austin brian jaime's and sixty other employers of a courier company were evacuated after an unexploded bomb was found here giving police potentially valuable clues to give me. that bag and in soon as i set it down and explode then i go in sort of the truck goes and then that truck is full of the other trucks full of gas and diesel and the whole fedex to senate is all destroyed and everybody strapped in their you scared now not scared not since the attacks by the so-called unabomber ted kaczynski in one nine hundred ninety five have police faced a spree like it now police will continue to search for any other devices he may

have left behind in trying to find out what his motive was john hendren al-jazeera austin texas. a police officer in the u.s. state of minnesota has been charged with demurred with murder for shooting an unarmed australian woman last july one hundred nor shot forty year old justin damon while responding to a nine one one call about a possible sexual assault near her house prosecutors say he abused his authority to use deadly force. russia's foreign ministry says britain may have orchestrated the nerve agent attack on a former double agent britain accuses the kremlin of poisoning surrogates cripple and his daughter two weeks ago twenty three russian diplomats were expelled from the u.k. on tuesday russia is also expelling british diplomats for ok on tuesday russia is also expelling british diplomats from moscow laurie chalons has more from moscow. what a rather interesting event has been going on in moscow this afternoon

a roomful of ambassadors or dorell representatives invited to the foreign ministry to basically hear the russian perspective on this case now as outlined by who's the head of the russian foreign ministries departments of arms nonproliferation and control essentially russia is being accused hysterically of something none of the versions that have been heard from the u.k. he says would stand criticism there are two options as he put it either u.k. or thirty's around able to protect against terrorist acts on their own territory or they've directed this attack themselves against the russian cities and they said there's no third option we see he said that the u.k. authorities are becoming more and more nervous and it's easy to see why the clock is ticking and they've driven themselves into a corner this is a blatant the framed illegal adventure of russia has nothing to do with this it's

interesting to compare this sorts of events with similar things that happened in the aftermath of the mh seventeen disaster when a passenger jet was shot out of the sky over eastern ukraine ams of course what happens just after the concha coom gas attack in syria and now in both of those situations there were similar briefings given in this kind of panel format. where people were invited to hear russia's version of what had happened and that it was nothing to do with russia it's been billed as the world's largest free trade area and it might soon be a reality forty four african nations have signed the pact to establish the continent's first free trade deal which would allow unrestricted movement of people goods and capital cross the continent but it doesn't include africa's most populous country nigeria mohammed atta has more from kigali. this is a huge deal for africa african leaders have for the past forty years been talking

about more trade between african countries and today with the i get them and the process has begun where the free trade area is being published it's a very long process riddled with challenges it will begin with there are terrific kishan of the agreement in individual countries thoughts find it this will involve negotiations with trade unions and the private sector in every country to ensure that all sectors that are very crucial to the success of these agreements on board the absence of nigerian president mamadou bahati of the signing ceremony is on everyone's lips saying that there are some countries the first feel i'm convinced that they will do well with the agreement so that also needs to be taken care of by the you secretary it's in the coming months and years it's going to take

a long time before these comes into being but the idea is to bring africa's one point two billion people with a combined u.d.p. or two point five two billion dollars on the one market and that is where africa seems to be headed for now or the president of the animal has resigned following months of health ten chowders a trusted advisor leader aung sang suu cheek france louis has more. precedents in myanmar are meant to be both the head of state and the government but not to he knew the role would be largely ceremonial when he was appointed two years ago the rail is wielded by all. who led her party the national league for democracy or n l d to victory at the general election in two thousand and fifteen months but the constitution which was written when the military was in charge barred from becoming president so she created a more powerful role for herself state council and made the president

a figurehead well i don't think this is going to have a huge impact on the country in the way that it is a primarily ceremonial position of power in the country is very. moderate she senior general and those are the few major centers of power and the president is just that sounds an. active role in policy discussions who's had heart problems in the past has been suffering from health for several months but his resignation which takes effect immediately comes months after he called for constitutional reform a sensitive topic for myanmar's military leader the constitution reserves powerful positions in government for offices. resignation coincides with increasing international criticism of the real crisis nearly seven hundred thousand russian jeff fled last year's military crackdown described by the u.n.

as a textbook example of ethnic cleansing the government denies persecuting the muslim minority. the constitution says a new leader should be elected within seven working days much of this has been decided and choreographed in advance we we anticipate that the current speaker of the parliament. close ally and michael. will be nominated as the next president and that should happen within the next couple of days. first vice president. who was appointed by the military leadership is acting president until a successor is named florence lee. and you can find much more on our website to. get a round of then of our top stories a suicide bomb blast in afghanistan has killed at least twenty nine people they

include teenagers from kabul university celebrating the start of the persian new year. at least twenty two people mostly children have been killed in a russian and striking syria's italy brewster rescue group the white helmet says they were killed while leaving their school in a village. in northern nigeria fighters have freed all but nine of the one hundred ten girls abducted from their school last month members of the group before to be dropped the girls in the center of the northeastern town of early wednesday morning . a menu of the. goals and of the you don't like somebody at least one person one wants to drop in one please along the line on the road. and . they went back. to the prince house is now been asked. to come in to visit to the police say the suspect behind

a series of possible bombings in the u.s. state of texas blew himself up as pollution police moved in to arrest him they were identified him as a twenty four year old. white male would say the motive behind the blasts is unclear but at least six explosions that killed two people and injured several others earlier this month. u.s. media reports facebook's chief executive mark zuckerberg will finally break his silence over the data breach of millions of users have been calls for an investigation in both the u.s. and the u.k. that's after revelations that people's personal data on facebook was misused by the political consultancy firm cambridge analytical forty four countries have signed africa's first free trade deal it allows unrestricted movement of people goods and capital cross the common continent but doesn't include the most populous country nigeria the aim of the deal signed in rwanda is to become the largest free trade area in the world myanmar's president in child has announced he is stepping down

in a statement on facebook char said he wanted to take a rest from his work vice president is filling his position until a new president is selected those are the headlines we're back with more after the strain. of the benefit of saddam people so see. documentaries that open your eyes at this time on al-jazeera. hi emily could be aired here in the streamed live on al-jazeera and you tube today what does the future hold for ethnic russian non citizens of the baltic states meant tensions with moscow.