torrance a victim on al-jazeera. a mixed reception for robert mugabe as he cost his vote in zimbabwe's first election in decades where he is not a candidate turnout is high for looks to be a close race between the current president and his much younger chamisa. a low i maryanne demasi in london you're with al-jazeera also coming up four million people are left off a citizens' list in india's asked am state leaving them in fear of being detained or deported. fresh from making up with ethiopia eritrea as president agrees to mend relations with somalia. and thousands more free their homes in northern california

as two wildfires combine. well there's just an hour left for zimbabweans to cost their ballots in an election that could bring major change to the country it's the first time in nearly forty years that former president robert mugabe is not a candidate the ninety four year old came out to vote in the capital harare saying he's supporting the opposition candidate nelson chamisa not his former ally amisom and gaga hundreds of thousands of people have been turning out to make that choice sixty percent of those at a jubal to vote on the age of fifty observers say the election has been very smooth in some places but totally disorganized in others as well as deciding who should be the next president voters are also electing to. hundred ten members of zimbabwe's

parliament and nine thousand local councillors twenty three people are running for president but in reality it's a two horse race between the incumbent zanu p.f. amisom and gaga and leader of the opposition movement for democratic change nelson chamisa when i was an ally of robert mugabe for decades until the former president sacked him prompting the coup that then so mugabe ousted and installed in his place now is a young lawyer and pastor who replaced opposition still was morgan chang after his death in february he's proof popular among young people particularly in the cities and on sunday he received an unlikely endorsement from no other mugabe himself let's go live to harm with tasm who's in harare tell us more about the atmosphere there and of course turnout in the election today. well generally they've been long lines outside polling stations all day across the

country and the official of the commission have said they've been some issues here and there but they say the voting went smoothly the e.u. election observer mission said the problems they saw at some of the polling stations this is too early to tell whether it's the just to call issues or is deliberate what they're going to do now is meet other election observers compare notes and then make some kind of statement in a few days' time the bobbins know that if the international community doesn't endorse these elections and say they were free fair and credible then all that talk about investors coming to the country may not happen and most people who are voting were young and unemployed they really want the economy to recover the really want jobs and they need these elections to be endorsed by everyone especially international community tell us more about the type of change people want to see what they want from this election her. everything it's about the economy this election is different from the past because right now

you know you probably be talking about the number of people who have been assaulted and beaten the number of people who've been killed in elections but it's a different election people seem free and the opposition are saying they feel it's a little bit more democratic and they hope that the votes won't be tampered with but people want to really deal with the economy when i say young people who are unemployed waiting in line they have so much hope some of them have university degrees and they can't get work because factories and businesses have been closed for nearly two decades partly because of the policies so while some of them aren't too happy that a muslim and god what is running some are saying let's give them a chance he says will be different from a globalist give him a chance others are saying no it's time for a complete change and the only person who can bring that change is a young leader nelson chamisa the main opposition leader but analysts say it's going to be a close race is too early to tell who's going to win. thank you very much for the latest from hari haram the task of there and joining me live now is charles lowry director and head of politics at u.k.

consulting firm various maple croft is also the author of the land reform deception political opportunism in zimbabwe's land sea air and thank you very much for coming in to speak to us so this is a historic election it was quite remarkable to see pictures of former leader robert mugabe of voting in an election when he's completely out of it of the political landscape what are your thoughts on the way voting has gone so far today the way the election has been conducted indeed it's historic election both parties have an enormous amount to lose if we look first at zanu p.f. they need to demonstrate that they can hold a free and fair election they need to demonstrate that if they are indeed a new party that this is the kind of party that they are meaning a law abiding party so far the election has gone smoothly but i would add that we weren't anticipating a lot of violence this time so this is an election that was probably outwardly going to be violence free i think it's behind the scenes what really counts in the

selection what do you mean it's for the form of god were to invite you and us observers the first time in sixteen years that that's happened it's extremely unlikely that state security agents would then act violently towards voters but there are many ways that elections can be tipped so it's incumbent on all voters of people carrying cell phones and observing not just officials actually looking at the elections to see whether the subtleties of the election where the ballot papers go to what degree the election overall is free and fair not just whether violence and of course that is crucial to the plan for zimbabwe to be reintegrated into the global economy and to attract that foreign investment is crucial for this election to be seen as legitimate by the international community the response so far from observers has. been somewhat mixed they said that it seems to be fine in certain areas but there's a lot of disorganization in other places and i think that's again not necessarily

the sign of something to be concerned about zimbabwe has a poor record of holding free and fair elections it's also logistically a major undertaking for a country with the scarce resources that it has available so i think it's too early to tell whether some level of disorganization is the sign of nefarious conduct or indeed just a sign that a better organization would have improved the performance. we just seeing some images of him then now has been very vocal in the last twenty four hours he is he's turned his back on his zanu p.f. party and on his former colleague anderson the one god why he is throwing his support behind nelson chamisa no surprises there no surprises but there's no doubt that someone congress moment to see robert mugabe voting for the opposition m.d.c. particularly given his history in and how he has coped with the party. again he has no choice but to reject sauna p.f. or off to the events that led to his back in november i would add as well i'm not

sure whether chamisa would feel that this is a a beneficial endorsement will not help or hindrance or chat some more later thank you very much for sharing your thoughts with this child's lowrey well now south africa's high court has overturned a decision to grant diplomatic immunity to zimbabwe's former first lady grace mccarthy she was accused of assaulting a woman with an electrical cord in the johannesburg hotel last year it was given to media immunity by south africa's government following the alleged incident which allowed her to evade prosecution and return to zimbabwe but judges have now quashed that decision saying it was inconsistent with its constitution. well now to mali where the government says attacks by gunman on the violence disrupted around a fifth of polling stations during sunday's election in the northern city of kid our fighters fired water around one polling station down the less present and bring

him to congratulate voters on a successful election day saying the credibility of the elections hadn't been affected results in june about a week and is hoping to win a second term. around four million residents of the northern indian state risk of losing their citizenship the government has published a register of citizens and to be included people must prove they came to india by the twenty fourth of march one thousand nine hundred seventy one this is two days before bangladesh declared independence which led to hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing to india many of them settling in assam say to officials there are telling the new foreigners they won't be deported but security has been stepped up to prevent any violence against them. reports india has tightened security across the northern state of which borders bangladesh thousands of bengali speaking muslims are worried about being sent to detention centers or deported. they sent me

to jail without even listening to me. the state's new registry wants to identify people who entered india after the bangladesh pakistan war in one thousand seventy one. the names of four million people from the state's thirty two million residents are missing from the new draft of a citizens' registry is regarded as very high cigar it is or it is very surprising it is unbelievable because they are his nose. are you legal infiltrators in our prime minister nuri and remote his government has pledged through move what it calls foreigners from us some state officials say people can appeal to have their names on the list hard because you claim every person whose name has not been included in the draft citizens' list will have many opportunities to object if you make a claim those whose names appeared on the revised registry are overjoyed and relieved at santa and felt really good saying that the names of my family members have been

included in the national registry of citizens those whose names are not on the registry continue to worry they fear if the uncertainty continues they might face deportation or risk becoming stateless culture dirge on al-jazeera. eritrea and somalia have signed an agreement has damaged diplomatic relations the latest store in the horn of africa or off to ethiopia and eritrea and investigative war well somalia in eritrea well once close with somali dictator. backing eritrea and its long fight for independence from ethiopia but when war broke out between eritrea and ethiopia somalia effectively became the site of a proxy war in recent years eritrea has backed al-shabaab who launched deadly attacks throughout somalia with the aim of overthrowing the government now its pledged support to support somalia's sovereignty and the government's efforts to restore the country's rightful stature. well somalia's president has been in the

eritrean capital s lara since saturday his visit is a reflection of how diplomacy in the region has been transformed since if his leader reached out to eritrea during a banquet with the somali president eritrea's president said in a pack of crisis conflict and stability was coming to an end but according to matt bryden chairman of the of a political think tank covering the horn of africa repression one could also be a result of somalia's deteriorating relationship with the u.a.e. relations are especially suspended since somalia confiscated almost ten million dollars. funding was a sense of the for its embassy in move to sure and for the payment of troops and the u.a.e. suspended its military operation program with this. and it's seen by most disher as being a country rather or government that supports the regional or federal member states in somalia who are to be at odds with the federal government. still ahead for you

on the program death of democracy cambodia's main opposition party plans its next move after being banned from taking part in sunday's election. and still no answers as investigators report back on the missing malaysia airlines flight m h three seventy. hello and welcome back it remains fairly wet across parts of indochina see the massive cloud showing up on our charts certainly across parts of me amar's very wet lot of showers coming off the bare bangle still house where we've got to heavy showers of bangladesh we've got a few showers for hong kong but really across much of eastern china the weather conditions aren't too bad at all up towards shanghai fine with temperatures there in the mid thirty's not a great deal of change heading on through into wednesday annoyed like to see some

heavy downpours across into south asia and here is really across more northeastern areas that we're seeing the heaviest of the rain out the moment see expected to continue you see some of the rainfall totals that we've had across eastern parts of india and bangladesh and thus where the concentration of rain is that circulation of low pressure one in kolkata should be dry and brighter in delhi karate should be largely fine by looking good as you get further south down through parts the western ghats would likely see some heavy showers moving in here choose day and on into wednesday across and. got a bit of a breeze which is keeping the humidity relatively low for the gulf states so look at my some here in doha of forty two degrees on choose day pleasantly woman the other side the potential highs of forty expected to medina. ethiopia's economy has grown at

a foster rate than any other african country. that sirens were heard here is that gives you an indication of just how close the fighting is groundbreaking documentary debates and discussion just six months ago we were to bring people who . shall be willing programs take you on a journey around the globe. on al-jazeera. welcome back a quick reminder of the top stories now polls close show in zimbabwe's election the first since robert mugabe was ousted as president is expected to be a close race between the opposition candidate nelson chamisa and the incumbent

a muslim and i gotta mali's government says attacks by gunmen or other violence disrupted around a fifth of polling stations during sunday's presidential election. and some four million undocumented muslims in the northern indian state of risk of losing their citizenship after being left off a new government. well now to cambodia where the ruling party says it's won a landslide victory in sunday's election but the vote was overshadowed by the lack of a viable rival of the main opposition party was banned from running while in hey reports now from the capital phnom penh. cambodia is election was held under normal circumstances the victory celebrations here instead the headquarters of the dissolved cambodian national risky party is empty. fearing a wrist most party leaders are outside cambodia where they watched in dismay and sadness at sunday's election being conducted without them.

history the ruling cambodian people's party of prime minister who won the election easily up to having the main opposition dissolved and its leader arrested it's fair to say that this is now a one party authoritarian state it's the end of cambodia after the paris peace agreements it's like i said a whole new bad cambodia the production visions of what the group was going. to. talk about what to do the day after the vote when sand was beaming as he greeted one of the main so-called independent election monitors is. the band opposition is running out of options to try to bring about political change and isn't ruling out supporting peaceful protests that may be a last difficult resort. as the prime minister has tightened his grip on power he's

become increasingly intolerant of protests behind this huge wall is what used to be freedom a high profile does ignited protest sites in the heart of the city. the government closed it after it became the focal point of opposition protests following the disputed two thousand and thirteen election which was almost won by the cambodian national rescue party. protests are almost always ended with violence from security forces the c.n.r. p. leaders say cambodians have been let down by their government and others we are calling the international community the obligation of the special relation. to the paris peace accord to respect the boys to. the paris peace accord signed in one nine hundred ninety one state that cambodia must have a liberal multi-party democracy. the election showed there is now just one party

wayne hay al jazeera phnom penh. the lead investigator into the missing malaysia airlines flight m h three seventy says he called to exclude the possibility of foul play or hijack the plane disappeared on its way from kuala lumpur to beijing in two thousand and fourteen with two hundred thirty nine people on board. a long awaited independent report says it was probably deliberately diverted and flown for more than six hours after communication was severed but investigators say they are still unable to determine the cause. not the fear that you could have been an event to buy into hundreds but had the same time we cannot deny the fact that there was an atom but we cannot deny the fact that as yet another life the systems men need to know with intent or otherwise so we

feel that there is also one possibility that could account for all these young the ruling or any possible we're just saying don't know what we do we cannot exclude the possible the awful the person or party or unlawful interference. hundreds of hikers in indonesia are making their way down a mountain where they've been trapped since sunday's earthquake officials say some of them suffered light injuries and were traumatized but most were in good condition the earthquake caused landslides on the mountain which blocked all of the skate routes a magnitude six point four earthquake killed sixteen people and destroyed more than a thousand homes on the tourist island of long walk rising floodwaters have forced tens of thousands of people from their homes in myanmar at least five people have been killed as heavy monsoon rains continue to hit the meek on region while fifty four thousand people have been displaced evacuation orders have also been issued in several areas counties have been set up by officials for people in the south and

eastern and central parts of the country. firefighters in california ah gaining ground as wildfires sweep across the state officials are saying they've managed to contain about seventeen percent of the car fire the largest and deadliest of ninety five as car in bunning left six people dead and forced woman thirty eight thousand to flee their homes. has more now from the destroyed town of keswick the entire community of keswick california has been turned to ash nothing remains it want slightly little town of about seven hundred people now resemble something like a faraway planet from a science fiction movie the fire that roared through here was described as a tornado of flames there was nothing firefighters could do to stop it the way that front fire front was coming through it was going to do what it wanted to do we might be able to say one little spot here but the risk would have been we'll just

going to try to even be anywhere near there in what remains are the remnants of people's lives there are small signs of life here like the burnt pages of this children's book it's silent there isn't a sound there's still a mandatory evacuation zone residents aren't being allowed back. only the occasional emergency vehicle passes by ironically the only color remaining in town a red fire hydrant that was no match for the flames it's the middle of the day but the sun can barely be seen because it's so gray and dark here the sun can barely peek out through that thick layer of smoke and ash that covers the air not only fear but in this entire region of california doctors say people that inhale the smoke now face health risks. by all accounts everyone here was able to flee just

before the fire overtook them the residents are mostly low income the future of the historic town is now in doubt i don't know if they'll have the resources to rebuild if i hope it goes and we have insurance have the opportunity with those who don't know it's. a low income type of area so i'm not sure that a lot of people will be able to rebuild. if they decide to rebuild it will be a new town because the old one simply no longer exists gabriels on. keswick california well gabriel joins us live now from shasta county california gabriel what's it like that. well it's still pretty grim here i mean firefighters say that they're starting to get the upper hand on this fire but you can really still see the remnants that will be charred remains of this fire that will be here for many weeks months and years to come as you can see

this is just another community that we're at just outside of keswick there that story was that we filmed at and you know if we can show these images all day of these burned out homes and it's really can credibly sad but it's also a reminder that these are people's lives people that lived here in some cases many decades people that are now with family friends in other parts of the state or are living in shelters nearby most of them don't want to talk to the media at this point they just want their privacy but i can tell you that even though the flames are gone here as we said from that story you can still see that the smoke is hovering over this area here it's well after nine am local time and the sun is still not appearing because there's just so much smoke here in the area so the situation still very grim a lot of restaurants in the area closed a lot of schools still closed this is going to be a fire that the people of northern california will not forget any time soon as soon

as firefighters are done with this fire and they've got it fully contained in the coming days they'll have to move on to other fires that are burning throughout the state indeed there are more fires out flat what do we know about the situation in the rest of the state. yeah there are there are actually seventeen major fires that are burning in the state of california right now since most of them in northern california but there's another one about two hours south of where we're at right now and another big one in central california that's actually shut down the famous yosemite national park that's a national park that's world renowned it's has four million visitors a year there are many international tourists the park is shut down because there are fires around there that are threatening the park so for precautionary reasons they've shut down the main road there it's the first time they've shut down yosemite for a fire danger since nineteen ninety so this is an incredibly bad fire season here

in california are officials are blaming it on very high temperatures here it was in the last few days over forty degrees celsius also very strong winds in the part of california that have pushed fires and made them move much faster than normal especially this fire here and there also a lot of people saying they're just seeing changes in climate as well with dry dry temperatures they're saying this could be one of the worst fire seasons in california in decades thank you very much from shasta county california. when all the developments the italian prime minister is in washington for talks with the u.s. president in the last few minutes donald trump has welcomed giuseppe conti to the white house today does have very similar views on immigration they're expected to speak about that as well as trade which has been a source of tension between the u.s. and europe lately alan fischer joins us live now from the white house so these two

leaders appear to have quite a bit in common allen does that mean they're likely to get along. who knows what donald trump i mean what we do know is that donald trump is looking for friends in europe and he doesn't have a lot of them at the moment but he's seeing in the italian government a spiritual alignment because of course you remember that it was elected on the wave of popular support and popular anger it should guarded as populist its positions reflect a lot of what donald trump campaign dawn it is anti immigrant it is you know a skeptic is in favor of closer ties with russia and less demonizing of blood in me or putin you'll remember that when donald trump called full of blood to me a putin and russia to be readmitted to the g. seven to become the g. eight the one voice that said that's a good idea was the italian voice as well so with all of those things coming

into focus then perhaps don't trump will see he has perhaps got someone that he can do business with you remember the the slogan that the largest party in the italian coalition was elected on was of course talian so far so donald trump will like the idea he'll be flattered by the idea that someone almost copied his template to get elected in europe they do have a lot of ground to cover the go to talk about trade and the position of the e.u. donald trump is keep keeps telling is that things there need to get better they will talk about links with russia they will talk about the growth in the power of the e.u. and certainly they will talk about the uterus although the italians have backed away from what they were seeing in me when they said look we think that a pillar of the euro that tight the markets in europe for twenty four forty eight hours until he said this isn't going to happen any time soon so that certainly helped things there so they've got a lot to cover a lot of ground to talk about donald trump is going to open himself up to questions

is going to be a news conference at the end of this visit that will be interesting for two reasons when they go into the oval office we will see. if you will accept questions you'll remember just last week when a reporter from an american network asked questions don't trump ignored them and then banned that reporter from the subsequent news conference or the subsequent gathering in the rose garden because he said they were disrespectful so will he take questions this time around and when it comes to questions in the news conference is going to be interesting because i don't suspect many of them are going to be this relationship with the italians and trade what they are going to talk about probably the fact that his former campaign chief poehlman afford to go on trial in virginia on tuesday and also whether or not he's serious when he put out a tweet at the weekend saying he's willing to force a shutdown of the government to make sure that he gets funding for his border wall something the senior republicans have said we're a minute we're not getting into that area just yet because of course at this time

of year you go to start looking at everything through the prism of midterm elections which come in november so it will be interesting to see what questions he gets how you respond to those and whether or not your response to any question is that our show today out in new york or first from the t.v. pool that is there are plenty to watch for thank you very much alan fischer with a preview of that meeting between the u.s. president and the italian leader. just a quick reminder of the top stories now not long to go until of aces is in for voters in zimbabwe to cast their ballot in the first election without robert mugabe for almost forty years ago came out saying he's supporting the opposition candidate nelson chamisa and not his successor and former ally and someone gaga. is in the capital harare. well generally they've been long lines outside polling stations all day across the country and there's the fisher there's the bobby difficult mission

have said they've been some issues here in there but they say the voting went smoothly the e.u. election observer mission see the problems they saw at some of the polling stations this is too early to tell with its logistical issues or is deliberate what they're going to do now is meet other election observers compare notes and then make some kind of statements in a few days time mollie's government says attacks by gunmen or other violence disrupted around a fifth of polling stations during sunday's presidential election in the northern city of fighters fired mortar rounds at one polling station counting is underway with results in about a week. millions of undocumented muslims in the northern indian state of a summer risk of losing messages and ship the government says this is it citizens must prove they came to india by the twenty fourth of march nine hundred seventy one which rules out the mass exodus of refugees who fled to india and bangladesh declared independence two days later eritrea and somalia have signed an agreement

to establish diplomatic relations off to ethiopia and eritrea ended their state of war during a banquet with the visiting somali president eritrea's leaders said an epoch of crisis conflict and instability was coming to an end and the lead investigator into the missing malaysia airlines flight m h three seventy says he can't exclude the possibility of foul play the plane disappeared on its way from kuala lumpur to beijing in two thousand and fourteen with two hundred thirty nine people on board. was the top stories are have more news for you know about twenty five minutes time a full bulletin so do join me then coming up next it's talk to al-jazeera.

you. see. the landmark conviction of. crimes and crimes against humanity by the international criminal court in the hague has now been overturned and mr bevan math can not feel criminally responsible. for the crimes committed by. operation. the former rebel leader and vice president of the democratic republic of congo has spent nearly a decade behind bars he was sentenced to eighteen years in prison up to sending his militia to the central african republic to help put down a coup attempt they conducted a.