operating base of u.s. central command i learned a lot leaving a bit and then we discussed all the issues of interest for our country's regional issues starting with the gulf cooperation council and the peace process in the middle east and america's top diplomat also visited jordan bihari in the u.a.e. egypt oh man will be his last destination after canceling a visit equate to a turned a family funeral kuwait's emir has played a crucial role in trying to mediate and to the blockade of qatar in june two thousand and seventeen saudi arabia u.a.e. barren and egypt cut off relations with doha accusing it of supporting armed groups a charge carter has strongly denied. or robbed mattson a joins us live now from moscow where pompei o. is now meeting with the omani officials there so rob well pompei are we taking the

same messages to amman in. i think it's very likely i think it's safe to assume that the secretary of state is going to be reinforcing the fact that the u.s. still intends to be part of the fight against extremism against eisel and of course reiterating that call for the members of the gulf the gulf cooperation council to stick together as hashem was talking about in the face of the blockade against khattala but it's the third element of this these messages that is most closely going to be paid attention to here in amman the u.s. has made no secret of the fact that it regards iran as a major destabilizing influence in the gulf and of course that is a view that is held by other gulf countries including of course saudi arabia the reason why that is going to be so important when the secretary of state is having those negotiations with omani officials is predominantly because of a man's geography just a few kilometers away to the east of there is the strait of hormuz and right in the

middle of the strait of hormuz is a maritime border but oman shares with iran to the west it has its western border again just a few kilometers away and it's shares that border with the united arab emirates and with saudi arabia and with yemen that means that oman has had decades to achieve a very carefully balanced diplomatic situation between several major players on either side of it which also means for trade purposes oman does business with iran and mine does business with saudi arabia yemen the u.a.e. and other arab countries further up the the western side of the gulf it does not want to rock that diplomatic boat but i was talking to a smilin tree and strategic analyst from university alley or on the softer noon he tells me that this is the closest that oman has come to being forced into taking

sides in any time that he can remember and oman does not want to rock that diplomatic boat it's going to be important for mando to try to retain some sort of middle ground whilst trying to make sure that everybody else around them is still happy with the decision they take. rob thanks for that rob math an inner muscat i speak now to educate a senior political analyst model on the shot and he joins me now on set so mark when we're coming to the end. of this middle east tour and now he was he was here to essentially clarify u.s. policy and to reassure key allies about u.s. policy here did he do that well we don't know what actually happens inside closed doors but from the tone at the outskirts of his of his journey in a speech in cairo it sounded quite. you know heavy on the stomach as it were. full of lecturing talking spoking act rather than engaging with arabs he wanted

to contrast positively with the speech made by president obama back then ten years ago he certainly failed utterly to do that to do so and in fact much of what he said was either vague or was inaccurate so really it's the whole trip started out at the loop point i think probably it has improved as he went on and start talking to various leaders in various arab countries where america theoretically historically has leverage among those countries you know jordan egypt the gulf countries these are what america calls the moderate friends in the arab world they are the closest countries to washington that's where they can exercise leverage and yet as we've seen in the last couple of days when you pass through the house and riyadh than i would not be that in fact the gulf crisis that should have been

resolved by a phone call from president trump is still not resolved eighteen months into its. beginning and when when when he was here when he was here in qatar yesterday he once again talked about the need for gulf nations to present this united front against iran nothing new there but is there a sense that things have kind of moved on from from this blockade against against qatar as far as it whether that will be resolved or not i think in terms of the by that the relations between washington and the ha certainly they've turned the corner they've even turned the page in the sense now that a year after the first dialogue took place in washington there's so much confidence in the deepening relations by that the relations you know with a huge surplus of trade in favor of the united states with huge investments coming tens of billions of dollars in the u.s.

economy and of course with having the bigger american base in the middle east in qatar. in addition to whole number of other agreements been signed so clearly not one in washington and the house being attention to what anyone thinking in cairo or a would be or riyadh about the bilateral relations and why washington thinks that everyone needs to get on board normalize relations back again with qatar and but i for be apologize for the blunder that was created eighteen months ago on thanks very much all right still ahead on edge zero when we come back nearly forty years on the run come to an end for an italian on revolutionary. i know that the clouds are gathering i have a policy of china once more we do have

a fair amount with us at the moment when it's the enough to give us a few light a outbreaks of rain but i think that rain will turn heavier as we head through wednesday so when say them most see some heavy downpours from the northern parts of it now all the way up towards we've had for the northern pauls weather system hits the cold air we see a lot of that turn to snow even further south it's not that warm now in hong kong with all maximum temperature just struggling to seventeen degrees and out towards the west is sri lanka where we have some of the worst of the weather recently this area of cloud has given us some very heavy downpours indeed plenty more showers are expected here as we head through choose day and into wednesday to further north it might be a little bit of cloud perhaps for the southern parts of india maybe one or two showers out of that but largely drop and in the fall north will see more cloud roll its way across is for wednesday and that's likely to give us a fair amount of snow across the arabian peninsula here we've got a fair amount of time with us to see it i reports of saudi arabia stretching up into iran in the north of that around the southern parts of iran the southwestern

parts that's where we're going to see a fair amount of rain from that system further south is likely to be just a little bit of grey weather a maybe the old spot of rain if you're unlucky the temperatures are rising once more into. how much more of it going to invest in the elusive notion that militaries guarantee our national security and poverty destitution and the sense of fun and this actually being at the heart of virtually every civil conflict in the last twenty years of him steiner head of the u.n. development program talks to al-jazeera.

and again you're watching are just a reminder of our top stories this hour the u.k. prime minister has made a last ditch plea to m.p.'s tobacco bragg's it deal before a key vote in parliament on tuesday to rescind me is warning if a plan to leave the e.u. is rejected gregg's it may not happen at all. he's foreign minister says his country will not shrink from threats by the u.s. president donald trump had tweeted he would devastate turkey's economy if its forces attacked kurdish fighters in syria. u.s. secretary of state might pompei was in our man for the last leg of his middle east war before that he met saudi the saudi king and crown prince in riyadh where they discussed the war in yemen and the importance of scaling back of. the

manner of the polish city of good danske has done it after he was stabbed on sunday . was attacked while on stage during a fundraising event at the attacker accuse the man's party torturing him while he was in prison. police in zimbabwe have fired tear gas at protesters angry about high fuel prices the cost of petrol and diesel more than doubled on sunday as president emerson mango goes government battles with crippling shortages that have seen motorists sleep in fuel queues or privilege more so than here he is in harare for a sense following the story so privileged these protests have been going on now in several cities we're. definitely. since morning early morning we hear there's been several incidents is in in all of this cities in zimbabwe particularly in harare the capital city and zimbabwe

like you see to blow i had already the central business district right now is deserted police if cleared to the streets people given us to go home you could see some people walking long distances to go home because transport is not up by local public transport is not operating from where i was where you went where witnessed police clashing with protesters in the east inside of airports yes there were clashes between the police with the protesters trying to be sikhs the police a police station in that city and there were a bit of some exits exchanges were just us throwing stones and our police had to retaliate and we saw some people who seem to have been short by a live bullets they some woman who lost her leg and the other gentleman that we

saw was short in the back and how much momentum is there for these protests to continue despite the tear gas and the water cannons. from the looks of things things that have come down at the moment you've been taught this seem to to to be some orchids of. approaches that are going on in different parts of the city but maybe if people heed to the core by this about the congress of trade unions we say that these demonstrations will be going on one monday tuesday and wednesday maybe we could also see protests going on tuesday and wednesday but for now things have seem to be calmed down particularly in central in the central business district where people have been cleared by the police could speak with privilege most fun here in

thanks for the update now at least fifteen people have been killed after a military plane crashed in iran it happened near fast airport just west of the capt to her on iranian state television says severe weather may have played a role it had been trying to make an emergency landing a second black box has been recovered from a lion air plane that crashed in indonesia in october the boeing seven three seven max plunged into the java sea shortly after takeoff from jakarta killing all one hundred eighty nine people on board divers found the cockpit voice recorder not far from the crash site investigators hope this will help piece together the final moments of the flight china's trade dispute with the united states is taking a toll on its economy exports of fall into their lowest point in two years while imports are also down the two countries are midway through a ninety day truce to find a solution to their trade war christina you reports now from beijing the

world's largest trading country has been trading in recent mass. according to china's customs administration exports fell by four point four percent in december while imports were at the lowest level since twenty sixteen concerns for the year ahead underlined at a news conference in beijing early in two thousand and nine the biggest hit the worry for china's foreign trade is through the complex and grim external environment uncertain and stable factors a stew numerous protectionism. from certain countries a rare in their heads. a slowdown in global demand and the continuing trade dispute with the united states are being blamed for the current predicament china finds itself in china and the us are midway through a ninety day truce in the tit for tat trade both which started last april a delegation from washington was invading last week to continue negotiations but

very few details from the meeting have so far been released with just over forty days left of the trade truce this seems to be still no solution in sight analysts say china's shrinking trade figures could be used by washington to increase pressure on beijing i think beijing clearly has the pressure there on your grocery store. the best of your shirts and restoring bastard concepts such as. national so i think a.j. clearly does that and i think you asked the. agent. here and they will put pressure because despite the lower figures china posted a record surplus in its trade with the united states last year with more than three hundred twenty billion dollars the largest in more than a decade that's a sore point for the u.s. and according to the trumpet ministration a major justification for its trade with china but the apparent good news there's

little to distract from china's cooling economy december's low trade figures follow a disappointing november when consumer spending also fell contributing to a gloomy economic start to twenty nineteen. al-jazeera. french president emanuel mccraw has launched a nationwide debate aimed at tackling the yellow vests protests in a letter published in french newspapers macross said he was open to ideas but warned he will not back down from his twenty seventeen election promises france has been hit by more than two months of yellow vest demonstrations which began over a fuel price hike a left wing italian activist convicted of murder and wanted for nearly four years has landed in rome has added but he still was arrested in bolivia on saturday his extradition is the result of cooperation between right wing political leaders in brazil and it's really more now from chad an agenda. his

story reads like a novel he might have penned himself chesser a but steep revolutionary convicted murderer and writer finally caught after forty years on the run down theone need known solo to be thought funny many is not only to relatives and to victims but he entire country were mortified by governments that were protecting a terrorist like but. it all began in the one nine hundred seventy s. when he belonged to an armed leftists group it wanted to bring down the toilet in government and in one thousand nine hundred eighty nine but he was jailed two years later he scaped and was convicted in absentia for the murders of four people including two police officers after living as a fugitive in france he fled to mexico but tiste later became a successful writer of crime novels before heading to brazil in two thousand and four he lived under the radar until he was arrested again in rio de janeiro in two thousand and seven but brazil's then president luis inacio lula da silva freed him

granting him asylum three years later. the country's new president gyre but also not pledged to extradite but he stayed during his campaign by the time judges ordered his extradition last month but tuesday was on the run again this time to bolivia he was caught by interpol on sunday bowl so narrow hill the arrest along with his son eduardo who tweeted brazil is no longer a land of bandits the little gift is coming then got through i thank those who make this change possible the new president of the brazilian republic. who took away the protect snow but tell us look there's. not a right and not an ideology just writing some newspapers you have the impression he's almost a philosopher a free thinker he was condemned by different italian courts to various life sentences because he personally took the lives of innocents he's a communist mudra that's all for me he will rot in jail for the rest of his life

but t.c. has always maintained his innocence saying he. scaped prisoner the one nine hundred eighty one because he believed he'd be tortured and killed almost four decades on he's now such a return to prison to begin serving a life sentence paltrow dirge on al jazeera. this is al jazeera let's get a round up of the top stories of prove my deal or risk no break that or the message in a last ditch attempt from the u.k. prime minister as she tries to convince m.p.'s to back her exit plan from the european union as before tuesday's vote in parliament she was speaking to factory workers in stoke on trent in england i've argued that the consequences of parliament rejecting it would be grave uncertainty potentially leading to one of two outcomes either a no deal for exit that would cause turbulence for our economy create barriers to

security cooperation and disrupt people's daily lives all the risk of no bricks at all for the first time in our history failing to implement the outcome of a statutory referendum and letting the british people down turkey's foreign minister says his country will not shrink from threats by the us president donald trump had tweeted he would devastate turkey's economy if its forces attacked kurdish fighters in syria turkey has been threatening a new cross border operation against the kurdish y p g forces in northern syria u.s. secretary of state mike compares in our mom on the last leg of his middle east tour he had met with the saudi king and crown prince in riyadh to discuss the war in yemen and scaling down operations there the mayor of the polish city of the dance because died after he was stabbed on sunday hubble at the moments was attacked while on stage during a fundraising event the attack accuse the mayor's party of torturing him while he

was in prison. french president emanuel mccraw has launched a nationwide debate and the tackling the yellow vests protests in a letter in french newspapers macross said he was open to ideas but warned he will not back down from his twenty seventeen election promises those are the headlines the news grid is here and a half an hour right now it's talk to al-jazeera and as always there's lots more on our website dot com get the latest there. shadowy financial operations are propping up north korea's economy hampering the elite and fueling the nation's missile additions. one on one east investigates north korea's secret money on al-jazeera. established in one thousand nine hundred sixty five the united nations development program works alongside u.n.

member states to create solutions. according to the u.n. conflict is the main driver of humanitarian needs followed by natural disasters overall more than one hundred thirty five million people worldwide are in need of humanitarian assistance and protection. and at least twenty five billion dollars is required to meet those challenges. but given the various crises faced by many countries is development even possible we will find out more from steiner the head of the u.n. development program talks al-jazeera. there's a complainer thank you very much for talking to al-jazeera alleged by asking about the un report published by the un d p which measures development in each country around the world according to your findings published for two thousand and eighteen the bottom five countries or burundi child south sudan central african republic.

all of those on africa why is the. well again it might be tending to say there is an african syndrome here but i would not advocate that i think each one of these countries is facing challenges central african republic essentially strife conflict and the falling apart of many of the structures that actually would sustain development in a country such as chad we have first of all the challenge that it is a vast country to this day central government services in education in health don't even reach a significant part of the population so we are essentially dealing with countries that either are still a very early stage or putting the basic infrastructure human but also into the services access to electricity health education in place and then you have countries that are really falling apart again over civil strife conflict or wars and unfortunately. a significant number of those countries still are falling on the

african continent joseph is going to be playing a part in it because there are those countries that were have similarities in the sense that they were former colonies or that they were maybe not so rich in the beginning or had their wealth maybe taken away like india for example which is doing a lot better in terms of development is why is it that in africa you're still finding that very slow development of not zero development is there a lack of interest is it because certain governments aren't paying attention is it more difficult to generate the reasons for the well let me can say i don't think there is a generic judgement on developing in africa we have countries such as nigeria ghana kenya south africa botswana. mozambique in the last ten years and these are success stories another one being run the governance reform investment in education development of infrastructure functioning markets and regulatory frameworks

accountability of government functioning parliaments those are the ingredients of success of developed. and you find them across africa as you would in other continents and let me also remind you that you know when we look at some disastrous development implosions there not only in africa the situation that we find in some countries in the middle east parts of central america. and even in parts of asia so there are countries with extreme poverty and i would simply say africa is a vast continent and one often forgets that if you take a map and compared to other parts of the world it is bigger than most people imagine and it is more than fifty countries so i would still say look at each african country in terms of its own reality and history and you will discover that there are different drivers that explain whether their success stories in development or perhaps failures when it comes to trying just of success is not obviously simply limits the true issue of resources corruption or bad governance

a key reason for lack of development is war and conflict in the three countries that have witnessed the steepest decline in development as you mentioned are actually in the middle east you're talking about syria libya and yemen all three are countries you witness protests calling for greater freedom and democracy in two thousand and eleven is what was then or later billed as the arab spring i want to start by yemen with yemen and it's been described as the worst humanitarian disaster of our time who is responsible for this. well let us begin with the fact that in every war there are at least two sides each one will blame the other it's not different in yemen i think from the perspective of a development program the united nations we go back to the root causes and much of what you just alluded to also in terms of the arab spring was in fact something that the united nations development program human development reports began to anticipate already at the time of the arab spring in the years before there was

a very often cited human development report that actually began to recognize the ingredients of what happens in societies in countries if political consensus is lost conflict becomes part of dividing communities where then i think the religious lines yes there are two sides but there's always maybe a more powerful site or more responsible side or something and by their side not necessarily one country or government but it could be even institutions and so forth if you're to maybe identify one of the main reasons or the drivers who is preventing maybe work to be done or which. kind of mechanisms need to exist in order for that crises to to end and for the development to begin again what would that be well first of all let us recognize that yemen has been a country a nation and has been challenged by geographical realities already for many decades

by different also tribal affiliations so there is within yemen. always a potential there for competition and conflict to also dominate national politics now into that kind of combustion situation come also regional perspectives i mean you know we are all very familiar with the kind of tensions that are now dominating the middle east and i think you have seen parties from different sides becoming engaged in yemen now the argument being that we are invited. we are asked to assist we are requested to provide support but at the end of the day let me go back to the root causes and most of the time when we end up in a conflict situation there are two drivers one there are development failures that lead to people losing either confidence in their government or confidence in the ability to trust other interest groups in the country and into that void or into

that tension come then geographical geopolitical interests from outside and this is the classic story of yemen and when you say it is the largest humanitarian disaster yes that is what the united nations is saying to the world week after week because what we are witnessing there is a catastrophe first and above all for the people of yemen but it is also a catastrophe in developmental terms this country is losing decades of the advancements that it had made on top of which we have the humanitarian emergencies so this is also why the secretary just non-stock home my colleague martin gryphus having putting so much pressure on all parties to come back to the table this conflict will never be solved by arms it can be solved by compromise and above all by reinvesting in what were the original causes for the conflicts that have driven the tensions within the country and beyond that in the region ok let's move on to libya it's an oil rich country it has

a very small population on paper it should be thriving really why is it not libya posed got off easy essentially was a political vacuum into that vacuum the forces that differentiate interests in the country began to organize themselves so today we have the remnants of a nation state with a central bank and an oil industry for example but we have no political consensus the governance system of libya essentially has imploded in that vacuum what we're witnessing right now is a. a continuous set of conflicts being used to establish an assert power control over certain parts of the country unfortunately some people are making a lot of money in this vacuum and therefore have little interest in allowing a national government structure and a democratic process to be restarted so this is the question i mean libya out of all the arab spring countries had a un resolution which allowed for international intervention if the united nations

is capable of passing these resolutions for intervention when there is this political vacuum as you say surely it should be the united nations stepping up to ensure that any roadmap or political consensus strategy is implemented rather than it saying well this isn't our responsibility leave it to one for however it is and when it unfolds badly as it has a libyan terms of armed conflict then the cost and burden on you is even greater because not only are you trying to fill a void but you're also trying to clean up the mess in the damage and destruction and kind of regression that has occurred as a result which is precisely why secretary antonio terra's continuously and repeatedly is advocating for the united nations to be recognized as a major force for prevention and not simply as a kind of global ambulance or fire service which we often not but let me also say my staff in the united nations development program but also of our sister agencies

are in libya today some of them at great risk to themselves working precisely to try and reestablish the conditions and which libya can become a nation state that is governed through a democratic process where its governance situations function again but our the limit has always been we cannot force a nation or its conflicting parties at gunpoint to exercise good governance and the rule of law now yes member states passed a resolution a whole series of political events took place what we're left with right now is a situation that i think all of us consider to. the fed the disastrous and into that void or into this chaotic situation very often the united nations is then asked to step in and perform miracles and it cannot do these miracles it needs international community and it needs to domestic parties to be willing to come to the table now it sometimes takes painfully long to get to that point but more often than not it does eventually happen i cite syria the third country there that war is

going on now for what seven more than seven years now and painfully is an essential with all the massacres and the destruction the entire infrastructure of the country is basically nonexistent anymore. and still people haven't come to the realisation that they need to find a political solution even though they've met and not for want of trying at least from the un's perspective what kind of work are you doing in syria right now or are you able even to do. well our ability to being engaged in syria is premised first of all on being able to operate across the country this already poses challenges right now because different forces obviously exercised different degrees of control our ability has been also partly constrained by many of the political tensions with the international community having said that you n.d.p. has been present in damascus throughout this period we are engaged in the collaboration with the humanitarian agencies and in particular to try to help

communities with emergency programs reestablishing basic services so that first of all those affected by the conflict have an ability to return or stay in the towns and villages and secondly for what is likely to be a growing number of people returning to the country to have something to return to now as of now there clearly is a challenge for any international agency because on the one hand those who are being asked to finance this are saying until a political settlement is found we do not wish to engage in reconstruction activities on the other hand everybody realizes that there are masses of people who could benefit from basic community rehabilitation schemes and ultimately have to help tens of thousands hundreds of thousand people to also wrist number said livelihood so in a sense we are in a whole position we were trying to help with the humanitarian emergency support we are looking at where we can already do some stabilization in

a particular with communities with very simple measures on the ground but until we have a political settlement in the country the work that you n.d.p. would do with syria is essentially very constrained you mentioned earlier. efforts by the surgeon general to transform the united nations in terms of making it more about prevention as well so not simply just fine. fighting don't you think that the countries that are doing the fighting in these conflicts syria yemen libya others around the world. that are responsible for the killing that are responsible for the destruction shouldn't they be made to pay for the development of those countries after that i mean obviously there's a political element of paying politically for what they've done but also paying financially and here are not only limiting it to those who are physically doing the fighting countries that use the regional countries that essentially allow for this to happen will give political cover for it's happened surely maybe that is

a way of at least first ensuring that the the development happens but also ensuring that maybe countries think twice before allowing for the destruction of whole societies. nothing and not in one simple response to your question because if you look at the last few years we've actually seen. a significant group of countries coming together rehabilitation of iraq for example. the kind of support that is being played at conferences for lebanon what we see there is also countries in the region beginning to step up with half a billion a billion dollars in financial contributions so first of all i want to recognize these countries for what they have done because it is not only europe or the united states or japan in fact we have seen quite a number of countries coming to the table but that is it's a taking responsibility as an international community. payments based on accountability or responsibility will always be very difficult to invoke the united

nations is not a world government it does not have the authority except when it is exercise for the security council to actually enforce a decision with its member states so we build first of all on what is international law we build on the good offices of the sector it general and we build also in the international community to actually respect the kinds of decisions that it passes in the security council or in the general assembly this very often is the soft law of international law but at the end of the day what we're trying to do is to make sure that even when some countries do not accept their responsibility or step up to the table when they could assist that we do not punish the country by saying well then the others will not step up to the table either this is a moral dilemma that is not very helpful one of the world's longest running conflicts the. illegal occupation of palestine and i want to ask you specifically about gaza which has been under siege now for a decade it's been subjected several weeks also of strikes and bombardments in two

thousand and eight two thousand and twelve and fourteen according to your findings gaza's economy has been virtually stagnant for the past ten years right where the average annual g.d.p. rate is and she barely exceeding one percent gaza's population meanwhile has grown by thirty eight percent over the same period and according to the report that you published. there's a lot more g.d.p. that's required in order to reduce the economic burden from about forty percent unemployment there and so forth. it's very clear that the main issue of suffering in gaza is the siege on gaza if there was free trade there would be jobs there would be money coming in and so forth why has the united nations or the u.n. d.p. not come out and hold for an immediate lifting of the siege. well first of all let me acknowledge that the situation inside gaza is desperate and it

is perhaps one of the most painful visits i have on the take in my word and my work around the world to see that situation and it is one that is also getting worse you mentioned some of the factors not only are there more people there are also challenges about the lack of employment access to clean water for instance the collapse of the aquifer there are factors here that are going to make things far worse in the years to come but as we all know i mean the reality of gaza is embedded in a larger conflict that seems to be you know eluding or efforts to resolve them the united nations has repeatedly as you know passed resolutions that has not only drawn attention to this it has condemned. aspects of that reality and i will say it in those terms because at the end of the day the resolutions of the problem it's the consequence of actually act but even to figure out the condemnation here no not it's not about putting blame what i want to know as you're seeking solutions in

order to make development so let's not even you can have something that's very simply worded the sieges century is making life impossible development impossible unemployment's increase as the united nations we would like the speech to be lifted even if that means borders that are governed by blue helmets even if it means that there are trade agreements that's will be stipulated by international law and you know agreed on by third party it doesn't have to get into the bog down into the whole issue of palestine conflict at all the even have to mention anything about peace talks or final status and nothing simply there are two million people living in the walled what's been described as the world's largest open air prison they have barely four hours of electricity a day there's no way development is going to happen there well first of all let us both agree that the u.n. has written many reports that actually not only. he described the situation but also presented in stark terms so i think whether it is the high commissioner for human rights whether it is the general assembly so i think the united nations is

not found wanting in actually being able to tell the world that this situation is one that requires urgent attention in terms of the humanitarian needs but also in terms of the longer term stability of the region as a whole secondly we are not invested there in fact there is a sister organization as you know that for decades now has been providing services to palestinians in the region as a whole that is currently being defended and struggling to get the funding to keep the services going providing schooling to tens of thousands of palestinian children medical facilities. we in the united nations development program are working in gaza and are trying to in a sense make an anon bearable situation just slightly less than bearable but at the end of the day for all of us the challenge is that this is a political conflict into which we cannot simply step in and believe that we

can write reports that will make it go away there is a need for a political solution the political solution is not forthcoming on the back of which millions of people are suffering and i think the best thing that we are constantly trying to do as united nations first of all to provide humanitarian support to provide development support where we can but at the end of the day it is in the political process that you know many presidents of many countries have also tried to move forward that the solution will lie for this finally i just want to look ahead to the future and it's estimated that currently a quarter of the world's population lives in poverty around one point three billion people. hearts of those are eighteen years or younger when you look at those numbers it doesn't really look promising but there are projects that you're doing and other ideas that are being worked on in order to increase development and not

only simply from the kind of one dimensional aspect of material income but also quality of living in freedom of expression into you know education and so forth how do you see the future in terms of challenges and opportunities. without in any way being too optimistic i think with hope because first of all what we must not forget on the back of these numbers which are in individual terms still dramatic numbers that affect individual lives but the story of development over the last one hundred years is a story of phenomenal progress and success the u.n. d.p. human development report that you cited earlier on has documented this progress over the last twenty five thirty years but let me just give you one example one hundred fifty years ago or two hundred years ago. a billion people lived on this planet at that time nine out of ten people alive lives in extreme poverty today vs

seven billion people and only one out of ten lives in extreme poverty we have gone through an extraordinary period of development people live longer more people read and write we have better nutrition life expectancy our possibilities today are phenomenal compared even to those three four generations ago so the first message that i have to those who always say oh development never works the sustainable development goals are just abstract goals take a look at history and ask it so how has progress been made possible people had a vision they set themselves goals we invested in the future we are today a generation that is actually in a position to eliminate extreme poverty it's the first time we can say that in history now will it happen a lot depends on what a lot of people will do but our role as the united nations as the united nations development program is to do everything possible to focus that in development no one is left behind we can use modern data artificial intelligence allow governments

to understand where other people living who are not having access to services how do we deal with for instance service provision for peoples with disabilities often overlooked in the development process gender equity. education of girls we can find ways in which we can make development far more targeted today and that is the power of technology that is coming to it but it is also a matter of political priorities of governments willing to invest their budgets and perhaps of asking ourselves how much more money are we going to invest in the elusive notion that militaries guarantee on national security when poverty and destitution and the sense of unfairness of actually be at the heart of virtually every civil strife conflict in the last twenty years we need to invest in development we need to invest in making sure that people are not left behind look at the societies who are succeeding today they are the ones who have taken that

paradigm on board and that shapes the development journey of these countries. head of the united nations development program thank you very much for talking to obviously or thank if you're. on counting the cost blame it on briggs it's one trillion dollars worth of assets shifted out of the u.k. change is in the air in aviation plus smarter and creepy the latest consumer gadgets connected to the internet on show in las vegas counting the cost on al-jazeera. if you were looking at this from the outside you would really wonder what was going on what do you see writes is a religion that they have an in-depth exploration of global capitalism and our obsession with economic drug this is still the center of capitalism there is no limits i view myself as

a capital artist we are trying to play for the world smaller and smaller we don't want to be set realistic in the world we would rather have a fantasy growing pains coming soon. in search of a safer neighborhood it was a little. when you make a mouse into being a man you can't put my family in the hole they discerned that's a problem for me struggling to secure a home through a really quite of our military does all until we don't we could potentially lose the house i'm living paycheck to paycheck there's nobody to blame and live with the consequences every day of the choices that have been hard. on al-jazeera. much hussein is now being held in pretrial detention for two years what is his crime. why hasn't he been tried yet why hasn't justice been applied in this case is he detained because he's a journalist as journalism become

a crime have moles become a tool to silence weiss's of truth we will continue our news coverage with professionalism and impartiality our work will remain credible and accurate but journalism is not a crime incarcerating journalists is not acceptable we demand the immediate release of all colleague mahmoud to say and all journalists detained in a gyptian jails free mahmoud's and all his colleagues we stand for press freedom. every.

studio. welcome to the news grid the confusion of syria's war with the prospect of a battle between. u.s. president has. against any attack even saying the u.s. could bring economic devastation to turkey as a result we will have the reaction is the. president is holding his. constituent assembly. but we're going to look at everything else the magnitude of venezuela's economic. and on the eve of the biggest break. well the birds that referendum. that is what's best for. life during this. angle on the

streets and online and off the government the price of feel overnight. with the news. of an al-jazeera dot com and syria's war can be hard sometimes to remember exactly who is on whose side for example the latest developments turkey has had to respond to a threat from president donald trump that the united. aids would quote devastate the turkish economy if its forces attacked kurdish fighters in syria now remember turkey and the u.s. are officially nato allies but the u.s. has supported the kurdish y p g fighters which turkey considers to be part of the terrorist organizations of is the disconnect in the meantime soldiers tanks and heavy military equipment i've been deployed in and taqiyya along the southern

border with syria has been an increase in tensions along that turkish syrian border since trump announced the draw of us troops from syria here's the tweet that got the turks upset donald trump saying starting the long overdue pullout from syria while hitting the little remaining i sew or isis as he says territorial caliphate hard for many directions will attack again will devastate turkey economically if they hit the kurds and then talks about creating a twenty mile safe zone where the turkish foreign minister move that covers only responded to president trump's tweet saying nothing would be achieved by threatening ticky. in the. we can see the difficult situation that mr trump is in now there is serious pressure on him and he took the decision of withdrawing however the security divisions are putting constant pressure to stop and we know that the latest tweet is a domestic policy message these. are important we germans do we have said several

times that we are not going to be afraid of any threats and will not bow down to it nothing can be achieved by threatening turkey economically and then in response to that secretary of state mike pompei o expand over there and what the president said in his tweet this is what he had to say. i think in some ways it it sets it just to marks the importance that we place on this the borders that we want to secure border for for all of the parties not not even just the turks and. the kurds there are arabs there are christians in the region that. we want we want that to be a place where there isn't violence as there's been over these past years we want good part of that region there still depending on how you define the region there are still millions of displaced persons in that region to we want we want to take that violence level down so that we can begin to return the displaced persons to that region as well i think the president's remarks are pretty clear about what america hopes to achieve in these conversations with all of the parties the turks certainly included among them so just before we move on it's not

a bad time to bring out who controls what map from al jazeera dot com just remind ourselves of all the players the locations in this particular part of syria there's the big map all the red areas around the government control yellow areas are in kurdish control and you do have a small pocket left here in a sort of unpopulated area but it's this part of the map we're going to look at a confusing sort of area up in the corner let's start here at this border here you've got turkish troops coming in there from an attack a you've also got the messing here in general plus you've got a couple of u.s. bases here and their man bridge is going to be. an important area here because also you've got syrian troops coming in from this red area in to manage so potentially a conflict between these turkish troops and kurdish fighters with the syrians coming in from the south as well so that's that as it's a very crowded sort of complicated corner of syria that we're looking at more on this now with cinema she is our correspondent in istanbul. the first reaction came

from presidential spokesperson and the director of communications and anchor and the first verbal reaction came from turkey's foreign minister made richard sure look he quit to size mr trump's a tweet especially about the language that he has used and he questioned why he preferred communicating through social media because he said we already have a proper relation ongoing between washington and contra parts he also mentioned that turkey would do well coming into the city interest stablish a safe zone or secure zone inside syria because it was first turkey who offered that more than one year ago president don had suggested that a safe zone should be establishment's side syria and north fly zone so that the syrians who are inside turkey and other countries other second rate countries can go back to syria in that and that continue their lives in that safe zone however foreign minister also underlined that the kurdish issue and the white p.g.p.

issue are totally different from each other and turkey has been trying to assure that they're not going to target searing kurds if they start this military offensive and we know that today presents are don't we'll be meeting his a team which is of the defense ministry foreign ministry military people and the intelligence to learn about the latest situation in syria. every enforcements are ongoing but because turkey is also suffering from decline in the turkish turkish lira turkish currency in the last couple of months due to some spat between washington and ankara they are being more careful and they're not willing to burn the bridges very quickly. and now to go for an update with muhammad joe on the turkish syrian border near that border there so we've gotten the political background if you like there from sin him mohammed want to bring us up to date with what is happening there this and i was outlining it before all these different

forces converging on this one area was the u.s. talks about leaving. yes indeed it's a very confusing picture confused even father by the latest comments from president donald trump on the continued wrongdoing kemal between the united states until a key is a huge boost for the fortunes of the president admits tradition of course the invitation from the kurdish leadership in syria as well as the presence of his troops on the outskirts of the number where they have been patrolling now for almost ten days or so is of course a gives them a gives him and his administration a foothold in attendance and controlled by the cubs which is estimated to be about a third of the territory of that city at ease of course also russian troops to be

patrolling there the u.s. forces there so it is a very confused picture but tukey insists it will not be detoxed by all these noises that it's just a month of time before they launch the offensive took his army commanders have been saying that would buddy the kurdish fighters known us y.p. deep in the trenches and they say they'll wonder waiting. whether before they begin these offensive of course they also talks between the kurds on the city and administration who have just a lot of the kurdish leadership in syria has appealed to egypt as a mediator for now they say they have a bun bun the idea of getting some of. it in return for protection against the turkish offensive so is it all for the turks at least mohamed all about territory trying to gain that foothold for them. in kurdish territory.

while. it's about security they say. they're why p.d. is an extension of that turkish kurdish workers pertti p.k. k. which they recognize as a terrorist organizations so they say they do not see any difference between the white community p k k fighters who form the bulk of the fighting force of the city and democratic forces who have been the backbone of the fight against. eisel in syria under false ally of the united states right now they are fighting what remains of isis fighters is somebody in malta district right on the border turkey syria has with iraq and they're saying they're making some progress but once turkey makes that offensive it will not be differentiating between the white

p.g. fighters who are fighting i still. something honestly say might reverse some of the gains achieved in the recent past thank you. thanks moment to get in touch with us on this topic or indeed any of the topics you've seen coming up on the show contact the house from your own screen of already heard from rashid who's watching at facebook dot com slash al-jazeera who says puts a pretty simply when you talk about this turkey u.s. disagreement turkey will do what's best for turkey if u.s. national security is paramount as don't trump would always say so is turkish national security who would decide what turkey does and its nationals here in this building you've got two sides there very much wanting to protect their own interests and they are really it despite them being allies are really clashing over this hashtag good twitter facebook whatsapp as well if you want to get in touch with us directly. all right u.s. secret is that my pump he is now in amman after meeting with saudi leaders in riyadh while in saudi arabia he met the crown prince mohammed bin salman and agreed

to continue a deescalation of the fight in yemen it was to discuss human rights issues within the kingdom did have to cancel the final stop of his trip in kuwait to return to the u.s. for a family funeral so off we go to muscat oman the capital robots rob matheson is there for us i'm on just first of all rob is that it's an interesting one the sort of quiet to diplomatic play of the gulf but so strategically important just by geography exactly that's absolutely right just from where i'm standing just a few kilometers to the east there is the straits of hormuz and down the state the center of the strait of hormuz all man shares a maritime border.