in the. straight. preparations for the world cup on being hindered by the blockade on the country that's according to the head of the organizing committee haas on the eve of the world economic forum in davos where he told al-jazeera that the world cup was bringing change to both cover and its national team. the transformative power of hosting a tournament like the world cup is not just limited to the national team but no doubt it will invigorate the national team and we have a fantastic example in east asia you know in japan south korea when they host a tournament you can see where their teams are today you can see where their leagues are today there is no dust they will have that knock on effect what i'd like to also emphasize is these tournaments have a knock on effect in terms of social events and economic events as well and we are working very hard to capture as much as possible these benefits and so that these benefits remain beyond twenty twenty two and these benefits are felt beyond the state of for the middle east and the arab world. is not going to help easing the

blockade and so she's around that's. blockade is a unilateral action taken by the blockading nations against qatar. you know for us we've always said that this world cup is a regional tournament it is a for the people of the region it is a tournament that we that we work very hard and we're working very hard to ensure that the people of the region benefit from it i think it's a testimony to the resilience of the state of the people of being able to overcome such an obstacle and now honestly we're focusing on delivery deliveries coming along very very well as i said projects are coming along the pipeline according to schedule and we're ready to deliver and host the world in twenty twenty. human rights watch report twenty one things that i still need to be somewhere in terms of workers rights and that's something we've always agreed to i mean i've never personally i've never said that the work is done on the back every time we've spoken to international organizations every time we've discussed the progress and

the significant progress of the state of couple has made it work we have always said that more work needs to be done i don't believe any nation can rest on its laurels and say that everything has been done in relation to labor reforms to work welfare reforms and there is no different however what is very positive is the fact that there's a recognition of significant progress being made good work being done on the ground and being done in a way where it's sustainable for the long term not short term solutions or band-aid solutions and that is exactly what we're looking for looking for long term solutions in terms of labor reforms and we're very proud of but again there's a lot more to be done. former australian football captain craig foster is calling on fever to sanction both thailand and bahrain's a phase if they fail to help free hakim. the bahraini player who is a refugee in australia has been in a bangkok prison for almost two months after being arrested while on holiday at the request of bahrain faces extradition to his home country we could be tortured and

killed. if every effort is not made and if the life of a mile or a b. in the eyes of the football governance officials and the football community is not equally as valuable as by the lives of the officials as my life is feel or yours or of the billions of dollars of influence that is brought to bear in this particular case then the soul of football is dead the family of missing football. has big rescuers to resume their search after they called it off on thursday the twenty eight year old cardiff city player and these pilot were on board a single engine aircraft that disappeared from radar on monday as they flew from france to wales after three days rescuers abandon the search saying the chances of surviving in the freezing waters of the english channel rick stream the remotes. when the enemy and mom know when and we'll the only thing i want is for my brother

to be found for the pilots to be found to put ourselves in their shoes to fill our hearts because you are missing a family member i feel that they are alive and that they are ok and that they are waiting for us but please don't stop searching for them please don't stop i am very grateful for everything but they are live. in the n.b.a. the oklahoma city thunder are building momentum towards the playoffs they've won their fourth game in a row russell westbrook made sure the new orleans pelicans never really got a call in oklahoma city setting up stephen adams for the dunk here westbrook unself school twenty three as he posted his fifteenth triple double of the season that's the best in the n.b.a. so far thunder winning one hundred twenty one one hundred and sixteen tiger woods has got his twenty nineteen season underway at torrey pines near san diego the fourteen time major champion opened his account with a solid round of seventy in the farmers insurance open and of course he knows

unlike some trails leader john rom eight going into the second round he's a ten on the par. the west indies bowled out england for just seventy seven as they took control of the first test in barbados the hosts that ended their first innings two hundred eighty nine all out before ripping through england with the ball much to the delight of their fans the tourists lasted just three and a half hours key more roche took five wickets for just four runs so the west indies found themselves betting again reaching one hundred twenty seven to six that's three hundred and thirty nine runs aid. and that's what was sport more coming up again later for banks face he wants now is their news hour with me so robin and peter start with i'm back with more news on the other side of the break until impacts your time and your company.

in the next episode of techno the team travels to the heart of the amazon. where we are now should be rain pours to investigate illegal gold mining mercury has a very unique characteristic finding the goal for a miner it's almost like magic and the technology being used to expose its devastating impact and so what we end up doing is imaging the forest in a very high fidelity stream. techno on al-jazeera. russian filmmaker andrina christoph explores how putin's russia impacts the very values of the nation russians are famous for their cultural legacy but can tradition and conservative be the source of stagnation and authoritarian rule why there's always the assume aided by the police to seize the crane from homosexuality the significance of it put into the russian elite is that he was like a feature who controls the cobra in search of putin's russia on al-jazeera.

if you want to learn about the world might look like very soon got hundred and hungary's in the extreme example of the predicament the whole world is going through. since mass immigration story we had paunch questions within the cultures and the problems that the culture of that these. cars should say some grading to us is or is not comfortable with european culture this is not like the old fascist. triumphal march. dreams of conquest and of global try. this is very very uneventful glide towards the precipice without resistance we are past the danger has already happened. it was then just ten years ago. now this is it.

a longtime associate of donald trump is arrested on charges linked to the russian election meddling investigation. you're watching others are live my headquarters here in doha also coming up greece's parliament approves a contentious name change deal with macedonia. venezuela's military commanders lined up in support of president nicolas maduro but the world is divided on his future plans the first look at an island where bungler those plans to send about one hundred thousand reading the refugees.

welcome to al-jazeera the u.s. president's close ally roger stone has been arrested as part of a special counsel robert miller's investigation into possible russian collusion of the twenty sixteen election was arrested at his home in the state of florida following a grand jury indictment he's been charged with obstructing official proceedings making false statements and witness tampering stone is due to appear in court later on friday so let's take a look at who roger is what he's a self described dirty tricks to the sixty six year old began his career as a campaign aide for the former us president richard nixon he worked as an informal adviser to donald trump and was a driving force in his presidential campaign before quitting in twenty fifteen questions have been raised about stone's communications with a russian hacker and his alleged contacts with wiki leaks but stone has long maintained that he's had no connection to russia's attempts to meddle in the twenty

sixteen presidential election let's join our white house correspondent kimberly haue who's in washington d.c. i mean what more do we know about this arrest and when he might appear in court. and we're expecting him to appear in court a little more than three hours time this arrest was certainly one that was taken seriously by law enforcement officials that happened at six am local time in florida in the city of fort lauderdale at roger stone's home the police were heavily armed when they went in they only do that when they suspect that potentially this person might resist arrest or have weapons himself he did surrender peacefully and now we are awaiting that court appearance it is important to note from these charges that well the russia probe is looking into russia interferes in the twenty sixteen u.s. election and whether or not the risk collusion with donald trump's presidential campaign these charges do not speak to that instead what they speak to seems to be

roger stone's effort to kind of stymie investigators looking into this case that when he was interviewed by the house intelligence committee that he tended to allegedly mislead investigators he's certainly been under scrutiny for months years in fact what it seems to be is that according to this indictment he mischaracterized particularly in some of his statements what he knew about wiki leaks and its efforts to hack the democratic national committee's e-mails in order to discredit the presidential bid of democratic presidential nominee hillary clinton calls kimberly and the investigation and the arrests and the charges that are associated with anyone close to the trumpet ministration rattles the white house all they commenting at the moment. in fact i think there is something going on as we speak just before i sat down in front of the camera i saw

sarah sanders the press secretary speaking to reporters on the white house driveway i did catch some of her comments initially and she certainly is defending this as being something separate from the president she's saying that in fact this has nothing to do with the president she's hopeful that when it comes to prosecution for false statements that in fact the same standard by the special prosecutor will be held to democratic supporters not just republican supporters and associates of the president because we know that roger sort of was in fact a long time donald trump associate she further went on to repeat what donald trump himself has always repeated that she says there's no collusion or wrongdoing but she certainly said given she's not a lawyer that she believes she should not to get quote into the weeds in terms of this indictment only saying that she believes this president has been tough on russia from the beginning and maintaining that that is the case in terms of posture

coming from this white house what she didn't answer and she did tend to evade questions was with regard to something in the indictment that has caught media attention that is an unnamed high level member of the truck campaign who allegedly ordered contact to be made with roger stone many people speculating on who that person might be asking questions of whether or not it was donald trump himself something sarah sanders the press secretary would not answer for they will leave the complete slogans through the day thanks love. it's new to europe now where greece's parliament has voted to ratify a landmark agreement with its northern neighbor to change its name to north macedonia greek politicians voted one hundred fifty three to one hundred forty six for the un brokered deal signed last june and it was approved days after days of heated debate protesters against the deal have been braving the rain outside parliament just hours after they were dispersed by riot police let's take a closer look at what led to the longstanding dispute because its roots are

established well way back in one thousand nine hundred one when macedonia declared independence after breaking away from yugoslavia which fell apart during the balkan wars greece objected to the new name saying it represented a claim on its territory as it has a northern province that also is called macedonia highlighted here in yellow last june the two countries signed an agreement to change macedonia macedonia as name to north macedonia the deal was ratified by macedonia as parliament while greek legislators delayed the vote until now that if passed greece will stop blocking its neighbors attempts to join nato and the e.u. but critics say the deal will give away greek cultural heritage. now the human rights chief is warning the situation in venezuela could spiral rapidly out of control with catastrophic consequences michele daschle is urging leaders in caracas to hold talks to diffuse the political unrest opposition leader

quote of a dog is declared or has declared himself interim president and has backing from the u.s. and its latin american allies venezuela's military has reiterated its support for president nicolas maduro saying attempts to remove him amount to a coup greater is due to make an address shortly let's cross over to our latin america editor lucien newman she joins me now from could cooter on the border between colombia and venezuela and it's an early start there for you lucy a difficult seventy two hours for the president and for the self declared interim president what seems to be sort of the lay is the land as the sun rises on friday. well it's getting extremely extremely tense here. across the border in venezuela and indeed especially for one boy who is due to hold a news conference in the plaza of the believer in the neighborhood of chuck power which is an opposition stronghold is about to do that are you due to do that in

about forty five minutes that's precisely at the same time that president muzzled his attorney general is due to make what he calls a very important announcement and according to why door to it in israel and journalist over instagram a short while ago he believes that there will be an arrest warrant issued against him at that time why don't have says that he wants to call on the news wayland's to take to the streets over the weekend on saturday and sunday again remember according to human rights organizations something like thirty people have been killed in clashes with police in just the last three days alone he wants to also deliver a an amnesty proposal to the armed forces who until now at least the upper ranking members of the army have shown absolute support for president hugo last mughal but does so there are a lot of moving parts at this hour taking place and we know that the government says it is going to stand fast that it will not for example accept the u.s.

is our argument that it will not remove its diplomats from. the u.s. has asked for u.s. diplomats who are not essential to leave the country immediately also for u.s. citizens to the of the country but it says it does not recognize president who does authority to break off diplomatic relations with the united states and my google as you said i gave them seventy two hours to leave the country that time is up on sunday what will happen if president medvedev continues to insist that he will expel the u.s. diplomats who apparently will not do it at least on their own accord that is really going to hike up the tensions not just internally but also with the united states which does not recognize the government of president a little any longer so have the tools of international reaction continues to divide the international community about which side. absolutely it is mounting minute by minute in the last hour and

a half we have heard from the european union which had been basically standing standing on the sidelines remember that the vast majority of certainly the largest latin american countries have sided with the interim president except for mexico and our allies as well as they are supporters of president the go to vote we also have russia turkey and china supporting him against the united states which is considered to be basically leading the charge here but now the european union says that i'm there are free and transparent elections immediately for a new government in the venezuelan to recognize whitehall as illegitimate interim president of that country so a lot of pressure now is mounting on the president as well as the opposition indeed an ongoing moving parts as well have to keep monitoring with you from the border thanks let's see now the united nations special rapporteur on me in the lead is

calling on bangladesh to allow the u.n. to make an assessment before reading the refugees a move to a remote island this week lee visited a muffin jar low lying island in the bay of bengal the five hundred kilometers in constant desire about one hundred thousand to be moved to live in you to build barracks human rights groups of criticize the plan saying living there will be like living in a prison. should even be contemplating. corruption . for. the government. actually has basic. to the same basic rights as those who live. may also criticize me for failing to turn around its poor human rights record.