record of achievements of the asian cup never got beyond the quarter finals they ranked outside of the top ten in asia going into this event they finished both sort of that world cup qualifying group by head of the russian finals but if you scratch a little bit deeper the worst signs of this it would seem on the rise was the dinner in the grounds of the aspire academy a hugely ambitious project it was set up in c. thousand and four to develop young players in this country and what you're seeing now is that for a wish it all for projects where players in their early twenty's are not coming through at senior level but i don't think anyone expected them really to go in and win this tournament before eight years champions on the way to this extraordinary win against you have their first major international trophy before they held the twenty twenty two world cup and the what does it mean for the team and also for the tournament here in twenty twenty two. you know this is so much focus on cut saw any why this big focus on the same and there was concerns globally and within cup so that would seem wouldn't be up to competing with the world's best of those finals

in twenty twenty two teams never qualified for a world cup the first harvest's never to have played at a previous finals and expectations will be high and now of course to be remembered that's only one asian seam even made it out into the knockout it into the knockout rounds of the last finals so this doesn't guarantee success at a world cup but going forward now you could see more guards the corporate america in june not south america's biggest international tournament cuts or been invited as a guest seeing other groups alongside all insane a power boy and columbia another step for these cats all the same or preparing for this finals in twenty twenty thirty but because of the planning this being in place if it's ten years it should be a surprise that the team is doing well but it perhaps is a surprise that the going on on wall in this tournament is in such style thank you for that andy richardson live here in doha. are still ahead on al-jazeera religious hard line is a game vent their fury in pakistan after the acquittal of

a christian woman sentenced to death for blasphemy and why indian farmers say billions of extra dollars from the government isn't enough. hello there it really has been quite wet for some of us in the middle east recently here's the latest system as it's made its way in through parts of turkey and across into the northern parts of iraq and iran and it's the northern parts of iraq where we've had some of the worst conditions here's some pictures of the flooding and that should be the bridge that you can see it's collapsed thanks to the raging floodwaters that we've seen that now this region is only going to see if you will showers as we head through the next few days nothing to heavy some outbreaks of snow there which will be drifting that way southward into paula to be ran as we head through into sunday i think there will be a few outbreaks of heaviest snow here but for the most part there will be like to

snow a bit further towards the south and here in doha we've got an area of cloud that's developing just to the north of us here in doha itself twenty five degrees will be fairly pleasant on saturday by sunday there will be more cloud around and there's a chance of seeing quite a few outbreaks of rain behind that it will turn cooler than it has been so a maximum temperature on sunday just of twenty one degrees the heaviest downpours there will be the other side of the gulf they do expected to be over parts of iran for some of us here it could be really quite heavy as we head down towards the southern parts of africa plenty of showers in the northern parts of our mom as usual but there's also quite a few showers in the eastern parts of south africa to. in recent years the sawhill of north africa has witnessed the so-called war on terror . but is this official narrative.

masking a larger battle. a battle for the earth's natural resources. shadow war in the sahara on al-jazeera. welcome back a recap of our top stories on al-jazeera this hour the u.s. despising its involvement in a decade's old nuclear missile not saying russia is violating it u.s. secretary of state michael bell says there's now a six month window to try to salvage the treaty the international criminal court has ordered the conditional release of ivory coast this former president on back

will and his right hand man shall they were acquitted of all charges of crimes against humanity last month and have hoisted football's asian cup for the first time in their history their defeated four time champions upin three one in the final in the united arab emirates a maasai one of the heroes with a record breaking ninth goal of the tournament it's. now u.s. vice president mike pence is meeting venezuelans living in miami florida to discuss the political crisis gripping their homeland the trump administration is supporting opposition to one guy dole has declared himself interim president current president nicolas maduro has accused those trying to push him from power of attempting to stage a coup as speaker and a gallegos in miami for us so what is mike pence hoping to achieve with this visit . or will this is one of the largest venezuelan communities in the united states many of the people that live consider themselves exiles of nicolas maduro as

government so in essence are two reasons that the vice president is here firstly is on the front finding mission as we speak he's sitting at an open table worries talking to many of those who consider themselves exiles of venezuela along with a couple of florida's republican senators florida's republican governor so that's the first part of the reason i don't mind pence's here but he's expected to speak to the venezuelan community here within the next hour what we will hear mike pence is that this administration a trumpet ministration is backing. and glider in no uncertain terms of course more than twenty countries are followed suit since the united states made that declaration shortly after one guardo declared himself the interim president so in many ways it's a fact finding mission but also a way for the vice president to reassure this community of more than thirty thousand venezuelans that the trumpet ministration in essence has their back and is fighting for what many people here see as the very freedom for their home nation so

when you are as you say nary a word where there are a lot of venezuelans what do people there think about what's happening back home. i mean i think if mike pence walked in here now he would be very warmly greeted there will be lots of hunch shirts and pants on the shoulder because the people that live here are the ones that have a skate the crisis that we're seeing in venezuela right now of course the economy for many years has been tanking more than a million people have been forced to leave and go into places like colombia and across latin america putting strains on many other economies in the neighboring region and i think what people here certainly the ones i've spoken to over the years want to see more than anything else is free and fair elections is nicolas maduro to be out of the picture completely because what they see is someone who's dragging the economy down they look at their fellow countrymen suffering scavenging for food in the streets and they want to see an end to that so i think many people here are extremely happy when president trump immediately backed one quite out within hours after he declared himself the interim president so certainly a lot of support from this community here in south florida thank you for that andy

gallacher reporting live from miami. feb first smog six months since the start of the latest ebola outbreak in the democratic republic of congo the world health organization says they have been seven hundred forty three confirmed cases with more than four hundred fifty deaths as a result of the disease is the worst outbreak in the country's history and the response has been hampered by violence and resistance from some communities mike ryan is assistant director general for emergencies at the world health organization he says despite the setbacks ebola vaccines are providing help. this particular vaccine. has been proven in west africa to be effective in trials so and we are seeing that that same process unfold in congo where using a strategy of vaccinating along social networks contacts of cases contacts of those contacts so we're tracking the virus along the route which it spreads in the community and using that targeted approach and using intense community engagement

over ninety eight percent of people who are eligible for the vaccine are willing to accept it that's a very very high vaccine coverage in the most high risk people so we're beginning to see the fruits of that endeavor and certainly we believe that a vaccination strategy is is why we are seeing cases of course we believe that that vaccination strategy is helping us to avoid many many more cases that would have occurred up to now had we not had the vaccine and thanks they've been more protests in pakistan against the supreme horses isn't to uphold the acquittal of a christian woman who had been sentenced to death for blasphemy has more from islamabad. the religion. all have. to go now and. your daughter.

and i have deployed. i'd made. that taking precautionary measure to now that. some of the really. big baby. by that however the government had already had their leadership. again maybe relieved. they were going to do that in america. india's government has promised billions of dollars to help support on the streets of new delhi many say doesn't go far enough to address second sentence mohammed john john has. these farmers protesting outside the indian parliament want the government to help them they're demanding loan waivers and better prices for their produce the government has pledged almost eleven billion dollars to help them india's interim finance minister is optimistic the economy will improve. once to

become i was to become a five trillion dollars economy in the next five years i. would be inspired to become a trillion dollar economy and that makes you. but the farmers feel they are not sharing in india's economic growth these are no good farming has become a loss making proposition for the farmers because seeds in fertilizers have become very expensive it is also expensive to hire farm labor for irrigation sowing and harvesting the fields. prime minister narendra modi has been facing. widespread discontent from farmers about six hundred million indians depend on agriculture for their livelihoods and many have huge debt debt they say that won't be lowered by what the government is now offering them this is was then a lot. six thousand five hundred a month it comes to fifty rupees for

a cup of tea cost that much today in india i think that this is a total sellout. the farmers by the government budget. among the crowd on friday many simply didn't believe the government's latest promises would come to pass especially with elections expected in the coming months a shotgun loaded with these governments will end soon and be in their graves by the month of may so whatever they are now it's now who will implement their schemes if a new government is elected later why should they agree to these budget proposals and want analysts say the direct cash support being offered to farmers in this interim budget is a clear attempt by modi to shore up crucial political support in the countryside protesters say the plan doesn't go nearly far enough. as. israeli forces have opened fire on palestinian protesters in gaza injuring at least five of them hundreds gathered for the weekly demonstrations near the border fence

east of the gaza strip the rallies which began almost a year ago are calling for palestinian refugees to be allowed to return to their former homes now inside israel meanwhile the un envoy to the middle east and an egyptian delegation are holding meetings with hamas to try to find ways to stop the violence. the u.s. president says progress has been made during trade negotiations with china officials have been meeting in washington to try to end a trade war but donald trump says no deal will be finalized until he needs china's president xi jinping while chinese traders have been hoping for a breakthrough as they go into the lunar new year but as china correspondent agent brown reports the year of the pig is looking tough regardless of whether an agreement is reached. it's the world's biggest annual exodus when china becomes a nation in motion. some of these travelers leaving beijing railway station face journeys of more than thirty hours but as people prepare for their biggest

celebration of the year there's apprehension over the slowing economy and rick criticism about who people blame don't tell by the common say it's good but they're not doing it well she reports he seems to manage the higher ranks well but he doesn't seem to know how the people are actually doing. the rhythm of chinese new year is not for everyone he. manages a popular cuban dance studio in beijing she's decided not to travel to her family's home in northeast china this holiday partly it's because of the cost and partly because of the endless parental questions about why she's still single. second or people. in their thirties like me some call the left the over spring festival probably means burden of pressure for them parents of pester me to

find a husband all year round not just adoring tennis so i am rather used to it or even say. zoo is also used to smaller class sizes now as more people cut down on luxuries and that includes salsa classes. official figures show that consumer spending is remaining static while manufacturing output dropped for a second straight month in january the slowdown wasn't caused by china's trade war with the united states but it's making things worse. analysts say this is why president xi jinping is under pressure to make a trade deal with president donald trump as a prolonged dispute creates another risk he doesn't need right now. she is so worried that a few weeks ago he convened a seminar of high ranking party officials to discuss how to reduce the risks to china's economy the gathering lasted for days

a measure perhaps of the seriousness of his concerns on monday chinese people here and around the world will begin celebrating the year of the pig traditionally the pig year is a lucky one the last time it was marked was twelve years ago when china was preparing to host the summer olympics and economic growth was a robust thirteen percent today it is less than half that. as china glides into the new lunar year there are predictions the economy will continue to cool in what's supposed to be a year the brings fortune to all adrian brown al-jazeera beijing. thailand's government is being accused of not taking bangkok's the notion problem seriously as a city chills on a worsening haze that shut schools for two days just this week officials are experimenting with unusual solutions when he reports. face masks have become a necessary fashion accessory in bangkok the thai capital and its people

a choking and a heavy air pollution a little bump this makes me gravely concerned about my health every time i'm outside i feel i shouldn't breathe air at all i heard the situation won't last long . i think the government should have better measures like car free days that would help reduce pollution closing the schools helps and offering discounts on public transport would also schools were ordered to close for two days but some here say the government's response has been slow and at times bizarre it's fired water into the air. and launched drones to spray water from the air i think your finger on to combat being an pollutant if it were a stray. from many respect the. fact is a p.r. stunt the government has defended its actions but doesn't seem to have a long term plan to fix the problem the bangkok administration has called for help from experts there are many causes of the pollution which is made worse at this

time of year because of the still dry weather conditions has been off the fields their respect tree pollution and of course bangkok's notorious traffic the city has a fleet of old diesel buses that emit smoke and fumes more rigorous testing of emissions has begun and the prime minister has even floated the idea of ordering diesel vehicles off the roads it's become a sensitive issue a thirty seven year old blogger was arrested and charged with violating the computer crimes act for writing that a woman had died because of the pollution the police say it was false and he could be jailed for up to five years wayne hay al jazeera bangkok. now again i'm finally back to bill with the headlines on al-jazeera the u.s. is pausing its involvement in a decade's old nokia back to everyone saying russia is violating the u.s.

secretary of state might says there's now a six month window to try to solve a treaty great russia has jeopardized the united states security interest and we can no longer be restricted by the treaty while russia shamelessly violates it if russia does not return to full verifiable compliance with the treaty within the six month period by verifiably destroying its i n f violating missiles their launchers and associated equipment the treaty will terminate. the international criminal court has ordered the conditional release of ivory coast says former president ball and his right hand man shall they were acquitted of all charges of crimes against humanity and last month for their role in the post-election violence of twenty ten twenty having football fans in qatar celebrating the country's first big tournament victory the one the asian cup beating full time champions shapin three one in the final in the united arab emirates and was only one of the heroes with

a record breaking nine goals at the time. the boat outbreak in the democratic republic of congo is now the worst in his history the world health organization says more than four hundred sixty people have died in the past six months israeli forces have opened fire on palestinian protesters in gaza injuring at least five of them hundreds gathered for their weekly demonstrations near the border fence which began almost a year ago calling for palestinian refugees to be allowed to return to their former homes now inside israel the u.s. president says progress has been made during trade negotiations with china officials have been meeting in washington to try to end the trade war and donald trump says no deal will be finalized until he meets xi jinping and north korea has agreed to dismantle two of its military sites and open them for outside inspections ahead of an expected summit between trombone kim jong il and u.s. special envoy stephen begun room meets north korean officials next week to discuss the next steps in washington has

a list of demands for pyongyang including the destruction of all of its uranium enrichment facilities. you're up to date with the headlines on al-jazeera the news will continue here right after inside story i hope you do stay with us. the oas pretty measures in venezuela as president maduro sells off his country's gold reserves the latest buyer is reportedly the united arab emirates so is the u.a.e. now at risk of u.s. sanctions this is inside story you get

hello and welcome to the program i'm martin dennis now the economic crisis in venezuela has of people to leave the country they can't afford basic goods like food or medicine president nicolas maduro has responded by using the country's gold reserves in an attempt to pay for these imports now the reuters news agency says he's planning to sell twenty nine tons of gold this month from the central bank vaults to the united arab emirates in return for cash in neurons a former central bank governor believes two russian chartered planes which landed in caracas on monday had been hired to take the gold out of the country well mature is government hasn't commented on these reports but the united states is watching all of this rather closely the republican senator marco rubio he's warned against

dealing in venezuelan gold and in a tweet to the u.s. embassy in washington he wrote we have reports that a french national working for nor capital is in caracas today to arrange for the fest of more gold from venezuela i hope you have advised them that they and any air charter service that does this will be subject to treasury sanctions nor capital is a financial services firm that's based in abu dhabi well the u.s. imposed sanctions last november to disrupt a venezuela's sale of. gold between january and september last year venezuela or exported nine hundred million dollars worth of refined gold to turkey nicholas my daughter's government wants to bring back five hundred fifty million dollars worth of gold that's currently held in the bank of england but the bank of england has so far refused that request venezuela's gold reserves fell from one

hundred fifty tons last january to one hundred thirty two tons in november thank you it was. right let's introduce guests now joining us from london is middle east analyst bill law who writes for the website golf masses name aslam is also in london he's the chief market analyst at the online brokerage firm think markets thank you both for joining us and one can i start with you what does it indicate about the state of a government the state of a country when the leader is going to the country's gold reserves and flogging them off. it only represent one thing a big chaos and now you are trying to go around the current sanctions imposed in order to find a solution to provide some liquidity in the market because the current sanctions have brought venezuela to its knees because they can't really export oil which is

what the commodity for the country and they have no other solution but to goo and start selling the gold reserves it's not the first time just for the for the record it's not the first time that we have seen such. actions taking place by by any man because we have seen that many other governments following the similar strategy when they need that liquidity when they need currency when they need other co currencies a bit naive is it actually legal i mean there are certain permissions certain requirements that need to be in place before this case a president who is widely disputed. being able to go to the central bank open up the vaults with his key and take out the gold bars. i'm in no position to make a comment whether it is legal or rather it isn't but what i can certainly say is that the governments it's

a normal practice for central banks to sell assets such as precious metal gold to do that but whether he has the right permissions whether he can do that i mean are cannot comment yes that supply is going to come on the market right all right bill now we understand from this reuters report that the u.a.e. is perhaps the latest customer we think even within this space of twenty four hours that there is likely to be a shipment of venezuelan gold to the. is you is the u.a.e. in any danger do you think then of being imposed or being slapped with sanctions as threatened by marco rubio the republican senator. well martin that was what marco rubio threatened but i think the reality is is something else really because he is is a key element in the donald trump strategy to really make the toughest sanctions ever against iran. and so i don't think that it would pay.

us any good to slap any sanctions i really look upon this as a kind of a shot across the bow perhaps it's a case of the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing we have this new order capital in abu dhabi apparently allegedly being part of this major shipment of gold from from venezuela but but equally you have a situation where the united arab emirates and if you go back in history has been very active in in gold issues involving sanctions and involving iran and indeed turkey is it was it was part of that that deal as well and turkey is as we know venezuela has been selling cold turkey but that's your question i don't expect that the united states would come down too hard on the emirates right now we're being joined by tom long he's at the university of warwick he's associate

professor of politics and international studies there and we can hear from him thank you very much tom for joining us what do you make of the state of play in this at the moment i mean we've been talking about the state of health of the economy clearly is in a darkened dition but the fact that the head of state because that is what he still is at this point is able to go and take the countries. and sell them on the open market is that apparently what he's doing clearly the state of the economy in venezuela is beyond dire it was already dire before the united states imposed oil sanctions and those oil sanctions will. will unfold gradually but could potentially have have quite a lot of bite. despite the conflict between the united states and venice well over a decade or more the united states as of a few days ago was still buying about forty percent of venice well as oil and was

overwhelmingly the customer that was paying for that oil in cash so with those payments coming to a quick end i think this is a response from the mother would a government to try to get its hands on some liquid assets by by selling this gold on the market as quickly as it can and let's go tonight in london name we talk about the sale of this gold injecting a certain amount of liquidity in practical terms in the economy what is the sale of this gold allowing the government to do what are they using the money to to buy. well and i think that the first question is that why they are really dealing with europe because right now what the intentions are that they only wanted to sell the gold whatever the quantity that they want to offload only in europe and the reason that they are going after euro's is because they completely want to award anything

to do with the u.s. dollar i think it's a huge threat to the u.s. dollar as a benchmark currency and then i've said i've said this many times before that europe is going to become another major benchmark currency and that is the reason that they are going after euro's because everything is denominated in you when everything is denominated in euro's you can easily make transactions with on the us system getting involved into that. for for venezuela if you look at the countries balance sheet it as you said it's absolutely dire the have literally no money to pay anything for them to get access to yours and then to get involved in the euro of banking system is the key requirement right now in order to award all the sanctions which are imposed on them by the united states now tom coming back to you earlier rather unfairly i put the question to name which is not really his area

but i put it to you because i think you'll be able to help us what are the sort of permissions the sort of consensus that are needed for the head of state to go to what are state assets these gold reserves that are kept in the central banking caracas what normally needs to happen. well at this point there are really no normal procedures about what needs to happen this is something that is happening largely at the discretion of nicholas modo and his inner circle there is a legislative body created by moto that was put over the elected national assembly but that's essentially a rubber stamp body i do think that there is something quite important here about the gold oil nexus and i agree with the comments about avoiding avoiding the u.s. dollar and focusing on on euro's but these sanctions from the united states have

another really important aspect to them and that's that that that's that they prohibit the export of us oil to venezuela and that sounds a little bit odd when we think about venezuela as of course a large oil exporter but it needs to import u.s. light crude to mix with venezuelan heavy crude to be able to produce an export and ship its oil so now it has a crunch to be able to acquire that like crude from elsewhere and it needs funds to pay for the crude in order to keep its oil industry producing right ok so the pressure is really mounting isn't it nice very quickly but thousands i just want to ask you about this issue of transparency i mean it seems very a paper the whole dealing of of gold and there are childhood planes that have taken a rather securitas route to caracas at some small out of town efi old is

then. a transparency exchange if you like by which and three which gold is traded. when we are talking about asses like gold there is no transparency and that's just the reality of it and especially when you are trying to avoid a certain situation and under this particular situation we are speaking of sanctions we have to deal with something what you called discount in liquidity discount premium because there is not enough there are not enough buyers you are trying to avoid the system you trying to attract buyers which are not part of the financial system how do you attract them you give them a massive discount anywhere between three percent to ten percent and then when the asset itself is gold and then the it is the physical presence in gold bars if you melt that who knows where the gold a little over there where the asset is coming from so there is absolutely no

transparency and that brings we need lee back to bill because what do we know about this capital this financial services organization and apparently according to marco rubio has a french national has been brokering this deal. yes it's all very murky isn't that which are which as you know the contributor notice is very much part of the sanctions game and gold plays a very important role in that the united arab emirate authorities say that they have a crackdown on money laundering and the lack of transparency in their banking sector the fact of the matter is that though they've set it out actually haven't done much about it transparency international for example says that dubai is a magnet for for money laundering from a variety of sources including criminal gangs and this is done through real estate purchases again what facilitates the getting

a round of sanctions is first of all that gold is a very useful metal to have and secondly the lack of transparency within the united arab emirates and other jurisdictions as well i would think that the the emirates may be reconsidering they certainly have got themselves into this situation the americans are not best pleased like i can hear john bolton throwing himself around in in deep irritation because a lot of thing he wants to see is undercutting of sanctions in venezuela because that then weakens potentially what can happen with sanctions moving forward against iran but this is the situation still has as a way is to play out and one of the challenges that i think everyone faces is this or possibly this lock of transparency that makes it very difficult to find out who exactly the players are what we do know is that this these transactions in gold it

means that money is made by the intermediaries all along the way wherever it ends up there's a lot of dirty money that that that people are pulling out of these transactions and tome when reading them i'm sorry name please. please come in sorry i just wanted to add something to that i think is i agree that there are in to meter is involved at every single stage right thing at the same time we shouldn't discount a factor there how u.a.e. is ringing transparency to the system by using block chain technology right because a by wants to become a paperless economy altogether so they are applying all the technologies to which brings a transparency and it would be unfair just to you to point all the guns to u.a.e. . and then saying that look you know this is this is the harbor for doing all this sort of. shady businesses i don't think are is that

a fair comment by just putting and all the blame on the u.a.e. and of course the government is very vulgar very often and the government is going to huard off every single. and anything which is coming to us them and then they're not going to allow them. to take i take your point because of course in many ways the sanctions that were imposed in november last year were in direct response from the united states to the gold sales that were made with turkey over the over the space of twenty eighteen. tom i was just going to ask you whether. it seems very much is that the u.a.e. in this particular instance is offering some sort of rescue plan to nicolas maduro does this mean that the government the state of of the united arab emirates if siding with nicolas maduro because of course the world is divided between the the self declared interim president and indeed this to mature.

well i think it's pretty hard to tell exactly what the longer term diplomatic interest in this might be but you could certainly imagine that they would be hesitant to recognize a. sort of a claimant to the throne to speak that there are lots of reasons why they would be standing up for international principles of sovereignty and nonintervention and why they might see that system in principle as being in their interests that said i'm not sure that this is a long term lifeline for mother would oh i think he is looking to get a little bit of breathing room from this purchase again to have some assets that allow him to reconfigure. oil production in oil exports in venice well in

a way that might allow him to survive the u.s. sanctions regime right. name coming back to you so it must make sort of economic sense then for somebody who is drowning at the moment like nicolas maduro to but what about the ethics the ethics of selling off what are essentially the is that the family silver isn't that the country's wealth is being sold off in order to buy toilet paper for instance. in terms of fixed verano ethics when you start dipping into your rizzo's gold reserves right just simple is that because you do not want to sell like if you look at central banks they're buying of gold as an asset over the in two thousand and eighteen it's the number stands at seventy percent increase in gold at the physical buying of gold so central banks are trying to buy gold off the market right because they

know there's a huge debt crisis is just on the horizon so if a country like venezuela is trying to sell those assets of course there was the question of i think it's just out of the window yeah definitely that is completely wrong blood if as i agree with the comments but if these to be are just trying to reconfigure the economy and just trying to buy some breathing room then they do not have any other option just to go and then sell some of those assets that they consider as a reserve assets and bill you mentioned earlier that this is clearly going to irritate john bolton might and the rest of them at the very least how would you characterize the state of relations between washington and abu dhabi at the moment given that they have been very close allies haven't they since the u.s. was formed in ninety seven one. and particularly

given. very strong support for sanctions against iran and that's part of. a whole attitude that sees iran as the next actual threat that the saudis very much share that view as well i think that this is something of a potentially it's a if it's a one off it's a minor irritant i suppose if the immoralities decided to keep doing is sending a ditto because of his difficult situation decided to keep selling to them then the americans could become a little more annoyed but i think at this stage there will be some behind the scenes questioning of what exactly the m.r. adi's are up to i think with marco rubio hinting at sanctions in his email that or his tweet rather that didn't come from white pompei or from bolton or indeed from the the the master himself don't trump so i think it is very much just part of a hey hang on here what do you guys actually think you're up to and i think you

need to be looking a little more seriously at newark hopital for example and saying you know maybe you don't want to be buying any more of venezuela's gold because the americans want to force regime change using sanctions in venezuela and of course what do the americans want to do with sanctions against iran certainly john bolton wants to force regime change these situations are completely different there is no straw low there are concerns in iran about the level of incompetence of the government and high unemployment is nothing near to the situation that then as well it is and it's much more likely that the americans can force regime change in venezuela but i think they would see this as you know meddling in an area that they for the united arab emirates just pops out of so stay away from purchasing gold in venezuela thank you very much right and tone we all see only what is. repeated of the hay. story can interfere interference by the united states into what it considers to be

its own backyard i'm just wondering whether what stage you think we might be at how long commit to hang on do you think he will retain the loyalty of the military . right i mean that is the crucial question one quick note that i would add a bad about reserve assets in venice well is that this is not necessarily a new practice we've seen venezuela centrally leveraging all sorts of overseas assets prior to the previous round of financial sanctions and that's part of what those sanctions were were aimed at that is leveraging u.s. oil assets venezuelan oil assets in the united states such as such as citgo in terms of moto and how long he can hang on you're right the crucial element here is the loyalty of the military and the military is not

a homogenous block in venezuela and there is a high command that is very closely connected to my woodrow and is likely to remain supportive of this government as long as it can because it is united in with it is united with modo in sort of in an unholy triad of things many of these high ranking officials are also indicted for drug trafficking violations by the united states and and others or suspected of involvement in drug trafficking suspected of involvement or complicit in human rights violations and have been closely wed to the government's economic policy however below the high command there are certainly some signs that there are divisions in the officer corps and that lower levels of the venezuelan military are less willing to respond to

commands from from on high from particularly if it comes to repress seen protests repressing their fellow venezuelans well there are those tensions there but they are within the venezuelan military a different level. thank you all very much indeed we've run out of time bill lauren london tom long in warrick and. also in london thank you very much indeed for a really interesting conversation hopefully shed some light on the murky world of gold trading thank you very much for watching the program you can see it again any time you like are going to the website al-jazeera dot com should you want more discussion you can either go to our facebook page at facebook dot com four with russia a.j. as i story and there's always a twitter sphere as well our handle is at a.j. inside story i'm at martine's ellis for me and the whole team here in doha is back on now. my.

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countries must be held accountable when they break the rules the united states says is suspending compliance with a soviet era nuclear missile pact accusing russia of violations the international criminal court or is the release of ivory coast this former president long back both following his acquittal on war crimes charges also this hour protest same pakistan after a court upholds the acquittal of a christian woman accused of blasphemy turned on peter stammered with all the day's sport have won the asian cup for the first time after a three one win over japan in the far better more coming up later this news hour. saying. thank you very much for joining us the u.s. is pausing its involvement in a decade's old nuclear missile pact saying russia is violating its secretary of

state michael made the official announcement saying there's now a six month window to salvage the treaty. russia has jeopardized the united states' security interest and we can no longer be restricted by the treaty while russia shamelessly violates it if russia does not return to full verifiable compliance with the treaty within the six month period by verifiably destroying its i n f violating missiles their launchers and associated equipment the treaty will terminate well let's say can look at the treaty itself the i n f is a cold war oms control pack signed in one thousand nine hundred seven by the us and then in the event soviet union it bans land based nuclear missiles with a range of up to five and a half thousand kilometers weapons effectively designed to be used in a localized nuclear war in europe in recent months both sides have accuse each other of violating the treaty the us has issued several threads to pull out as speak to alan fischer in washington d.c.

for us on and so what are the key messages here from the trumpet ministration. what the thing you've got to remember is that it's not just the trumpet ministration the americans have been concerned the russians position on this treaty for quite some time and it goes back all the way to the obama administration when they issued warnings to the russians as well now we've seen donald trump come into office and rip up a lot of things that barack obama has done and pushed for with others that he felt he shouldn't have pursued more keenly and certainly that's what we're seeing here that donald trump is pushing this forward we know at the end of the year last year might prompt war and the russians that this was under consideration they say there's been more than thirty diplomatic meetings between the united states and the russians the americans have asked the russians to be in compliance with this agreement they feel that the russians have ignored them the russians for their part say that they have tried to be open the tried to be transparent they've tried to explain what is going on but they say that the americans are really just keen on

rebuilding their arsenal will certainly have that from donald trump in the past they would like to see new weapons more weapons more advanced weapons and this certainly gives them a window to do that will there be some sort of movement over the next six months it's unlikely given the position that both countries are taking at the moment i was going to ask you that in fact there's a six month window now can be salvaged. well certainly what the united states would like to see is a wider negotiation including china because when this deal was signed back in one thousand nine hundred seventy china wasn't really on the register as a military power of course in the last thirty years we've seen them build up their arsenal quite significantly including their short and medium nuclear weapons and so the united states if there is to be a really renegotiation would like to see china brought into that prospects are that

still very thin as well the united states is worried about china's growing threat as they see it in the asia pacific region so that is another reason why they want to bring in here's another problem for the united states as well the country talking with north korea about north korea abandoning its nuclear program the north koreans may well point the united states and say hold on a second iran how to deal with the united states donald trump spilled out of that you had to deal with russia over these weapons and you've pulled out of that what's to say if we come to some sort of agreement and we get some benefit out of it that suddenly disappears because donald trump is no longer president so that creates problems going on in the diplomatic realm but certainly at the moment the united states and russia seem very set on their positions they don't want to change them either for their domestic or international audience and so what happens over the next six months never say never particularly with the donald trump white house but it seems unlikely that both sides are ready to move anywhere in negotiations thank

you for that alan fischer in washington d.c. and here now is al-jazeera as rory chalons with the view from moscow. it's a version of this russian cruise missile that's brought an end to one of the nuclear age is most important arms control agreements when russia displayed the nine am seven to eight last week it insisted the range of its update the nine m. seven to nine is too short to fall into the ban zone for the intermediate range nuclear forces treaty or i am af but the us hasn't believed that since it first raised concerns in twenty fourteen. standards are. consequent to. standards so parties are to the. standard. by that standard other parties are allowed to demand a. standard that undermines all of our arms control. last

ditch talks as an international nonproliferation conference in beijing failed when it was signed by the united states in the soviet union in one thousand nine hundred seven the intermediate range nuclear forces treaty banned a whole class of weaponry both pledged to give up possession and development of land based crews and ballistic missiles with a range of five hundred to five thousand five hundred kilometers but in recent years the agreements been pushed past breaking point the united states says the russia has been lying about the capabilities of its newest cruise missiles russia says that isn't true that it's the united states that is violated the i.n.f. treaty and that washington has long wanted to start a new arms race. it's also accused the u.s. of blackmail tactics. as far as russia is concerned we're not to

blame for anything we're open for talks on all issues even the most acute problems and we're willing to be as open as we possibly can. the united states says it will take six months to complete the i.n.f. withdrawal process rory chalons al-jazeera moscow. well listen speaks more about this to terry crowe fools the former head of the verification and security policy coordination office at the international atomic energy agency his line from vienna thank you so much for being with us this move by the united states was somewhat expected is it though in your view motivated by security concerns or by politics i think it's more emitted by both security concerns as well as politics on the security side as you were to reports have noted the u.s. believes that this nine m. seven to nine cruise missile which has been tested by the russians at ranges below five hundred kilometers from a fixed launch year for deployment on air and sea based systems and tested at

a range above five hundred kilometers from a fixed launcher put together the u.s. believes that this is that. the russians do have a system that is in contravention of the i.n.f. treaty it's not very clear how this judgment has been achieved by the united states on the other hand eight of the nine countries that possess nuclear weapons today among them was that sixty one different types of ballistic and cruise missiles that potentially could be covered under an i and f. type treaty of ranges between five hundred to five thousand five hundred kilometers on the political side of course as your commentators have noted the ministration one stew of unfair of the united states in terms of its buildup of nuclear weapons and also ballistic missile defenses put together the u.s. would like to be free of the constraints of the i.n.f.

treaty that the europeans are very nervous are on edge about this how is europe going to deal with whatever the u.s. does going forward if the u.s. were for instance to decide that they would like to deploy weapons in europe power the europeans preparing for this. well once the treaty collapses then the europeans would be back in the situation of the early one nine hundred eighty s. where they were facing nearly three thousand nuclear warheads on soviet missiles aimed at the germany france and the united kingdom and also about two thousand nuclear warheads on the american missiles aimed at the soviet union so this could reignite a arms race in europe the russians could build and deploy weapons closer to nato its borders and buy said bertha which makes the europeans very nervous in particular germany it's interesting that although the nato countries joined the united states in blaming the russians for the violation of the i.n.f.

treaty they did not say anything about supporting the u.s. on we're drawing from the treaty and i believe that in private. discussions with the united states the europeans have raised concerns that they would like the treaty to be kept in some form thank you very much for speaking to us terry crowe former head of the verification and security policy coordination at the international atomic energy agency we've seen your time and insight thank you. the international criminal court has ordered the conditional release of ivory coast says former president bible by boy and his former right hand man shall be a good day where acquitted of crimes against humanity last month they have to live in and yet unspecified country pending an appeal by prosecutors the seventy three year old was found not guilty of being behind a wave of violence that followed disputed elections in the west african country in two thousand and ten joining us now in the news hour is mark airstone who is the deputy director of the foundation which promotes and advocates for the

international criminal justice system he's via skype from toronto canada the t.v. on al-jazeera by boat now the third african had a state to be released after a long period of time in custody at the i.c.c. what does this tell us about the state of the international criminal court and its ability to operate as the the instrument for international justice thanks for having me i think it depends on where you are and who you ask this is clearly about and that we are the i.c.c. prosecutor in a very good start to the weekend or later on bible and supporters and how we look at the i.c.c. depends on depends on where we stand so for supporters and learning viability defense team this is this is the criminal justice system of the international criminal court working appropriately everyone working effectively for those people who have the expectation that the international criminal court is able to secure convictions and high profile.