in the world it's probably been repaid up to two thirds of that but that leaves anywhere in the neighborhood of twenty to thirty billion dollars venezuela china analysts say china's leaders are concerned about whether the deals will be honored if the opposition party takes power but for now china continues to voice support from the duros coupled with veiled warnings to the united states. china opposes for interference in the internal affairs. especially one as well in government to uphold national sovereignty independence and threatening military interference and continued to support efforts made by the stability. the growing political economic and humanitarian crisis in venezuela has attracted global headlines and concern the main evening news on state controlled television has shown pictures of the protests but so far made no mention of the violence or suffering of the people. as in africa

chinese influence in south america is expanding fast especially in venezuela besides money china has also been helping the mature regime in another important way it's now venezuela's biggest provider of arms including weapons for crowd control which have been proving so effective joining the current unrest still to come on counting the cost of a wake up call for the mining industry in brazil one of the worst disasters in the nation's history puts the spotlight on the world's biggest producer of iron ore. but first more of our top story venezuela there things like rice cooking oil and other basics are in short supply people have to scavenge for food according to reports parts of the coastline have become havens for ex fisherman turned pirates there as well and smugglers in twenty nine thousand are exchanging drugs and guns for things like nappies and on the other side of the equation the rich and powerful

in venezuela known as the balibo gaze many of them a high ranking military the u.s. alleges that they've been stashing their money in safe havens like u.s. luxury real estate in places like miami well oil isn't the only resource in venezuela the country claims to have the world's fourth largest gold mine there were reports this week the president nicolas maduro is getting ready to ship twenty tons of gold out of the country the bank of england has blocked matilda's officials from withdrawing one point two billion dollars worth of gold that's being stored in its faults but joining us now from london is diego campos diego is a principle analyst for country risk in the americas team at i.h.s. market good to have you with us go so we have u.s. slapping sanctions on venezuela a country which relies on oil for ninety five percent of its foreign currency earnings in order to pay for imports this great confusion in the energy markets at the moment just how to trade in venezuelan oil what's going to happen. well

certainly the sanctions on the old sector are a game changer you will make it very very difficult for the administration who will to get access to the proceeds of this sales. of oil and certainly these going to accelerate pressure for him to step down to go where are venezuela's assets right now unknown billions of dollars hidden in possibly u.s. real estate rumors of gold reserves being flown out of the country pirates in the caribbean we're hearing about at the moment where is or this money well there are the reason why venezuela signal me seeing such a dire state is because of years of widespread corruption among gorgon officials and big mismanagement some of these procedures are being laundered in

different places in the caribbean in european countries even in the u.s. and some like in american countries and. it's at the moment difficult to precise exactly where these assets located and who has been operating a front man for man your mode of thought gorman official but what is clear is that the national assembly menace well or which is controlled by the opposition and which is the only legitimate democratically elected institution in the country how to use late there to establish the necessary make any sense so that these assets could be frozen abroad and be channeled to be administration or one way or the head of the national somebody who has their team up. and who has been. recognized by the u.s. may gonna buy most american gone trees and many e.u. countries and i think. the first steps doors trying to get control of

these assets we think that the fact that these gone trees have recognized the administration was thought we make it more easy for al thora these of those going to have to frozen those are said but separate and up. those scientists who don't belong directly to the orbit of various wait up to stay don't quote bunnies i mean refineries bank accounts. and so on the u.s. treasury and the u.s. in particular is thinking that necessary steps so that the revenues and it will do all of those are said to go directly to administration or was under the law so to make it more difficult for mother look to govern we have to remember this by difficult motors not be recognizing their nationally he still in control of government functions and enjoys the support of the military at least until now and the fact that way though will axes the funding for his people amount which are

being recognized by these countries for humanitarian aid are great steps towards not only baby in the way for a democratic transition but also to generate an influx of revenues for where you go to ministration to get a really good to talk to your counting the cost many thanks for being with us thank you wade and always a pleasure now it's being called the most hated company in brazil violate the world's number one all producer is being held to account for its role in a dam collapse an industrial accident which is devastated a local mining community it's fear that more than three hundred people have died buried under tons of toxic sludge and there's growing anger because this is the second time in five years that valets mining waste has devastated the local environment and a serious daniel swam or has our report from burma deal in brazil. the first funerals are some of the first victims to be recovered and identified the whole town of bora geno is grieving their brothers and sisters sons and daughters

were employees and subcontractors of valley the company that owns the iron ore mine where the dam burst. thank you we didn't hear anything from the company if we had looked for him his body would most probably still be in the mud after the accident we wanted information. francis was thirty four years old married and with a four year old daughter. was missing you know how many people would ever be found how many fathers mothers and kids how we going to cope now i don't know how i will cope but my brother how will his daughter cope without her father how my father being about his son. dozens of bodies have been recovered but many hundreds more remain unaccounted for and with a far we don't have space for more than three bodies in the funeral parlor so many people are gathering here i might end up doing a collective funeral in the sports center where i think. emergency teams are still

involved in the rescue operation although most say there is little hope of finding more survivors. after the tragedy the morning this is a mining town but it's a small town where everybody knows everybody else and with many many more funerals to come the anger people here feel is only going to grow there are already signs of it at lessons not learned at insufficient investment in safety it's mostly directed at the mine owners that the same part owners of a nearby mine were at them burst in two thousand and fifteen killing one thousand people and causing immense environmental damage. in others in this profoundly religious country has their own way of showing their grief and support was local it was usage year we came from a nearby city to give emotional and spiritual support. these people who are suffering who brought donations too but we're mostly here to hug and console on a busy mining is the region's major employer amidst the grief and the

recriminations the brazilian government the mining industry and this devastated community must now tackle what is emerging as one of the biggest crises in the country's history joining us now from one of service is humana blanco is the head of latin america research at various maple crossed a risk analysis and forecasting company good to have you with us brazil's frozen more than four billion dollars worth of assets the company itself has said that it's going to spend more than one billion dollars decommissioning dams like the ones that failed it's somewhat worrying isn't it that there are potentially more disasters like the ones like the one we saw we saw that could happen. well you know our research at various shows that community opposition and community concerns around mining largely relate to water management issues across latin america one of those issues is how water is stored and disposed after it has been used in mining

operations and of course you know in the case of brazil in and in this particular decision in question there's a lot of work that will need to be done around regulations and for cement and how the industry responds to this disaster to prevent future ones from occurring again is this a test case for the government environmentalists worried that president bush tomorrow will open up the amazon to more logging. production. this is a timely reminder of potential manmade disasters what lessons will president bush and laura take from this well it remains to be seen if the government will respond to this disaster by reevaluating its own environmental policy the question then becomes you know the risk threats in brazil increased enough. you know with very responsible business plans environmental management mechanisms

would not want to go into these environmental sensitive areas that the government is planning to open up to the sector and the other question is can the government actually implemented reform program around environmental regulation and e.c. environmental regulatory processes or will they have government have to go back to the drawing board because of not just investor pressure and even sector pressure because of course the mining sector you know really works very hard to to try to mitigate this perception that all its operations are environmentally damaging when many responsible companies operate in this country's. in a safe manner but there will also be a lot of social pressure even from potentially the president support base if these are communities that are exposed to mining operations and have concerns about potential environmental disasters following the scandal which which ultimately took

down the last government what's your gut feeling about what's what's going to happen. well even in the perspective of you know government stability going forward projection indices which look at the six month outlook and the two year outlook we actually see the stability of this government strengthen over the six month period the simple reason for that is because it's a new government in power with a new support base in congress and it's not facing the potential risk of impeachment that we've seen in brazil over the past three years a pretty recurring basis both for dilma rousseff and nischelle turner the question then becomes what happens if this government is unable to deliver the reforms and the changes and improvements it has promised for example on the security front or an economic growth and when we talk about corruption a corruption is in brazil is not linked to one particular party or one particular

administration alone it's really an entrenched problem in the political class and of course there are members of the new administration who are being investigated for corruption and new allegations are emerging every day against different members of the new government so really we need to look at how those investigations involve and whether a threat emerges more in the medium term so we're looking out at the one or two year outlook rather than in the very short six month term. for this week if you'd like to comment on anything that you've seen you can treat me. on twitter but please use the hashtag a.g.c. to see when you do or you can drop us a line counting the cost of. email address. as always there's plenty more few online at al-jazeera dot com slash c.t.c. that takes you straight to our page and there you'll find individual reports links even entire episodes for use of catch up on but that's it for this edition of counting the cost i'm adrian finnegan from the whole team here in doha thanks for

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al-jazeera raising fears of a new arms race the united states says russian violations of forced it to back out of a cold war era nuclear missile packed hour of talk. also in the news supporters of the former ivory coast president now run by both celebrate his release by the international criminal court venezuela's opposition leader rejects a mediation offer from mexico and europe why both camps are now planning mass rallies for saturday there is new footage of the moment a wall of sludge and mud burst from a dam in brazil and sport cover celebrates football history the asian cup becomes the first major trophy for the twenty twenty two world cup hosts. the u.s. is suspending its involvement in

a decade's old nuclear missile pact with russia sparking fears of a new arms race the trumpet ministration is accused moscow violating the treaty and says it will fully withdraw in six months unless russia complies with the deal's terms rejects all these accusations that in washington d.c. . suspension of the historic treaty that has been a cornerstone of european security for decades for years russia has violated the terms of the intermediate range nuclear forces treaty without remorse the united states will therefore suspend its obligations under the n f treaty effective february second. the white house maintains the u.s. has adhere to the intermediate range nuclear forces treaty well russia has not in that time it accuses russia of covertly developing and fielding a prohibited missile system that poses a threat to european allies u.s.

forces stationed there the u.s. did not give specific examples of violations russia has consistently denied it's breaking the agreement but u.s. secretary of state says that russia is in violation what's your response we're not going to approach this many times but they don't want to lose the agreement was signed during the cold war by u.s. president ronald reagan and russia's mikhail gorbachev in one nine hundred eighty seven when most agree it's not perfect it did hold to ask leading arms race between the two superpowers u.s. president donald trump has long been a critic of the treaty. but on friday he suggested it might be time to negotiate a new one less thing to do and here we should be the only one i hope that we're able to get everybody in a very big and beautiful room and do a new treaty that would be much better still there's concern the u.s. did not exhausted. diplomatic options and is trump pressure is north korea to give

up its nuclear arsenal many question why he would relax any missile restrictions on russia it actually opens the door for russia to deploy more of these missiles and opens the door for a new european missile race some analysts have speculated the trumpet ministration isn't just worried about russia. china is not bound by the treaty there's criticism it's been gaining military advantage deploying large numbers of missiles with ranges beyond the current limits there are now just six months for the agreement to be saved the united states is russian must destroy equipment in violation of the agreement or will move ahead with a response designed to deny what the united states perceives to be russia's military advantage can really help at al-jazeera the white house. is with us now she was an ambassador coordinating the reduction of weapons of mass destruction for

the state department joining us from woodbridge virginia. is this another example of the quote unquote trumped doctrine i.e. where he just withdraws from pacts because he doesn't like them or doesn't like the way they were set up or does the united states have real grievances here. i actually think it's a little of both i think there is a concern about russia's missiles there's been teligent that indicates that the missiles do in fact have a range dance beyond what's allowed under the i.n.f. treaty and that there's a chance they have actual plane done some testing with them so there is a concern valid concern about what russia is doing however there are some diplomatic efforts that you know they could have done more to actually try to resolve the issue on the other hand you know it is another case obviously of the u.s. withdrawal from retreat that really is very very important in terms of what it's been able to do and what it can prevent in terms of our control so it can also

deftly be seen as another case where the u.s. sees an agreement that it doesn't like and rather taking the time to really exhaust diplomatic efforts it decides to address the concerns that you talked about before are they the type of concerns that from what you can see they could be some middle ground for russia or in the u.s. to agree from i mean at the moment russia is just saying well no we reject the alegate the accusations that the type of thing that could find some common ground. i think there is an opportunity for common ground i mean there also in russia also has been cern's about some you know planned ideas the u.s. has in terms of developing missiles so i think there is an opportunity for ball to to possibly inspect to some inspections to have some more transparency about some of the concerns that they have and pursue that route let's go a little further to see you know if if in fact russia saying it's not true though let's give it a go and see for ourselves and same thing for us for russia so that avenue has not

really been tested enough so i think there is potential common ground but we're not giving ourselves a chance to see if there really is. let's say six months down the track that nothing is resolved and the u.s. does dissolve its involvement here then what happens. fears of some sort of nuclear right so arms rights i mean do they become a lot bigger in six months time potentially. well what it does it is allows for that to potentially happen because there's long as you have a treaty even if there's a disagreement there's a foundation there for some agreement or for some diplomatic effort to stay with ending agreement which is always preferred because why should don't have a tree then you have nothing you have no limits you have no discussion about what can be done to try to stay within the limit and so it really does really does destroy that opportunity and it opens up the door for russia to do other things

were concerned about a missile that they have were giving up an opportunity to try to resolve that same with russia in iraq concerned russia may have about any ideas the u.s. might have missiles so it does open a door for more on two reasons one of jenkins with us from woodbridge virginia really appreciate your time thank you thank you appreciate it and thirty two other news the former ivory coast president iran has been released by the international criminal court the seventy three year old was found not guilty of crimes against humanity including initiating a wave of violence following disputed elections in two thousand and ten or acquitted of the crimes by his ally former youth minister charles blackwood a late sorry child they go to have remained in detention since last month judges ordered their release on the condition they live in and as yet unspecified country . when jubilant supporters danced and chanted outside the course they say by bo is innocent they hope he will one day even return to our very coast thank.

god. thank you sharon because that was. ok because it cannot be christian because that was the fact that we have we have free. the thoughts of much person who is deputy director of the white yama foundation which promotes the international criminal justice system he tells us by both still faces jail time on other charges the acquittal itself may not have that significant of a man a fact what would have a very significant the fact is of course if your own bible returns to ivory coast and in particular if you re enters the politico arena that is quite likely but it's actually unclear it's quite likely that he would enter the political arena if he returned but it's unclear whether he would actually return to the ivory coast at

this at this point one thing of note is that despite the fact that the i.c.c. acquitted. there is still an arrest warrant that was issued in ivory coast an international arrest warrant issued for him for the misappropriation of funds and should he be convicted for charges that arrest warrant speaks to he could face up to twenty years in prison. it has been six months since the start of the latest ebola outbreak in democratic republic of congo the world health organization says more than four hundred sixty people have been killed by the virus this is the worst outbreak in the country's history priyanka gupta has. the monday in task of scrapping shoes takes on a whole new meaning in the democratic republic of congo it's part of who team that keeps these health workers on the frontline of the world's second largest. safe from infection. the latest outbreak here has killed hundreds of people in the last

six months eighteen year old. survives but to conceive unborn baby she's grateful for a second chance at life when i wasn't but then when i was at the a ball the treatments into many friends came to see me and that gave me confidence that i will be fine despite my mother crying when she saw me other people were afraid of me the doctor said that he could save me all the child i think the doctors for helping me survive the virus was first reported in the small town of mangino in the north keevil region last year in just six months it's spread to some of the most densely populated areas making it difficult for health workers to predict his reach. and there are fears that the virus may be inching closer to goma a city of over a million people along the heavily traveled border with rwanda reaching the affected areas means treading across an active conflict zone there are more than

one hundred armed groups active in north kivu the epicenter of the latest operator . health workers and civilians in were hit areas have come under repeated attacks bearable fighting people are centers for vandalised in the run up to december's presidential election but they would have organization says there is some room for optimism we vaccinate. sixty six thousand people with targeted ring vaccination and you know new vaccine in the field for the for the first time in a situation like this and we have literally hundreds and hundreds of staff in the field doing this work so we believe that we've managed to contain the disease in the areas concerned we've also worked very closely with the fork in the surrounding countries and in neighboring south sudan health workers have started getting the first shots of the border vaccine screening facilities have been set up and the board trees have been opened to stop the disease from spreading across the border maximum preparedness for disease.