demonstrators hundreds of people have been arrested since rallies against president omar al bashir began in december human rights activists say at least forty five people have been killed nigeria's ruling all progressives congress party has held a rally in lagos ahead of next saturday's election president rouhani is hoping to secure a second four year term but the main opposition party has accused the president of trying to silence his rivals the people's democratic party says it's been kicked out of its planned rally venue. and dozens of people have died in northern india after drinking contaminated alcohol the government ordered a crackdown after three separate incidents in the past few days priyanka reports. people in the northern indian city of so hard core are in shock families of those killed by contaminated alcohol are trying to piece together what happened to cities and a town in the same region coping with the same crisis. he complained

of severe stomach ache so i took him to get an injection he was better then slept after coming back home the pain came back so we took him to the hospital again a steady stream of patients are being wheeled into nearby hospitals time is of essence. those who couldn't be saved are piled into trucks but these are just the cases that have come to light only we are trying to find out if anyone else has consumed the liquor i was being kept in any other homes we are investigating the state governments of through our kind and go to pradesh have promised to crack down on illegally brewed alcohol charm are important get we have suspended six foreign portman officials including the inspector the sub inspector among others who are responsible for curbing these kind of illegal train according to a latest government report at least fifteen hundred indians died from to gain contaminated alcohol and twenty fifteen the victims are often from poor communities

who are unable to afford liquor from licensed shops and buy it from unregulated suppliers who used toxic chemicals and even pesticides to save costs priyanka took the zero. still ahead on al-jazeera with six weeks left for britain's exit from the e.u. we look at the concerns and fears of living in germany. death and disease in india's read of a high level of the petition that's killing marine life. and it's a case of double delight for liverpool and the english premier league in the era when explained in sport. hello we've still got some more disturbed weather into central parts of china into

the south of the country slushy set amount of brought weather and some decent spells of sunshine so hong kong gets up to twenty three celsius on sunday but some places the snows showing there have for sunday sinking further southwards will see temperatures in shanghai at around seven celsius that's an improvement but we are going to see that wet weather and that wintry weather just coming in across a good part of central china the southeast on the other hand staying settled and sunny twenty four celsius the for hong kong settling across much of the philippines much as catch your charge to southern parts perhaps one or two showers that sue into good part of malaysia indonesia seeing somlata showers from time to time. singapore coquette she got the to the day with thirty two celsius in singapore not looking too bad cops chance of better weather just nothing further north as we go through monday we settled at essentially sunny thirty two celsius here in bangkok a lot of dry weather too across south asia so the chance of wanted to shout into

the south of india into nadu into caroline maybe the into thing to be few and far between little more cloud up towards the far north of the country but temperatures recover in new delhi. who was it sponsored by qatar and. soon ten from many members. i mean. the war has passed some. people in power are meets the woman heading an eighteen mile militia. and dispensing justice with an unforgiving hand. and eye for an army in iraq on al-jazeera. has their own studio and you both mentally resources are under the wire who are measuring you guys which finally form a good bit of the tocsin with essentially nowhere the more we would push them the

more they push back we knew it was coming to question was do we sit and wait for do we surprise them with a preemptive strike. or one just. welcome back i'm just. a reminder about top stories this hour the u.s. backed syrian democratic forces say they've begun their final push to get i feel out of the last pocket of territory. the political crisis in venezuela has turned into a dead dog over a consignment of u.s. aid to sitting on the colombian side of the border the opposition is trying to work

out how to get it into the country. turkey has condemned china's treatment of its muslim week a minority calling it a great cause of shame for humanity around one million we believe to be held in camps against their will. u.s. democratic senator elizabeth warren has officially begun her twenty twenty presidential bid she made the announcement in her home state of massachusetts her campaign is centered on wes's rights fair wages and access to health care and joins an increasingly crowded field of democrats vying for the chance to challenge president donald trump eight candidates have now throwing their hats in the ring they include new jersey senator cory booker longtime prosecutor and california senator kemah harris and barack obama's former housing secretary julian castro or several others have also signaled their interest in entering the race twenty sixteen democratic candidate and vermont senator bernie sanders is expected to run

again and former vice president joe biden said in december he's the most qualified person for the job well we spoke to eric have a u.s. political analyst author and radio host he says elizabeth warren will be a tough competitor. actually elizabeth warren enters the race actually on a very strong footing she's got an amazing war chest she's got a rabbit base of followers and supporters and she's actually done a lot of the leg work for the all important iowa caucuses so expect elizabeth warren to run really strong and she's actually set the pace of for the rest of the field as she's already attacked her her her space in terms of focus on focusing on working class and middle class voters and workers and we already know that president donald trump sees her as someone who he has gone after and so i think that will actually embolden her with many of her already legion of supporters what

we're seeing i think is a race that is shaping up to look much like what we saw in two thousand and eight when president barack obama and hillary clinton staked their candidacies for the presidency we're going to see i think an energized democratic field and also a base that's energetic and energized because many of the candidates that we're seeing already at least the top tier candidates many of the democratic base are very happy with them and the issues that they are focusing on and so i think it's going to be a crowded field and we're going to see a number of people of color and women actually jockeying for the for the for they can't for the candidate see to lead the party but i think what it does is it energizes the base it brings more people into the tent and overall i think it's going to make it that much more difficult for president donald trump running in two thousand and twenty. the governor of the u.s. state of virginia has made his first public appearance since defying calls to resign over a racism scandal ralph nor them attended a funeral service for

a state police trooper the democrat is facing controversy over a photo taken in one thousand nine hundred eighty four showing students dressed in black face and as the true klux klan nor them denied it was him but later admitted to wearing blackface to another college party and it's not the only leadership scandal plaguing the state of virginia the left handed governor just in fairfax also a democrat has been accused of rape and sexual assault he's denied the allegations calling it a smear campaign caster has more on the political turmoil from the state capitol richmond. the turmoil engulfing virginia as president has roots in the state's racist past a century and a half ago as virginia led fellow slave owning states into the american civil war white actors painted their faces black to walk and humiliate enslaved blacks the war ended slavery but not blackface but john was most popular character jim crow

became the symbol of racial segregation that continued into the one nine hundred fifty s. and now these photos tied to virginia's current political leaders connect that racism to the present there's always necessarily been a belief that black people were inferior to justify slavery and segregation and sue and sue i don't want to say excuse but explain why they are lower in society in terms of income and education and so when you put on blackface you're essentially making a caricature of someone that you think is less true than you governor ralph northam continues to resist calls to resign he's wavered on whether it's him in the photo from his college yearbook but says he did wear blackface on another occasion i look back. now and regret that i did not understand the harmful legacy of an action like that virginia's attorney general admitted this week he also wore black face in the

eighty's in the states senate majority leader edited a college yearbook with these photos of fellow virginia military institute students to nightmare a nightmare in virginia right now and we needed to and two of the three leaders in the black face scandal are democrats having campaigned on racial equality to win votes in a state that was recently a republican stronghold now the democrats rise in virginia is in jeopardy and the party's national efforts to draw a contrast with the race politics of donald trump is damage. that bought the. secular party but the democrats troubles in virginia go beyond race just as lieutenant governor just in fairfax seemed poised to replace the embattled governor two women including this college professor came forward to accuse fairfax of sexual assault fairfax denies the allegations does anybody think

it's any coincidence that on the eve of potentially being elevated that's when this uncorroborated smear comes out does anybody believe that's a coincidence coincidence or not the cascading scandals have thrown virginia into political chaos it's unclear who will lead the state once this is all over or if the social troubles one thought to be confined to history will ever see a true end. castro al-jazeera richmond virginia. subideas capital has seen its tenth weekend of anti-government demonstrations several thousand people marched through belgrade on saturday demanding the resignation of president alexander virtue he is accused of stifling free media and democracy has previously denied the allegations with state media quoting the protest as western stooges. on monday iran will mark the fortieth anniversary of its islamic revolution in the lead up to the anniversary we've been reporting on the changes

iranians have seen in that time when ayatollah khomeini returned from exile in one nine hundred seventy nine he'd been living in france and since then the french government has had a complex relationship with terror on the tasha but that takes a look back. it was a turning point in the iranian revolution ayatollah khomeini arriving in tehran in february one nine hundred seventy nine after fourteen years in exile in iraq and france with khamenei on the flight from paris was apple has son bernie souter who later became the islamic republic's first president today benny sajid lives in exile in france he fled iran in one thousand eighty one but his memories of that flight forty years ago of fifty eight. some fit the plane would be shot down naturally we were scared but the excitement was stronger after thirty years of exile to see iran in the people it was more than we could imagine the enthusiasm

the joy and. bunny sighed helped commenee join his exile in france in one thousand nine hundred eighty eight he says france was chosen because iranians didn't need visas at the time and there was freedom of expression the french government was an ally of evolved sharp it didn't prevent khomeini's arrival saying he was free to visit for nearly five months the ayatollah lived in the countryside near paris it was in this quiet village on this street that ayatollah khomeini planned the iranian revolution and each day dozens of his followers from across europe would come here to watch him pray and listen to him preach. the french government had hoped that harmony would bring iran democracy but if you changed after nine hundred seventy nine and what was once france realized this wasn't just a transitory state and harmonies role wasn't only symbolic the french began to rethink then events such as the u.s. embassy hostage crisis meant france really changed its mind in the one nine hundred eighty s. france backed baghdad in the iran iraq war and relations with tehran broke down

they continued to be strained for decades relations improved in twenty fifteen when france signed the iran nuclear deal they're far from warm today but presidency matter will not cost supports dialogue with tehran so applause started. paris's iran as the only stable poem's the middle east a ship that disappeared iraq and syria over so dear it isn't just a great power to prison and clark or like obama believes iraq is a region's only country of the future. last year the french government accused iranian security forces of plotting to kill iranian any k. position activists on french soil it was the latest sign for france the forty years after the revolution iran is some way from being the reliable ally the paris has long wished for tasha butler al jazeera nothing to shuttle france. britain's departure from the european union is now just six weeks away but the future of

british citizens living and other member states remains in limbo as many as one and a half million britons live in the e.u. about one hundred fifty thousand of them in germany and as dominic cain explains many are worried about the impact that might soon have on their lives. at home in prince la bella composer and musician richard scott experiments with mixing up sounds he performs right across the e.u. but now fears his british nationality could make that much harder so i guess what i would most like to be is not a playing card or a chess piece and we were told at the beginning that we weren't going to be you know we're not going to be trading with people's lives but that's exactly what is happening on both sides so yeah i feel like i'm a i'm a pawn in some growing no control over however britain does leave the e.u. its citizens will then find themselves having to register at places like this

office for foreigners it's thought around one hundred fifty thousand british citizens are living and working in germany right now perhaps around sixty percent of them have lived here long enough to qualify to obtain german citizenship but that still leaves the other forty percent around sixty thousand people who cannot and would therefore find their freedom of movement potentially impeded. and that concern is not restricted just to u.k. citizens many german firms have trade links with britain like a measuring instruments in the rhineland its chief executive says the idea of the u.k. crashing out of the e.u. is really ominous worst case scenario is the heart of the worst case scenario is a heartbreaks it which would mean customs checks at the british border in less than three months for which no one is prepared it would be an absolute chaos of course we hope for a different outcome. on the political side of the german government has tried to

give reassurances about what might happen if. we want to keep the damage and breck's it will be damaging to a minimum so we will of course continue to try and find a solution for an orderly exit but we also must head for the eventuality that there won't be an orderly solution. all for richard scott the simple solution is to become german he's lived here long enough to do so but many thousands cannot and for them with each passing day hard drugs it sounds increasingly worrying dominic kane al-jazeera in. saudi arabia has denied claims it has any connection with the national enquirer as the u.s. tabloids dispute with amazon boss jeff bezos escalates bezos has accused the national enquirer his publisher of trying to blackmail him with private photographs after he hired an investigator to prove the coverage of him was politically

motivated as also also owns the washington post which employed and murdered a saudi journalist jamal khashoggi. when voters in thailand head to the polls next month many will be hoping for an outcome that needs to improve human rights particularly free speech the military has run the country since a coup n twenty fourteen when hail reports from bangkok. seeking justice and answers a small group gathered outside the office of the thai prime minister in bangkok everybody they risked a wrist to demand an investigation into the murder of two critics of the military government and monarchy and the disappearance of another they went missing from neighboring laos and in december the bodies of two of them were found in the mekong river teil authorities say they had nothing to do with the murders all of these cases create a fear among people like people are afraid to express their views and opinions especially about establishment such as the monarchy no one dares to do anything even to demand the rights of the dead. some york was arrested before the coup and

spent seven years in jail for criticizing the royal family in articles published in his magazine but i mean you know he says when he was released last year he found that human rights had to rewrite to dramatically under military rule inspiring him to continue fighting for democracy and free speech the government has used several laws to try to stifle dissent charging people with sedition or violating the computer crimes act to things they're posted online and after the coup there was a surge in the number of people charged with insulting the monarchy. if the military has also used less overt tactics like harassment to silence critics for the past ten years the hosts of this web show have divided thailand's politicians since the coup the being summoned by soldiers and continue to be watched closely. angry. these and of intimidation and during these time.

until now may still. come in the form of information officer. on my twitter account on my facebook or. my instagram or my wife you know i'm confident the election and the reintroduction of opposition voices to parliament will help ease restrictions but others on sure anything will change because of a constitution that allows an elected senate is and even an appointed prime minister. in the near future is still hopeless fertile and we should brace for more chaos and conflict because i don't think a truly civilian government will be full. until it is those whose voices have been being silenced say they'll continue to.