a 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 to and to 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 black face you're essentially making a caricature of someone that you think is lesser then 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 black face 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. 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 but my. particular party but the democrats troubles in virginia go beyond race just says lieutenant governor just hymns their facts seemed poised to replace the embattled governor two women including this college professor came forward to accuse fairfax of sexual assault their facts denies the allegations does anybody think it's any coincidence that on the eve. potentially be 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 one thess is all over or if the social troubles one thought to be confined to history well ever see a true end. castro al-jazeera richmond virginia. well the weather is nice but still ahead here on out is there a turkey condensed china's month's detention of we could see becomes describing it as an embarrassment for humanity and death and disease in india's river high levels of pollution it's killing marine life. we've got a good mobile flow in our weather across north america at the moment outbreaks of

rain sleet and snow making their way a still some warmth into the southeastern corner miami gets up to around twenty six hours just pushed a little further north not a woman atlanta seven degrees as a single figures for many so minus seven there for ottawa cold crisp sunshine coming through is our next band of wintry weather pushing out of the northern plains pushing over towards the midwest some snow all the way down is walking some more than parts of texas as well celsius the top champ is there for dallas but some places of rain and snow to just pushing up towards the rockies over the next couple of days the pacific northwest seeing some really heavy snowfalls as we go on into the early part of next week to clean up around the cascades pushing for the race more snow coming in his snow on our leading flank all that disturbed weather down towards the southeast including winds coming in from the south so warms up in dallas warm right seventeen degrees celsius a little warmer there in atlanta as well around twelve degrees but florida doing quite nicely again getting up into the mid twenty's mid to high twenty's across the

caribbean largely dry you could just catch the southern parts of jamaica for sunday but i think essentially with those winds driving further west where it should be settled by monday. on counting the cost digital divisions why half the world's population risks missing out on the next evolution of the internet from russia with interest kremlin backed investments in venezuela are all about plus a report from senegal's currency control to see counting the cost on al-jazeera.

welcome back you're watching not just a reminder of all top stories the u.s. but syrian democratic forces say they've begun the final push to push myself out of its last pocket of terror a treat more than twenty thousand people have been moved camps also the political crisis in venezuela has turned into a deadlock over consignment of u.s. aid sitting on the colombian side of the border the opposition is trying to work out how to get it into the country. thousands of anti-government protesters are calling for haitian president boise to resign accusing him of being involved in corruption some demonstrators are throwing rocks at his home. turkey has condemned china's treatment of its muslim week of minorities saying it's a great cause of shame for humanity about

a million years are believed to be holding comes against their will in turkish foreign ministry wants beijing to respect their human rights and shut down what it calls concentration camps beijing says the camps of volunteering designed to stamp out extremist tendencies that we guess are ethnically turkic muslims and the language is related to turkish. is a professor of global islamic politics at australians deakin university he says turkey should improve its own human rights record before criticizing others particularly for turkic speaking people and we grew up being part of that larger turkic world its belief that martin came out of central asia including from she and young so there's a broad connection both as muslims and as to peoples so there's no doubt a lot of genuine sentiment to its part but of course turkey is guilty of much the same sin with its accusing the regime of xi jinping of being guilty of the you know when regime is doing the same thing on the same scale china being twenty times the

scale of the size of to the similar proportion of people are in in prison for similar reasons into turkey is suffering itself from a great economic downturn depends very much upon trade with china like many countries so that relationship with china is vital. is involved in a lot of out of manufacture into into europe which competes with china so it's a complex story but there's no question this is this is a move which threatens to put the chinee tookey relationship at risk but turkey's relationship with europe and with the western hemisphere is already so fraught that perhaps there's a hope they can balance that somehow. those ready forces say they've arrested a palestinian man in connection with the murder of a teenager and. was detained a jury in a raid at a mosque in the occupied west bank is being questioned over the death of a nineteen year old israeli beauty and he was killed in jerusalem on thursday going

to detention has led to violence between palestinian protesters and israeli forces and the guards refuels been held for a fourteen year old palestinian boy. was shot by israeli soldiers on friday during protests on the barrier fence separating israel from gaza palestinians have been staging weekly demonstrations at the border since march last year members of sudan's parliament of call for emergency session to discuss the government's treatment of protesters several politicians say they're worried about an excessive use of force hundreds of people have been arrested since rallies against president omar bashir began in december human rights groups say at least forty five people are being killed that on saturday sudanese state media said all detained journalists will be released will stay on the continent egyptian president sisi is set to chair the african union at its annual summit which begins in ethiopia on sunday and amnesty international says this could undermine the

a use commitment to human rights organization has expressed concern over the potential impact of cc's chairmanship could have on the independence of regional human rights mechanisms and their future engagement with civil society amnesty goes on to say the least violations it says were carried out by egyptian authorities including in force disappearances and nice killings during a wave of demonstrations and twenty thirteen that year the african union suspended egypt's membership when sisi led the military coup against the democratically elected president mohammed morsi. is a social and political commentator he says presidency sees a leadership will prove to be damaging. ultimately the choice of having sisi as the leader of the you is a clear indication that although things have changed. although things are supposedly changing the fact is we are. being very rich aggressive we're actually

going back to be the eighty's ninety's type of situation where. that he doesn't very reluctant to allow more human rights to be available to the to the people and i think importantly i mean the fact that sisi virtually rigged an election won it by ninety seven ninety eight percent. tells you a lot about how the a you will most likely respond to any electoral issues were any political issues around the elections there on the continent and i think this is going to be a very bad year for africa in terms of moving forward. when voters in thailand head to the polls next month many will be hoping for an outcome that means to improve human rights particularly free speech the military has won the country since the coup in twenty fourteen wayne hale reports now from bangkok. seeking justice and says

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 i mean you know he says when he was released last year he found that human rights had to rewrite a 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 or things they're posted online and after the coup there was a surge in the number of people charged with insulting the monarchy. 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 that been summoned by soldiers and continue to be watched closely. these intimidation and during these time. they 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 aren't

sure anything will change because of a constitution that allows for an elected senators and even an appointed prime minister. in the near future is still hopeless for thailand we should brace for more chaos and conflict because i don't think the civilian government will before. until it is those whose voices haven't been silenced say they'll continue to use their woods and actions to push for change as thailand begins another episode of its turbulent political story wayne hay al jazeera bangkok. the australians parliamentary computer network has been hit by a cyber attack politicians on the staff in the company were made to change their passwords after the breach but the government says there's no evidence that any data has been improperly accessed and speculation that a foreign government is responsible prime minister scott morrison though has refused to be drawn on the source of the. parts of india river which flows through new delhi. that environmentalists say no marine life can

survive millions of liters of sewage are dumped into the river every single day. the reports. at first it seems these fishermen are paddling to snow but the foam resting on the murky black water is sewage parts of the illinois river flowing through new delhi have been labeled dead best so polluted no marine life is able to survive yet many people depend on the river for their livelihood. or the pollution africa business left with nothing to try for now they cannot survive. because the entire city's waste is being dumped into the yemenite ever the government doesn't do anything to clean it. it's illegal yet industrial waste rubbish and untreated sewage are dumped into the yamuna. almost four hundred

million liters of sewage comes from new delhi every day and more than half of that is left untreated. prime minister narendra modi's government has been pumping millions of dollars into projects to clean up india's rivers. but environmental experts say it's not working the delhi government has still not filed a single case under the water act against any polluter so far as the human is concerned in the whole country is in not more than twenty cases that existed under the provisions of the water prevention of pollution act which provides for the imprisonment punishment for any person who is actually polluting a river. the hindu community considers the way the sacred but it ceremonies carry their own breasts the gun that is they love the got there it's people who doubted the river is the residents who made it impure but for me it's not dirty i drink this water too. for many the river kinds is the spirit but the mix of sewage and

pollution it's all said damaging health and destroying livelihoods laura that is badly al-jazeera. to europe now where britain's departure from the european union is due to happen in just six weeks time a list of one of the half million u.k. citizens living in other states is still up in the double a cane but one of them in germany. at home in pensacola barrack 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 trust 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 game no control over however britain does leave the e.u. 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 so many german firms have trade links with britain. measuring instruments in the rhineland its chief executive says the idea of the u.k. crashing out of the e.u. is really ominous put us 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. 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 have head with 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 that many thousands cannot and for them with each passing day hard drugs it sounds increasingly worrying dominic kane al-jazeera. you're watching al-jazeera with me still robin a reminder of our top news stories the u.s. by syrian democratic forces say they've started to push eisel out of its last

remaining territory the kurdish fighters say the offensive is focused on the village of eastern their resume province u.s. airstrikes have helped them to surround isel members in recent weeks more than twenty thousand civilians have left the area. this battle will be sealed in the next coming days. most of the terrorist in back and is a fallen in the last two months most of how to themselves them were arrested they were foreign. there are very. in numbers according to civilians who are leaving backers there may be about a thousand civilians in the five hundred six hundred terrorists so that means there may be close to two thousand or three thousand civilians the political crisis rocking venezuela has turned into a standoff over consignment of u.s. aid sitting on the colombian side of the border the opposition is trying to work out how to get it into the country after the aid was blocked by the venezuelan military which remains loyal to president nicolas maduro protesters in haiti have

thrown rocks at the president's home and vault with police during a third day of anti-government demonstrations at least three people have died since the rallies started in the capital port au prince on thursday there was traitors and calling for haitian president driven are more easy to resign they're angry over economic mismanagement and allegations of corruption or protests are expected on sunday. one of the. president and all of his cabinet must resign he's not thinking or acting in the interest of the people who get it one way or another we want him gone. turkey has condemned china's treatment of its muslim weaker minority saying it's a great cause of shame for humanity about a million weak as are believed to be held in terms of against their will ses the camps are voluntary designed to stamp out extremist tendencies. ethnically to kick muslims and are on their language is related to turkish practicing islam is forbidden in some parts of china with individuals caught praying fasting or wearing

religious clothes risking the threat of arrest. those were the headlines here on al-jazeera you can follow the stories of coals on the website and i'll just have a dot com counting the cost is next to stay with us. as venezuela is on the brink. with two men facing off for power. one of them self-proclaimed interim venezuelan leader. talks to al-jazeera. hello i'm sam is a than this is counting the cost on al-jazeera your weekly look at the world of business and economics this week digital divisions world wide web foundation president and c.e.o. adrian lovett explains why the internet and the danger of splitting also this week

venezuela's health system remains starved of money and international tug of war gets underway for control of a key asset. class senegal's money matters a west african country famous for a pink lake and a strong musical heritage by its currency is now become an election issue. in a bid to control the internet of the future some say a kind of digital iron curtain is falling on the one side there's the u.s. on the other there's china other countries are lining up to this is also a battle about five g. or fifth generation wireless technology that increases the amount of data that can be transmitted wirelessly the so-called internet of things could also combine things like artificial intelligence and virtual reality the problem is politicians don't understand it and haven't got a clue how to regulate it all control it is even no clear consensus about its very

definition it's also worth remembering that the internet wasn't built by a government or a large company the founding fathers were interested in things like providing a force for good. well joining me from london now is a degree in love it adrian is the chief executive officer of the web foundation the worldwide web foundation was established in two thousand and nine by the inventor of the web so tim berners lee good to have you with us are we seeing now a sort of global divide emerge around chinese technology and whether you accept its mission and comes things like five g. or whether you oppose it. i think there is a there is a divide there's and it's not a simple kind of black and white tools of the left and right split there's a there are arguably a number of internets emerging now wendy hall from universities and absence does and great work on this talking about how there is a sort of the original internet if you like that is based on openness and permission list space which is you know associated with the pioneers of the

internet there's if you like a european internet emerging which has some of those features but also elevates a focus on privacy and protection of individual citizens perhaps at the cost of innovation and there is as you imply a chinese model which is not only restricted to china where the emphasis on surveillance and arguably social cohesion within that now this is going to remain a complex picture but i think that in the first two of those at least there are the seeds of of a future internet that we can defend that we can be proud of that we can say is consistent with the founding vision of the web but there's certainly work to do to achieve that and what does that divide ultimately mean for uses i guess you your user experience will be very different depending where you're logging in from right yes certainly does and then of course let's not forget that although we're reaching

this point in fact just last month that for the first time more than half the world is online the first problem is the other half are not there is there's a real problem for the three and a half billion people who don't have access to the internet at all we have to work on that but for those who do you're absolutely right there's a there's a. a whole range of different experiences and research that we did in sixty five countries recently found that more than half those countries don't have pretty basic data protection for their citizens what progress has been made in the sort of pushback against some of these tech giants having too much influence well i think you know the example in europe of the general data protection register the g.d.p. ours it's called that came in last year is an example where actually there's a what is largely seen now as a pretty sensible and moderate piece of legislation very expensive but it's but it's moderate. and which you know initially companies were saying well we can work with that and i think most of them have found that actually they can and they

should and indeed are applying the kind of standards that are now required in europe to in many cases to to their users in other parts of the world so i think there has been a shift in the direction of travel in the last year or so i think this is further to go on that but we are seeing progress and you know i think actually the other aspect to consider is people who work in these big companies you know whether they're at senior levels or the rank and file programmers engineers and so on and many of those people actually are very concerned that their own companies do better and they're calling on their own companies to do better so that's a very powerful voice from within the industry as well talking about a shift how crucial is the issue of five g. darter going to be and the question of who controls it. well it's hugely important in one respect control of it is key and we going to need the same kind of.

approach that was applied in the founding years of the web to ensure that there is . an approach that is open that is distributed and decentralized to ensure that those safeguards are there but i think it's also important to remember that you know as i said earlier for for half the world five g. is a it is a pipe dream for half the world you know while some people are worrying about. getting into their driverless cars in the next few years half the world has yet to send its first e-mail so i think it's important that we keep this in proportion the web and the internet were intended to be for everyone and if you're in a. decreasing minority of your fellow citizens who are not connected when most of them are then you're missing out on some pretty fundamental things like being able to access health care. services and to vote and to participate in in public life in various ways so you know those kind of challenges

are not you know five g. is not the solution to those five g. will happen it needs to happen in the right way but we also need just as much energy behind ensuring that everybody gets connected including the hardest to reach including women who are less likely to be connected than men and less likely to be active online and including rural areas as well as urban in different parts of the world so there's a there's a real job to do there especially focusing on getting everybody connected to the web my thanks for your thoughts on that adrian love it thank you still to come on counting the cost the pacific island nation that's looking at legal action against big polluters thousands of kilometers away. but first the head of presidential elections in senegal later this month the country's seventy four year old currency has become a focus of debate it's called the west african c.f.a. frank a problem for some is viewed as a legacy of colonialism because huck has more from dakar in senegal just

enough in till next month. i would john is calling her younger brother and jack to thank him for the money he sent he's down in france having left his life in the car for a better one in europe he tells her it's not what he expected but he's still able to send a few hundred years every month to his sister to look after the family. it's not easy but without him we couldn't make ends meet there's no work for him here we need him there he's doing this for the money. in january italy's deputy prime minister luigi accused rounds of fueling the migrant crisis by controlling the economies of former african colonies through the local currency the c.f.a. france is one of those countries that by printing money for fourteen african states prevents the economic development and contributes to the fact that the refugees leave and then die in the sea or arrive on the coasts i didn't like the comment

from thailand foreign minister i found it very patronizing africa to the need any foreign minister want to speak on our behalf i the comment came days before the start of the presidential campaign in senegal and the c.f.a. is now part of the debate with each candidate taking positions on the matter some arguing for it others against it like it who asks why should white people in paris take decisions on their currency. the central african franc or the c.f.a. has a fixed exchange rate with the euro so europeans can bring to africa and easily swap them for the c.f.a. but state regulators make it difficult for africans to take out of their country and swap them into europe was under an arrangement dating back more than seventy years france's central bank controlled the treasury of all fourteen countries leaving these nations with a limited supply of liquidity. this here and he's

a certain level of stability. and see allowing i went jogging to shop at her favorite friend's supermarket because french companies profit from this arrangement it allows them easy access to a growing market of over one hundred million people but there's also growing resentment towards this currency not just here in senegal but throughout francophone west africa france get out the graffiti found in various avenues of the capital sana'a is behind the messaging. mini dog food we want to common currency but for wished african countries only with out fraunces involvement we have our own currency like morocco and algeria they are doing much better than us. france is so far yet so close while money travels more freely than people europe continues to attract young african men for john's family

the journey is worth the risk. one area which desperately needs a venezuela's crumbling public health system in the coastal city of barcelona fourteen children have died this week alone from contaminated food or water hospital workers say there's a dime need for medicine throws a bo has this exclusive report was. this is a pretty high tricks emergency room at the last city hospital in the venezuelan city of. about three hundred kilometers east of us here dozens of children are in desperate need of proper treatment most of them have been diagnosed with a more b.s. is a form of dysentery transmitted by contaminated food or water lady check on starter is three months old she suffers while her mother says she has been abandoned the air my daughter has diarrhea she almost had

a heart attack we have nothing you arrive here and there is nothing i was in a crisis because i thought i was losing her children here have diarrhea with blood in it and they are vomiting but nobody is helping us i want this government out now it has destroyed us. we were allowed to film because staff here say they want the world to see that they are unequipped to save children's lives just this week fourteen children have died the figures could climb you can see how desperate the situation is here there's several children on each one of those very people are telling us that there's no medicine there are not enough syringe is among other things many of the children that are arriving here are dying from one day it's one other madeline in my teen years baby boy was one of them she was two months old on tuesday night he died he's forty remains in the hospital because she hasn't been able to get together the money needed to buy a coffin.