combatant commands or other campaigns such as a covert one in pakistan africa has been extremely forthcoming with casualty as suspects after every strike to conduct but it's simply not enough to us us conducted many strikes killed many hundreds if not thousands of people over this campaign. there really needs to be more an amnesty international laws push forward the discussion it will certainly be reviewed many of these reported incidents whether they are strong claims of civilian casualties and the next weeks or months. still ahead on the bulletin a french colony convicted of a sex abuse cover up tries to resign at the park as an internet embargo.

and of the stormy weather has eased a little bit in northern europe it's moving slowly eastwards so currently the center retold is in the baltic and this is a front on wraps around it disappears into the western side of the mediterranean where it produces showers and quite active weather that behind it so relatively quiet and warming up quite nicely once all temps are to twelve in berlin even stockholm's come up six degrees about some to get to thursday i would think would come up a little bit more as well the coldish air dissipating eastwards giving some snow in the western side of russia barely has warmed up a little bit back up to disappointing but sunny sixteen in athens so all the actions for the west might well catch the bally oregon southeastern part of spain catch parts of north africa so off to morocco you're enjoying the sunshine a twenty one if your knowledge area particularly in the north or in tunisia is going to be windy cloudy and for some time wet as well it's warmer in these inside libya middle twenty's much the same as in the old egypt as well and the position if

anything on thursday gets more disappointing was almost all of two newsier least the north covered in cloud of potential rain on shore breeze of forty in the capital and i'll just his coat is still a twelve degrees still go back to morocco and still enjoy the sunshine is only twenty there in about. nothing.

it's good to have you with us on al-jazeera these are all top stories the first funerals for victims of the new zealand mosque attacks have been held a father and son who fled the war in syria to be buried in christ church where fifty. two mosques during friday prayers. the number of people killed in power. has risen above two hundred. could be one of the worst weather related disasters to hit the southern hemisphere. and amnesty international is accusing the u.s. military of killing civilians in somalia allegations the military denies amnesty had my satellite images from five of the one hundred strikes and found that at

least for. now there's a diplomatic rift between australia and took off to comments why president of the on those remarks concerned a strain his involvement in the first world war and the on accused new zealand. having an anti when their troops took part in the campaign more than a hundred years ago. scott morrison is now threatening to someone turkey's ambassador. well that's an election campaign rally for local elections later this month at the underminded australia new zealand that has defeated their troops at gallipoli. you know your grandfather's came here and saw that we were here and then some turned back on foot somebody. if you come with the same intentions you are always welcome have no doubt we will send you back like your

grandfather's will scott morrison said he may review a story of his travel advisory to warn astray and against travelling to turkey and he rejected comments implying historic islamophobia. i don't find these comments very hopeful i don't find them very accurate or truthful as well because the actions of the australian new zealand government as being consistent with a have values of welcome and supporting people from all around the world we are the most successful margaret countries and in particular on the planet today we are an example to the rest of the world about how we can all live together in place of how many and i think australia and new zealand has a lot to offer the rest of the world and and perhaps they should be looking more closely at the example that we've set. up on and drop mcbride in sydney has been following the response to comments this is quickly developed into a serious diplomatic spat between australia and turkey with the australian prime minister scott morrison describing earlier ones comments as reckless and highly

offensive it stems from apparent attempts by earlier one to make political capital out of the shootings in christ church by showing clips of the video of the attack at some of his campaign rallies and also going further by claiming that the australian suspect did shoot or in that case had made threats against people in turkey going further than that by saying that if any australians came to turkey with murderous intent then they would in his words go home in coffins like their grandfathers from the literally now this is a reference to the literally campaign of the first world war when thousands of australian and new zealand soldiers died in the battles against turkish troops it is something that is very close to the hearts of all australians and any attempt to misuse or disrespect the memory of these soldiers is regarded here as being

highly offensive morrison has called in the turkish ambassador for a dressing down on wednesday and for an explanation of these comments afterwards he said he did not receive a satisfactory. explanation and he's still demanding that the one withdraw his comments saying that if he doesn't then australia is likely to take action and that all what are open. is go now to our correspondent in istanbul's and corsi it is joining us live the turkish president of course made these comments and following the attacks in christchurch and he was quoting the suspects comments about turkey is he likely to hate prime minister marston's call and take them back. well elizabeth of course it would be a little bit speculating to guess what for instance our don is going to do or what he's going to say about this but let me explain you the situation in turkey on march thirty first there is a local election in turkey despite this is

a minister below election the governing ruling party which is headed by the president. don they see this election. as a future as an election that is going to determine the future if their ruling party into their presidency and everything that's why i can tell that the election campaign is a little bit wild and turkey ended the rhetorical end the political campaign language has has gone wild and a little bit assaultive. to the people who are against the ruling party or the alliance that they represent that's why we have been witnessing similar attitude from president are drawn to language against others whom they see as others but to what i can tell from the previous experience election experience in turkey for instance last year in the previous election we had that turkey had this

tension with another lens as well until the election is over are gone is not expected to take his words back but of course as the election finishes we don't know whether the tension is going to go down and whether he's going to try to make it up with his counterparts and as for the new zealand sinan thank you very much for that found that cynical syrian who live in istanbul thank you. now kazakhstan has a new president custom talk has been sworn in to replace those. who resigned on tuesday after nearly thirty years in power talking for the rest of the term which ends an april next year as are by israel has been described by rights groups as tarion not in the imprisonment of government critics. dutch police have arrested another man in connection to a tram shooting and trekked three people killed in the attack on monday dutch authorities their letter was found in the gunman's. getaway car and it's one of the

reasons why a terrorist motive is being considered thirty seven year old went on as was detained hours after the attack he is known to local authorities and has been convicted of crimes in the past month. but that negotiators has bush and will only be allowed to delay its departure from the block if you can a prime minister to resign make an shows that will increase the chances of getting the breaks it do through parliament may is expected to ask the e.u. for an extension of three months the deal she struck with the e.u. has already been rejected twice by british m.p.'s. if prime minister may requests such an extension before you bring it comes through and serve. it really before the twenty seven leaders do us this the reason and the usefulness for an extension you really do need a concrete brown for the u.k.

in order to able to be able to make an informed decision and. we'll be. those an extension increase the chances for a direct if you. do we do agreement. put francis has rejected the resignation of a french cobb known who was convicted of failing to report sexual abuse allegations for the bobber on travel to wrong to present his resignation to the pope after being found guilty of covering up sex abuse committed by a priest and from bob ronson the pope projected on the basis of the presumption of innocence he is a pain in the conviction father robert gallucci a professor at the pontifical university of the holy cross and he says the case could set a new precedent. so judicial experts are watching this case very closely because if it is the case that he is found eventually guilty even after the appeal this would create new precedent under french law that someone would be required legally to

report a crime that is already expired under the statute of limitations and this new precedent would be such that anyone anywhere would be legally were criers to report any crime including those that took place a long time ago that it actually mutation has already run out because that is exactly what colonel barbara barberin has been held responsible for he's been convicted for despite the fact that the prosecutors themselves twice thought that he should be acquitted. now unusually wet weather on the west coast of the u.s. has turned some health sides into a blanket of wild flowers the supervillain has attracted crowds to one city in california but it's also caused a headache of sorts reports on the rare phenomenon. southern california's hillsides have put on their most gorgeous garment a brilliant robe composed of countless golden poppies it's a rare sight in this usually brown and dusty land heavy winter rains brought forth

the blossoms in such abundance that the super bloom as it is known is attracting huge crowds to gaze in all it nature's splendor it's amazing it's like we're in heaven most people are chained to a desk and they don't get the chance to see anything like this and you can't even get this on your widescreen t.v.'s i don't think you get to see it up front you got to see it you guys you actually have to see it with your own eyes a few days ago so many people flock to walker canyon near the town of lake elsinore that mayor steve monoliths had to temporarily close the area we just didn't have the crowd control necessary to deal with the enormity of this which. we thought twenty thousand people maybe and we got a hundred and so disneyland usually gets forty four thousand on any given day so you can figure that you can do the numbers now things are under control with extra

parking and more shuttle buses provided we're asking everyone to be kind of mind the trails don't pick the poppies don't own the poppies the kind of nature the california poppy or s shoulder california is the official flower of the golden state much of its original habitat has been lost to development and invasive plants species some people make a pilgrimage to the wild flowers whenever they appear like a curious sato whose late mother brought him when he was his own son lucas's age the poppy is the sign of remembrance so you know looking at poppies is a good way to remember your loved ones who have passed the poppies hay day will be brief a week or two at most in the fourteenth century the persian poet hoffa's said spring and all its flowers now joyously break their vowell of silence it is time for celebration. soon the sun will drive the verdant hills and the poppies will

return to the earth as all things mortal must. but for now it is a time for celebration robert oulds al-jazeera lake elsinore california. with the headlines on al-jazeera the first funerals for the victims of new zealand's mosque attacks have taken place a father and son who fled the war in syria were buried in christchurch where fifty people were shot dead at two mosques during friday prayers thirty bodies have now been released to families and police hope to return more by the end of wednesday when haye has more from christchurch the first of the people to be there well that asymmetry in christchurch was a father and son and that was. and his son.

arrived in new zealand they were refugees from syria they arrived just last year. there was another brother of homs as was also at the mosque was shot in. the funeral the number of people killed in a powerful cyclone in mozambique has risen above two hundred and it's expected to rise further the u.n. says cyclon it i could be one of the worst weather disasters to hit the southern hemisphere. and seem to nashton is accusing the u.s. military of killing civilians in somalia allegations the military denies the rights group an ally satellite images from five out of one hundred air strikes and found that at least fourteen civilians were killed. there was a diplomatic rift between australia and turkey after comments by turkish president of the one who led the christchurch shootings to a stray his involvement in turkey during the first world war on accuse destroyer and new zealand of having an empty islam module when they took part in the troops

took part in the campaign more than one hundred years ago astray as promised to scott marston is now threatening to summon turkey's ambassador. kazakhstan has a new president talk a it has been sworn in to replace. by a who resigned on tuesday after nearly thirty years in power talk of for the rest of the term which ends in april next year and as our by israel has been described by rights groups as all torah tarion not in the imprisonment of government critics . those are the headlines on al-jazeera but do stay with us inside story is coming up next thank you very much for watching. in the next episode of earth royce nick clark two into grouping screwed on a for each through the which will see to highlight the importance of protecting this from child on top to ecosystem against an expanding list of manmade threats

could leave the surface of this magnificent desolation is just t.v. with life the bees are told the local is on antarctic century on al-jazeera. editing human geno's scientists gather in geneva to better regulate research on this controversial issue but how will officials in force rules around our d.n.a. and what are the risks of advanced research into human genetics this is inside story. hello welcome to the program i'm hasn't seeker our genetic make up has fascinated scientists and medical research as for decades they've been significant advances in the field of rewriting the blueprint of life for our d.n.a.

it's been used to treat and prevent a number of disorders and diseases but it could also be used to create what some have called design a baby's the medical world is divided over the approach last year a scientist in china said he created the world's first genetically edited twins it led to global condemnation it is the first attempt at assuring the world into a future in which we can edit the very things that make us human the scientists have gathered in geneva this week to try to come up with some regulations we're bringing our guests in a moment but first many on a honda explains how science works. our d.n.a. makes us unique it determines our height our eye color and they didn't miss it disorders many of us are born with genetic editing offers us a way to fix those faulty jayne's altering our semes excels the cells in our organs and tissues and i'll skin and eyes genetic changes to these cells one person to

your children the problem has been huge an issue to germline cells the sperm the egg or in the case of the chinese scientist a fertilized egg at the single cell stage those genetic changes are passed on we still don't know what the consequences could be. at this conference in november chinese scientists he junk we made an announcement that caused a collective gasp the birth of the world's first genetically edited babies he donated the c c r five gene in twin baby girls while their was still in a petri dish to give them protection against hiv he said he knew he was crossing in it the goal line but he did it anyway there will be someone somewhere first thing in this if it's anatomy in someone else the scientific world responded with condemnation and no babies should be born at this point in time following the use

of this technology it's simply too early to premature as a fantastic technology if it's applied to the right applications semantics our editing that editing cells the. adult cells from a fully consenting adult from tass to technology and i'm sure we're going to see it progressing into the clinic but what he did was take this amazing technology and apply it incorrectly. gene is getting trials involve consenting adults but the twin girls known as lulu and nona weren't given a choice the changes to their genes are likely permanent and with consequences unknown the technology to use these extremely error prone. and utilizes genetic modification pathways within the cells that are pretty much. very hard to control and particularly have been

known to cause mutations elsewhere in the genome dr he used the chris because ninety acknowledging not to correct but to genetically enhanced of raises the specter of scientists creating so-called designer babies in the lead to potentially make them stronger faster smarter even many scientists are pushing for clear and transparent guidelines even advocating a poor until countries can agree on how to meet the challenges of germ line it is having a panel of scientists assembled by the world health organization is now working on a way forward maidana hond how to syria. our let's bring in our panel now in singapore we have bio medical ethicist owen schaefer who is an assistant professor at the national university of singapore in boston sharon begley a senior science writer at sta health focused news website owned by the

boston globe and in london helen o'neill lecturer in reproductive and molecular genetics at university college london who researches genome editing as a potential treatment of disorders welcome all of you so helen if i could start with you then why why did this happen does this event show that we. we might be perhaps be going on a slippery slope here is is it too early to be to be. to be going into into this sort of field. it's certainly too early to go into this field why this happened is down to i think probably one person's hubris and their own motives to advance themselves i don't think it reflects the rest of the scientific community for their motives or that the globe in fact the way the globe reacted was perfectly

resoundingly of how the rest of us feel about it that it was a premature adoption when schaefer is it acceptable to to edit the human genome but it's a big question i don't know who am i to say i'm i'm just one ethicist i think the most important thing that everyone has been emphasizing now is we need to have a public dialogue on that very question on whether or not we think it's acceptable to alter our genomics to alter the d.n.a. that affects so many of our traits and i think if there's an ethical experiment by her john can have any silver lining is that it prompts us it forces us to have a societal debate over these very thorny questions sharon begley. what what what what what's the what's the general public's. what's public opinion say about all all of this i mean do you do your criticisms of dr hay in china and his team reflect public opinion a large. i think the public is very confused about what this technology can be used

for and what it can appropriately be used for there have been a number of public polls in the united states as well about and elsewhere and the general response to those polls is that the question is posed if you could save a child from having a soviet or even deadly disease and before that child was formed would you want to post like that a large fraction of the public says yes it is it is ethical it is desirable hasten to say that child but then when you start drilling down and use phrases like designer babies and whether this technology has the best of all only to the very very grass will it create a society of genetic had somehow not then not sequentially the public public opinion various choices now this should not be them. yeah helen helen o'neill i mean sharon brings up a good point there about the design of babies this this is this is the this is the

phrase that really kind of pushes people's buttons when when you get into this subject is the fear that this could be. taken to extremes to so that we could have a society where that sort of happens i mean i know it conjures up sort of dystopian visions of the future and so on but is it a legitimate concern i don't think it's a legitimate phrase at all i think it insults the technology it insults the would be patience when you look at that the two scenarios that were just presented one of them is quite factual that said would you prevent a genetic disorder in a child if they were going to be born with us yes people agreed to that that would be a viable viable use for the technology the other tech the other scenario that was presented was to say would you allow designer babies can you define a designer baby we design our babies every time we choose a partner so it's an unfair use of a term that is in correctly just defining something that actually does not shed any

light on the situation by calling it designer babies it really insults the technology and would be patients of that would be very actually wanting and willing to do this to prevent serious heritable illnesses in children which you are you would be in favor of further research and further efforts. to. genetic editing that would that would improve people's health prospects absolutely i think further research is is top of the list not just in terms of skipping to the clinic or skipping to health benefits the major benefit that we will see from doing germline genome editing and the research in the us is to understand more about the earliest forms of human development which at the moment we know surprisingly little about. we mentioned there did the world health organization is. it is going to get together with lots of people whose business it is to to know this kind of stuff and come up with with some guidelines some boundaries perhaps on how this this research

should be should be done going forward. is it going to make any difference you think particularly when there's no real sort of in force and mechanisms. well that's a difficult question you know w.h.o. has a certain amount of clout they don't necessarily have the record legal enforcement across various nations but if they produce guidelines it is very possible that their recommendations will carry on a good amount of weight in individual countries but ultimately it is it looks highly unlikely there will be any international treaty on this so it's probably going to be up to individual countries to decide once the over this is its own recommendations how to adapt that to their own proper particular values their own particular norms and their own perspectives on what kind of society they want to live in sharon begley how how should the medical community or you know people involved in this sort of thing being gauging with the public to to to

inform the more about the pros and cons of all of this well certainly programs like this make a step in that direction but i think there is an assumption here that the medical and scientific community is monolithic in some way on this topic and just lastly we saw that it wasn't eight hundred scientists around more than half a dozen countries call it four and a blanket moratorium on crisper germ line editing for reproductive uses but the number of scientists who in fact led the development of crisp air were were absent from the list of people calling for a moratorium so just a few months after dr has announcement the expert community cannot agree on whether there should be a blanket prohibition on this or whether there should be a more sort of case by case decision making and the argument for the latter is if

there is a blanket prohibition if there is a moratorium either world wide or country by country and just to insert there are more than thirty countries already outlaw germ line at it thanks but if there were a global moratorium the concern is that it would be there. hard to undo that and a number of scientists now despite the condemnation of dr who do think that eventually we should not only elaborate but perhaps embrace germ line evidence that the idea that this is an outrageous possibility and the eyes of the entire medical scientific community is simply incorrect how gnomeo where do you draw the line here on on what's acceptable and what and what is it i mean how do we make the judgment of whether the risk is is is is right or not and who makes that judgment. i don't think that's up to any one person to make it has to be a collaborative effort to come up with where the line is drawn and yes in our moral

stances we know that the the line is very clear between in huntsman and medical treatment where that line gets very much blurred even though everyone agrees that enhancement it would be beyond that line where the line gets blurred is where genes are not fully understood and actually the perfect example of that is the gene which . tried to mutate i say tried because it was not necessarily successful in both twins and that gene though though the mutation he attempted to create would prevent them having hiv contracting hiv it also served other roles such as enhanced neural cognitive ability in individuals with the same mutation so it's the us that blurs the line between whether we can make a distinction or whether it is the distinction gets made for us through learning and through understanding our biology i would say for what's your take on this i mean would would strengthening regulations necessarily be an effective solution to

to avoid the you know rogue behavior like what we saw with with dr hay in china and was reminded of the comment that he made he said if it wasn't me it it's going to be somebody else. well it's tough i mean you have an international community you have a technology that the basic science of it is widely available in publications that almost anyone is able to access crisper as such a powerful technology because it because it is relatively straightforward to deploy and utilize so yeah you could have a country like china could tighten its regulations to make sure there's not another hood but what about other countries we're not even thinking about right now where there are scientists that are thinking about the engaging in this practice it's going to be extremely difficult to absolutely prevent such rogues from occurring that having been said i think that about having tight regulations in the countries that are of interest in this field are countries where the basic science is being performed and china was one of those countries that was

a pioneer in the basic science for those countries to have tight regulations to really clamp down on rogue scientists like the john quite a i think that's going to go a long way towards minimizing the risk of future on ethical experiments but you can never fully eliminate that risk the technology it's basic basic understanding of it that's widely available and and that the genie is out of the bottle how how would you how would you clint dunn down the road scientists i mean there's no there's no international governing body that in force is bioethics rules at the moment i mean it is a come down to you know if somebody breaks the rules the scientific community can just sort of ostracize them refused to publish their findings that sort of thing. well one would hope that individual countries that have the capability to do this sort of experimentation would also have the laws and the regulations to enforce to sanction those that would engage in this activities and countries that lack such laws yeah i think that the center for community has an obligation to stand up as

they did with john to condemn or to ostracize but it becomes difficult you might say oh they shouldn't publish any of these sort of results but they're saying you shouldn't publish then we won't be able to know what exactly if the facts of these experiments were so it behooves the community to find out what those baby twins girls genetic profiles are like so we can evaluate the effectiveness of an unethical experiment and that's a difficult conundrum because then if the article does get published it kind of reward the scientists that did it but i do think that yeah condemnation is absolutely essential in these cases sharon begley as we mentioned earlier the world health organization as it as it gets together to bring people together to to come up with these sort of guidelines as far as we know people like sociologists patient advocates historians and so on are not going to be represented another a policymaker in in these meetings have they missed something there because these are people who who who can understand some of the big social questions that are

inherent in genome editing and as a journalist yourself who covers this field is that something that w w h i would benefit from. it certainly would benefit from that and well and the law representation on the part of the patient representatives the disabled community and many others.