sort of disputes over those results but the big question is how it stumbled that has always been such a strong sense of peace of the party's political dominance in turkey how it was even allowed to reach a point whereby it was so closely contested that's what's the act party their leadership will be thinking about taking long in deep thoughts about the coming few days because it was from here that the party was born through the essentially rise of president. as mayor of this city and then later on a national figure they have always been winning this city quite comfortably with a much bigger gap so the fact that it was brought down to the wire is will be considered some sort of a defeat in and of itself adrian just one of the issues that have driven the turnout was pretty high it was and it was over eighty percent what are the issues that have driven versus towards the opposition. well

there's two ways to look at this i mean there's the economic issues that have essentially plagued the political spectrum for the past couple of years that there's been a stagnation a huge devaluation of the. there has been an increase to some extent in unemployment increase in prices and inflation that hasn't been true catastrophic effects compared to other countries in the sense that you are not seeing people starving or so that degree aging but because the act party built its success on huge economic. benefits that you've seen the average income quadrupling get many parts over the past ten years and you've seen such huge economic benefits through the average person that's what's been the barometer for the vultures so when they suddenly saw that suddenly they weren't having that same economic luxury let's say they have had before and they've gone to the polls several times in the past couple of years and each time the party has said well for us to turn this

around you need to vote for us and they haven't been able to turn that bend after those elections it would appear that a certain section of the electorate has had enough of those promises and believes that there needs to be a change on the other hand if you look at the figures in terms of the numbers of people who voted in the percentage of overall overall the act party is still by far the highest victor in these elections by getting more than fifty percent nationally even in istanbul its share of the votes for the mayor has been slightly more than the last local elections but what's changed is that the opposition rather than there being so many different figures clinton contesting they're all united behind one person so rather than the opposition vote being divided among several people it was united in one and further to prove that point is that if you look at the council seats in the istanbul the vast majority went to the out party as well so whilst they lost the mayor's ship because it was between true candidates when there was votes divided among several different candidates they were stored. able to win

but nevertheless a huge wakeup call a huge alarm bell for the party that after seventeen years of being in power and winning to fourteen votes in that time this time fifteenth time around they've been given essentially a massive wake up call that they need to change roles come the next elections they could risk losing even more jamal many thanks let's go live now to sit him close the only who's in the capital ankara we heard jamal there talking about the significance the blow to the activity of losing its stamboul to the opposition one is that the significance of the of the loss of the capital ankara for the president's policy. well out there in the capital ankara has been as important as a stumble for the ruling party and the opposition especially in almost a quarter century helm of the ruling party and its predecessors has been highly criticized and onkar out wanted to make

a change because especially in some districts people were totally against even the presidential system but let me summarize the situation like this even though the ruling of party has remained its majority across turkey. it seems like while winning the ruling party lost and the opposition while losing the majority they won because they won in three major cities the stumble ancora and israel and when you look at the cities that are part of laws including these three states plus madison untuck and some other cities these cities are more populated and these are these are centers for business bureaucracy and everything and the cities that are part in los resembles at these fifty percent of the national income of turkey so we can say that with the business owners the employers and the employees picked economic problems as

a matter that has fired their votes while the ruling out party and its allies the nationalist party have claimed that turkey turkey's greatest problem was the issue of served by evil and border security issues and etc so we see that the reaction what's the ruling our part to say that we give more importance to economy rather than the survival issue survival which hasn't been boat by the opposition. itself and when we listen to president aired on last night in a party headquarters in a bulk on a speech he he he he meant that he heard. the voice of the opposition and even the people who didn't vote among his supporters and he said he gave a message to the markets and he said that immediately he is going to take. a major changes he is he will take major decisions to make some changes including

a rich shuffle in the cabinet as well because currently turkey sees economy as it as the greatest problem and it needs update on that also we have the kurdish wards as well they lost in the western cities because they supported the opposition ok so the many thanks indeed. even the news hour from now says there are still to come on the program with the clock ticking the u.k. part of a prepares to vote once again on finding a way forward on briggs's. facebook gives the thumbs down to hundreds of counseling to indian politicians and pakistan's military. pounded on the whole sties of sound just days off the racetrack is reopened and he will have all the details in the schools a little. government leaders in mali a warning of even greater turmoil if the united nations reduces its peacekeeping force the mandate of the mission is due for renewal in june but canadian and dutch

peacekeepers who form of the sixteen thousand strong force already going home nicholas hawk joined one of the last missions as they pull out of territories regularly attacked by fighters linked to eisele and al qaeda. they call this operation desert falcon on board this royal canadian air force helicopter for the dutch long range reconnaissance team they're about to be dropped close to the border with burkina faso in an area controlled by armed groups while i still in syria is on the defensive here the slow mixtape in the greater the local ice a lot shoot is on the offensive it's highly active in this border area and has claimed a number of attacks. too dangerous and sensitive the un would not allow us to film this infiltration operation with both canadians and dutch forces removing some of the footage we shot to protect their troops they say. while this is

a peacekeeping mission in looks and feels like an exercise in counterinsurgency what makes this mission dangerous is that we have a lot of different layers of conflict drivers that that actually feeds. the danger in mali as we have a lot of smugglers smuggling activity illegal trafficking a criminal. we have this ethnical tension between different groups we have the influx of terrorists from from the border region and from inside mali and also we have this tension between the armed groups that are sort of fighting for political power. and all these things add up to one big dangerous melting pot. as the mission in mali is known costs a billion dollars a year and is considered the un's most perilous it's already cost the lives of two hundred peacekeepers that's more than any previous mission and some of them were dutch. the canadian forces have brought back their helicopter to get it refueled

some three hundred kilometers away the dutch forces continue their ground patrol. this is an international effort to try to bring back peace to mali in a country that spiraling out of control although their mandate is to protect all of the european forces limit their operation just as far as this canadian medivac team can carry them and bring them back in march the un forces did not intervene when hundreds of full on the villagers were attacked by government backed militia groups in the region of mctee while the violence continues to spread in canada and the netherlands are pulling out of this operation saying their mission is done. we are leaving but the un still stays behind with another thirteen thousand troops so i'm not afraid that mali will completely collapse now that's why we leave they might lose a specific asset but the other troops that are still around can do a job just as well they come back hours later after having seen thousands of people

uprooted by the increasing violence in need of help but in the hands of armed groups they bear witness to what seems to be an expanding war thoughts out of sight deep in the nicholas hawk al-jazeera. earlier we spoke to hugo who's the africa editor of the french weekly news magazine l'express he says the violence in mali is a toxic cocktail of community clashes fueled by regional groups originally the danger was localized in the northern part of the country and then it's coming south with new tensions in central mali and to give you a very recent example in the twenty third of march you had the massacre of more than one hundred sixty civilians in a small village and here you have the real danger it's a toxic cocktail between and shouldn't if not ancestral inter-community clashes between i would say basically farmers and cattle breeders and the

activism of these groups in fact the jihad has never been uprooted from mali and now from central knowledge and you have to add. something to the problem you have a conflicting approach between for example france and russia on the one hand and the united states on the other. britain's parliament will once again vote on a series of breaks at options aimed at ending the political deadlock over the u.k.'s departure from the e.u. the prime minister has met her cabinet us after his whole withdrawal deal was voted down for a third time on friday reports suggest that the reason they could bring back a deal to parliament for a fourth vote but m.p.'s are divided on the issue with some pushing for a major drop bragg's its strategy all together as his new book is live for us in

london so m.p.'s need for points again taken control of parliamentary business and will vote later on their own preference is any of them likely to win. well there are a few front runners i think right now is jungle junk ahead of the european commission say the only thing we do know outright is waltz m.p.'s in the british parliament don't want. peace of course of trying to break the impasse trying to build some momentum and coalesce around an alternative to reason may's plan that as we know has failed in various different forms three times now the so-called indicative votes begad last wednesday the first round was held then eight alternatives were on the table m.p.'s failed though to find a majority for any one of them but at least two or three did pretty well including remaining in the customs union and also holding a public vote on the final deal that actually got most support from m.p.'s then was

actually given to to reason may's full deal when it went before parliament for the second time so arguably m.p.'s are saying the reason degree of support for a couple of ideas while the happening what's happening now later on in the day is that this it will be the second round of these indicative votes to see if m.p.'s come whistle away. key and clear alternative to reason mais plan and there are again on the table we gather that the labor opposition labor party may be interested in end of the norway plus option that would see the u.k. closer closely aligned to the e.u. in both the single market and the customs union to reason may though it is not legally bound to take any of these on board but if she does want to give her a deal another go she may well need to tag some changes on to head deal to get the support of parliament behind it but some of these options on the table red lines

that theresa may has said that she has said in the policies not willing to cross things like holding public votes on a final deal so the options are running out for two reason why but for now at least it looks as if parliament are continuing their goal of trying to forge ahead with an alternative plan they've many thanks they've both of them live in london. india has put an intelligence gathering satellite into orbit as the m.s.s. satellite lifted off along with twenty eight smaller ones from the story how to call a launch site the indian space scientists announced last week that they've successfully tested a missile to shoot down satellites that's concerning neighboring china pakistan and others about the militarization of space. facebook has removed hundreds of fake accounts and spam pages links to political parties in india and pakistan military social media giant made the cuts saying they were created to manipulate people the group says that india's main opposition congress party is one of the main offenders

just days before elections in india let's go live to new delhi al jazeera is first jamil can tell us more given the concern of a fake news on social media in india as what's been the reaction to this move by facebook. well adrian as you just said the fact that we're ten days out from an election in india and that that this has happened has been raising a lot of eyebrows here now fake news spreading has been a major issue in india spreading on social media and messaging apps including by whatsapp which is owned by facebook but it's mostly been groups that are either supporting or fairly aided with the governing b j p they have been accused of spreading fake news stories about the slaughtering of cows an animal considered sacred by many here in india that's led to attacks against minorities as well as more recently the targeting of kashmir is across the country following the suicide bombing in february in india that mr kushner that killed about forty indian troops

now only one page considered b j p leaning was taken down the rest were all supporters of the opposition congress party but interestingly enough facebook says it wasn't the content these pages were sharing that got them taken down it was their quote inauthentic behavior what facebook says how they share that content by using fake accounts which got them banned and what's the opposition saying about this first. well adrian they're being very tight lipped the model code of conduct in effect here that's an election law that limits what political parties can say during an election campaign but a short time ago a spokesperson for the opposition congress did send a message to al jazeera and he said and i'm quoting here i don't believe any indian national congress member had facebook pages are moved there is a possibility that b j p supporters run pages that seem like to their pro congress

pages and they do crap like this we are investigating and of us facebook for details so the opposition denying that these pages were there but facebook says they could be their supporters and just moments ago facebook released a message saying that they are being transparent and denied that they were targeting the opposition i was there as fester reporting live from new delhi many things rescuers are struggling to search villages in the poll cut off by a severe thunderstorm at least thirty one people were killed but that number is expected to rise as emergency workers reach the remote districts of pasta buildings collapsed a bus was blown off the road and cars overturned in the storm helicopters are expected to join the recovery operation once the weather in proofs will it's take a look at what actually caused the devastation from the storm this meteorologists kevin corriveau kevin that's right huge thunderstorm this is an area that doesn't normally see this type of weather for the area so they were really quite prepared

for this but take a look at the satellite image i'm going to put this into motion i want to show you the area first of all the area that was affected was just to the south of katmandu now i'm going to put the satellite into motion and you can see how those storms pushed right across that region we're talking about very gusty winds as well as hail possibly even a tornado across that area as well and i want to show you what to expect to see over the next few days we are looking at still some scattered showers just to the east we may still see some active weather across that region as well as gusty winds we're going to watch them for a carefully because of the gusty winds it will be. hard for the power to come back up or show you what's been happening here across the western part of the of europe because we have a big change happening here beautiful weather has been the norm but now things are quite changing quite a bit we'll be seeing those temperatures dropping out here anywhere between five and ten degrees over the next day so paris here on tuesday eighteen degrees for you that is not going to be what you see on wednesday we're going to see a major drop in temperature down to about ten degrees or eleven degrees there at

ten in the overnight hours some of that priest of that's going to be falling could even be snow flurries so this area is going to feel a little bit more like winter in some locations if you want to good weather still out here towards the eastern part of your we are looking at bucharest at fourteen and we're at about fourteen as well. kevin many thanks we're at the midway point in this news still to come on the program china steps up the battle against the highly addictive painkiller at the request of the u.s. . plays up economic ties with china strained relations over. technology. at its for the title one is about football league the sided with a game to spare. egypt strongman. faced and the silence from his allies is deafening the u.s. was perfectly happy to trade off the mark for city for security. when

even the citizens have fallen victim to his repression executions torture censorship is not acceptable and you won't hear such strong words from. or paris or london. on al-jazeera. to. talk to. the partners.

again this is the news hour from al-jazeera adrian finnegan here in doha the top stories algeria's constitutional committee gathers to talk about the future of president bush of flicka millions of algerians been protesting for weeks now calling for the resignation of the eighty two year old and an overhaul of the country's political system. turkey's ruling party says that it will appeal some of the results from sunday's local elections president threats of top are the ones ak party was beaten in ankara and trails in istanbul but says they were voting irregularities in both cities britain's parliament is preparing to vote on a series of briggs's options as politicians remain divided over the u.k.'s departure from the e.u. the prime minister may bring her deal back to m.p.'s for a fourth of those as she tries to break the political deadlock. early results from

ukraine show that a comedian has won the first round of the presidential election a lot of as alinsky says that it's a major step toward victory but his numbers are far short of an absolute majority he'll now face the current president petro poroshenko in a runoff vote on april twenty first john howell reports from kiev. election night at the zelinsky campaign headquarters it's a casual affair a long way from the stuffy formality of the more established parties which is little surprise a lot of is the landscape than is certain the winner of the first round of ukraine's presidential election is a comedian turned actor whose only experience of politics is playing the part of president in a popular television series he may soon be playing the part for real now. great. legs and always a. new life begins

a normal life life without the option without bribes without anything like this life in a new country a country have my dreams you. will go into the second round runoff in april against incumbent president the confectionery business owner petro poroshenko who seems to have lost public trust over his broken promises to end the separatist war in the east and wipe away the stain of official corruption he says because you know people for not returning to the soviet union you know talk about fire and fair fight so it was for ukraine the chocolate billionaire versus the comedy king russia would be watching the second round closely as will the european union ukraine is stuck in the middle geographically divided by conflict its economy in the doldrums and anticorruption reforms failing to take hold neither candidate has ready answers. back at h.q. in this matter the finance minister alexander downer look could provide the

experience the candidate lacks something like an act of blind faith isn't it to support a man with no political background or experience going to why should people do it. well that's a good question right or just maybe because they trust him more than the alternatives that's it. and they. blindly bluntly actually saying that we don't want. a continuation of cutting forces you know with what we don't want people don't trust running the country so this is the shiny new look i'll take in ukraine and younger voters in particular will surely many hard to like the five of them is immense his promise to trade everything even if he's so far later in the fray his suggestions about how he plans to do that will have to change fast as voters' minds become far more focused in the second round. of.

let's return now to one of our top stories this hour local elections in turkey and some key losses for president other ones party for more analysis let's bring in who's a country risk and an analyst specializing in. chest market in london and he joins us live from london now good to have you with us how how much of a bloody nose is this for president won and his act party that the loss of certainly of ankara and other major cities i mean first of all we have to be very clear about one thing although local elections in turkey are technically about local politics about who controls the municipalities in practice this was really not the case the government led election coalition ran on a campaign focusing on security issues on terrorism even president and on himself the head of state was on the fields with a crazy schedule holding election rallies in almost every province in the country

and the voters my view is that it's voted based on national level issues and in particular of course we need to look at here the economy and the rampant inflation and economic slowdown and how that has influenced voter behavior that i think is the single most important factor that resulted in what we see today over the last few years that the accusations that he is drifting towards authoritarianism but this is proof isn't it that democracy is alive and well in turkey if the act party can lose strongholds like the capital ankara and istanbul. democracy is alive i'm not sure if it's well we saw that of course the high election board is continue to demonstrate its integrity even though there was some confusion about the results with the pro-government media agency providing different results to what was the case provided being provided by the official

authorities. we see that that part of the situation has been maintained however we did see in the lead up to the election that there was not at all the level playing field between the government candidates and the opposition in particular when it comes to the media and the amount of space the opposition has for getting its voice heard. on both written on televised media and this result came about this by the fact you say that this was mostly about of course the people complaining about what's happened as far as the economy is concerned in turkey what effect as these results have these results had on the turkish lira which of course a been devalued which is causing so much pain. of course the turkish lira has been in a vulnerable position for quite

a long time now however the determining factor here will not be local elections again in terms of direct impact on national level politics there won't be much however the key question that will determine the outlook for the new era in the medium term will be of course what type of reform program the government now puts forward or whether they do that for the first time in a long time turkey now has a four point four and a half year. period in which there won't be any elections and that's unprecedented in a long time so that is a very good opportunity for the government to push through some of the reforms which the economy is in is in desperate need for a good talk to many thanks dave for being with us i get such can the from my h.s. marcus a woman accused of murdering the half brother of north korea's leader will be freed from a blaze in prison next month that's after the law long admitted a lesser charge of causing hurt she was sentenced to three years and four months

but will be released soon due to time already so serious florence louis reports now from kuala lumpur. i don't just over a month long will be for the vietnamese charged with killing kim jong nam the half brother of north korean leader kim jong un in february two thousand and seventeen has accepted a plea deal she pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of causing harm and has been sentenced to three years and four months in prison she would have faced a mandatory death sentence had she been found guilty of murder. in the i hope that my daughter will be released in a month i'll be very happy to once case is similar to city i shas her indonesian kohak used prosecutors dropped charges against city last month without saying why the indonesian government later revealed that its officials had lobbied malaysian authorities believing city had been used as a tool by north korean intelligence for north korean men who fled the country hours

after the killing have also been charged but their whereabouts remains a mystery you know mediation of iraq we see that justice must be done. and he also said before it's not ships that are really assistance in fact koreans are just fine and they emphasize that they must be brought to justice north korea has denied any involvement in the murder lawyers for the two women have always maintained they was indeed scapegoats it's very likely that no one else will ever stand trial for the murder of kim jong un the four north korean men are still at large despite an interpol red notice equivalent to an international arrest warrant florence al-jazeera kuala lumpur china has announced a new crackdown on a highly addictive drug fentanyl will be added to the list of controlled substances from may should please donald trump the u.s. president's pushing for a crackdown on the drug is part of the new deal to end the trade war with beijing

well first produced in one nine hundred sixty fentanyl is used as a general anesthetic and surgeries that has now become the most deadly drug in the . u.s. soldiers are is so high that she's here to explain. well this latest announcement is a great win for the u.s. president donald trump chinese made fence no flooding the u.s. market has become a major sticking point for him in the trade deal and here is why last year seventy thousand people in the u.s. died from drugs overdose at least hoth of those were caused by fentanyl last month the u.s. department of health reported that between twenty eleven and twenty sixteen fentanyl overdose deaths rose by more than a thousand percent and that's because the drug is fifty times stronger than heroin and around one hundred times stronger than morphine and the largest increase in defense in all related fatalities is among those aged between fifteen and thirty four and while most victims are whites overdose deaths are rising faster among

black and latino communities in january the u.s. customs and border patrol announced their biggest ever seizure offense will in street value well three and a half million dollars in fact one hundred fourteen kilos of this synthetic opioids were discovered under a false floor in a truck carrying vegetables from mexico and the illegal drugs travel from china to mexico and then across into the u.s. in fact fence nals potency means mexican cartels can deal with smaller shipments instead of smuggling fifty kilos of heroin with the risk of getting caught dealers would only need to smuggle in one kilo of fence will instead to receive the same street value and financial return and while most of it is transported into the u.s. through legal ports of entry or even by post trump has repeatedly cited the opioids including fentanyl a one of his reasons for building a border war with mexico. i'd also like to have you take a look at the event and all that's coming out of china and mexico and whatever you

can do from a legal standpoint whether it's litigation lawsuits of people in companies but in china you have some pretty big companies sending their garbage and killing our people it's almost a form of warfare and i'd like to do whatever you can do legally to stop it from china and from mexico and if you could look into that appreciate it. china by its disputed u.s. claims that it is responsible for the fence no crisis may volatile free of arts and the accusations from the u.s. led evidence that contrary to the facts the chinese government has always been committed to n.t. drug principles and has implemented its international anti-drug obligations and amena befitting a responsible large country the us itself is the main factor in the country's problem of fintan the abuse and the biggest label fence on produce and china has actually welcomed the cut down but insists it has nothing to do with the drugs that

end up in the us in fact since blaming it on illegal produces in the meantime via spend so epidemic has prompted police to carry a lifesaving and.