listening on. what's happening in our region have to get to. that others and. tell the story is what can make a difference. how we are rude but crude as there were hundreds of rage on the streets of beirut as riot police used tear gas and break up hundreds of anti-government protestors. hello i'm adrian finnegan this is al jazeera live from doha also coming up. fueling the conflict libya's oil output has cut in half of the wall khalifa haftar orders a blockade of 5 major oil exporting. airports and the u.s.

start to screen passengers from china as fears grow over the spread of a new virus plus media. today i am being seriously threatened in my physical integrity and that of my family the venezuelan government is accused of offering bribes to the opposition. we begin with breaking news from lebanon where police have fired tear gas and water cannon the protesters who are demanding a speedy resolution to the country's financial and economic crisis hundreds of protesters have been involved in running battles with security forces in beirut the demonstrators are angry of a plans by the ruling party to form a government from the current political plus let's go live now to beirut al-jazeera has a honda is there for us. what's the situation. adrian for the pops to. 2 hours downtown beirut the center of the lebanese capital has

been a battleground as you can see behind me protesters are still here hundreds of them they remain very defiant anti-riot police have been using excessive amounts of tear gas to push them away from this area it all started outside parliament building which is approximately 40500 meters from where we are the protesters had gathered there as it is as the as a form of action to show their frustration with the political class when they tried to break through the security barrier protests the anti-riot police responded by firing tear gas and water cannon and you can see people have started to found the lies the banks in the area there is anger in the streets it's escalating people are frustrated. and they're blaming those in power for the near collapse of the economy and they have been venting their anger at banks as you can see because they blame the banking sector for the financial that's the policy is really that has led to

the worst economic crisis that lebanon has faced in decades really since the end of the civil war never before have people had their deposits and savings in the words of the people here held hostage by the banks you cannot access your your bank accounts there's a cap on the amount of dollars you can withdraw there's a cap on the amount of the lebanese pounds which you can withdraw and the lebanese town for the 1st time in 2 decades has lost value on the black market the last at least 50 percent of its value so you can imagine the purchasing power has been affected prices are on the rise there's inflation so you get this you get anger in the streets so and at the same time you get the financing from here for things the anti-riot police who are doing their job and protecting public property this is what the internal security forces have been seen what your guys. dropped to the 1st

person a crowd so atrium in downtown beirut is now a south pole ground we've seen a number of incidents like this over the past few days. this time it's outside of it's an in central beirut a few nights ago it was outside a police barracks where people gathered and tried to storm the barracks after the police did not release the protesters who were detained or might earlier and the night before that there was a value on on one of the main commercial districts in beirut. and there was one battle from the street so this is what you are getting the people growing increasingly frustrated with the political process which they want to topple. in the leadership level spectrum yes it is good we were on air now like any of those you know people against this government so. as you can see people even reaching out to president from to try to help them. topple the political class now that.

and people we've been speaking to people here and in the explain to us how dire their economic situation is. and why this escalation now we've seen you here since october 17th you haven't left the street right. because we don't have social justice in this country we have nothing life at this point of life at this point is not. it's not worth living if this doesn't change and we are in the common economical crisis our system as. they've they've just moved their selves how much of a failure there are in every single way we have no ministry working we have nothing we have nothing people are dying because you think you think this is this is so do you think that any change can happen there's no no way it's been it's been almost a 100 days nobody's listening they still. forming the same other minute please

let's not use i'm sorry but this is how it is we don't want to use the cursing word but we do what they've been doing is a crime they have been their criminal is real we are ruled by criminals very word reloads they've done the civil war and this. says doing us ok but do you really think i mean do you have all the support that you meet i know there are still people who support those in power how would you could how you're going to convince them to side with you if order in order to put enough pressure and here we are in an economy crisis everybody's going to get hungry everybody's going to be did need to see soon enough i don't have to convince anybody about what's happening today it's clear what's happening who can get a hold of their money in the banks who has electricity down there who has water how can you resist this season that we're breathing now how could you read it. so you know this this protest comes at the end of the week of rage as it's been described

it's clear that some of the protesters came prepared for trouble how did the violence start. well we have to remember when this uprising began back on october the 17th for a few weeks it was full of protests everywhere gatherings yes there were roadblocks so they try to disrupt public life security forces with. things excessive force was used but nothing like this because we have seen over the past few days we've been speaking to people they say that you know enough is enough our peaceful way this is just not working and we have no other alternative but to use force to convince those in power to leave but none of that is there have been done because those in power the political class have been in power for 3 decades and they control the security forces to control the state and you can say people are wounded. and up to 75 people have been wounded in the ongoing clashes here in the downtown made to

stop shopping. chaos adrian chaos. nobody is blocking their own both sides are very defiant and now the fear is if this continues the escalation continues then it's going to be very difficult to control the street you're going to see because they vandalized the banks of the banks so. it's up in flames they're venting their anger at the banking system in the country the banking sector they believe that their economic policies have made their lives difficult and we've been speaking to people here the people here are not just from the capital they've come from across the country they have come to gather here to converge in downtown beirut to get momentum back into the protest movement took people by no way of the actual riot police. they're on their way here so we have to be very careful because the other day the media was caught up in the confrontations so this is a this is been and in many ways

a cop and mouse game has been played with the protesters they try to advance the anti-riot police tried to push them back in the past in the past 2 incidents earlier this week the unrest was contained after a few hours so it usually takes a few hours but like i mentioned the biggest question will this continue would this escalation continue and this is what people here are promising which really will be dangerous times because not only is the economy in freefall people are losing their jobs out there is a political vacuum in the country but people here want is an independent government that will govern the country for a few months before those are the elections those in power say no you can't topple us we won in a in a in an election in 2018 we control part humans and the next government has to have political representation that we're not going to accept to give up a political power like that that any change will not cut it will have to come

through the ballot box so that is how the authorities have been responding to the demands and in the street but ok the longer the longer this crisis continues the worse the economic situation becomes that you're going to see unrest in the streets so many thanks i was there was a note of that live in central beirut where the air is thick with tear gas and the smoke from fireworks when you're talking to me as she was saying that it was it was difficult to breathe she had to move several times during our discussion away to where the ad was a little clearer joining us now on the line is. an investigative journalist and founder of beirut report good to have you with us. zain i was posing the question. just a moment or 2 ago will this continue after tonight is it going to get worse. than what we're seeing right here in downtown beirut. yeah i think that whenever

there are massive confrontations this kind of inspires people to go down and bigger board so that whole defiant attitude i think it's very important that's kind of what shaped this is that the more people are pressured the more that they fight back so we've seen people so defiant that they are surrounding police stations demanding anybody who has been held. on the charge of rioting that they may be released and they've been successful at really thing most prisoners so there is a new defiance in the air that we haven't seen before in the past several decades in lebanon which during that time people had the kind of respect for let's say big businesses and banks that they kind of feared and had some faith in but now that the banks money they're literally breaking down the walls of banks and the windows i've seen people throwing rocks at police cars. breaking windows so that's the kind of thing that we haven't seen in the been on for decades and it's and it's it's

building up from all of this anger and economic starvation and people not being able to access their funds and there are so many other problems happening simultaneously because like just any blackouts are worse than ever before right now and that's pretty bad for lebanon to be a worse than that usually is has always been a power blackout and the likes of defectors one of the biggest corruption. scandals in lebanon where billions of dollars been poured into this sector and all these consultants have come from all these countries and we still don't have electricity for only about half a day but it is getting worse and worse is the anger frustration and should universally across the country we spoke to. someone a little earlier who expressed extreme frustration with the protests he said that then making things worse. yeah i mean i think the country is definitely divided i think about you know probably around half the country have some kind of stake in the current political system or you know maybe

a little bit less than 3 but it's still a significant amount of people you have to remember that these institutions power these parties who for militias during the war have very deep loyalties and people have built their lives around these movements that have been going on for 3040 years 50 years and the country's history so i mean i think like a lot of regimes across the middle east you know we forget that these things have very deep roots and they may do are tied their incomes are tied to them so it kind of pit people against each other the police also will say that the policemen are you know also average citizens trying to earn a paycheck they're getting hit with rocks in the face that could be deadly they've had many injuries as well and they've upped the ante on the protesters as well they've been beating them back more they've been attacking journalist more there are reports now that some of the 10 from the protests that have been burned by security forces hard to confirm that but some people have said that they have witnessed that so so there's a it's a very divided society in many ways but i mean i think for the most part you know

the majority of the population of the country is living in a disaster zone the question is whose fault is it and i think the more vile the protesters become justifiably or not that will lead some people to. kind of pull back from support as well because they've lived through such wars in this country and been on and people have fought so hard to kind of stop fighting a return to violence is difficult i think a lot of youth are it's a generational gap as well there are a lot of views out there that are really leading the charge and have that kind of enthusiasm as the older generation has kind of lived with it have kind of resigned themselves in many ways to to this reality and the youth are saying that they reject the completely so there's a bit of generational 'd there as well so we have we had a commentator on here say the tonight is all this week has been a turning point in lebanon how does this end. well the protesters want to see some real action happening and there's been very little action happen from the

government side i mean they promise to form a government it's been what 3 months now it's kind of ridiculous that these millionaires and billionaires that we call our parliamentarians can't even get their act together to create the most basic system of governance and just fill basic ministries and positions why is it so difficult the whole process is shrouded in secrecy another problem with governance there's not transparency in government so we don't really know who is being chosen or why until the names are announced to us so there's a there's a big problem there as well so we're very frustrated by living in that kind of limbo and not know what can happen next nothing else to get money in the bank and on top of that with them with all these other problems you know hospitals 2 are said they're running short on supplies do are very nervous and anxious and worried about their lives and every turn they find a new crisis there was just announced yesterday that the internet levanon might not be my might be shut down because the government can't pay its internet bills which just a few $1000000.00 i mean so this governments who bully proved itself incapable of

any kind of governance and the most basic satis factory way and it's really no surprise because again these are warlords and and kind of you know billionaire millionaire capitalists who take advantage of a vacuum of power that lebanon is the level really never had a really good state formation after its civil war and everyone had a reconciliation or justice process the people who committed crimes during the war are now at the top of power and i think you know the situation shouldn't be that surprising to most people. could many thanks indeed have a battle that the founder of beirut reports and just to remind you what we've been watching for the past 15 minutes or so. an ongoing situation in the center of beirut where police have been firing tear gas and blows a cannon that protesters who've been demanding a speedy resolution to the country's financial and economic crisis in return the protesters have been throwing fireworks and rocks at the police will continue to monitor the situation in beirut and we'll let you know if there are any further

developments to pass on to you. but now let's move on to the rest of the day's news libya's state oil firm says that it's been forced to halt operations at 5 major oil ports in the east of the country its facilities have been under attack by forces who are loyal to the warlord khalifa haftar who say that the ports revenues are being used by the rival tripoli based government to pay turkish fighters but arsenal oil corporation says that 800000 barrels a day of output will be lost but amounts to some $55000000.00 a day well the un's envoy for libya says the oil revenues should be used to feed people. not to leave me alone. our position at the u.n. is very clear you must not play with oil because it is the livelihood of libyans without oil libyans are starving we have to tell it like it is so we must not play with oil we must not turn it into a weapon of war we must not allow it to become

a matter of division or outbidding al-jazeera is muffled up the one head is in tripoli and says the oil blockade has already had substantial effects on the markets. in less than 24 hours the libyan dinar has lost about. 10 percent of its value compared to hard currency is b. because of the blockade of the terminals and oil exporting ports in the east of the country the united nations' support the mission in libya has suppressed concern over the blue kade of the installations and it's sad that the. must not be part of the conflict and there and no see that's the state oil for the national oil corporation must stay neutral away from the current.

conflict that's going on the oil revenues are of the bag borne of libya's national income and their national oil corporation is stressing that it's now losing about 800000 1000000000 that is a day which is estimated at about $55000000.00 a day loss because of the blockade 3 u.s. airports have begun to screen passengers arriving from $100.00 in china for a new virus than so far led to the deaths of 2 people new york's j.f.k. airport along with those in los angeles and san francisco are taking passengers temperatures and asking them about symptoms china says the billy 50 people have been infected but research by london's imperial college suggests there could be more than 1700 cases of the u.s. based centers for disease control says it hasn't seen this kind of disease before chinese officials have identified this outbreak as being caused by

a novel coronavirus. a corona virus is a class of viruses that can cause the common cold but it actually can also cause more serious diseases like mers and sars observes katrina you in beijing has more on the government's response to the outbreak. the chinese government they are very much trying to keep a lid on any sort of widespread panic they're trying to say that everyone who is associated with this particular seafood wholesale market which seems to be connecting all the people who have been affected so far have been are being closely watched or have been tested and that everything is under control and that they've said that everyone who is affected is from is from rouhani and so far it hasn't broken out into other areas now of course the government is trying to do this because we're entering the chinese new year period who hunt is not a small city 11000000 people live there and during this period there are about $2000000.00 trips made across china if there's any panic sparked around this corona

virus that it could lead to all sorts of cale's so the government is very much interested in trying to spread the message that it is all ok if you have any symptoms get tested because we're not ruling out human to human transmission but at the same time don't panic and just go about every business that's that's their message so far. in syria warplanes a bomb shelter housing displaced people in killing 4 people it's the latest attack to violate a cease fire that came into force a week ago. reports were no one. but a desperate rush to save lives to get this shelter for displaced people was one of several sites hit by recent airstrikes in syria. inside is a family including several young children yeah the urgency crews take the injured to hospital or some of the missiles hit several towns in the northern province of aleppo. but for others it's too late for that because some of the

airstrikes hit this house which was for displaced people they came here looking for shelter trying to escape the bombing when we arrived we found 4 bodies on the ground. turkey's president recent high apparent on says syria's government violated the cease fire brokered by turkey and russia. the target it live province is the last territory controlled by rebel groups in syria's northwest region. thousands of civilians are caught in the violence the u.n. says more than 300000 syrians have been forced from their homes over the last 10 weeks women men and children simply carrying out everyday activities at the workplace in markets and at schools being killed and maimed in senseless violence was these protesters say they've had enough they are tired of short lives

cease fire agreements that go ignored. for those of us living in syria we know the talks of cease fire turned out to be lies there is no ceasefire a few days ago there was a massacre here that killed civilians. many families are now packing their belongings in leaving the. many don't yet know where they can go and be safe. al-jazeera. members of venezuela's opposition posse say they have transcripts of government officials offering them bribes they say that ordeal recordings reveal $700000.00 each was offered for them to turn on lead a. lesson america at its newman reports from caracas. a new twist in the hostile takeover of the news whalers opposition controlled parliament . nearly 2 weeks ago soldiers prevented opposition. from entering the legislature. while

a small group of dissident deputies installed their own man as speaker of the house with the government's full support. now the majority opposition leadership is showing would it says is proof of how the government tried to buy off deputies to. including. the things we agreed on $700.00 initially there was another proposition of $1000000.00 i suggested $1.00 but they came back with $500.00 and said no that's unacceptable so we arrived ability ground of 700000 which is still money you know. says he met and taped. a deputy who'd been expelled from his opposition party offering him the bribe just ahead of the january 5th vote for control of parliament he says only 16 out of more than 100 deputies took the bait and that he and others who refused are now in danger. today i am being seriously threatened in my physical integrity

and that of my family al-jazeera tried without success to speak to who nevertheless responded to the accusations on twitter calling the recording a hoax and threatening to take his accusers to court for slander he added if deputy . had this audio why didn't he make it public 2 weeks ago after the election as the director of the national assembly he didn't because he didn't have what is a vulgar montage we asked mark a not the very same question and he responded that it was because of fears for his and other deputies safety now that they've gone public he says that if anything happens to them they will hold president nicole last mughal personally responsible the white house has accused the venezuelan government of using bribery tactics to oust with regards as the legitimate opposition leadership and slap sanctions on deputy noriega according to the voice transcript the so-called turncoat deputies

met with president mahmoud of personally the night before the bribe offer was made to calculate how many votes were needed. none of this is admissible in a court of law but then it's the court of public opinion that the opposition is trying to win over to see in human al-jazeera. the f.b.i. believes that saudi arabia's government orchestrated secret missions to help its citizens escape the united states the agency released a highly sensitive memo which suggests that saudi officials almost certainly assist the u.s. based saudi citizens to flee the united states legal system the f.b.i. says that saudi officials deceive the embarrassment of saudi citizens and during the u.s. judicial process being greater than the embarrassment of being caught evading u.s. law but the classified document lists alleged crimes ranging from traffic violations to child pornography rape or murder to u.s. citizens jeff merkley and wyden pushed for the f.b.i.

letter to be released they warned that saudi will continue its behavior if president trumps administration doesn't act. the trump in ministration and government doesn't get tough now it will happen again and again and again so what i'm going to be pushing for is for the trust in ministration to step up the saudis are supposed to be our allies well that's fine but they're not above the law and i'm going to make sure that this administration pushers now to protect the people of war again and our country mexico's government is promising jobs to nearly $3000.00 migrants hoping to get into the u.s. at the moment there in guatemala as they make their way north towards mexico central american countries have come under increasing pressure from washington to stop migrants crossing into the u.s. john holdren reports now from guatemala city. die another and dead mother from honduras thought the family had finally made it when they reached the u.s.

knox for asylum instead you a sufficient sent them to guatemala they say without their consent you know you don't know if you're much better than they gave us papers to saying they would in english when we asked what the where they said they just had her details on them when we saw the asylum officer the next day he told as we change our consent to go back to. they're not alone the u.s. is now shipping hondurans and salvadorans who arrive at its border to guatemala to apply for asylum there instead more than $100.00 so far and no being for a mouse they're not being informed of what's going on in the u.s. they're being told they're going higher and it's a surprise for them to arrive in guatemala. president trumps of ministration says the country is safe for asylum seekers and the question. in the 2019 fiscal year what the mala was actually the biggest source of migrants detained at the u.s.

border over the years it struggled to keep its own population from leaving let alone taking care of asylum seekers coming in here. the country is one of the poorest in the hemisphere and the u.s. travel department itself warns but crime such as armed robbery murder is common gang activity such as extortion violent street crime and narcotics trafficking is widespread he added to that the asylum system here is skeletal there are only a dozen case offices meanwhile n.g.o.s. picking up the slack i said the little said we said that. we had to provide the migrants with legal aid medical aid food everything so we know the state doesn't have the resources to offer asylum or even conduct the process we asked the u.s. department of homeland security for comment we didn't hear back. but it's reach similar agreements with honduras and el salvador hoping to reduce pressure on

a cold up immigration system that means asylum seekers could soon be sent to 2 of the world's most violent countries. after a night at the migrant shelter. in the children a trying to get the bus fare together to get home they were dropped in guatemala with nothing but the clothes they're wearing john homan now does it or what tamala city. it is good to have you with us hello adrian finnigan here in doha the headlines and al-jazeera beirut riot police fired tear gas and water cannon the protesters who are demanding a speedy resolution to the country's financial and economic crisis hundreds of protesters have been involved in running battles with security forces in beirut al-jazeera zana hold a spoke to one of the protesters who says the social and economic situation in lebanon is becoming more desperate than ever. we don't have social justice in this

country we have nothing. at this point the left at this point is not. it's not worth living if this doesn't change and we are living the common economical crisis our system as. they've they've just proved their selves so much all the 13 years they are in every single way we have no ministry working we have nothing we have nothing and people are guiding by libya stable firm says that has been forced to halt operations of 5 major oil ports in the east of the country its facilities have been under attack by forces who are loyal to the warlord khalifa haftar who say that the ports revenues are being used by the rival tripoli based government to pay turkish fighters but ashville all cooperation says $55000000.00 a day will be lost the un's envoy for libya says the oil revenues should be used to feed people. not to leave me i don't need to clear our position at the u.n.

is very clear you must not play with oil because it is the livelihood of libyans without oil libyans are starving we have to tell it like it is so we must not play with oil we must not turn it into a weapon of war we must not allow it to become a matter of division or outbidding. 3 u.s. airports have begun to screen passengers arriving from will haunt in china for a new virus that is so far led to the deaths of 2 people new york's j.f.k. airport along with those in los angeles and san francisco taking passengers temperatures asking them about symptoms but iran is sunday the black boxes of a downed ukrainian a lot of back to ukraine 176 people were killed when the jet was accidentally shot down by the iranian military in it. those are the headlines we'll have more news for you on al-jazeera after the day's edition of inside story thinks.

the u.k. puts the squeeze on lebanon's hezbollah and the entire group political and military case terrorist blacklist and all of its assets are now frozen but why now is iran the real target and does it complicate an already tense situation in the middle east this is inside story. by michele kerry and welcome to the program the u.k. has added lebanon's entire has a lot of movement to its blacklist of what its arms terrorist organizations and now it's freezing has assets and will prosecute any.