you're really invested. as a journalist. 2 days after his acquittal and donald trump fires 2 officials who testified against him in the impeachment hearings. and again i'm the star of the attack and this is al jazeera live from doha also coming up. closes in on bernie sanders at 7 democratic contenders face off in a debate in new hampshire ahead of tuesday's primary. china struggles to contain the coronavirus of the number of people dying continues to climb and almost 3000 more cases on the books and. turkey deploys troops and tanks to syria's last rebel stronghold as pro-government forces claim a missile attack. while

the fallout from donald trump's impeachment trial continues with 2 key witnesses both being fired gordon sunland the u.s. ambassador to the e.u. is the latest to be removed from his post just hours after ukraine expert lieutenant colonel alexander event than now officials testified to a house committee about the president's efforts to pressure ukraine to help him against his domestic political rivals it all comes just 2 days after trump was acquitted and his impeachment trial lawyer is calling his removal an act of revenge by the president. trump said he wanted them gone. well i'm not happy with their customers are they happy with about not they'll make that decision you'll be hearing they'll make a decision. while the top democratic senator chuck schumer was quick to respond to

the news on twitter he said the pentagon assured me that patriots and whistleblowers likely tenet cuddled and then will be protected any reprisals against him all of those who came forward to tell the truth are wrong and should be seen for what they are an extension of president trumps cover up well here's a reminder of what colonel than been told the us house about i was concerned by the call what i heard was inappropriate and i reported my concerns to mr eisenberg it is improper for the president of the united states to demand a foreign government investigate a u.s. citizen and a political opponent i was also clear that if you crane pursued an investigation it was also clear that if you create pursued an investigation into the 2016 elections the bidens and it would be interpreted as a parson play this would undoubtedly result in ukraine losing bipartisan support undermining u.s. national security in advancing russia's strategic objectives in the region well let's get more on all of this randi gallagher who is in washington d.c.

and it seems that president trump is cleaning house who do you think is next. well i don't know who is next but this is pretty swift retribution these were 2 key witnesses in his impeachment trial of course he was cleared of that 2 days ago and now is really sending a strong message to anyone who works in the u.s. government that if you criticize me if i see you as doing me harm then i will do harm back to you gordon sunderland of course we. are to europe the u.s. ambassador to europe or someone who gave a $1000000.00 to donald trump's campaign fund he was said to be close with don trump he's clearly not someone who the president would say is a no trump or. release a statement saying the president has recalled me i thank him for my opportunity but there's a clear message here from the president in that he feels completely vindicated in the impeachment trial and now we can pretty much do what he wants to tell and colonel alexander when was actually

a scored from the white house hours before gordon son was fired you know potentially ending his military career this is the ukraine expert someone who's a decorated war veteran from iraq is now being sent back to the defense department but this does send a clear message from president trumpy clearly feels vindicated but he clearly feels vindictive as well and how is all of this going down over and in d.c. i can only imagine the outrage from democrats. i mean i'm sure on social media the golden sun on news just came through in the last few minutes but i'm sure democrats democrats will be taking to social media but it's friday night here in washington d.c. i don't know whether the timing was deliberate to bury it on a friday night when no one's really paying too much attention but this will have reverberations come monday morning you know the democrats will clearly say look the president may have been cleared from the impeachment trial but essentially firing

senior figures who did what their consciences told them to do in other words tell their side of the story and tell the truth and yet lost their jobs for it doesn't send a good message it's not good for democracy i'm sure that's what the democrats will say gordon sun is in a stronger position is a very wealthy man he can go on to do something else but someone like alexander ben ben is a military veteran he's been in the military is entire life is his career may have now come to a complete standstill if not worse and his twin brother also was reportedly escorted from the white house as well he's also a lieutenant colonel so this is a very vindictive president one who clearly feels he's on the right side of history have him being gotten away with the impeachment trial because it was basically a partisan vote and republicans backed their president but there are serious from of occasions for moves like this i don't know if there's a historical president within a few hours of a president firing 2 key figures in an impeachment trial in this manner but as i

said many times before on this network this is no ordinary president is now ordinary president under god there for us in washington d.c. thanks so much angle. well democrats in the united states also trying to move on from the chaos and delay surrounding the iowa caucus results with the new hampshire primary coming up on tuesday now the 7 leading candidates will go head to head in a debate just in the next hour opinion polls in new hampshire show p. put is closing in on bernie sanders now 38 year old who says has voted from being the mayor of a small city to finishing marginally ahead of saunders in the iowa caucus the military vet with a centrist platform is the fast openly gay candidate to start off on such a high earners in the primaries it has been an extraordinary week and we are absolutely electrified by the energy that we are coming here with and by the extraordinary validation of this campaign vision that we had in iowa on monday i'm

also mindful and humbled by the fact that new hampshire is new hampshire and new hampshire is not the kind of place to let iowa or anybody else tell you what to do about the saunders was only 0 point one percent behind in iowa the 78 year old has strong grassroots support from the left and he's attacked dr wolfe for taking support from wealthy donors and i'm reading some headlines from newspapers about wouldn't it. be buddha church has most exclusive billionaire donors of any democrat that's that was from forbes the hill people to judge tops billionaire donor list. well elizabeth warren who is also from the left of the posse finished in iowa she has been struggling to shake off criticism about house of fund medicare for all plan and also seeking to recover from the stump his former vice president joe biden who finished 4th in iowa that he is seen by many senior

democrats as the person who could beat donald trump and. well you i spoke to john messenger who's a democratic strategist and also a former communications director at the democratic national committee and he says candidates should focus on defeating trump instead of throwing barbs at each other . and bernie came out of iowa essentially tied and so now it's there's there's all sorts of incentives for them to be attacking one another i think what the the party in the country would like to see or at least not all the country but democrats would like to see is them making their case to be the one to take on donald trump and what you've seen is that the democratic primary electorate the voters aren't sure who is the person who can take on donald trump even as he becomes administrator becomes more and more menacing in the wake of the impeachment acquittal i think this is still anyone's race at least among the top 4 or so contenders we haven't yet seen a state vote that has

a large african-american population that goes for both iowa and new hampshire are predominantly white which is not what the democratic party or the general election electorate looks like in the u.s. and we know that joe biden for instance has a lot of strength in that community so it's still a very wide open race whether it will be less about ideology i don't know i think there's a there's a lot of reason for these candidates to throw some elbows i'm just hoping they they don't forget to throw some of donald trump. well moving on to other news now and china's government is struggling to stop the spread of the corona virus with 81 more people reported dead in a province overnight now across china at least 717 people have now died and the world health organization is warning of a severe disruption to global medical supplies there's also widespread anger over the death of a doctor who was silenced when he 1st sounded the alarm on the outbreak back in december meanwhile thousands of passengers and crew remain quarantined on board 2

cruise ships in hong kong and in japan there are now $61.00 confirmed cases on the princess cruises ship that is in the port of yokohama now matthew smith is one of the passengers who doesn't have the virus but it is under quarantine and he joins us live via skype from the ship thank you so much for joining us matthew let's start with what the morale is like onboard tell us a little bit about what the conditions are and how everyone's feeling. well actually it's hard to speak to anyone else because of the korean chain we are all instructed to stay in their own cabins. you know that people from the insurer cabins been allowed. on and they may have had a chance to interact although they've been instructed to stay a metre or from each other so it's hard to read. the mood of the other passengers without a contact with a much see you know some people are very worried on the internet and social media

but we're we're fairly confident that the origin is going to work and that we will be allowed to leave the pm or. how much information are you getting from with artie's and from the crew on board and how they looking off to you. ok. in terms of information there was some concern early on that that the captain was not reporting this week maybe as frequently as he could have but he appeared to recognize that fairly quickly and it's increased the information that we're being provided we had a 1st announcement today and he restores us that he's providing the information from the health officials as soon as he can in terms of being served in our cabin we service meals 3 times a day that the crew comes by and knocks on the door they are fully massed been clothed and so that's the sense of the only contact they're not allowed to come in the cabins and we're not allowed to go out i understand that you are being asked to

take your own temperature how is everyone managing with the trying to monitor their own health. well apparently it seems to be working so yes we were given their monitors and the captain asked us to check our tempers several times a day part of the announcement that he just made was that the medical center is very busy right now because apparently other passengers who have been in quarantine have reported that they have a high temperature it was i believe 37.5 centigrade was that threshold so apparently it is working that there are jenna find possibly other cases that are just becoming symptomatic now while we have been seeing the number of cases rise onboard the cruise ship way you are and i understand the w.h.o. then takes the come back to 0 so every time there's a new infection the 14 day quarantine period starts again so do you have any idea when you're going to be able to actually leave the ship. well we haven't received

any information along those lines yesterday and the captain informed us that according to the japanese health officials that absent further developments we would be allowed to go on february 9th change if the quarantine is doing what it's intended to do is keep everybody separate from when it was instituted on wednesday morning the fact that additional cases are developing is likely from the should be from infection that occurred before the coroner game and we're hopeful that they're not resetting every time they discover one which would seem to be a little bit of an overreaction given that the nature of the quarantine but frankly we recognize that anything could happen at this point we're hopeful to get off on the 19th but are open to the possibilities of quarantine might be extended matthew smith who is one of the passengers under quarantine in the port of yokohama matthew we wish you all the best and we had to get i'm saying thank you now still

ahead on al-jazeera. syrian government forces retake a strategic town as they battle to regain control of the last rebel held territory . and the british woman on the former i saw a member facing an uncertain future after a decision by u.k. calls. hello winter proper finally arrived in japan particularly. and there is still snow showers falling this mass here but that of a 2nd fast as they were still be there are suggesting is that today in fact some stir might just catch the east coast of the korean peninsula temperatures are where they should be subzero sapporo about 11 in tokyo and if you're east of the mountains the sun is out in japan now further west it's old ice and qualities

warmed up considerably 10 degrees in beijing far above where it should be still manas dein hop in from shore was welcomed on this cloud down the southwest corner of china allowing itself to bring some rain in but not much this time it's sunny for the most part not necessarily in hong kong there is still in the central southern philippines and a big mass in southern borneo and indonesia but for forecast accuracy you probably want to say the biggest showers going to be in the west coast of sumatra not so many further east a good part of java though shari isn't really prone to huge downpours in the next day or so although when you get to bali that's quite possible will be the case. now we still go unusual rain you know disher it's been there for the last 3 days will be there for the next 2.

in india identity politics on the rise what we're seeing is the construction of budget shooting cuts and loads of what you want to put across the country and as a dockside into 12 is you do see the grit from his office the majesty of the him to fix into something more like the team i didn't see of the british football i meet with victims of violence and discover what life is like for minorities in the country join me on my journey in search of india's soul on al-jazeera. hello again you're watching al-jazeera reminder the top stories this hour the fallout from donald trump's impeachment trial continues its 2 key witnesses being

fired golden sometimes the u.s. ambassador to the e.u. is the latest to be removed from his post just hours after ukraine experts who attended coming out exams of the. u.s. democratic presidential hopefuls will soon go head to head in the debate ahead of dead next critical test of the new hampshire primary on tuesday opinion polls people are closing in on. china's government is struggling to stop the spread of the coronavirus with $81.00 more people reported dead could be problems overnight that takes the death toll across china about which least $717.00. israeli forces have shot another palestinian dead in the occupied west bank the 5th in 48 hours a funeral procession has been held for one of the victims a palestinian policeman who was killed in jenin on day he was in uniform at the station when he was killed during raids by israeli forces they were seizing c.c.t.v. footage related to a car ramming now trina's he is president has fired his country's ambassador to the

united nations the removal of the career diplomat came as a surprise to some within the security council and it appears that the palestinian issue is the reason for his dismissal out of him out of it as a james bays has more from the u.n. . mon's surf barty came out of retirement to take up the job of u.n. ambassador to coincide with his country's 2 year term on the security council but now he's been fired on the orders of the country's president. and the reason is the issue of palestine which perhaps seems odd because it's one of the country's main stated priorities as ambassador but he himself made clear the beginning of the year . tunisia will be the voice of the arab world in the african continent and will push for the settlement of just causes particularly the palestinian cause when the trump plan for the middle east was made public just over a week ago the palestinian ambassador to the u.n.

riyadh man saw told reporters that president mahmoud abbas was becoming to new york as ambassador barty stood by his side he explained that tunisia as the arab member of the security council would draw up a resolution rejecting the trump plan i'm told ambassador bartie was told news of his firing shortly before jared cushion i held a lunch with members of the security council the tunisians were represented by their deputy ambassador other council members including the current president were taken by surprise by the news and say i was quite shocked to hear that no i don't know all the details. and the reasons behind this but the eva is a very good colleague and really very much regret to see him leaving. so why has this veteran diplomat been fired the foreign ministry in chu news says he has been dismissed for purely professional reasons concerning his weak

performance and lack of coordination with the ministry all important matters under discussion at the u.n. but that might not be the whole story i've spoken to diplomats from a number of security council countries who told me they've heard that jerad push to himself called cinesias president before the ambassador was dismissed one source says the question the call was to the prime minister not the president the white house is not confirming there was a call at all one u.s. official says the tunisians told them that the ambassador was dismissed because he'd gone rogue james bays out jazeera at the united nations now tell us on the vehicles and tanks have entered the province in northwestern syria the last rebel health region it's in response to an advance by syrian government forces and could pave the way for them to stage an offensive on the provinces capital but as and of course only reports turkey is determined to stop that syrian government forces in

the suburbs of surat camp hours before distributed town well after fierce fighting with the syrian rebel defenders. sits at the junction of 2 major highways and was seen as a major obstacle in regaining control of the province one 3rd of which is now under syrian government control. turkey has warned pro the massacres forces to back off. unfortunately the syrian regime does not believe in political process and thinks peace can only be possible by a military solution and i have to say they are wrong about this they have stepped up their aggression. turkey has 12 military observation posts positioned around a blip the escalation zone agreed with russia and iran in 2017 but 9 of them have been surrounded by advancing syrian government forces to protect and stop the

advance troop yes stablished for more post which ended up in direct clashes between the turkish and syrian army's sole little mission with the hook ups and will miss you know culturally get tax responded to within the scope of such offense from now on any kind of attack will be responded to appropriately and observation post will continue their duties the syrian government has intensified its attacks since last november and backed by russia has targeted civilians this triggered a new wave of migration with hundreds of thousands of people fleeing the violence in the 9 year long civil war in syria that was where the displaced could find refuge but it live said the center is now under threat as the syrian government forces captured ceroc it and just 7 kilometers away soon after solo al-jazeera bubble howa northwestern syria now iraq's most powerful shia cleric has called for

security forces to protect anti-government protesters grand ayatollah ali al sistani is intervention follows weeks of violence in baghdad and in southern iraq iraq's human rights commission says nearly 550 iraqis have been killed since the protests began back in october well despite the violence iraqi students are continuing to skip school so they can take part in demonstrations they say until their demands are met there's little point in returning to class and many schools and universities have now been closed for months simona 14 reports from baghdad. your education is a failure they chant rather than preparing for midterm exams these students from various universities in baghdad skipped class to join anti-government protests they demand a better future a future they say the current system is incapable of providing the government is at the mine if this doesn't succeed we won't have another opportunity this is the last

chance for us we haven't achieved anything in the protest square yet so we can't return to our studies as usual you've unemployment in iraq is high and one of the protesters main grievances a lot is a 1st year engineering student but without connections she stands little chance of finding a job missing class is a small price to pay. it doesn't worry me to lose one year because there are 600 people who lost their lives entirely not just one year what is one year compared to the goals of our revolution which is to bring change. what they want is to open the political establishment that rose to power after the overthrow of saddam hussein's regime they reject prime minister designate mohamed. the former communications minister and member of parliament is seen as representing the status quo. as protests continue midterm exams are looming to catch up on months of last education some received tutoring at private institutes like this one. is a senior in

a nearby public high school classes there were suspended for several weeks when protests began in october but even after schools reopened his peers pressured him to stay away from the law of the law. in the protest squares they were asking for support they said they need us some of my friends pressured me don't go to school it's not good it's better to go protest. despite his private schooling the worries about not achieving the marks he needs to get into university the biggest losers are of course we will get hurt by this we went with the protesters and supported them but it will all come back to us of months teacher and the director of this institute doubts that many students will fail not because they mastered the subjects but because the education ministry has told instructors to help them pass . the education ministry told us to teach only the important things and skip

whatever we feel isn't necessary to be so expect that this year we will see highest success rate public schools reopened but attendance has been solo many classes have been cancelled so private institutes like these are flourishing many public school teachers earn double salaries by giving private lessons classes here cost over $600.00 per subject too expensive for many lower income families. and so the inequality gap threatens to further widen students who can't afford private tutoring have a little choice but to keep protesting and hope for a better education for all the government and shia cleric thought or have ordered students to return to class for penalties for both. of these students are determined to stay on strike the only way to pressure the government to listen to their demands even if it means putting their own future on hold see monopole to mean i'll just about. pakistan's parliament has passed

a resolution calling for the public hanging of convicted child killers and rapists now the measure follows a spate of high profile child sex abuse cases that have already sparked widespread protests human rights groups have been quick to condemn the non-binding law but as kamal hyder explains it does have a lot of domestic support. bugger's guns polymer and highly approved the barrel which will carry their death penalty for child rapists and those exit q sharon's will be carried out publicly there has been a stronger mond from people across bargain stand that there should be exemplary punishments for such heinous crimes there has been a rightly number of cases in this country last year alone there were all 4 tolerant cases that were reported and that means almost 11 children per day the pakistani parliament supporting guard bellbird the majority ward because of the

growing demand from the people here their day should be very strong sentences against such crimes in order to curtail day however their city international may be critical but people across bloggers don't say that this is the only way forward now 20 year old precious from one who joined eisel has lost the 1st stage of her appeal against the u.k. government's decision to strip her of her status and shed some ema back in was found in a syrian refugee camp last year she was 15 when she left the u.k. international makes it illegal to take away citizenship if it leaves a pass and stateless but a tribe you know has ruled that beckons bangladeshi heritage means that she can tend their citizenship and what explains what the next means could be. it's 5 years ago this month since a member begum along with 2 of her friends disappeared from east london police appealed for their saper turn but the girls had travelled from london into turkey and then into record in northern syria where they lived on the ice will rule now

nothing was heard of shamima begum until she was spotted inside a refugee camp early last year now within weeks the then home secretary sajid javid 100 boat citizenship now her lawyers argue that that was unlawful because it rendered her stateless but a decision today by a special tribunal set up to look into the shimmy my begum case said that was simply not true because she is a citizen of bangladesh by descent through her mother well she. said they will appeal against this decision and this is really just the 1st stage of the process it could even end up in the supreme court the u.k.'s highest court and this case really does shine a light on the difficulties governments now are facing in dealing with those individuals who left the country to travel to syria to support i saw who now want to return catalonia as a regional leader once the spanish government to agree on

a date for independence referendum tim torah says the past towards the region secession is absolutely reversible and that catalonia will be independent he met spanish prime minister pedro sanchez on thursday and sanchez rejects any push and dependence. erica and this is al jazeera and these are the headlines now the fallout from donald trump's impeachment trial continues with 2 key witnesses being fired called in songs and the u.s. ambassador to the e.u. is the latest to be removed from his post just hours after ukraine expert lieutenant colonel alexander vandeman of the top democratic senator chuck schumer was quick to respond to the news on twitter he said the pentagon assured me that patriots and whistleblowers like you tenet kind of intimate will be protected any reprisals against him or others who came forward to tell the truth are wrong and should be seen for what they are an extension of president trump's cover up and

gallagher has more from washington d.c. there's a clear message here from the president in that he feels completely vindicated in the impeachment trial and now we can pretty much do what he wants to tell and colonel alexander did and was actually a school did from the white house i was before gordon saundra was fired you know potentially ending his military career this is the ukraine expert someone who's a decorated war veteran from iraq he's now been sent back to the defense department but this does send a clear message from president trump clearly feels vindicated but he clearly feels vindictive as well. u.s. democratic presidential hopefuls will soon take part in a debate is ahead of the next critical test the new hampshire primary on tuesday opinion polls show people he is closing in on bernie sanders china's government is struggling to stop the spread of the coronavirus with $81.00 more people reported dead in a province overnight that takes the death toll across china now to at least $722.00

. israeli forces have shot another palestinian dead in the occupied west bank the 5th in 40 as a funeral procession has been held for one of the victims palestinian policeman killed on thursday he was in uniform at the station when he was killed during raids by israeli forces iraq's most powerful shia cleric has called for security forces to protect anti-government protesters grand ayatollah ali al sistani is intervention follows weeks of violence in baghdad and southern iraq iraq's human rights commission says nearly 550 iraqis have been killed since the protests began back in october well those are the headlines and next up it's inside story stay with us on al-jazeera.

as the coronavirus crunch the great wall of china people the government action off to the virus kills the adults and he sounded the alarm can challenge as leaders can tell you in the online anger about the cover up this is inside story. hello welcome to the show i'm sam he's a china senses the incident more than just about anywhere in the world and i think critical of the government is usually immediately removed.