the all. type of the storm all to help hundreds of people escape after a soldier goes on a shooting rampage. and how he and this is al jazeera live from doha also coming up. the world health organization will send a team to investigate the coronavirus site break as the number of deaths is on track to surpass sars. inside a ghost town in northern syria while an uneasy standoff remains between turkish and syrian forces also the irish prime minister leo varadkar fights for reelection but poll suggests voters of tired of him and that's

a dominant parties. at 1st high security forces have stormed the mall to help hundreds of people escape a hostage situation a soldier had shot and killed 20 people before holding others in the shopping center in the city of caracas just northeast of the capital bangkok when the say the shooter has an assault rifle will circle life nights wayne he joins us from bangkok when just bring us up to speed on the latest in that situation as it might be brought circles. it hasn't according to the latest update we've received from the police or so the defense ministry giving a regular updates at a location near the mall the shooter is still believed to be inside that shopping mall in the city of course where he has been for several hours in the police

confirming that there are hostages they believe being kept by the gunman somewhere inside the mall they're not sure exactly how many hostages there are in there and it seems that there is also some confusion about exactly where he may be inside the mall are what they are saying is that police soldiers as well have gone inside the building itself and of managed to secure several of the floors within the mall obviously those floors are not where the shooter is he is still in there somewhere exactly we're if they know the police are not saying so again this is been going on for several hours began mid afternoon on saturday on an army base he is a serving member of the time military he shot at least 3 people on the military base before driving in a stolen vehicle towards the city center towards the mall where we now know he went in many more shots were fired inside the mall and now it appears situation is still

ongoing with again hostages being held by the gunman and when just to give us some context here how unusual is this type of incident in thailand. it's pretty unusual for a shooting to happen on this scale certainly we see them fairly regularly on a smaller scale than this it has to be said in the southern most provinces of thailand 3 southernmost provinces that border malaysia that is where there is an armed separatist movement so there are regular attacks staged in those provinces against security forces against other symbols of the state of the government in bangkok but certainly of this nature it is not common gun ownership is fairly common in thailand and therefore gun related crime gun related violence is also fairly common but again not on the scale it also has to be pointed out the army is

a very large factor in thai society it is very present it is a very large military about $350000.00 or so serving full time soldiers within the time military so it's fairly big and quite often there are reports of weapons that go missing from the bases the weapons storage facilities are often broken into and a lot of weapons do go missing again this shooter is believed to be a serving member of the thai army is likely to have had access to many different types of weapons and according to unconfirmed reports he has more than one gun on him inside the mall where that situation is is ongoing ok when hey thank you. there after a brief respite in china the rates of new corona virus infections is again increasing the number killed is on track to surpass the summer's total 17 years ago

at least $722.00 chinese have died from the evil iris well in addition an american woman and a man both from japan both passed away in will haunt where the break started hong kong has become begun a 2 week mandatory quarantine for all arrivals from mainland china while in japan thousands of cruise ship passengers remain in quarantine docsis in the port of yokohama have confirmed 64 cases on board well as of the show says sending an international team of investigators to china as early as monday. yes we have submitted names and i got a response actually today so the team lead the team leader will be leaving either monday already tuesday that's what we have a me at now and then the rest of experts will also for last event

catarina you report snow on the passengers and crew so stuck on board that cruise ship in the japanese port of yokohama. the owners of this luxury cruise ship describe it as a home away from home and for those aboard there's now no choice about 3700 people on the diamond princess are being quarantined for at least 2 weeks after japan's yokohama port that's after more than 60 tested positive for corona virus we are instructed to stay in our own cabin. you know that people from the insurer haven't been allowed there. they may have had a chance to interact although they've been instructed to stay a metre apart from each other so it's hard to read. the mood of the other passengers without a contact with them i see you know some people are very worried on the internet and social media. japan is already dealing with cases of the virus and has imposed new border controls to stop it spreading it turned away another cruise ship that had

sailed from china. the world health organization says there's no need for alarm there's over 3700 people in crew and this is after extensive searching for cases and testing and testing of many many people so if i don't get my math wrong that's that's less than 2 percent of people so. it's still a bad it's not a great number it does show the virus has spread in the ship but again let's be careful here not to overreact the outbreak that began to china has spread to at least 25 countries in kazakhstan there were reports of violence between kazakhs and the ethnic quake moving over fears of coronavirus. chinese restaurants and businesses have reportedly been burnt down has increased its alert level after new cases of corona virus not linked to previous infections or travel to china of course it. people are rushing to supermarkets to stock up on food and essential

goods and around the world more people are buying masks and what's called personal protective equipment or people pushing up prices and creating shortages the world is facing severe disruption in the market for person and for person and protective equipment the mondays have 200 times higher than normal and prizes that up to 20 times higher. the un agency says more than 80 percent of corona virus cases globally reported can be considered mild and is calling for nations to work together to fight the outbreak in who had a 2nd emergency hospital with beds for 1600 coronavirus patients has been opened china's president xi jinping has declared what he calls a people's war on the virus saying no effort is being spared in fighting the epidemic but there is growing criticism of the chinese government's handling of the crisis social media is flooded with complaints of attempts by police and other

government officials to nischelle cover up the outbreak then silencing the doctors who 1st sounded the alarm for china's leaders this is increasingly a battle on 2 fronts against the virus itself and the discontent it sparked katrina you al-jazeera dating russian and turkish delegate some are meeting to discuss fighting in syria syrian activists say turkey is setting up new outposts in the last rebel held area of it comes the syrian government forces continue to advance on the province but us in him can see all the reports from baba howard in the side syria turkey is determined to stop that syrian government forces in the suburbs of surat camp hours before distributed town well after prayers 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 program ask us forces to back off no arkie 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 the globe to 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 solve little measurement of focus on the missed you know cultural advantage to get actual 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 for a good and 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 so rocket and just 7 kilometers away soon after solo al-jazeera bubble howrah northwestern syria ok was crosswise to istanbul and there were hashem is standing by at this is a crucial meeting at a rather precarious time for russia and turkey and it's still well underway as we understand. it is still underway with both parties trying to negotiate terms. for any deal that could deescalate the mounting tension in it live

now the turkish government has been frustrated over way described as lack of cooperation from the russian government says that that russia has not been able to rein in president abbas and his troops who have taken over and seem to be determined to move forward towards the city of live. this meeting is more about the need to see where. the russians would be able to convince. syrian troops to back away from. and meant the turkish military outpost there were operating around and also on the outskirts of that's very crucial for turkey and this explains why they have been sending more reinforcements however if you look at the situation on the ground you have the syrian army sending more troops all the way towards sadako and it could potentially move towards must

bomb or. to move ahead to words to words. and this explains why the turkish army is setting up new outposts in those areas and the turkish military has said its troops that are equipped enough and where the to retaliate of the syrian government decided to go ahead with this minister of finance of now the problem with the whole situation in the province of the rebels territory has been shrinking over the last few weeks now there are about 4000000 syrian civilians trapped in those areas and if worse comes to worse and the syrians backed by russia decide to go ahead those people have nowhere to go and this explains explains the growing tense of that you're seeing on the ground and the strained relations between turkey and russia about how to deal with the situation in libya ok ashim our barrel lifers

there in istanbul and i thank you. well for still to come here on al-jazeera we'll take a look at what the votes in india's capital name mean for prime minister narendra modi. i'm alexia bryan in new south wales a stray which is seeing some of its biggest rain since the fire season began find out why that's got some scientists worried. hello again to welcome back to you in a national weather forecast for some good news here across the eastern part of the mediterranean the big storm system is finally making its way out now we saw a lot of problems in terms of snow across turkey we will still see some residual snow pushing into the caspian as well down across much of the west to middle east we're talking about temperatures still quite low for this area so damascus only

a high here on sunday of 5 jerusalem of 6 and by the time we get to monday slowly creeping back up in terms of those temperatures but still quite cloudy across much of the region here in doha though expect to see a warm day as we go towards sunday we do expect to see $27.00 degrees clouds in the forecast by the evening timeframe it is going to be windy we could be seeing some blowing dust as well by the time we get towards monday the winds still are in the forecast temperature dropping to 20 but monday and into tuesday it is going to be 19 as the forecast high there well across parts of libya as well as into egypt of course the winds have died down that's the good news there we're still seeing some clouds across much of the area so for cairo expect to see a cloudy day at 16 dropping to 15 by the time we go towards monday and then here across parts of south africa it is going to be the heavy showers at the cape town expect to see a temperature of $28.00 degrees. but . from passion into transformative science that brings about

change colleges here it goes on a journey with 5 scientists who are determined to use scientific knowledge to serve the humankind and we have dolphins in our sanctuary we can monitor them and record their mobile the photos and behavior we're able to figure out how they're adapting to their new environment women make science coming soon on al-jazeera. or be a. way of. this is al jazeera a quick reminder of the headlines this hour tight security forces have stormed

a shopping mall to help dozens of people escape a hostage situation the soldier went on a shooting rampage and killed 20 people in the city of karachi just northeast of the capital bangkok situation is still ongoing. an international team of investigators led by the world health organization is heading to china to look into the corona virus a break when a 720 people have died from the virus so far the number of those infected has risen 234000. and russian turkish delegates are meeting to discuss fighting in syria on friday turkish armored vehicles and tanks entered the last rebel held area syrian activists say turkey is setting up a new high school says syrian government forces continue to advance on the province . and the united nations is working towards a cease fire in libya the u.n. secretary general antonio good terrorists made the announcements ahead of the summit of african union leaders in ethiopia so your god will be

a better example with regards to libya it's evident the crisis has been seriously aggravated by the presence of forces and equipment from many other countries in clear violation of the mandate of the security council i think we have to reestablish the sovereignty of international law and the conditions in which the decisions of the security council could be implemented and that countries should understand that their engagement to promote certain conflicts only increases the potential for action by terrorist groups on hamad farthings a smaller from at a suburb where the african union summit will be held. antonio guterres the secretary general of the united nations also mentioned sudan and he at the beginning a big it began with south sudan praising the efforts to bring about some resolution about the constellation there and then he talked about the republic of sudan saying that it's high time to remove it from the list of sanctions of the list of state

states possible sponsors of terrorism listen to his words on that respect. i reaffirm that it is time for sudan to be removed from the list of state sponsors of terrorism and i call on the international community to help sit down in its efforts to meet its current challenges. there is also talked about cooperation and solidarity with africa he said he's coming here. in oh he's bringing a central message of solidarity and support to the african union he's aware of the complaints here within africa with regards to what's been perceived marginalization of the united nations or the international community in terms of what's going on in libya and the african union believing that they should be given a greater role in that respect he mentioned the will of the united nations to exactly do that and he said that from now on the african union will be invited to have a permanent representation within the united nations representation in libya he also

asked the african union to join efforts with the united nations in terms of peacekeeping in terms of combating terrorism. voting is finished for a regional election in the indian state of delhi the elections been seen as a test for the national governments after weeks of often violent protests against the new citizenship some of the largest process where in new delhi where elizabeth purana reports. determines to have this same millions in india's capital region headed to polling stations after a bit before campaigning. from the very old to 1st time voters they told al-jazeera what matters to them i think we need to shift. from. from. talking about an. issue.

to be prime minister that in the modi and has bought at the party of b j p have campaigned to end weeks of widespread protests against the citizenship including in the shooting bog neighborhood to be j.p. politicians were banned from campaigning after comparing protesters to rapists and murderers saying the demonstrators were determined to make india a muslim country. another politician said protestors should be shot they were 2 shooting incidents against protesters in one week after those comments were made a b j p election candidate said protest is a disrupting every day life yet every year. on race do you know we want peace you want a harmony because. if that is entirely peace in your city and your country. the teuton chief minister of delhi ivan kejriwal from the common man party focused its campaign on development education and health care which. i'm hopeful that the delhi

public will vote on the work that we've done about the common man party can form the government here for the 3rd time analysts say the alternative could lead to more protests but the fear is that if the b.b. comes to power in delhi the protest and the protests in different parts of the country would be approved so what we are stating at this. is some more tension in the coming days so let's see how it plays out. the election result is due to be announced on tuesday b j p hasn't been in power and delhi for 22 years the result will indicate whether its nationalist campaign has paid off or if voters are giving the activist arvind kejriwal a 3rd term in office elizabeth for on al-jazeera. irish voters' frustration with economic austerity and a housing shortage or choosing their next prime minister polls suggest a shift away from the over and cruz governing phinney galan opposition phina for

oil which have donated politics since independence supports has surged to the center left shin fein long shunned by mainstream parties because of their links to the ira nick parker has more now from dublin. if the polls are to be built if there could be a major upset in this year's election largely because for as long as many people can remember one of 2 parties in the field a gale off in a fall has dominated irish politics but this year things could be very different indeed shining faintness a party on the political left of the spectrum has been making significant gains largely because in a gale has been accused of failing to live up to expectations when it comes to solving importantly critical issues here the housing crisis homelessness and also the soaring costs of child care to name a few the reality is that nobody can really cool the selection at this stage

undoubtedly coalitions will be need to be formed but the question is who will partner up with who well for more on this i'm joined by a donica who's written extensively about irish politics he's director of research at dublin city university school of law thank you very much for joining us so it looks very much as if the country could be heading towards something of a political shake up mean for ireland for shin fein to potentially have a foothold in government it will be transformational really because since the beginning of the state really for the last century irish politics has been a 2 horse race between fiona fall and phoenix gale so there's never been any combination of parties other than those 2 leading a government and they've never call us even though there are share of the vote has dwindled from 80 percent collectively in the 1980 s. to about 40 percent likely today so soon fein are are the big winners in this election because they've come from being a minor party to now a party that is now potentially i think cost of getting perhaps even the largest

share of the vote and i think that's reflected in the weather here to take a very blustery where i think we're feeling the winds of change here in arden's. us president donald trump took to twitter to defend his decision to far to. key witnesses in his impeachment inquiry ambassador to the european union gordon sunderland was recalls just hours after the tenants colonel alexander vin was a scoresheet from the white house both men were critical of trump's handling of the military aid to ukraine and together reports gordon sunland was considered a close ally of president trumps the 61 year old businessman gave trump's inauguration committee a $1000000.00 became ambassador to the european union and is said to have had the president's number on speed dial all that changed after someone's explosive testimony to the president's handling of military aid to ukraine was there a quid pro quo as i testified previously with regard to the requested white house

call and the white house meeting the answer is yes another pivotal witness in the impeachment korean to president trump was lieutenant colonel alexander that mn was a highly decorated soldier an expert on ukraine binman is testimony was said to have been breached the president is improper for the president of the united states to demand a foreign government investigate a u.s. citizen and a political opponent 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. on friday lieutenant colonel vin and his twin brother a lawyer at the national security council risk order from the white house by officials both have been reassigned just hours after the president commented on the lieutenant colonel well i'm not happy with this because supposedly happy with the fact that it is midnight in washington senior figures in the democratic party reacted angrily to the firings adam schiff who took a lead role in the president's impeachment tweeted lieutenant colonel that man did

his job as a soldier in iraq he received a purple heart then he displayed another rare form of bravery moral courage he complied with a subpoena and told the truth he upheld his oath when others did not one of the president's senior adviser said the firing sent a clear message that not backing the commander in chief will not be tolerated following the impeachment inquiry in his acquittal it seems that president trump is bent on retribution whitman's lawyer released a statement saying the most powerful man in the world boyd by the silent pliable and complicit as decided to exact his revenge it came as no surprise to many that 2 key witnesses in what president trump called a hoax and now gone the question is who's next and a gallacher al jazeera washington flood warnings have replaced bush far alerts in southeastern australia rain in new south wales are some of the heaviest in almost 20 years that i'm poor is helping to extinguish some bushfires which happy burning

for months as alexey o'brien reports welcome rain on this blackened land just waste of sydney. it's not the 1st downpour since the fire season began last year bars it's reduced the number of active blazes and is bringing relief to areas gripped by the worst drought on record. but the deluge is also sweeping piles of ash so to other debris and to rivets lakes and dams that provide drinking water to those living nearby we've never had an experience like this before. during the bush period of we had i $395.00 pass and take off attachment actually burned and that kind down to the water alongside it's a significant impact of what frosts i put across it. this is war again but damn it supplies st of sydney's drinking water but could be contaminated by charred debris

from the vast bushfires in the area scientists say it probably won't cause any health problems. taking any chances but they've put in silk persons to catch any metairie elect could affect water quality and of monitoring the situation closely contaminated water isn't just a problem for humans small pieces of ash from trees like this can get into the waterways and suffocate the fish by can also cause algal blooms which can produce dangerous talk sense all cut the amount of oxygen in the water and that can put all the wildlife at risk fatally peter davies thousands of fish died in january when brains washed sludge into the maclay river in new south wales. and late last year piles of ash called to the beaches as fires raged by. many bushfires a still burning up and down this coastline leaving waterways and water supplies at risk it takes decades for

a forest to re grow and to raise diable laws we will be dealing with different quality water different organic matter coming down sediment loads for many years and i would predict in many cases certainly in sydney's chis decades new growth is beginning to push through the scorched landscape but the cost of this unprecedented fire season is mounting and it's not over yet. alexia brian al jazeera new south wales australia. this is al jazeera and these are the headlines tight security forces have stormed a shopping mall to help dozens of people escape a hostage situation a soldier went on a shooting rampage and killed 20 people in the city of caracas just northeast of the capital bangkok when hate has more on the ongoing situation the shooter is still believed to be inside that shopping mall in the city of koran where he has

been out for several hours in the police confirming that there are hostages they believe being kept by the gunman somewhere inside the mall they're not sure exactly how many hostages there are in there and it seems that there is also some confusion about exactly where he may be inside the mall are what they are saying is that police soldiers as well have gone inside the building itself and have managed to secure cyril of the floors within the mall the number of people killed by the corona virus in china is on track to surpass the sars epidemic 17 years ago where than 720 people have died so far and 34000 people are infected the world health organization says it's leading an international team of investigators to go to china as early as monday russian and turkish delegates are meeting to discuss fighting in syria on friday turkish armored vehicles and tanks and said the last

rebel held area syrian activists say turkey is setting up new outposts a syrian government forces continue to advance on the province. winter weather has worsened conditions for syrians living in a refugee camp and lebanon's bekaa valley it comes as the ongoing economic crisis in lebanon is having a serious impact on humanitarian programs. and irish voters are choosing their next prime minister who will suggest a shift away from the veronicas governing phin a gale and the opposition feel to follow which have dominated politics since independence well those are the headlines keep it here on al-jazeera inside story is up next.

a potential political shakeup in pretty good poll said the ira shifting away from the 2 main parties towards shin fein so how might this affect the next government and could it redefine islands politics this is inside story. a welcome to the program i'm adrian finnegan islands governments of long been dominated by 2 center right policies feel a gale that's the policy of current prime minister leo varadkar and feed a full.