really i think is still a very common pattern around reward and it's a man's world on al-jazeera. the a. 2 senior members of the saudi royal family including the king's brother arrested with reports of the ledge coup attempt. well again i missed all of you teo and this is al jazeera live from tehran also coming up south korea restricts the sale of mosques as the battles to control the coronavirus and china announces a major hit that's one of them. as i suffices to take advantage of an uncertain situation in northern iraq we need the villages left alone to defend themselves. and a severe shortage is forcing many zimbabweans to use untreated water southern africa

faces its western drought decades. now we begin in saudi arabia where security forces have reportedly detained 2 senior members of the royal family they are off form a crown prince mohammed bin nayef and prince ahmed been otherwise a south south that's the younger brother of the saudi king according to the wall street journal they've been arrested over accusations of processing against king solomon and crown prince mohammed bin sama reports suggest they're facing treason charges and could face life imprisonment or the death penalty both could have rivaled crown prince mohammed bin for the throne when dies saudi guards have also arrested one of mohammed bin nayef brothers al-jazeera senior correspondent alex planes just what these detentions mean for the kingdom and their impact on saudi politics. in terms of his significance it's huge because we're talking about true

of the most senior members of the saudi royal family and true that up until now have not been seen as supporters of crown prince may have been someone in the direction that he's been taking the country both domestically and in terms of foreign policy what's printed it is very difficult to ascertain needless to say because saudis are very close culture in terms of back of transparency and no media freedom there but also what's peculiar about it is that these are 2 figures who have they've been under house arrest they haven't been able to move freely for a very long time so the idea that maybe they were trying to hatch some sort of coup is very farfetched and difficult to see considering the restraints they were under already more likely than not what's a lot of analysts are talking about is that the current king solomon is somebody who has been reportedly suffered from dementia for many years he's unwell his health is very frail so is this a sign that he has either passed or is about to and therefore the crown prince

needs to ensure that there are no obstacles in his way in terms of succession so now may have been some man was able to get the us true digits long term. if the person he's arrested and supports him and his god unconditional support from this current us administration he's managed to sideline the religious institution either by co-opting them onto his side or by arresting many of them including people like some others but the royal courts the royal family he has failed to exert his total control over even after he managed to do things like rounding a lot of senior members of the world family in the ritz carlton that famous case in the end of 2007 there were still those figures like the only other child of the founding king abdul aziz that is a human being somebody who didn't support him as well as his cousin and the nephew of the current king mohammed bin i well i spoke to rami corey he's a senior public policy fellow at the american university of beirut he says there's

an ongoing effort to stamp out dissent within saudi arabia. i think this is a sign more of the nervousness of the crown prince and the people around him who also do rabia because they probably expect that the king will either abdicate or pass away soon and they expect there might be some kind of challenge to the succession even though he is the crown prince but the most the critical thing about this i believe is that this is the the final affirmative confirmation the seal. taking over the mantle of the arab autocrats that used to be held by people like saddam hussein and the mum of that duffy hafez less this very tough military man who ruled the country with an iron fist and that mantle has now passed on to. him and said he's not worried about people trying to make

a cool he doesn't want any independent voices that don't agree with him and it's noteworthy that i am a been abdulaziz woman's of 3 people on the council of royal members in saudi arabia that decides the succession he was one of 3 who didn't vote for him had been summoned to become the crown prince you know how many people in saudi arabia are not happy with the crown prince's policies i think that's the big question and nobody knows because so few rabia today is like the soviet union in 1960 you can't tell what's going on either in public opinion or in the corridors of power because it's very closed now south korea is imposing restrictions on the sale of mosques and has carried out raids on companies stockpiling them as it tries to combat the coronavirus they have already been long queues outside store was a mosque stocks are running low south korea has now more than 7000 confirmed cases that's the highest number outside china has also banned the entry of travelers from

neighboring japan well let's speak to rob mcbride our correspondent who is in south korea's capital seoul robyn we've been saying that's clearly a lot of fear on the streets that how are people dealing with this new rationing system when it comes to mosques. i think people here a grudgingly accepting that there has to be a rationing system simply because everybody is wearing a mask to go on the streets and it's very rare now to see anybody not wearing a mask of course advice differs about the usefulness of face masks and just whether you do need to wear them and when but certainly if you're if you're choosing to wear disposable face mask ideally you should be disposing of them every day but if everybody in korea did that there aren't enough face masks to go around so the government has had to put in place and this rationing system basically it means that you everybody here has an id card and depending on what the last couple of digits are on your id card number you get

a particular day of the week when you can go to a pharmacy and that is your pretty much your one visit for the week and you can pick up your to face masks for the week that is the ration and the government here is putting out advice on how to. make those 2 face masks last for a week but it's also taking other measures it has now completely banned any exports of face masks basically any face masks that are made here in south korea stay in south korea it is also been cracking down on any companies any warehouses that have been stockpiling and has been of quite a few cases of people holding mass the presumably with the hope of cornering the market and making a big profit later on those those holdings have been seized and they have been distributed through pharmacies so basically everybody can get their face masks and rob clearly panic spreading around the region but there have also been rising diplomatic tensions how's that all playing out. that's right i

mean everybody is still reeling from this announcement friday by japan that it's going to impose a 2 week quarantine on people arriving from south korea and also from china south korea has retaliated it was expected that it would retaliate but it's actually stopped short of imposing a quarantine measures of its of its own a tit for tat exactly the same as the japanese have done what it's done is gone and suspended a visa waiver scheme for example i think there is genuinely a fear here that although south korea would like to give give back to japan exactly what it has received there is an acceptance that it's going to hurt more economically to give you an idea last year a full 50 percent of the visitors to japan came from by the south korea or china so this is going to hurt very hard and people are still wondering exactly why shinzo

are be the prime minister of japan took this measure there's a suspicion here in south korea that it's a politics is line behind it i think from japan's point of view they are increasingly worried about 2020 was going to be that big year they were going to stage the summer olympics they still want to go ahead with that and also hoshi jim painting of china in a very important summit now that's been delayed and if things continue to get worse then it may be canceled altogether so i think there is a real concern in japan that if they don't do something now they simply won't be able to deal with the kind of outbreak the scale of outbreaks that they've seen and the 2 neighboring countries of south korea and china that on the ground for us in self thanks very much rob. well the coronavirus outbreak has hit china's exports and imports hard causing severe disruption to manufacturing wild wide customers data shows exports shrunk by about 17 percent in january and february compared to

the same period last year imports into china also fell by 4 percent analysts predict the situation could only get worse in the coming months i'll give you the pollen is in hong kong for us with more on how the virus is impacting china's economy. chinese exports for february january and february fell nearly 20 percent now i just want to point out this is the 1st time we're getting a clearer picture of the impact of coronavirus these numbers usually come out every month but because of the shutdown they did not put up these numbers in january so this is going to be a huge concern for the chinese government factories have shut down and people can go to work time has been in a massive lockdown as you know people have been stopped from going to work most of industry in china came to a complete halt in china is known as the factory of the world now china's economy though is not fully export through life which is good news for the chinese

government all the while it's a large number but 20 percent of china's g.d.p. relies on exports it will take a huge hit it is a huge blow for the chinese economy and the chinese government at this point and the palestinian government officials say 15 american tourists have been quarantined in a hotel in bethlehem coronavirus fear is the precautionary measure comes after a state of emergency was declared there on thursday and abraham has more from the occupied west bank. the claim had its best tourist season on record last year now all reservations are being canceled. many people believe the city to be where jesus was born and it draws tourists from around the world but just weeks before easter several posting in workers at the hotel have tested positive for the corona virus and the israeli military has shut bethlehem off stopping people coming in or out al-jazeera reach some of those stuck inside can you tell us a bit more about the situation in bethlehem where you want to be i'm asked.

i'm going to be given a. study. palestine's mentors to traction is the church of the nativity believed by many to be the birthplace of jesus it's also been closed off by the palestinian tourism ministry come on to my pocket you can see better on the consent to happen and yesterday the church was sterilized and cleaned so that when people come back after 14 days everything will be safe we're taking precautions for the health of the people so of course they shouldn't be any panic the main reason we're doing this is because the bar spreads fast so we need to protect the people and keep them safe and the palestinian authority has also shut down the occupied west bank for a month in an attempt to contain the spread of the virus schools and public spaces

and also been closed conferences and other public events counselled and people's movements between city limited to only those that are strictly necessary in the city of jericho people protested against the government decision to treat all infected patients in a center there they blocked roads and called on the government to keep people who are ill where they already are this void officials telling them to stay calling some people are stocking up on food water and cleaning supplies out of fear that this shutdown will go on for some time some say they're starting to panic is a very male disease or the occupied west bank well still ahead on al-jazeera. people are dying every every minute every day we speak to a woman running a hospital in war torn syria featured in an oscar nominated documentary. a new generation of thai protesters we'll tell you about the backlash following the baton

on an opposition party. of indonesia i've had a couple of drive days but sunny that a plenty of seasonal rains in the 4 cars are very active and as you can see now the heaviest rains as we go through sunday will be across the south so much a failure but again java seeing where you some of the heavy amounts of rain fairly well scattered throughout much of central and eastern areas of the as well as where we'll see some heaviest falls of rain wanted to much of the philippines but actually monday is generally a drive day and not bad into southern areas of thailand across into vietnam $38.00 celsius in bangkok so a very warm day on monday and then the scottish isles continuing through much of the march and again heaviest still across those central western areas of java meanwhile across into australia we have finally where you seen the end of what was

asked to across much will stray in the still want to like the 3 sunny sunday coastal areas of queensland maybe a few shot just popping up into new south wales but this you can see here. that's one of the remnants of s. to mix it with another system the moisture of course has been gathering across the tasman sea so that will bring some rain as we go through sunday and monday again some pretty strong winds as well but. 27 rain in brisbane with a high of 23. on charging the cost why the nurses say fed rate cut just isn't good enough to save the global economy from the impact of the fast spreading coronavirus scientists race to find a vaccine to stop the epidemic plus the environmental damage of drilling for oil in the republic of congo counting the cost of al-jazeera.

holding the powerful to account as we examine the u.s. is wrong in the world on al-jazeera. the arab. hello again i'm just. a reminder of our top stories this hour 2 senior members of the royal family have been reportedly detained in saudi arabia they all form a crown prince mohammed bin nayef and prince out men been the devices out south that's the younger brother of the saudi king. the south korean government has limited the sales of mosques to 2 person a week it's an attempt to replenish stocks that have been running low to use a clinic by the total number of corona virus infections there now stands at more

than $7000.00. and the current virus outbreak has hit china's exports and imports hard causing severe disruption to manufacturing while why customs data shows exports trunk by more than 17 percent in january and february compared to the same period last year. now turkey's defense minister says the ceasefire is holding around to provence in northern syria the agreement brokered by turkey and russia has ended as strikes for the 1st time in months there have been reports of some fighting in southern parts of the province between syrian government forces and a section of the opposition. well the 1st syrian woman to run an underground hospital in rebel controlled areas is urging the international community to stop the humanitarian catastrophe unfolding in dr ramani by law worked in the once besieged enclave of eastern quarter for 3 years and she until she and her staff were forced to evacuate how work is the subject of an oscar nominated documentary

sat down with her in paris. towering documentary the cave pediatrician dr. oz she runs an underground hospital in east ghouta but the enclave fell to the syrian regime in 28. did you kate. exhausted and at times terrified staff battle to save lives as russian backed syrian forces relentlessly area i was after it all for us well after you know being in and and we were in a hospital it's our gift of bombing we saved some lives we helped and that's make us inquirers us to continue but a lot of the children we couldn't help them a lot of them died because of being a lot of them died in the chemical attack at the time in 28 to the head of the united nations called eastern ghouta under the bombing hell on earth i think it was

like that it was very dangerous places securing this everywhere and it's officially in 20th team before we forced to leave in the last month they started to bomb every 2nd they did install their own doctor money also faced another challenge she battled prejudice for men believed a woman should be in charge of running a hospital. how did that feel there you are saving lives and then you have men say a woman's place is in the home it's really frustrating it's make me very angry but i insist to stay and to insist to sex it also because i was a brawl there that woman can do. like the men already better than them in. the cave was nominated for an oscar through the spotlight on dr armani she's using it to campaign for an end to the humanitarian crisis in the northwestern syrian

province of it lip intensified bombing at the area by syrian and russian forces in recent weeks has killed hundreds of people and left millions in desperate need not optimistic and i think a lot of syrian are not optimistic we need international community to do pressure on them to stop killing people and you know all the situation now and it's catastrophe situation people. every minute every day off to paris talk to amani who visit other european capitals to governments and people not to ignore the millions of syrian civilians particularly children trapped in what seems like an endless war . all just 0 powers. now the lebanese government is meeting to decide whether or not to default on $1200000000.00 worth of debts by monday lebanon has one of the largest debt burdens in the wild more than 150 percent of g.d.p. more protests are expected in the capital beirut following months of unrest over

the government's handling of the economic crisis now there are reports of attacks by eiffel fighters in northern iraq as the group takes advantage of an uncertain security situation there in january iraq's parliament called for foreign troops to be expelled after iranian general custom sort of money was killed in a u.s. airstrike some other fault in metz with villages in northern iraq who have been left alone to defend themselves. overlooking the tigris river iraq's mccoll mountain seemed peaceful at least on 1st glance but the crevices and caves up above have become a refuge for eisler fighters and the villages below the target for their complaint of terror last month members of isis set up a fake checkpoint and opened fire to people. when they were returning home from work i saw and they attacked them one of them was badly hurt and the other suffered light injuries. while the. villagers stay up at night to

keep watch they say it's the only way to protect themselves there's no army no police only on the main road this land is open all the way to syria so anyone who wants to come can come. until late last year at the u.s. led coalition and their iraqi partners conducted regular air raids in this area forcing eisel into hiding but since tensions between the u.s. and iran escalated on iraqi soil earlier this year those operations have largely stopped and i saw has taken advantage it's areas like these honeycombed with river beds and surrounded by mountains that offer ideal terrain for eisel to operate in they lay low during the day but at night they emerge from their hideouts to terrorize the population villagers here say they have noticed an uptick in i still think since coalition activities came to hold in january as a result of growing u.s.

iran tensions. useless family survived in iceland tak last month they are now staying in their relatives home in the nearby town for the moment going back is not safe they were targeted because her husband the or village chief an arabic cooperates with security forces has suffered a broken jaw and serious injuries to his stomach had not in months the incident was very terrifying there's no security in our area it's finished from dinner time until the morning we're watching we never sleep i swear the families aren't sleeping. you start daughter the ha was shot in the leg during the attack. the army is trying to do their duty but they don't manage to contain the security situation we want more support for them because the army can't control the villages at all support that until recently came from the u.s. led coalition. by adding when we heard the sound of the american airplanes we know

it's safe. it's unclear when or if call this an activity will fully resume this climate of uncertainty office fertile ground for eisel with iraq civilians once again paying the price see want to fall to an al-jazeera in the than iraq. now thailand could be facing another round of political unrest with a banned opposition group calling for more protests but it's widespread rallies from students that may be even more concerning for the government which critics say is not democratically elected when hail reports. one university campuses around thailand there is a political awakening underway students representing a new generation of thai protest is a coming out to call for the removal of a government still largely run by military generals who staged a coup in 2014 when it took them on and it up that woman this is just the beginning at that moment students have come out to express that awesome concern we just

started to show our strength in numbers and. they have many concerns but the catalyst for the protests was a court decision 2 weeks ago to ban a popular opposition party a decision widely seen as politically motivated 8. while large scale student protests are rare in thailand so not towards university has a history of political activism and was the scene of one of the country's darkest days in 1996 dozens of students were gunned down and murdered on the campus of tom assad university they'd been protesting against the return to thailand of a former military ruler who'd been overthrown 3 years earlier it was here that the security forces began their assault on thomas a university more than 43 years ago firing through the fence at students the message is still a sensitive subject in thailand today which is why the government may be particularly concerned about students from this university playing a leading role in the current protests protests which are again to an extent about

an army general the current prime minister who led the 2014 coup got the award earlier this week. said he wouldn't answer the media's questions about politics or protests and instead chose to warn protest is about coronavirus. any protest to public assembly if you can please perspire in it if you insist on holding your protest please make sure you take all the necessary precautions that's just a scare tactic say critics like this film a student who's been supporting the protests through art designing stick is to handouts he says other problems like thailand stuttering economy will see the protests grow way beyond the universities now sport is getting bigger from this didn't we have to have. people to come to to support them. at the protests some have also risked long jail terms by expressing even

subtle disapproval of thailand's powerful royal family the introduction of those sensitive messages adds another potentially provocative and dangerous element to a protest movement that's just getting underway wayne hay al jazeera bangkok u.s. president on trump has announced the appointment of a new white house chief of staff republican representative mark meadows will take over from mick mulvaney who has been acting in the position for the past year now anyone now the washington special envoy to northern ireland. things. now southern africa is suffering its worst drought in decades and zimbabwe is one of the countries most affected many families there are already struggling with almost daily water shortages and that's adding to the hardships they're facing as the country deals with rampant inflation reports from but aware. in zimbabwe 2nd city the supply of piped water from the city council is unreliable that means

they sometimes have to use i'm treated water these women uses for washing and flushing toilets if they have to drink it they will boil it 1st in some suburbs supplies are often cut off for days at a time when the supply is turned on with lindsay make several trips to the communal tap to stock up she says a neighborhood can sometimes go a whole week without water and she doesn't want to use any that's not clean and safe getting water in the halls doesn't make us feel cold because that water is not here at the lake this person to reach so many people is suffering from stomach so i believe it was something i don't know because some of the people they drink that water some they use it for. so it is a big challenge that we're living in cold to purge. like other parts of southern africa zimbabwe is experiencing its worst drought in years city authorities say rationing is necessary it is implemented. to try

and have. digital that we have straight to receive enough rain as we all know and it liar is. saying myriad region where we receive very little ordinary info like this year it's really critical we haven't received the referee falls grateful for it rains. some dams have stopped operating since the water fell below pumping levels the remaining still functional a critically low the rainy season started late this year and even then has been erratic a new dam is being built about 100 kilometers from way or 30 say it will draw water directly from this and busy river but is still a long way from being completed part of the problem is a source of foreign currency and have always worsening economic crisis zimbabwe's already grappling with shortages of fuel medicines electricity and some basic commodities many here say corruption and mismanagement in government and opposition

one minister pellet he's is also to blame the few who can afford it buy a water privately or drill boreholes but for millions of others that is not an option. al-jazeera. hello again this is al jazeera and these are the headlines 2 of the most high profile members of the saudi royal family have been detained they are former crown prince mohammed bin nayef and prince ahmed been otherwise it's all saudis the younger brother of the saudi king now according to the wall street journal they have been arrested for processing against and crown prince mohammed bin reports suggest they have been accused of treason and could face life imprisonment or the death penalty but if could have rivaled crown prince mohammed bin for the throne when king solomon dies saudi guards of also arrested one of mohammed bin nayef brothers jamal else while explains why the reported arrests are so significant.

it's huge because of the positioning of these 2 figures within the royal family their seniority both in terms of lineage but also in terms of positions hold some form of benign have been the former crown prince being head of the intelligence before he was somebody that had great respect and commanded a lot of respect both domestically within the royal family within the religious institutions but also internationally with the united states and other countries and obviously not lizzie's being the only other son of the late king faisal him being a significant figure with respect now south korea is in prison restrictions on the sale of mosques and has carried out raids on companies who've been stockpiling them as it tries to combat the coronavirus there have been long queues outside stores and mosques stocks are running south korea has now more than 7000 confirmed cases that's the highest number outside china it's now also banned the entry of travelers

from neighboring japan while the corona virus outbreak has had china's exports and imports hard causing severe disruption to manufacturing world wide customs data shows exports strong by about 17 percent in january and february analysts predict the situation will only get worse in the coming months turkey's defense minister says the ceasefire is holding around if the province in northern syria the agreement brokered by turkey and russia has ended as strikes for the 1st time in months but there have been reports of some fighting in southern parts of the province between syrian government forces and the opposition well those are the headlines the news continues here on al-jazeera after counting the cost stay with us. it's a tough time for the afghan security forces taliban attacks have increased their suffering heavy casualties and the prospect of a withdrawal of u.s. forces hangs over them yet young men are still joining up some for patchy otic

reasons for others is the only way to get a job despite the risks middle was an army bomb disposal engineer in helmand province he knew the risks he was blinded in both eyes and lost a leg when a roadside device exploded as you try to defuse it always aware of the danger of seeing friends wounded while working on mines i wasn't scared to lose an arm or a leg is to sacrifice we have to make to serve this country. i'm adrian for them this is counting the cost on al jazeera a weekly look at the world of business and economics this week recession why an emergency fed rate cuts just isn't good enough to save the global economy from the impact of a fast spreading coronavirus.