there are barriers begun steps towards declaring a state of emergency as infections surge in major cities more than 100 people have died there have been more than 4500 confirmed cases. the government of the democratic republic of congo is shut down the capital's main commercial hub for 14 days in shas is the epicenter of the nationwide outbreak 161 people have tested positive. a criminal investigation has been launched in australia into how hundreds of passengers were allowed to leave a cruise ship despite some showing flu like symptoms 11 deaths and 600 coronavirus infections have been connected to the ruby princess it docked in sydney last month more than $1000.00 crew members remain on board up to $200.00 might be sick it's up front now stay with us. as the wealth battles the kuranda virus pandemic will bring you the latest developments from around the announcer. with updates

about travel restrictions and how to protect yourself. around the virus content and special coverage on al-jazeera. am. i am. am. i'm at the house and welcome to a very special edition of upfront special because for the 1st time in this age of the coronavirus i'm recording it from my home on today's show we'll discuss how brazil is handling or mishandling the crisis under its controversial president an hour i'll speak to one of his most high profile critics in the brazilian congress but 1st it's official because it to be believed at least 6 people die every hour in iran from code that 19 the disease caused by the corona virus which is ravage the

islamic republic and made it one of the world's epicenter for the worst time to make about a lifetime with more than 3000 iranians dead so far how much is the iranian government's response to the crisis to blame for the death toll and how much is the fault of u.s. economic sanctions joining me now to discuss this from tehran is this week's headliner sayid mohamad marandi one of the country's most prominent political analysts and a professor at the university of tehran mohammad marandi thank you for joining me on up front thank you for having me you live in terror and you've watched this crisis unfold over the last few months how bad is the situation there right now on the ground. the situation now is actually a lot better it's stabilized and the numbers are it they do seem to be gradually decreasing initially it was very difficult because the iranians had big problems

of painting kits because of the us sanctions we had a shortage of kids but gradually the situation has become better iran has a very powerful world class primary health care network that it established in the 1980 s. in the 1990 s. and it is carrying out through that mechanism active screening both through the phone and online so they've been able to contain the virus despite the many difficulties that were in the path of the healthcare network this forbid in for people to travel outside their provinces so i can't travel outside of tehran universities are close all my classes are online of course not during the 2 weeks of vacation but from saturday again my classes will be back online parks are closed cinemas are close and shops over the past few weeks are closed a lot of people are rightly pointed out that u.s.

sanctions have exacerbated the crisis in iran that prevented companies from delivering medical supplies essential medications equipment to deal with the crisis your foreign minister to observation has accused the u.s. of practicing quote medical terrorism against iran is that a fair description though given the u.s. would say humanitarian aid has always been exempt from their sanctions on iran. well you know the united states is lying and i think everyone knows that in those who say otherwise they are guilty like those who are pet carrying out the policies this is a crime against humanity and it's it's they've weaponized the coronavirus for the iranian people by prohibiting iran from be using the banking sector by prohibiting iran from purchasing goods from. important pharmaceutical companies the united states has put so many conditions on different pharmaceutical companies across the world that they will not work with iran they don't officially banned cooperation

but they put so many restrictions and so many threats that these companies have all told iran we can't work with you today what about the news stories humanitarian trade agreement the sh t. which allows switzerland and the swish banking system to act as a broker for international companies that want to deliver medical supplies or agricultural commodities or basic goods to iran it has u.s. indorsement approval but the iranians aren't using it warning the americans are good at propaganda and the western media whether it's corporate media or state media they'll mimic what the u.s. government says when it comes to foreign policy just a few days ago in an editorial the york times had the audacity to claim that the sanctions had no impact on the situation in iran that's the degree of dishonesty whether the. a given a rules or whether the leader of our playgrounds it has a leader and we must have developed

a western governments of encourage the iranians do the swiss sugar i mean that would you the neutral country why not use this essentially humanitarian travel the iranians have are have been using all available channels and the americans are trying to prevent iran from exporting any goods so it may it it impoverishes the country but if you have that we are applying for as your money has gone out of your government but not the cause. we graded with this with humanitarian trade agreement which is there on the table i don't know about that mechanism and you'd have to ask the iranian government i'm sure the iranians have a very legitimate response to that but i think it's quite clear that the europeans have failed in of and their obligations within the framework of the nuclear deal the iranians have been waiting for this iran is not iran is not a poor country iran's assets have been stolen so it's interesting that you say your why the way those governments that are operate with the title of the old are on the subject momentarily on the subject to grumble coming out of that point and

a lot of european countries would abide with the iranian predicament a lot of people in the west who are condemning u.s. economic sanctions on iran they also do point out though that when iran does have spec osh when it does have millions of dollars to spend it spends a lot of those dollars on proxy wars in syria in the yemen in lebanon in palestine want to use that money at home they say on their own people come on let's be serious here the united states invaded afghanistan from across the world they invaded iraq. they they and their allies spent tens of billions of dollars destroying syria's supporting extremists you know know that as well as i you know about the u.s. defense intelligence agencies i'm going to run them in and look at any water being honest and reliable flynn i would only had a very argue the syrian war i'm asking why not spend that money on home when you're saying that you're being crippled by u.s. sanctions when you do have money you spend it on military support for the assad

regime although the rebels whatever it is you know that's nonsense iran spends money at home and that's why western countries have failed in the fight against the coronavirus and we see the catastrophe taking place in the united states in europe and despite the sanctions he done much better and we wouldn't have their own hands and interference the world but we also and when you're out have been in syria we know you are not so and spends hundreds of dollars and let me respond on. a yes let me respond if you ron hadn't answered syria in 2013 the black flags would have been over damascus as we speak right now in iraq if you run it wasn't there to defend baghdad the city would have collapsed in the face of the sunrise that is out there going i did say i don't need to our country is weak you know quite well i love them to rise and then we would have it if i and on monday we've discussed these conflicts on the show many times before i'm not here to re argue iraq or syria that i'm simply pointing out that as you say iran is not

a poor country it does have funds and it spends a lot of the money abroad all i'm saying is why not spend more about money oh now you're in the middle of a crisis. no iran does spend money at home but if the run hadn't prevented the fall of these countries if iran hadn't helped these government and these countries and the people of syria in iraq to defend themselves against these extremists we'd be fighting these extremists in iran and we'd have to pay a much greater price today just to create stability in this country so actually if you look if you want iran to spend more money on its own people then stop intervening in countries like iraq and stop intervening and destroying libya in iraq syria afghanistan yemen ok so let me ask you this about people in tehran clearly u.s. sanctions have made things worse but what about the iranian government actual response which many would say also many the coronavirus crisis much worse much more deadly for your country for example the deputy health minister at the outset

publicly opposed quarantines he said there were ancient medieval things and he started out while he was coughing and sweating at a press conference i think the very next day it was just the political code 19 the iranian government refused to shut down flights between china and iran for weeks because they didn't want to wreck relations with the chinese government iranian officials repeatedly play down the numbers of cases in iran in places like you can't just blame us sanctions for the situations in iran right now surely that needs to be some recognition of syria's government trailers in tehran to come on me iran got its 1st kid i think on february the 17th and on february the 19th they discovered their 1st case and they declared it on the very same day and the fight began since then if you're talking about complacency i don't know do you mean the take it on the chin complacency of boris johnson or is going to magically disappear

complacency of donald trump but from day one iran must either a virus and western governments are here to defend old raynier is just a label in the west or gloating about mohammad marandi the deputy health minister. fused to quarantine the city of all which was the worst hit city in iran over a month ago saying quarantines are a thing of the past but i said we faced a much graver crisis people need to turn now for the election and you had the president of a university in mushin saying why did we stop the chinese students coming at why not admit that the iranian government botched part of its response to this crisis no the iranian government didn't buy the response i'm not an advocate of that ministration but the iranian government as soon as it discovered what the problem was they began to deal with it but they didn't know the scope of the problem this will hit iran far earlier than it hit europe and until very recently the europeans and the americans were still debating what to do about it the iranians with one hand tied behind their back their assets stolen but you didn't listen but you didn't shut down flames prevented it from carrying money back and trying to that

was. they did shut down they did shut down flights from china actually flights were still going to europe after the iranian stopped the fight and with regards to quarantining home the world health organization sent a team to teheran and the head of that team actually did an interview on international media and they said that what iran did was the right thing at the world health organization was opposed to a quarantine they said it's not doable and what happened what was done in china they said cannot be repeated in iran and should not be repeated so they actually told me it was not in his in their view iranians you how you think i said at a time that doesn't make you a friend it was a member of the you told me at the beginning of this interview that you now have shut down city you now can't go outside you are doing classes from why not do that months ago 6 weeks ago. maybe the situation evolved the world health organization guidelines evolve and change at that time the world health

organization team which came to iran and went bomb and stayed in bomb with the iranians that was the decision that was made by the iranians to with the support of the world health organization so if you want to criticize anyone go criticize the world health organization one last question one last question for me do you want to run isn't the problem that for a long time iran has blamed the us for a lot of things and on issues like the sanctions they have a good argument yet a lot of the iranian people are getting fed up with the answer as a as a as a as a justification for all of iraq's problems earlier this year iran for example blame the us when the revolutionary guard shot down but ukrainian civilian airliner and tried to cover it up and now it's the coronavirus and again you have supremely should just be us government might be behind the pandemic seeming to endorse irresponsible conspiracy theories in a live address to the nation just a few days ago nonsense nonsense there was no cover up about the plane and i think

that's really disturbing that when the us president threatens our country and threatens to obliterate it he said that specifically and threatened to strike cultural sites the iranian air defense was waiting for an american strike it was tragic but the blame lies on the americans for threatening our country with regards to conspiracy theories sen cotton was the 1st person to talk about this the iranian leader never said that the americans carried out it out the chinese made a counter claim and the iranians said well if the americans can make the claims then so can the chinese let's hear them out do you believe that the killer vives you tell me where attacks against iraq as i. know i've never said such a thing he never said never said he said that i did y. e a simply i doubt it might be. why did set a senator apart and say that the chinese did it why did the chinese government say the americans are to join involves a lot let's hear the evidence supremes that is there a problem if there were. when when you go and speak of

conspiracy theories that iran was hiding this and iran was hiding that then then the chinese and the chinese make these claims your claims are no more legitimate than chinese claim simply because you do you live in the united states the. movie with laney's played on that americans respond. in a live address to the nation it's a bit irresponsible to do that though i don't know what was the region of this virus but i know that the the regime in washington has been using it as a weapon against the iranian don't blame the victim that's ugly. we'll have to leave it there i hope you stay safe from indoors thank you majority be out up front thank you thank you for having me. just over a year ago temperature armorel was a relatively unknown 25 year old congress well but brazil but she became

a household name in her country after a video of her critiquing a then conservative education is that went viral she chewed on a list of $100.00 rising stars by time magazine that was forced to be reckoned with in brazilian politics and not includes critiquing president. handling of the coronavirus brazil has now more cases of covert 19 than any other country in latin america and the president doesn't seem to really care if. joins me now from sao paulo to discuss the situation in the country have a general thank you for joining me on upfront hello let it thank you very much for inviting me you have around 7000 cases more than 200 deaths in your country those numbers of spike this week your country's health minister says brazil's health care system could be overwhelmed by the end of this coming month do you agree just how bad are things going to get in brazil do you think well myside all the numbers that are already brought a lot of specialists in my country believe them numbers might be actually much

bigger than that because brazil has a me able to test all of the people who need it and besides all of this situation and how her fall off the craze of prices we're having right now our president keeps going to television and going on to social media to we spread fake news to a spread lies and to say this isn't just a little crisis and my doing those things and by telling people to go to the streets and actually going self to leave the crowds what he did last week and he's putting like lives in danger and what i keep asking myself is will he be held accountable he making so responsible for all of that that is that might come from him he's a responsibility i don't think so. he's saying some crazy stuff he referred to the coronavirus as a little flu as hysteria as a fantasy he's a q the media and other politicians in brazil like yourself are trying to trick

brazilians he said he wouldn't worry if he got the virus because of its history as an athlete he's railed against governments who tried to take action go and get people to stay at home how much of a danger they not just to brazil but to the wider region. wow 1st i'm very ashamed by all of the things he's doing he is specially moments of crisis we need a leader who are like people everything will be alright and he says he's doing those things because his very words about the economy but all of those studies have shown that our health system doesn't have the cup ability to take all the people who need it if we don't flatten the curve so what he's doing doesn't make any sense he is actually forcing people to. have access to food are taking the disease what he should be doing is special in that country as an equal as my country was to provide some type of cash to us for so people could actually stay at home during this time of need and they're being very serious concerns of the president who show

they have the fire risk when he went to the u.s. and met with donald trump and came back more than 20 but the delegation then tested positive for covert known troops there were initial reports that the president himself that just one of them came from a lone star it was all later denied jubilees covering up his own condition. he is not someone i know for telling the truth and he hasn't he he hasn't showed his test so i think that's possible but the bigger point is that he's the extremely responsible we have 13 people started 13000000 people are leaving favelas in brazil those people don't have access to infrastructure sometimes they don't have access to water if they don't receive any help from the government they them starve they won't have any financial to buy their foods and then they call congress has already approved this project they're going to use that for 3 most people have 600 houses for miles so they can actually stay at home and be safe but the president and his

government has been putting all types of difficulties always say we don't have the money it will protect their economy but all while you are protecting the economy if you are not taking care of. the people in the 1st place yes. you've called bolton ayers rhetoric not just irresponsible quote homicidal on the subject of the coronavirus you also said the president the fault of people to choose between sickness and a plate of food doesn't deserve the office isn't the problem for you though that he was a clear majority less than 18 months ago in a free and fair presidential election in brazil really 60000000 of your fellow brazilians wanted him as their president that's the reality yes. i know that our democracy is the if english should learn who and protect the most but that's our democracy has to follow is because of that congress and the legislative is there to make sure that the president is be how the countable and democracy puts

a lot of limitations when the president on national television when he uses his social media to spread lies to each other facebook instagram have taken the how things that our president wrote because they believe it was meant as harm to the community so that's that that will force that we are talking about i don't think so when we say that the president is lying or when we try to protect the people we are doing something of them a critic no i think is the contrary we are reminding him that he lives in the mall prosy and that are. also a lot off limits on him to make sure that he's not using this power as being the president of our country to harm people and when he tells people go to the streets come and meet me oh this is just a little fool he's actually putting people in venger and our constitution would you support if he's putting people in danger would you support calls to impeach him

because i believe polls now show that almost half the brazilian public actually support impeaching and removing an ira from office it's not something you support is up them you think is realistic even in the middle of this crisis i don't think we'll have disco versation and i don't. he should be held accountable for every 3 years doing it but after the crisis i don't think my country can handle another crisis on top of coronavirus right now because congress is a working just wish computers from far away and people are already very scared our economies are out of our own stable so as for hard as it is to work with a president such as the one that we have i do think we should try our best to protect people to do what's necessary to conduct a car and a virus but after all of this is over i do think it might be the time for the country to have disciple of conversation because what he's doing i've never seen our history so for a lot of our viewers what you're around the globe will familiar with president

donald trump in the u.s. from his tone of serial fabrications and his cover ups and his unreliability and reckless need to ship a ridiculous comments about the crewmembers but i'm not so familiar with president bush tomorrow what he should have done how would you compare bolton our own truck what are the similarities and differences. so also not as self he's a big admirer of joe and especially in the beginning of the coronavirus when he just he resumed he would he would he would say that john said that so why can't i do the same but president trump is more pragmatic when he saw all of the people who are there in the u.s. when he saw a lot all know what that meant to his popularity to the economy he changes his attitude and also not is not changing the attitude they hope i have is that no matter how many fakes fake news he might spread to his social media it doesn't matter how many lies you tell us sex only polls themselves when people start nosing

love to us because of the responsibility of our president i don't think you're supporting many more your bullshit at the top of the brazilian political system called how that can be altered not taken seriously but just how many people in brazil taking matters into their own i believe the head of the supreme court am bullshitters own house but is that i've repeatedly contradicted him on the threat posed by code with governors have told residents to stay home across brazil really one governor said quote do not follow the guidance of the president and even in some struggling even in some shanty towns you have criminal and gang leaders imposing curfews to try and prevent the spread of the coronavirus are you heartened by your resilience taking russia into their own hands is it enough to counter the damage being done from the top by bolton are a while what you said destroy we have most of his ministers we have the supreme court we have already governors mayors who are taking a match to the docks completely different from president bush on how to and we are

doing a good job like as a society my state bottle has 70 percent of the deficit like on of ours and the government you mention 80 s of the government are in my state and what he's doing is actually saving lives because he has been able to flatten the curves and ideological. i do agree to most of this people but they are doing what's necessary my point here is that this is such a huge prize is the whole situation so hard to everyone that when we have chill i do it just is spend so much energy we for president that does people look to they straight go and protest because you want to walk out and this is just added a few and he talks to the media as a people who might hear him it can be so frustrating that all of these people that we just mission are working so hard i'm working so hard and you see the president on t.v. saying that it does makes our 4th have a smaller impact but it doesn't matter that we want or because of that is that lost

on lotteries that the biggest leader in our country it we like it or not and be police into what he's saying so that's why what he says matter so much and matters much more than what i specially is or a governor might say unfortunately unfortunately tabata amaro thank you for joining me on out frog stay safe good luck thank you very much that's our show the last episode of upfront for this season. would be back later this year hopefully from a studio good luck they say translate into thank you thank. you. in one lifetime we cannot see everything with our own i think but i had testimony we know very little witness documentaries that help in your eyes on al-jazeera.

a story of popular resistance political intrigue. and betray. a son's quest for justice or sometimes i feel like the following i mean i would open for under the illusion. al-jazeera world goes in search of the truth about the 2 new zealand independence fighter the last harshly. on al-jazeera. 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 arctic reasons for others is the only way to get a job despite the risks midway's karimi 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 like to serve this country. 10 days after testing positive for covert 19 the position prime minister is being treated in hospital. i want to reassure you that if we remain united and resolute then we will overcome it queen elizabeth makes a rare televised address to the public as the u.k. fights the pandemic. i'm sam is a band this is out to syria live from.