joe is that secure his place is the democratic nominee can he be still trying to join us for continuing coverage of the u.s. election 2020 on al-jazeera. al-jazeera. hello i'm barbara sara this is the al-jazeera news hour live from london thank you for joining us coming up in the next 60 minutes the coronavirus pandemic and its threat to aid and food supplies a stark warning that the number of people in acute hunger could double by the end of 2020. the u.s. president says he will temporarily suspend immigration to protect american lives

and jobs from the virus outbreak donald trump also pledges to bail out the u.s. oil industry after prices they put into negative territory for the 1st time in history and serious questions are being asked about the true number of coronavirus related deaths in england and wales. the current a virus pandemic could lead to famines in dozens of countries pushing tens of millions more people around the world to the brink of starvation a un report has highlighted the vast number of people around the world who are now acutely food in secure the world food program has requested $350000000.00 to set up a network to keep humanitarian supply chains moving around the world. no samples yet but i must warn you that if we don't prepare and act now to secure access avoid

fundies shortfalls disruptions to treat we could be facing multiple famines of biblical proportions within a short few months the actions that we take will determine our success or failure and build a sustainable food systems as the basis of stable and peaceful societies the truth is we do not have time on our side so let's act wisely and elicits a i do believe that our expertise and our partnership we could begin we can bring the gether the teams of the programs this assert to make certain that covert night team pandemic does not become a human food crisis catastrophe the world food program says if it is unable to reach those in need to do you to coronavirus restrictions at least $300000.00 people could starve to death every day for a 3 month period and that's not taking into account of those affected by the

outbreak which will push the number of people on the brink of starvation to more than a quarter of a 1000000000 unless they get help soon they're warning that in a worst case scenario there could be famines in more than 30 countries and in 10 of those more than 1000000 people are already close to starvation the world bank has also cautioned countries against hoarding food they say global grain production and stocks are near all time highs making restrictions unnecessary. why than 5000000 people in south sudan rely on food aid to survive and the coronavirus pandemic is making their lives even harder the outbreak is slowing down humanitarian operations that the liver essential food supplies hit a morgue and reports from juba. even prior to the 1st coronavirus case in south sudan many face starvation that's the result of 5 years of fighting between forces loyal to rival political leaders the conflict ended in february with the new

transitional government's warn him somewhere in the room if my children survive i want them to go to school and learn to take care of themselves before the coronavirus emergency aid organizations estimated more than half of the 12000000 population would need food aid this year. the were forced a 3rd of the population from their homes 200000 of them are now in u.n. camps around the country hundreds of thousands of others are in hard to reach areas for them food drops are sometimes the only way they'll get food last year we had to feed 5000000 people due to fighting and flooding already in 2020 we've had locust invasions and now there is the covert 19 plan demick which we predict could almost double the people in the queue hunger by the end of 2020 across the world the only way we can hold this trend is if generous funding for humanitarian crises like the one here in south sudan continues floods last year affected nearly

a 1000000 people forcing the declaration of a state of emergency in some parts of the country then a plague of locusts in the eastern part worsened an already dire situation the u.n. describes the insect threat as extremely alarming and president farmers who have relied on their crops fear another invasion as eggs hatch from the 1st wave to the human being i've tried to chase them away but they wouldn't leave they're everywhere in my backyard in my banco plantation the mangos the papayas the glover's that i plant is what provides me with food and income well i do if they're being eaten by locusts preventive measures by the government and aid organizations have been imposed to contain the spread of coronavirus they include restrictions on movement making many in need even harder to reach people who are going on just there. well for more on the how dire the situation could be in many parts of the world let's fake the sarra base of who is the representative of the unicef in yemen

she joins us now on skype from atlanta in the united states wedeman thank you so much for joining us here on al-jazeera i would obviously like to focus on in yemen with you we're just watching the example of south so that yemen obviously a country effectively torn apart by civil war where the health system already is pretty much the story just tell us briefly how vulnerable the country now finds itself for a potential spread of coronavirus. thank you bob and thank you for drawing the attention that's really needed for yemen at this time you find that prior to the conflict we had children already out of school and as you see it now with the coronavirus pandemic we have almost 5000000 children who are now unable to go to school where you have a situation in western countries where children can continue to learn online children and women don't have this opportunity health systems that were already fragile in at the brink of collapse we've been working with other agencies to ensure that we preserve those system so systems are not under threat and with the

blockade where you have you have limitations to access to food importations we do not have free movement of humanitarian supplies and staffing you can only imagine that the situation in yemen is further exacerbated with the cold it endemic testing is a huge issue that i mean it's a big issue everywhere but aden yemen do you get the sense that we actually know how widespread coronavirus and covert 19 are there. well what i can tell you is that the authorities in the north and in the style's have developed master plans and as you know there's been one confirmed case of corona virus in hydra martin in the south but with that with all size authorities are developing their plans they've requested the united nations for support and for unicef specifically we're supporting already with risk inform communications we're supporting with the health infrastructure that we have supported prior to cohabit in showing that there

strengthened and working with with you and others who are in the lead on that making sure that we look at how we can continue to maintain our humanitarian response which existed prior to call that which is required doing covert for example water infrastructure for example communications at the community level but especially intervention such as social safety nets we have emergency cast transfer that reaches almost 9000000 yemenis in at this time between march 10th and april 9th it critical moment in this cool pandemic we've been able to reach those same people who were already vulnerable prior to the conflict and remain further exposed in most vulnerable now during during call that. the u.n. obviously faces many logistical difficulties in getting help to yemen many of those are of a military and political nature iraq and i ask you details about those but i am going to ask you about funding because already even before the covert crisis there

was a funding crisis that when it came to the u.n. in yemen of course now countries everywhere we're seeing could be facing a recession how difficult is the financial situation from your point of view and what do you think you can do as unicef representing the representative in yemen to try to haifa to to raise attention to what potentially could happen to that country . well i think a couple of things the international community as you rightly said had raise harry's concerns around the need for funding increased funding in yemen at the same time there had been issues raised around the need for ensuring a risk inform operation and all of those were underway when called it hit us i can tell you that donors the u.n. international n.g.o.s all concerned making of the international community and media like yourselves all are galvanizing all efforts to ensure that we get resources into yemen and this is an effort that's ongoing right now in addition to resources

we can have all of the funds required right now but there are many things that will facilitate in showing that people are reached and people are people's lives are saved from from coronavirus we need to have unfettered access to airports and seaports right now for humanitarian supply for the supplies supply chain and logistics to be ensured right now we only have the oman route through salah we need to have airports and seaports open for humanitarian access for staffing and for supplies we also at this point in time need for the international community to make a loud cry to all of the parties to the conflict we're looking at interventions for coronavirus and you're looking at children we recently had a call from the unicef executive director asking for the unconditional release of children in detention when you see the response to people in detention right now around the world they're furloughs their early release is different mitigation measures we need all children who are already vulnerable who are suffering physical mental and emotional distress to be released from prison at this particular time

a lot of issues and difficulties facing the country as sort of a southern anti unicef representative in yemen we will fall of the situation closely and hope to speak to you again as the develops for the moment thank you thank you very much for having me. u.s. president donald trump says he will suspend all immigration to the u.s. to protect american lives and jobs from the coronavirus the announcement on twitter is the latest in a string of moves cracking down on immigration as the virus spreads in the united states last month all travel to the u.s. from china parts of europe and the u.k. has been blocked as cross live now to our white house correspondent kimberly how kids are kimberly do we have a clear idea about how this fan is meant to work. well the u.s. president or at least his administration their press secretary has been in the sort of trying to explain this to reporters and defending it essentially saying this

will sort of respond to the ebb and flow of the pandemic this is they insist a temporary issue we already knew that a lot of the ng aspects of the immigration system in the united states had essentially shut down for example visa processes had been halted there was citizenship ceremonies had been postponed what we expect is that in the midst of all of this there will be some carve outs for some essential workers deemed essential by the trump administration for example migrant workers will be allowed to continue to work in the area of farm work they're valuable to make up 110th of the farm working workforce and then also as well as those immigrants who work in the health care field will continue to be allowed in under the immigration system to deal with chronic virus now what the executive order we know won't address is the removal of immigrants that are already in the united states but i can tell you the details that we know this far are not sitting well with democratic critics and

capitol hill they're calling this an authoritarian type move taking advantage of a crisis to advance an anti immigrant agenda but the white house is defending this saying look at we have tens of millions of americans that are unemployed right now the numbers continue to climb in terms of those filing for unemployment benefits and right now the president's responsibility is to take care of those americans already here in the united states not the ones that wish to come to this country so they are defending it and we should point out that some polls in the united states seem to show across the board about 2 thirds of americans support this type of action as this country deals with this pandemic ok let's focus then in more detail about how the country is dealing with the pandemic new york governor andrew cuomo is actually in washington to meet the president that relationship. been strained through much of the crisis so what did they discuss. well there's not been a lot of detail about this meeting so far we're watching very carefully in fact to

see if the governor andrew cuomo makes it to the crown a virus task force briefing today that set to begin in the next half hour if it's on time what we do know from some of the leaks that have come out of this meeting was about 30 minutes and in it there were essentially discussing the big issue that so many governors are having a problem with with this is ministration and that is testing they say they can't get the access to the tests they need in the quantity they need and that is the message we understand was conveyed by the new york governor we also know they did discuss some of the budget problems that new york is facing given the fact that it is the epicenter still in the united states when it comes to combating coronavirus but very quickly on that issue of testing barbara i can tell you that just passed on capitol hill in the u.s. senate in the last few moments is a very large legislative package to top up helping small businesses that paycheck protection program we've heard a lot about but tucked in it 25000000000 for

a national testing fund this is the 1st step towards getting what democrats been working very hard for and that is some sort of national testing program that the president was very resistant to so democrats who this is a victory no doubt again we're going to hear a lot of questions about that at the upcoming briefing that is set to take place in the next hour absolutely we will be taking the briefing live here and i'll just there and kimberly you and i will be discussing what is said there in a little while for the moment kimberly halkett thank you. for saying with president trump he's pledged to bail out the u.s. oil industry after the u.s. futures market plunged into negative territory for the 1st time ever on monday. here over the price of oil so u.s. stocks open and close in the red for a 2nd straight day that would jones index closed more than 2.5 percent down on tuesday let's speak to al jazeera as gabriel is on the in new york what did we see

happen on the oil markets on tuesday then gabriel. well the oil plunge really continues u.s. oil is now about $13.00 a barrel that's what it closed at that's the w.t.r. the west texas intermediate as it's called that's different from brant crude which brant crude of course is the international benchmark that's about $1000.00 a barrel so we're watching both of these closely but it's really the markets here in the u.s. who are really watching that the u.s. or oil so closely and that's what essentially went from 0 or less than 0 on monday depending on how you want to look at it barely $13.00 a barrel so things aren't really getting much better. in terms of both of those oils the. the american oil of course is coming from texas louisiana mostly and north dakota and that's the oil that can really help it was mentioning there with donald trump with that tweet that came just about half an hour after the new york

city stock exchange opened with the opening bell this morning that tweet that came out said he was going to you know help or oil producers in the u.s. because they are absolutely getting destroyed by these low oil prices especially down there in texas in these other places so really no end in sight to that sought to manifest itself in the markets and just you know why don't we get out so these terrible oil prices a story close one wider impact are they having on the u.s. financial markets we saw yesterday what about today. everything is in the red the dow dropped about a little over $500.00 points that's what it was all day all of the s. and p. 11 indexes of the s. and p. all were in the red as well but here's the real critical part what they're now looking at is oil futures sales for june and july and june u.s. or oil futures market dropped below $10.00 at one point on tuesday so what the

market was reacting to was many things but the fact that this is going to go on at least for u.s. oil potentially to june and july and the same time you still have coronavirus no vaccine no proven remedy for it and you have a new u.s. economy that remains completely shut down no one driving to work or flying and there's a real realization now here in the markets that the u.s. economy will remain shut down for weeks if not months to come a lot of people are hoping that maybe there could just be a switch that would turn on the economy again but it's been clear now for a while particular here on the markets that that's not going to be the case it's definitely going to take a while for it to come out of this and we're still very much in it at this point yeah not just the u.s. of course globally gabrielle elizondo thank you so much for that. well let's look at the u.k. now where more than $17000.00 people have now died from covert 19 in hospitals but the true extent of the outbreak is feared to be much higher the u.k.

says it will start human vaccine trials on thursday if ocker has more. an intensive care unit in scotland. where the youngest to test positive as only just being born . the medics here are traumatized by what they're dealing with. 2 or for the staff to. hurt so far and now research by the office of national statistics suggesting the actual death toll in england and wales in early april was 40 percent higher than the number reported by downing street those daily government figures don't include deaths outside hospital in care homes hospices or in the community they also classify what counts as a covert 19 deaths in a slightly different way there are concerns the u.k. could soon have the highest number of deaths in europe putting pressure on the

search for a vaccine human trials will begin at oxford university on thursday this is uncertain science but i'm certain that we will throw everything we've got at developing a vaccine. the u.k. is at the forefront of the global effort we've put more money than any other country into the global search for a vaccine the crisis is now also defining the shape of britain's democracy with m.p.'s making plans for a virtual parliament the proposal allows up to 120 m.p.'s out of 650 to join the debate by video conference a further 50 will be in the chamber sitting spaced apart there are some who believe the parliament should close altogether given boris johnson the prime minister's recent bout of coronavirus but others insist it must remain open to continue scrutinizing the government technology offers a compromise. but it doesn't provide easy answers on the rising number of deaths

elsewhere in europe germany where infection numbers of foreign sharply carmaker volkswagens become preparations to restart production and some kind of for all sorts but the country's foreign minister said normal travel in europe is unlikely to happen this year italy's the latest hard hit country to announce it would begin lifting some restrictions starting in early may and in austria restaurants churches and some schools will reopen in 3 weeks time the world health organizations warmed governments that lifting lockdowns must be gradual these are europe's 1st tentative steps towards normality. but the u.k. government continues to face criticism over a lack of personal protection equipment for health workers it's been forced to clarify claims made by a foreign office official that a political decision was made not to participate in

a european scheme to bulk buy whitman to fight the virus the official now says his statement was incorrect the british government is intitled to participate in such schemes under a transition deal since leaving the european union last month the u.k. said it missed an invitation in an email mix up paul brennan has more from london on that this puta over the ukase virus test all. one of the biggest bones of contention as far as the u.k. goes is to try to get a really accurate handle on how big the scale of the pandemic is here in the u.k. and the reason why is because there are essentially 2 sets of statistics that are issued the 1st from the government only deals with those from hospital those people who've been infected and those who've died in the hospital whereas the office for national statistics issues a different set of figures a wider set which includes deaths in the community and deaths in care homes and residential homes and the difference between the 2 has been growing in recent weeks

41 percent is the difference now the figures showing that some 13000 were coronavirus deaths whereas the official government statistic was 9000 so a big difference there that was addressed in the daily downing street briefing on tuesday with the deputy chief medical officer jonathan van time saying frankly it was like comparing apples with past because of the different methodology that said plenty of other nuggets of information from that daily news conference including intriguingly that there is a human vaccine trial which will be conducted this thursday in oxford with the government putting some $20000000.00 pounds that's going to be worth at around $25000000.00 into that scheme one of a couple of schemes there's another one being done by imperial which will be getting around $22000000.00 pounds that's around $28000000.00 so you can see the

amounts of money that's being thrown out these possibilities no guarantees of success of call of course but the urgency and the amount of resources that are going into them shows just how much effort is going into trying to find an answer to this pandemic. at least 150 like prince in a shelter in southern greece have tested positive for the corona virus the whole stall in the town of crony tea was placed in isolation on thursday hundreds of people who live and work there were tested after it was confirmed that a pregnant woman was infected last week it's the 3rd migrant facility in greece to confirm cases of the virus the government is trying to relocate thousands of asylum seekers from crowded camps to smaller facilities johnson is in athens for us and has more on the number of virus cases in migrant camps across greece. the government placed this hoto where these 470 asylum seekers are being kept under

quarantine last thursday because on that day a woman who works at the hotel cooking and cleaning for these people tested positive on sunday one of the asylum seekers tested positive and that was an accidental discovery she is 6 months pregnant and had gone to hospital for a checkup so now everyone in that facility is being tested what makes that different from previous cases because there have been 2 asylum seeker camps that have also had infections in the past is the quantity the number of people infected presumably because they're living in close courses. we had a case of 28 positive tests but in a camp that holds about 2000 we had 4 positive tests in a 2nd camp that holds 1400 so to have roughly a quarter or more of the population of this hotel infected means that it is by far the biggest outbreak among refugee populations in greece so far the government is

taking precautions as well because this is exactly the kind of outbreak they're trying to prevent and i have to say on the whole they've handled this fairly well for example in the supremely of the present camps on the highlands of east asia and they have put preemptive measures in place people working in the camps have been pared down to skeleton crews the asylum services have stopped working so that neither interview is no interviewees and inspecting each other both camps are being ring fenced in order to prevent people coming and going from them freely as they have been until now. coming up on al-jazeera this news hour why the constitution and the tradition are making it difficult to flatten the coronavirus curve in japan bribes and nepotism and underground services how some baghdad businesses are surviving the coronavirus lockdown and more turbulence for global airlines the core

of our us pandemic puts virgin australia into administration. however the weather remains brighten breezy across northern parts of your very different story further south big massive cloud through those sense layer is down into the met this well 2 areas of low pressure just swirling the way we're seeing some very heavy rain recently into the northeast the spine that will drive its way a little further eastward so the riviera will see some very heavy rain across southern parts of france pushing across into central and southern parts of italy further north it does stay largely dry not too bad on the temperatures but it is quite a keen wind that we have just rolling across the north sea taking those temperatures back to around 18 celsius which isn't too bad but there's a brisk wind the sun shines out $24.00 celsius there for paris 19 celsius madrid it

will brighten up in madrid as we go on through the next couple days much of spain will see more in the west sunshine but notice live fish i was there to central parts of the mediterranean one of those showers my will affect the far north of africa particularly around northern areas of morocco pushing across northern algeria into tunisia some showers coming through here possibly leading to some flooding quite a brisk wind into northern parts of libya norm areas of egypt for a time card with a top temperature of 30 degrees. a history of guerrilla war fan i am placed on the stage. the piaggio strength their revolutionary zeal knowing no bounds did a series of violent acts by their splinter groups down the palestinian cause or

ensured survival chronicling the turbulent story of the struggle for a palestinian heart p.l.o. history of a revolution on al-jazeera. welcome

back here's a reminder of the top stories on al-jazeera the coronavirus pandemic could push tens of millions more people around the world to the brink of starvation the world food program warrants that in a worst case scenario there could be famines 3 dozen countries u.s. president donald trump says he will suspend all immigration to the u.s. to protect american lives and jobs from the coronavirus. travel to the u.s. from china parts of europe and the u.k. has been. what the pandemics throwing the world the oil markets into turmoil donald trump says his government will bail out the u.s. in the street the dow jones index closed more than 2.5 percent down on tuesday. strict measures continue to be imposed across asia as countries try to reduce kovac

1000 cases singapore has extended its lockdown by another 4 weeks while people arriving in hong kong need to stay at a testing center the reports from hong kong. scenes like this are the main reason japan is struggling to contain its crew in a virus outbreak according to the country's prime minister siniora. the medical situation on the ground based on the pressure can relieve the pressure if even by your leave to protect your own health we would like you to refrain from going out. the number of cases in japan has exceeded 11000 while 2 q. is still reporting more than 100 new infections daily but locking down the country is not straightforward despite it being under a state of emergency. the constitution makes it impossible to legally enforced social distancing and the traditional work culture discourages remote working it's in stark contrast to hong kong which has imposed tough social distancing

restrictions and encouraged people to work from home and that seems to have paid off for more than a week the city had only single digit daily increases in infections and on monday recorded none but hong kong's government isn't taking any chances despite the adverse impact on the economy is indeed a very very difficult balancing act you are right that on the one hand we want to fight the virus to keep our citizens safe but only the head of the city is that it doesn't have any business people do not have normal. at tipitina's that becomes also a very very difficult the government announced it will extend the measures for another 2 weeks hong kong people have been here before the number of you daily infections fell to 0 in early march but soon after the city was hit by a 2nd wave some blame people letting their guard down too soon and the number of

imported cases rose as hong kong residents rushed to escape a growing outbreak overseas from wednesday all passengers arriving are required to stay at a testing center or a hotel until the coronavirus results are in less than a month ago singapore was hailed as an example of a success story in avoiding a major outbreak but now it has the highest rate of infection in southeast asia suffering more than 1000 new cases a day this week mostly among migrant workers making the city a cautionary tale and a lesson in what can happen when the vulnerable members of the population are overlooked the vehicle pollen are designer of hong kong. south africa's president has announced a $26000000000.00 fund to to address the social economic effects of the pandemic the fund is equivalent to 10 percent of south africa's gross domestic product in a national address president cyril ramaphosa said his top priorities were to stop

the spread of the virus and relieve hunger and social distress caused by the country's lockdown measures 58 people have so far died in south africa. we recognize that food distribution capacity of the government is not adequate to me to be a huge need but has risen since the start of the. the core of our spend that make will provoke the worst recession in latin american history a united nations agency report has warned mexico has entered what the government calls phase 3 as transmission of the virus is now intensifying the government is encouraging people to avoid public spaces mexico has registered 712 coronavirus deaths and more than 8000 infections but officials believe the number is actually much higher due to limited testing capabilities are latin america editor lucien newman joins us now live from chile so let's focus on mexico we had some figures

there give us a little bit more of an idea of just how bad the situation is in that country. but the situation is bad but it clearly is going to be much much worse and in fact the government predicts that by the middle of may they will have a peak in infections now when the health minister was asked this morning did that mean that the government would finally implement some kind of foreign tina in the worst affected areas the health minister said we're not going to force anybody to stay indoors the mexican people know what they have to do close the schools rather are already closed so a parks some offices are closed but they are not going to do more than just encourage social distancing which is a reason for concern but even more reason for concern is the fact that mexico has the highest ratio of people per bed in critical care or emergency care of

any country in latin america my memory serves me correctly it's something like one bed for every 14 and a half 1000 citizens so mexicans clearly have very good reason to be worried now. let's focus on another country as well we've been watching the outbreak in ecuador 10000 cases reported on monday so where are we now when it comes to ecuador. well you know that $10000.00 cases is pretty bad and the $500.00 officially confirmed deaths would sound sort of moderate but the truth of the matter is that there are many many many more than that that is a huge underestimate the officials know that and the reason that they can't tell us just how many cases or how many deaths there are it's because they simply do not have the capacity to test them we do know that in the city of why you have killed the worst hit area there there are normally 1000 people die within a 2 week period they had 6000 and nothing happened except for

a cold bit so that you can you know make your own calculations out of that and that pandemic tin is to spread and even worse yet is the news of the plummeting price of oil that's very important for a country like ecuador which depends absolutely on oil exports the country was already hugely in debt and now with the complete crash of oil prices it's going to be even more hard place to be able to meet not only demand for the public sector but to have any kind of response to help people who are out of work out of money and desperate of it lucy are you speaking to us from santiago in chile obviously you've followed the whole of last in america how would you say people there are generally are feeling right now having seen how the disease developed in europe how would develop in the united states how worried do you think people people are. people are very worried they're scared very you know some people are more frightened than others here in chile people are frightened they're frightened not

only of the disease of whether they can die depending on how old they are or the state of their health but also whether they might die of hunger for lack of jobs in chile in ecuador and in so many countries we've seen a lot of social unrest over the last year precisely because of people's that they feel that there's too much to do quality rather they know that the inequality was already high salaries were too low social services. to poor and now we have this unprecedented economic crisis the worst in history the executive secretary of. the united nations agency for latin america and the caribbean announced today that probably that not only the worst in history but the worst that anybody has ever ever tried to mark i guess we'd have to go back to the time of the spanish conquest nobody really knows how far back but it's the forecast is much worse than anybody could have ever imagined and if these things continue the way they are now people

have very good reason to be frightened about their lives their livelihood as well as are absolutely lucy and human with the latest on that from some connection in the sea has always thinking. now iraq has partly lifted a curfew that was imposed 5 weeks ago to try to contain the spread of coronavirus but with the lockdown still in place at night and on weekends some businesses are doing whatever they can to make ends meet some of the fault and has more now from the capital back that. at 1st sight businesses in iraq's capital appear to abide by the curfew that has been in place for over a month to contain the corona virus pandemic but not on the close shutters and they will slide open just enough for visitors to sneak in like many other businesses this barber shop has been operating secretly throughout much of the curfew. i'm forced to go out i have to pay rent food and medicine for my elderly father how

can i pay this is my work i don't have any order including. shop owners who defy government orders risk temporary detention the police turn up several times a day at these nurseries to arrest their owners this time they were let go after al jazeera arrived at the scene. normally they're taken to the police station where they must sign a statement promising in the further violations and sometimes the shopkeeper say they're pressured to pay a small bribe. this is hire some and they said we have orders from the government but even if they are just $100.00 times per day and put me in prison i will come back here to make money for food for my family a ministry of interior spokesman deny that the police extort business owners from money but security forces also appear to be using the curfew to advance their own business interests this is one of baghdad's main transportation hubs and despite

the presence of police to enforce the curfew there's a flurry of activity. we ask one taxi driver how he manages to pass through the city's many checkpoints he spoke on condition of anonymity going on with. me and it's because i'm a member of the security forces they facilitate the passing for their brother who is also a member of the security forces and life continues normally. a ministry of interior spokesman told al jazeera that security forces only function as drivers to facilitate the movement of citizens in need but many iraqis feel that those in power are taking advantage while ordinary citizens are struggling to get by. the curfew in baghdad was partially lifted on tuesday meaning that some businesses can once again operate freely without the risk of penalties but there's also concern that the reopening could lead to a spike in covert 19 inspections we want to hold in al-jazeera that. the curve of

our spend them make has claimed another big name in business virgin australia the airline entered voluntary administration on tuesday seeking new buyers and investors and it is unlikely to be the last the future for south african airways which entered a form of bankruptcy protection in the center is pretty bleak there are reports that the airline will lay off all its $4700.00 employees by the end of the month the international air transport association says the mystic air traffic globally is that 70 percent and the recovery is expected to be slow other airline staff already collapsed under the weight of the coronavirus include the u.k. regional service fly b. and american regional carriers trance state airlines and compass nicholas nicholas gage reports from sydney. with billions of dollars in debt and most of its fleet grounded the announcement surprised few virgin australia

handed over its books to insolvency firm deloitte as board members placed it in administration it's the largest global airline to collapse or fall under the shock of the corona virus outbreak this is not just something that is. strongly we know it's hurting the industry globally and is the worst ideation process i was saying that the company will continue to operate while it's being restructured but it leaves nearly 16000 people in a strong uncertain about their jobs at a time when unemployment is rising due to code 19 shutdowns and a global recession becoming a me is social reality. stuff had already been stood down due to floods being cancelled for weeks the airline has been urging the government to line it hundreds of millions of dollars to survive the crossest but it's refused saying it wants bail out a company that's 90 percent oil and by foreign shareholders with big pockets if the

airline suspends operations the national carrier quantas would have a need monopoly in a stroller which many say would be ignored but if the interest the straining. the street will i stick to this and they really do need to support station astray. now it's an administration which. quintus virgin australia remains optimistic it will survive and says there's been interest from foreign investors richard branson who co-founded virgin and owns 10 percent of the australian tweeted this is not the end of virgin australia but i believe a new beginning the question is whether it will be an attractive investment when borders remain closed and the industry is under pressure worldwide gauge al-jazeera . still to come on the al-jazeera news hour a volunteer as a battling an invisible enemy of ordinary iranians to step up to disinfect streets

as the country starts to ease restrictions the philippines crowded jail cells where prisoners take turns to sleep and the coronavirus it's almost impossible to stop one year on then the grief phase as war as ever sri lanka marks the anniversary of the easter sunday bombings.

iran. reported dozens of new virus that's on tuesday and the release of more foreign prisoners many businesses in the country have reopened drawing criticism

from health officials but thousands of people have been volunteering help this infect streets and stall the virus from spreading saying he has more now from the capital tehran. it may not look like it but this quiet suburb is a kind of battlefield and these men and women are lost against a key to the white house for the start of the coronavirus briefing that's listeners of every american continue to be with our fellow citizens who have lost a cherished friend or a family member to the virus myths or grief we're making tremendous strides against this invisible enemy thanks to our aggressive campaign against the virus and leave extraordinary talent of our medical professionals are mortality rate remains roughly half of that of many other countries and one of the lowest of any country in the world and that's due to a lot of

a lot of things but our medical professionals have been incredible since we announced our guidelines on opening up america as we call it see opening up america and we have the word again i think we can add the word probably again but that's what it is were opening up america again 20 states representing 40 percent of the u.s. population of announced that they are making plans and preparations to safely restart their economies in the very near future so that's 20 states about 40 percent of our country they're moving along pretty quickly 3 announced today as you know and they're going to be doing it safely they're going to be doing it with tremendous passion there is they want to get back to work their country wants to get back to work. a short time ago the senate passed the paycheck protection program and health care enhancement act with additional funding for the paycheck protection program

hospitals and testing a lot of money for all of them especially for workers in our small businesses my administration has worked aggressively with congress to negotiate this critical $482000000000.00 funding package we reached a deal that includes $382000000000.00 in crucial small business support to keep workers on the payroll $75000000000.00 to $8.00 hospitals which really need the aid and very badly very proud of that and $25000000000.00 to support coronavirus testing efforts i urge the house to pass the bill 'd and they're going to be voting on it i imagine very very soon. i think while we're here and so he's a very busy man as you know secretary nugent he's going to be running back so i thought would do we'll talk about that now and we'll take

a couple of questions on that and then he can go and start phase 4 as the ink is dry and probably they'll be voting tomorrow in the house but. shortly shortly and i think we have tremendous support so steve please come up safely state. thank you mr president and thank you for all your work with us to get this passed i dispassionately like to thank mitch mcconnell and chuck schumer in the entire senate for passing this i don't also like to thank kevin mccarthy and nancy pelosi who have been working with us round the clock as well and our chief of staff mark meadows who was also very instrumental in this let me just comment we've had tremendous support for the p.p.p. this gives us another $310000000000.00 for the p.p.p. we look forward to the house passing the. tomorrow in being up and running quickly after that this also gives us $50000000000.00 for disaster loans idle loans that

will allow the s.b.a. to make $300000000000.00 of disaster loans all 1st small businesses. also allows us as the president said more money to hospitals and unprecedented amounts of money for testing and again i think we understand hospitals not only the hospitals that have been impacted by coronavirus but more importantly many hospitals that have been shut down and making sure that the doctors and nurses get money now let me make just one more comment on the program we have over a 1000000 companies that have received this with less than 10 workers so there is very broad participation in really small business i will comment there have been some big businesses that have taken these loans i was pleased to see that shake shock return to the money we will be putting out some f a q's there is a certification that people are making and i ask people just make sure the intent

of this was for a business that needed the money will put out an f.a.q. but again the intent of this money was not for big public companies that have access to capital. it was. so so mr secretary are you going to request of those other companies obviously she was not alone in being a big company to do 50 got money in this read about what you're going to ask them to return that money yeah we're going to harvard going to pay back the money and as they should be taking it harder it's going to you have a number of them are going to have the names but when i saw harvard they have a one of the largest and downwards anywhere in the country maybe in the world i guess and they're going to pay back to manage it i just want to clarify that even to a certain people on the p.p.p. may have not been clear in understanding the certification so we will give people the benefit of the doubt we're going to put. in f.a.q. out explain this certification if you pay back the loan right away you won't have liability to the s.b.a.

and to treasury but there are severe consequences for people who don't properly certification and again we want to make sure this money is available to small businesses that need it people who have invested their entire life savings we appreciate what's going on and they're hiring people back are you to ensure that those small businesses the small restaurants cafes followers who did not get the money last time around to get it as well if i said you know there are a 1000000 a 1000000 of these companies that did get it that are very small working with the banks were extremely pleased that the small banks did great 20 percent of the loans were made by banks of a 1000000000 unless 60 percent by by $20000000000.00 and less and the big banks also we want everybody to participate there's now a lot of money back in the program and we look forward to all these small businesses getting access to funds brett it's great to see you here. you know asked me how long this is going to that other for my wife we could use assume this is

going to move quickly as well well let me just say i mean you know kind of we're pleased with the success of this program and how quickly this got up operationally we've we've put out more money in these s.b.a. loans than in the last 10 years of s.b.s. so i want to thank all the banks that have worked really hard we knew that when we passed this originally if there was full take out we wouldn't have enough money that's why we've worked with congress for more money and this is going to you know we've already impacted about 30000000 workers will be they'll be a lot more so we look forward to this having a big impact on the economy. yesterday president bush came to the genre elin's the . idea that it's in these these programs or even. worse we worked with the white house on this there were actually much more onerous restrictions in the s.b.a. program. there were people who had misdemeanors that that weren't allowed to access the program it was much longer than 5 years and you know we very much because of

the criminal reform legislation that was passed in the work that's been done in the white house by jared and others we specifically designed the program in the 5 years was significantly shorter than what had been done before so we've already taken that into our consideration of the whole for now we're not going to do that but i want to just emphasize we did take this into account there were a lot of people that wouldn't have access previously and we changed those regulations say to the president talked about a phase 4 i know when we all understand the circumstance of the why did this thing that's not how many more phases can we afford to have or can they expect to have i do you see how it plays by the faith in the faith and what's your thinking on the 1st of all i very much appreciate the president's support for phase 4 he put out a tweet as the president said we would look forward to phase 4 would be infrastructure the president's been talking about infrastructure since the camp aid roads bridges broadband especially broadband now to rural america is very important

we've talked about incentives for restaurants sports entertainment because these businesses have been impacted the president has talked multiple times about a payroll tax cut and we've also we're talking about in the case of states the states we've heard from the governors and the fiscal issues of the states i think phase 4 will most likely be what we need i think based upon what we're seeing on the reopening of the economy and the amount of money we're putting in and working with the federal reserve on 133 i think you're going to see a lot of liquidity and we look forward to business rebounding especially later this summer just simply to follow in the p.p.p. program is this the last traunch of money you think you're going to need for small business then we would expect this is the last tranche but obviously we can always reconsider that but this is a lot of money going out again let me just. clear you know it's it's another $310000000000.00 here and a nother $300000000000.00 of loans that's over $600000000000.00 putting into small

businesses which are the backbone of the economy 50 percent of the private payroll . for them because it will include all of those they sure are for us to comment what the cost is will will work with congress on that and will will consider it ok for me to be a big investor this. is a taxpayer dollars are going through our photos going to a different way of thinking about the need for oversight independent oversight on behalf of the taxpayer we have to do an oversight we supported in the last legislation let me be very clear we have a new inspector general the president has already picked someone for that position we look forward to the person being confirmed we have an oversight committee of congress that many of them have already been appointed and let me just say we put up last week for full transparency we have no obligation to do this we put up you can go to treasury dot gov full transparency on the money that had been sent out on the p.p.p.

across states showing all the big lenders how it was distributed no one lender did more than 4 percent showed the businesses so again the president i very much believe in full transparency we're spending a lot of money and we want to make sure that it's done effectively and fairly so who think you got you started by thinking out of the leaders in the house and the senate can be done it's more about how easy or hard it was to deal with both sides . well we've been working around the clock i think there's been very good bipartisan support to get this done the congress is coming together understanding the importance of this and we've been working around the clock for days so this is important legislation it was a lot we spoke to a lot of people mark meadows has been fantastic as i said it's great to have him here in the white house i couldn't have done this without him working on this with me and the president and vice president. and have been available to us around the clock so this was a big team effort not rouge the democrats said absolutely we couldn't have done

this today without unanimous consent and the democrats being on board and we look forward to this being passed on a bipartisan basis tomorrow this is a real example of the country coming together to fight this virus. best understand what it wants. again i think we're not we're not at the point of designing that like every other bill we will work with senators on both sides on a bipartisan basis i can tell you there's a lot of support particularly for things like broadband and especially what's going on today but the president has talked about you know i was on the campaign with the president we've been talking about bridges and tunnels and rebuilding this country for years so the president wants to make a big investment in this this mitch mcconnell. said what we said the $17000000000.00 portion of kias reserved for a company screw be critical for national security and also will or companies fit

into that all part of the president's trip so we're in the process of putting out guidance that part was really designed for national security companies that are either major suppliers to the department of defense or companies that have top secret clearance so this that national security provision was was very clear when we did that the president has asked me to work with the secretary of energy obviously the energy business is very important to us this has national security issues but different and we look forward to both looking at what existing capabilities we have and that will be something we may need to go back to congress and get additional funding similar to that airplane with your line below 0 or wouldn't you completely different situation i mean what you have with the airlines is you know we had a very very good airline industry because of the virus they basically shut down we have a situation now with the oil.