al-jazeera. al-jazeera. every. afghanistan's president orders an offensive against on groups after $34.00 people including newborn babies are killed in 2 separate attacks the taliban denies any involvement says. the air. well i'm fully back to boyer watching al jazeera live from my headquarters in doha also ahead there is a real risk trigger outbreak that you may not be able to control the u.s. scientists leading the coronavirus response warns against lifting restrictions too

soon despite president tom's push to restart the economy as cover 1000 infections rise in brazil state governors protests against president jalal sanaa was decreed to reopen some businesses and uncertainty in sri lanka over bottom entry elections scheduled for next month in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. at. the end afghanistan's president ashraf ghani is blaming the taliban for an increase in violence $34.00 people including newborn babies were killed in 2 separate attacks president gandhi has ordered a military offensive against the taliban and other armed groups all but. the porter bill is spar repeated cool and from the international community to taliban have not reduced violence and instead they have increased their attacks in order to provide

security for public places and the attacks and threats from the taliban and other terrorist groups are ordering afghan security forces to switch from an active defense mode to an offensive one and to start their operations against the enemy it will but the taliban deny any involvement in the attacks and they've accused the government of creating obstacles to peace us secretary of state my own pale has called the latest attacks head. and urged the afghan government and the taliban to call prayed to bring the perpetrators to justice as alexia ryan has more on tuesday's attacks. maternity hospitals are supposed to be a place of sanctuary for a new life but instead this was the same of what the f.b.i. and governments calling a war crime and an act against humanity. i brought my newborn grandchild for a vaccination and suddenly the explosion happened i don't remember anything after that i was in the middle of the hospital but then i found myself outside and hit by

a bullet. gunman storming a hospital compound in the capital kabul with the aid organization doctors without borders runs a maternity clinic new mothers and babies are among the victims. the attackers were shooting at anyone in this hospital for no reason it's a government hospital and a lot of people bring in their women and children for treatment the attack is reportedly threw grenades. provoking panic inside. and a gun battle with security forces. the question of a lot of often when the firing started we went to the safe room there were 9 of us inside for 4 hours the attacker came at the back of the door and fired but he couldn't into the room all our colleagues were on hurt there but there were casualties amongst the patients inside the ward. while the firefight was underway dozens of people will lead to safety the injured transferred to other hospitals.

in the neighborhood in the west of the city is home to the shia his are a community a frequent target of attacks by both the taliban and i sold into groups. and at a hospital in the eastern province of negra more chaotic scenes after suspected suicide bomber targeted a crowd gathered nearby for a funeral here where there were a lot of bodies lying on the ground some of them were dead and some of them were injured. the victims bundled into ambulances tex's and pickup trucks anything to get them to medical help quickly. some of the injured were treated on stretchers on the floor the hospital overwhelmed. and the surviving mourners left planning more funerals alecks aaron al jazeera or less speak to rodger shanahan who's

a research fellow at the lowy institute for international policy he's via skype from sydney thank you so much for being with us mr shanahan. you know even by afghanistan standards a country that has seen so many horrific attacks an attack on newborn babies and their mothers is unimaginable an absolutely shocking that the taliban deny being behind this who do you think is responsible. well i think it will find more in the next few days that it at the moment you probably think it's more likely to be. state ophelia. done something of this nature pretty soon we've also seen those but not a question militarily you know some of their senior leadership risks in a couple over the last few weeks so if you were to say who's more likely you're probably so small in these loic state at least. the president ashraf ghani is blaming the taliban primarily they'll end announcing an offensive against simple we

know that the afghan government was never really happy with the deal that so has been agreed between the u.s. and the taliban do you think this is an excuse for them to scupper this deal as the taliban are claiming well i'm not sure that he's going to scuttle it but certainly he's. tell you this is not to need to try and place some type of military pressure on the taliban to get some kind of negotiating advantage in a future there's also the immediate domestic political requirement there him to be seen to be doing something so he has to apportion blame and then have the security forces act against those blown so i think you say both. parents working at the moment but surely this is going to be a setback for efforts to get the taliban in the afghan government to talk. so. i think the only way that you could say this is not going to be so is if yet again

government. owns in the next few days that this is purely islamic so it was no to missions to any taliban or taliban affiliates and that may allow the negotiations to continue unabated we've already saved their own in dire straits prior to this so this action certainly has done nothing to the cause of those in afghanistan in the past as we've heard to our in the past similar attacks in the mostly shia area of kabul have been achieved it to eisele how much of a wage is a group like i saw driving between the taliban and the afghan government and how big of a threat on day to day i still are to peace in afghanistan. so is lists an issue there probably was 4 to 6 months ago or even or even list both suffered some battlefield folks is there any indications that the americans

and noise at the top of our own pain support of of the attacks against or putting military pressure on islamic state and chorus and province that was part of the agreement there heresy united states that having being sued you know islamic studies wherever they are show that they are still capable of mounting operations against such targets and the uses climate of operations show that they still have a presence the softer the target that more media attention that you're going to gain and more of the appearance that they rather than you have but i think it's a mixed has been significantly reduced over the past few months you know down i started as a pause to reckon with roger shanahan thank you very much for your insights roger shanahan is from the lowy institute for international policy joining us there from sydney thank you for your time. well. now to the u.s. where a top infectious disease expert has issued

a stock warning the leading member of the coronavirus task force has told congress rushing to ease restrictions could result in serious consequences including needless deaths dr anthony found she sesa money contradicts president trump's repeated calls for a quick reopening of the economy she says ignoring guidelines could trigger an outbreak that states may be unable to control he was among experts sesa fine before senators were reviewing chums handling of the pandemic and discussing cramps and if it's they feel if that occurs there is a real risk trigger an outbreak you may not be able to control which in a. dark certainly will set you back only leading to some suffering and. it could even set you back role to try to get the creek of which you would always turn the clock rather than going forward that is my b.g. concerns. unless bring in dr bob are not who is

a medical doctor and former chief medical correspondent at n.b.c. news always good to have you with us on al-jazeera so top health experts telling congress to us is not out of the woods yet would you agree with that assessment. absolutely i think it's an incredibly dangerous time for the u.s. you know if you look at the curve and will hand china it went up like this it got flat which is where we are right now and then it descended only when they did contact case tracing it took every single contact and put them into quarantine so we're playing with fire here at the top but it's interesting folly is this look at i'm in the state of vermont we've been incredibly successful yesterday we had no new desk we had no new cases we've had a hard lockdown here very smart about industries starting up it's smart in other words outdoor landscape makes sense small manufacture when you're 6 feet apart but look at some of the mindless opening up georgia as an example you have hair salons

nail parlors tattoos restaurants theaters gyms people in close contact makes news no sense and for the fundamental problem here is you have phenomenal scientists like dr fox you have known since 983 and then you have the politicians who are using this phrase open up which is just it's playing with fire it's incredibly dangerous right because it's encouraging people to go out and live life as they did instead of opening up smartly right dr in his testimony today said that the official death toll almost underestimates the true number of deaths that the viruses cause in the u.s. and there are some projections predicting 147000 deaths in the u.s. by early august i mean that's just incredible what's what's going to push these numbers high i think. so what i think it is is that when you look at areas like new york city where you have a tremendous number of cases and you have people who have to work you see you have

those of us who have been fortunate to quarantine but you know people who drive buses who do subways who are in the front lines of health care and they're then bringing the virus back to their households which is continue to accelerate this now you add to that opening restaurants bars we saw down in florida over the beaches are california open beaches you know this fire is people have they mistake it is that you have to cough or sneeze it's breathing it's 3 feet away like this even a mass doesn't offer you very much for text and so that incredibly well thought out science were tremendous risk of recurrence right it is a us testing more people than any other country as the president claims i mean 9000000 people tested i think he said out of a population of 330000000 do we know who can get tested at this stage and who is being tested. so it's pretty hard to get tested and there are the 2 different kinds of tests you know i guess he has been more available but you need something like 900000 tests today because there's the active amount of virus you have the new

cases and then there's what they call an i g.m. or and i g g test those 2 and a body show you had the virus that allows you to say gee this area doesn't and hasn't had very much wire a virus or this area has a tremendous amount we don't have much of that background testing it has been in california in new york state in new york state they were stunned stunned at the number of people who probably had the virus which is over 20 percent so yes we have more testing that we've ever had but no it's not widely enough available and the bottom line is she would say is we don't have enough testing to open up because without contact case tracing which is that the heart of any epidemic i've been covered have an epidemic for you in a bowl in uganda as an example and sleeping sickness the malaria and whatnot with epidemics you have to be able to find those cases take the contacts in quarantine them we're not following any of those basic public health measures we're simply not

ready to open up yet without disastrous results thank you so much for talking to us and thank you for a insight as always talked to bob are not joining us sam from vermont for. thank you for saying in the united states see f.b.i. has mistakenly revealed the identity of a saudi official believed to be linked to the 911 attacks it's intimations so sensitive that the u.s. government has been trying to keep it from the public for months the official was named during a proceeding of a u.s. federal lawsuit filed by families of victims of the attacks there accusing the saudi government of complicity the declaration was found by an f.b.i. official a senior u.s. government official says this was done in error a spokesman for the victims' families says they believe they have uncovered a mink between $911.00 hijackers and the saudi embassy in washington 15 of the 911 hijackers were citizens of. the saudi government denies any connection to them

let's speak to michael isikoff about this his the chief investigative correspondent at yahoo news and joins us from washington d.c. via skype michael thank you for being with us so. this is information the trumpet ministration in recent months had been working very hard to prevent internal documents related to 911 being made public and being released to the victims' families how could the f.b.i. have inadvertently revealed such sensitive information and was this really a slip up. oh well it's a very good question and yes it was a slip up because when i noticed that. the declaration included this information. i on monday contacted the f.b.i. for comment because i knew that the justice department and been going to avonlea trump administration as a whole of it going to extraordinary lengths to keep all of this under wraps in

fact both attorney general william barr and the acting director of national intelligence richard grinnell and filed motions with the court saying that any information relating to the saudi embassy official and all internal f.b.i. documents about this matter were so sensitive they were state secrets that means that if they were revealed they could cause grave damage to the national security and then i'm reading this declaration that was filed by the f.b.i. assistant director for counterterrorism which was basically designed to justify bars position that this is sensitive information in every instance in the declaration they blacked out the name of the saudi embassy official except for one paragraph where it appears and it is the name of somebody who the lawyers for the families of 911 victims have had on their radar screen for some

time but have investigated this individual's activities and what the f.b.i. documents appear to show is this is the guy ok f.b.i. agent suspect they're having directed support for the hijacker ok so we're not naming the saudi embassy official but what do we know we don't name him in the in the article because his name is now ok but what do we know about him and you know the extent of his involvement in in supporting the 911 hijackers. well we don't know a lot about him we do know that the that the f.b.i. agents who are investigating i know of a plot found what they believed was evidence that showed that he had met with a b. at the king fahd mosque in los angeles where the 2 hijackers when they flew into the united states were seen were hanging out and also had

communications with a nother suspected saudi agent who provided help to those to a hijacker when they came into the country providing them with. helping them get an apartment lending them money setting them up with bank accounts and what the f.b.i. documents show is that the saudi embassy official had directed the and this guy by you me the suspected saudi government agent of providing this assistance to the hijackers ok so why is the administration so adamant about keeping this material secret even after the president himself promised to have you know the victims' families and how do you think this information now might affect the case. well i mean the only conclusion one can draw is that obviously the saudis are critical ally of the u.s.

government despite all the strains and u.s. saudi relations over the years particularly the murder of jamal khashoggi the. the washington post journalist and. revealing information that the f.b.i. argues is inconclusive i should point that out that in the same declaration the f.b.i. assistant director for counterterrorism argues that the evidence is not that strong that it was more a theory of the agents then an actual conclusion that the embassy official was involved that is the f.b.i. is official position it's different than what's going to be found in the documents and i think that if the f.b.i. concluded or the justice department concluded that it was inconclusive information that it did not wasn't sufficient to build a criminal case against the saudi embassy official then better to keep it all under

wraps then let the lawyers for the plaintiffs for the families of the victims have it and try to pursue accountability in a civil court michael isikoff thank you very much for talking to us about this thank you. to saudi bats government forces intend separatists fight to supported by the united arab emirates have been killed in the latest fighting in southern yemen the 2 sides are vying to control is injured by the provincial capital of abyan province separatists in south in yemen declared south for last month breaking an agreement with the internationally recognized government signed in november. all right more now on the corona virus pandemic and as the number of victims mounts across latin america governments of facing criticism for failing to provide an adequate response in brazil the president has consistently downplayed the crisis is now being defied by local governments who are pressing ahead with mandatory lock

downs while in chile the government is being accused of dragging its feet as infections soar and latin america at its embassy in yemen reports from santiago. in the city of needed oyo local authorities are restricting entry from neighboring rio de janeiro which has the 2nd highest called 1000 infection rate in brazil. it's necessary because the population is not respecting social distancing and that affects more people if the virus isn't stopped now who guarantees that it will be stopped later. it seems logical enough but not to president. who is blocking it calls from governors to impose a lockdown. first he went on a jet ski escapade on the day brazil's death toll surpassed 10000 and called fears of coronavirus paranoia. now as the toll approaches 12000 he's issued a decree to allow barber shops beauty salons and gyms to reopen as essential services the prestigious british medical journal the lancet says boards are not all

may be the single biggest threat to brazil's fight against corona virus. in chile the government is also under fire accused of taking too long to impose widespread quarantines in the capital. infections have soared from 15 to more than 30000 in just 2 weeks nationwide the majority here in santiago the death toll is still relatively low but that's likely to change very quickly this is the entrance to the emergency room of one of some tackles oldest and largest public hospitals the beds in the critical care units are now almost full and that isn't even the worst problem it's the lack of nurses and other technicians that are needed to care for patients that need emergency care. the air force is airlifting recovering patients to other provinces to share the load short staffed and with 90 percent of beds taken the government has declared what it calls the battle for santiago will

clearly worried president. is overseen the arrival of massive amounts of protective gear and more ventilators inital gimpel that there see that these next weeks will be valid challenging it will require the best of all of us. but many say the government should have done more already like this mourners who are waiting for a loved one to be brought out for burial a bill says he lost his nephew and his uncle in less than a week with no one in the world now we're all dying because of the incompetence and greed of our leaders who refused to declare a total lockdown in santiago we were supposedly experts prepared for the worst but it's a bunch of lives more than half of santiago is now finally under quarantine but it may be too late to prevent the health system from collapsing even before chile reaches the peak of the pandemic you see in human al-jazeera sente our. sri lanka's

election commission is deciding whether to hold parliamentary polls in june the election has already been delayed by 2 months because of a nationwide coronavirus lockdown now fernandes reports preparations for poor that was meant to be held quickly but the coronavirus pandemic intra lanka forced the snuff parliamentary election to be delayed when it became apparent people couldn't go to the ballot box really bore on. all of them for that it would be youth of the public or the god or the working elected reality think about the. other way you have a pretty good democracy. president got our bed rajapaksa dissolved parliament in march and called the polls 6 months early in a bid to win control of the legislature but with a nationwide curfew ordered to combat coronavirus the election commission the lead it that triggered fears of

a potential constitutional crisis as the election was meant to be held within 3 months the new date of june the 20th falls outside that tragic says there be no need to recall the parliament. law does not expect to do the impossible whatever happens i have no need to recall the old parliament i can only convene the new parliament if a new illustrators are appointed by an election. the opposition says the election must be here soon we are very mindful of the necessity to have elections the importance of elections and the protection and promotion of democratic institutions having said that we need to have a precious environment a liberal present context where we can have a free and fair election. critics argue large campaign rallies canvassing for votes

and voting in ballot boxes will risk people's health several individuals and groups have petitioned the supreme court to delay the election even further. but with restrictions easing and an election approaching the cool doesn't have much time to decide and then there's just colombo. pakistan is expecting snow is sweet harvest in 5 years heavy rains hail and plagues of no concern of all taking their toll on the country's main crops and that's on top of existing wheat shortages caused by corruption and the coronavirus up high def reports. he did however it's time he gets done and the farmers that bady already. but. more rain than usual now it should be nor did. reduction happened in green fair day to day where the land hoarding it small and the farmers depend on diet wheat for their desperate budget done in the age of the largest producer no we

didn't the were producing anything between $20.00 to $25000000.00 tonnes of wheat and them only 10 percent is grown in grain fed areas such as these and these farmers of course will now be depending on their wheat crops and they have to do other jobs did read and because the factory than other dogs are north of their liberal because of the pandemic these people are now praying that they will have an adequate crop what is so whole body was just excessive rain has affected the crops and it will not be enough for most farmers to last the year many small farmers will now be forced to buy the wheat from the market and the food and agriculture organization it already warning that because of unpredictable weather stan may see a lawyer in 5 years and died of course really mean more problems for the for farmers for defendants on day. food and agriculture organization is also warning

that the local warms are now sweeping through the south because of the extra weight read up they have been able to breed in large numbers and foghat on future crocs may be compromised because of that trait there is a question now age get on be able to meet a show on requirements dacia. it's being described as a one in a 1000000 discovery a super with new zealand researchers say the planet is one of only a handful ever detected has an orbit and size that's close to our own it's a bit launcher the net fun to go is a senior astronomy research fellow at the university college london he explains the significance of the discovery. i read like planet is a planet which is more or less the same size as the earth it has to have a solid surface because a lot of this new plan is a classic on the gas giants which are easier to detect in

a way similar to jupiter and saturn but if the planet is subtly then if this exciting because then it comes closer to what they had looked like and that with possibility of having are not in the sphere liquid water on the surface etc etc and then we have up us ability for another environment that that would be similar to the heir to the host living organisms we are finding out how the universe works how life the universe what cheese mean there are plenty of possibilities so far we know now about by extrapolation we can tell that up there are about billions and billions of planets in order and not on. weight aleksey alone but all of them i will be very very different very different from the air and the conditions on earth and very special what he's telling us that despite of all the said enormous amount of blood it's we may be still in a unique place in the universe because the development of intelligent life is

a bed if he called that improbable. event to happen in in the universe in general it requires many conditions and we're finding out by studying. account the amount of planets out there out there and the amount of planets that are not like the earth and we hope to find something that we see now on the screen a kind of plan in the house the house land and water we will find out in the future but these are going to be a long way to post. well again the headlines on al jazeera afghanistan's president is blaming the taliban funny increase in violence after $34.00 people including new born babies were killed in to. separate stocks the taliban has denied any responsibility but president danny has ordered the military to resume offensive operations against the armed group all but. only part of the will aspire are repeated poor and from the

international community to taliban have not reduced barlett and instead they have increased their attacks in order to provide security for public places and to tax and fruits from the taliban and other terrorist groups ordering afghan security forces to switch from an active defense mode to an offensive one and to start their operations against the enemies of the leading member of the us coronavirus task force has told congress rushing to ease restrictions good result in serious consequences including needless deaths dr anthony fauci is testimony contradicts president trump's repeated calls for a quick reopening of the economy. they feel if that occurs there is a real risk trigger an outbreak you may not be able to control which in fact dark simply will set you back only leading to some suffering and. it could even set you back road to try to get economic recovery would always turn. rather

than going forward that is why did you concern and brazil local and state governments are pressing ahead with mandatory lockdowns against the will of the president. has repeatedly dismissed the call of eyes as a little flu and says job losses will be more damaging and the f.b.i. has mistakenly revealed the identity of a saudi official believed to be linked to the $911.00 attacks it's information so sensitive the u.s. government has been trying to keep it from the public for months if isha was named during proceedings of the u.s. federal lawsuit filed by families of victims of the attacks there accusing the saudi government of complicity 15 of the 19 hijackers were citizens of sodger arabia the saudi government denies any connection. with the headlines on al-jazeera that's it for me for the battle coming up next year is a rewind share jarrah my neighborhood to stay with us. we understand the differences and similarities of cultures across the world. so no

matter. al-jazeera bringing the news and current affairs that matter to. hello and welcome again to rewind i'm dating you navigate around back in 2006 when we 1st launched al-jazeera english our goal was to seek out the sort of documentaries other channels simply weren't doing here on rewind we're revisiting some of the best of them to find out.