the heads of 4 u.s. tech giants are accused of stifling competition as a contentious congressional hearing. out of there on the stasi attain this is al jazeera live from doha also coming up a daily record for a new coronavirus infections and deaths in brazil the total number of fatalities there passes 90000. the u.s. were treat from a nato ally 12000 troops ordered to pull out of germany and the european head courses to be. in for hong kong students arrested for social media posts in the 1st

police operation and forcing china's new national security bill. to dominant and too powerful that's what's being leveled against 4 of america's largest tech companies at a congressional hearing in washington d.c. the chief executives of facebook google amazon and apple have been defending their business practices via video link they're accused of stifling competition and monopolizing the industry free from regulation this is the culmination of a yearlong investigation by the u.s. congress detailing how the companies avoid liability under the current laws well amazon has been accused of accessing data from sellers on its online shopping platform to create its own products when pressed on the issue chief executive jeff bezos says he called to guarantee his company doesn't engage in that activity. let

me ask you mr amazon after access and use 3rd party seller data when making business decisions and just a yes or no will suffice or. i can't answer that question yes or no what i can tell you is we have a whole yugant using solar specific data to aid our private label business but i can guarantee you that that policy has never been violated you have access to data that your competitors do not have so you might allow 3rd party sellers onto your platform but if you're continuously monitoring the data to make sure that they're never going to get big enough that they can compete with you that is actually the concern that the committee has correspondent allan fels says in washington d.c. on capitol hill and breaks down the issues that u.s. politicians want to dress to. it's important because both democrats and republicans see that there is a problem here they see it through slightly different lenses and certainly the republicans on the committee were concerned the boat bias even though this was

meant to be all a boat business practices and. they carry their job but what is important here is that this subcommittee has been investigating this for more than a year they see there is a significant problem there and essentially this is a short being fired across the bows of the tech giants know that shot was also echoed by the president don't trump seeing that if the tech companies didn't do something to stop their monopoly then he would take executive action if congress didn't i well looks as if congress might well i this committee has called for further hearings in september and the chairman of the committee who you heard from earlier he said that some of these companies need to be broken up some need to be regulated there has to be a change in the law and the legislation particularly in the digital age because a lot of these laws were drawn up at the beginning of last century when there were big companies around and they were taking advantage of their position so this is essentially the legislator seeing to the big tech companies you really need to get

your house in order and if you don't we'll do. well turning to the coronavirus pandemic and the death toll has surpassed 150000 in the united states that's the highest number of fatalities in any nation by far and accounts for nearly a quarter of the global the global recorded death toll now 2 of the most populous states california and florida have both recorded their largest single vote death tolls and the 2nd west affected country in the world brazil has reported a record daily jump there and infections and deaths nearly 70000 cases and 1600 fatalities were confirmed just in the past day that brings the total number of infections to more than 2500000 while more than 100000 people have died there. and now some countries and cities in asia praised for effectively tackling this pandemic and now raising the new infections it has now ordered bars and pubs to shops and banned large gatherings after being virus free for months hong kong leda

is also warning the city is on the verge of a large scale outbreak and that the hospital system is at risk of collapsing scott hyla has more from the thai capital bangkok. vietnam has been viewed as a success story during the coded 1000 pandemic through centralized koren teen and strict contact tracing the country of 95000000 people had no deaths from the disease with the borders sealed the government encouraged to travel in that but things took a turn for the worse last weekend when the central city of denying it was hit by an outbreak the 1st cases of local transmission in months the city was locked down and domestic tourists were sent home just before the airport was shut for 2 weeks and now there are cases linked to denying in vietnam's 2 largest cities noise and even city and even in the central highlands the prime minister has called on all regions to be on alert wouldn't go to the old provinces under

a high risk all provinces should raise the alert level chairman and general secretaries of each province should take action how should the entire political system. one case in the capitol hill no it was a worker at a pizza restaurant who had returned from a trip to denying despite these cases some feel that the government has the ability to control the potential next wave of covert 19. ministry of health has gained much more experience in combating to a virus and its face weighs this time i think you also pos quite soon because we have experience and in hong kong which so far has been spared from a high number of cases the city's leader is warning of a potential large scale outbreak after local transmissions surged the most strict measures since the outbreak began were enacted on wednesday for at least a week no gatherings of more than 2 people and no dining in restaurants thailand has also been viewed as a success story with no locally transmitted cases in more than 60 days to officials

are no doubt looking nervously at their neighbors after these recent spikes in cases of 19 that's because the government here has also encouraged domestic travel and tourism to help the ailing economy i'll just bangkok now the united states has announced plans to pull nearly a 3rd of its military personnel out of germany in an ongoing wral of the defense spending nearly half of the $12000.00 troops will be moved to other locations in europe including italy and belgium white house correspondent in the house that expands. making good on its threat to the us announced withdrawal of almost 12000 us soldiers from germany it's a move the defense secretary insists will improve the military partnership between north american and european allies. i think we are we are excited about where we're going and what it will mean in terms of our ability to enhance to turn strengthen our straight to the alliance in the process the cuts will reduce u.s.

forces in germany by about a 3rd about $25000.00 will remain some soldiers will be repositioned within nato countries including belgium and italy the rest will return to the united states the u.s. european command will also move to belgium but speaking to reporters on wednesday outside the white house u.s. president trump offered a different explanation for the move he said it was to punish germany for not contributing 2 percent of its g.d.p. as required for members of the north atlantic treaty organization. but. well germany's military spending is up it's still smaller relative to other nato allies as a driver of europe's economy republicans and democrats in the u.s. congress have long held germany should be paying more for share defense but most

oppose removing u.s. troops from germany fearing it will weaken regional stability and nato is capacity to push back against russia the plan to withdraw u.s. troops from germany is expected to cost billions and could take years to execute and could be reversed if president does not win reelection in november can really help get al-jazeera the white house. now hong kong police have arrested 4 students for allegedly posting secessionist content on social media in the 1st a police operation and forcing china's national security you know post for weeks ago the students belong to a group called student localism and are accused of advocating for hong kong's independence the new law grants police powers to arrest suspects without a warrant. for some decoration for them so for example they wanted to be a scottish. country and also. want to keep all the means to

keep doing this strange and finally they wanted to united. home home. with a view to. that. well speaking of politics and social media opponents say turkish authorities will be able to censor social media there after parliament passed a new law to regulate foreign platforms the government says the legislation is needed to prevent cybercrime but the opposition alleges it could be used to stifle political dissent and criticism some cause ago who has moved from istanbul. inside turkey's parliament m.p.'s voted to pass a law that aims to control what many have said is uncontrollable social media critics say it's another attempt to silence dissenting voices and threaten the freedom of expression the government argues the law is needed to enhance they come to belittle foreign platforms. and many are worried since the majority of the

mainstream media here are already under government control there is no more platform left for free debate trying to learn it is through the whole barrel restriction everything it's because they are being criticised on social media we are all against it as often the 1st the bill requires social media platforms with more than $1000000.00 domestic daily users such as facebook twitter and you tube top and offices in turkey they're also required to appoint local representatives to implement the government's request to block and promote certain content if they don't comply they'll face stiff fines along with possible data speed cuts. woman rights watch amnesty international and the un have campaigned against the law on the grounds it would lead to censorship and silence dissent. the governing party and says the new law will balance freedoms and obligations it says it doesn't

want the closure of social media providers but wants to end what it considers insults bad language and harrison social media. the governing party insists the new law will balance freedoms and obligations it say's it doesn't want the closure of social media providers but wants to end what it considers insults bad language and harassment on social media borders and. this regulation doesn't aim any ban on social media but to protect the basic rights and freedoms of the 55000000 turkish users on social media to protect their information and stop misinformation. in 2016 turkey tightened its quip on the internet after members of the outlawed. accused of plotting that for years failed to launch an online attack against president treasure john last year dozens of people were detained after speaking out online against turkey's military operations in northern syria a senior level legislature but a court asks for user details from that social platform it can avoid sharing this

puts the company above judiciary and is wrong everything that freedom of expression must surely be protected in turkey many iran and maintain so-called small groups on social media platforms how they use is accounts what fake names and automated balls to attack their opponents this includes the government opposition and the outpolled groups like the p.k. k. and villain movement for now it is not clear how the turkish government is going to implement its new law but the rights groups are worried they could target government critics at the cost of democracy and freedom off expression his solo al-jazeera a stumble. still ahead here on al-jazeera we look at whether the peace deal involving yemen's southern separatists is back on track. plus anger over rolling power cuts reaches boiling point and iraq.

hello welcome to the look at the international full cost still have some very heavy rain in the full cost of parts of japan korean peninsula and into central areas of china the m i u front still bring you some very heavy pulses of bright not quite as intense or prolonged as it has been recently but the show is still there nevertheless and nothing little further north will be somewhat to weather coming into the south korea for a time pushing into central parts of honshu nudging up into northern areas of japan where we have seen some flooding recently a shower still legacy go on into the weekend but not as wise but as i said over the next couple of days pennywise parts showers meanwhile across the philippines lots of cloud showing up here some heavy downpours certainly on the cards as we go on through the next couple of days those showers just grazing the fall north of borneo

wanted to show was there into malaysia indonesia is generally fine and dry will be a few showers once again as i would expect into thailand showers continue meanwhile along the spoils of friday it's a north east and piles of india into bangladesh running right up across the foothills of the himalayas a boot on pushing up into more the poles seeing some very heavy right and the showers continuing are up the western ghats war big downpours coming in here and this lady not in the way a little further north. came from the countryside to cairo and became part of i've been lying. to say this is different from being the normal al-jazeera world meets the man who's been keeping a close eye on residential life in the big cities for decades but who may now be passing into history. to see for all the people he wasn't dormant but he's now

managed by a security company the doorman of egypt on al-jazeera. the . let's remind you about top stories here this hour the c.e.o.'s of facebook google amazon and apple have all been defending their business practices how do you s congressional hearing they're accused of stifling competition and avoiding liability under the current law. brazil has reported a new record daily jump in corona virus infections and deaths nearly 70000 new cases and 1600 fatalities were confirmed just in the past day brazil is the 2nd

west affected country in the wild after the u.s. . and the united states is scaling back its military presence in germany and what the pentagon calls a strategic repositioning nearly $12000.00 troops are to be withdrawn and hoff will be relocated to of the european cities the german government says the decision doesn't make a geo political sense. while the u.s. department of homeland security says federal officers will start pulling out of the u.s. city of portland after months of protests there they were deployed to despite the state government's objections with the stated objective of controlling and he racism and police brutality demonstrations but they've been accused of using excessive force activists have been demanding that they leave for weeks local law enforcement and state troopers will take over the policing of the protests but our john hendren is in chicago that's one of several of the cities where federal agents have been deployed he says the ongoing operations won't be on the same scale as and portland. chicago kansas city in albuquerque we're in this last phase of federal

troop deployment what's going on now is troops federal agents being deployed to cleveland detroit and milwaukee but that's a very different program i spoke to a federal law enforcement official here in chicago he spoke to me anonymously but he said that what's happening is they're really sending in a lot of department of homeland security investigators and other people who are here to investigate existing crimes he says you won't see these people on the street there are perhaps 200 perhaps a little fewer here in chicago about the same number in kansas city but the numbers that we're looking at in other cities are paltry cleveland 25 detroit 40 to milwaukee 25 of those federal agents so it is clear by those numbers alone you won't see their presence out in the street in the way that we have in portland that they would be investigating previous cases and doing other things from desks behind the scenes trying to knock down a crime rate that has really been exacerbated now the u.s.

has added charges against to form a trust the employees of a 3rd person accused of spying for saudi arabia the 3 men were originally charged with accessing the private information of more than $6000.00 twas a uses including prominent critics of the saudi royal family they're now facing 7 offenses instead of 2 including wire fraud and money laundering and a cattle says it's perplexed that saudi arabia is appealing against a ruling by the world trade organization which from the kingdom supports pirate broadcast it be out q now initially saudi arabia claimed it was vindicated by that but says the decision to appeal shows riyadh now understands that it lost the case be out too has been accused of stealing content from qatar based be in sports including english premier league football matches on the premier league is weighing up a saudi led takeover bid for the newcastle united club. separatists in the south of yemen have abandoned their declaration of self for all this is seen as

a came towards unity between the government and the southern transitional council against their theory the un c m an envoy says the end of fighting as an important step towards peace reports. show the unity in yemen southern coastal city of chicago these tribal leaders mostly from prison are. hometown of have a message they won't allow the u.a.e. back southern transitional council to monopolize power in the region despite the group of stubborn separatists announcing on wednesday it's giving up on attempting to self rule the globe without libya we're here to express unity we are part of the game and we are not all separatists we are all for one united federal government and we are in support of. throughout history our beyond has been the beating heart of yemen and it will remain so we're supporting the legitimacy of hardy and the yemeni republic and peace and stability or against the practices of marginalization

and sidelining. the southern transitional council says its decision to give up on self rule aims to end divisions and unite to thirty's internationally recognized government against a common enemy both the rebels in the north it's agreed to return to november's saudi brokered power sharing deal with yemen's president and he has already named to southern transitional council leader as a new governor of the port city of aden dealing clue to reshuffle of his cabinet in the 1st 30 days with no more than 24 ministers and stipulates that forces loyal to the southern transitional council in aden. are to leave their positions aden was used as a temporary capital for head after he was pushed out of sun on the aftermath of the 2014 for the takeover then southern separatists find his broker cease fire and seize the port city in august last year. declared a state of him. urgency to tackle couvade 19 but soon proclaimed so freely need in

another southern provinces a move that led to months of fierce pointing to supporters in the south and in the yemeni archipelago. we hope they can reach an agreement we've we've not really pinned their hopes on any agreement being reached simply because whatever comes out of saudi arabia is always linked to them followed by a series of useless agendas with the 2 members of the coalition is pointing to the u.a.e. and saudi arabia supporting different forces in the area southern separatist issues the stream. and devastating. opposition leaders in mali are threatening a 2nd phase of civil disobedience if the president does not step down they say they'll be more protests after the muslim festival of eat president abraham is accused of corruption mismanaging the economy and of failing to contain armed groups the opposition has now rejected several attempts by west african leaders to

resolve that disappears now ivory coast's president is considering standing for a controversial 3rd term in october election opponents say a 2 term limit bars allison were torah from seeking reelection in march which are said he wouldn't run but the ruling party has asked him to reconsider the electoral commission is promising a fair balance after a contested 20 tentpole now zimbabwe has agreed to pay $3.00 and a half $1000000000.00 in compensation to white farmers evicted from their land 2 decades ago thousands were displaced often violently under the leadership of former president robert mugabe half of that money is to be paid in the next 12 months and the balance within 5 years the agreement says zimbabwe will issue long term bonds and jointly approach international donors with the farmers for farms. protesters across southern iraq are demanding stable electricity supplies last week temperatures soar to 54 degrees celsius and the increased demand on the grid is

causing frequent palekar it's so wonderful to reports from the capital baghdad under bugged out scorching sun electricity workers go from house to house to collect their dues government electricity in iraq is heavily subsidized hussein's monthly bill is $16.00 but like most iraqis people living in this neighborhood only get a few hours of electricity per day during the summer and amid rising temperatures their anger at the government is boiling over alex. look at me i'm swishing you talking to me and i'm full of sweet from 2003 into a no god brought these people promise as a punishment with 0 atrocity sleeps that's a state of the. when the government cuts electricity the family relies on the neighborhoods private generator company that costs the family 4 times as much as they pay the government but the power from the generator is not enough to run the air conditioner so everyone gathers in the living room where only an old air cooler

and a fan of her responded from the heat next door hussein's wife prepares the family's lunch with only a small fan to battle the heat this hour every hour the power cuts and we have to run to turn off all the appliances including the fridge and the freezer if i want to run the washing machine i have to turn off everything else it's so difficult. the family would be willing to pay more for government electricity if supply was stable some accuse the private generator companies of exploiting people by charging high tariffs but this provider says his price does not cover the cost of fuel and maintenance no i think that is the incentive that we are not the ones deciding on the price we charge per ampere that's decided by the mayor and local council and the income is not enough. the poor state of iraq's power infrastructure is the result of decades of war corruption and mismanagement rapid population growth has for added pressure on the grid. it's 48 degrees celsius today and in the hour that

we've been filming here electricity has cut 3 times the previous electricity minister told al jazeera a few months ago that the government had added 3500 megawatt to the grid since $2800.00 increasing capacity by 22 percent but many people here say that they're not seeing the difference on the ground earlier this month the parliament formed a committee to investigate corruption in the ministry of electricity the prime minister also announced a deal to import electricity from the gulf but that will take time. and i wish there was a magic solution but unfortunately many years of sabotage corruption and mismanagement can't be solved overnight it's not fair to ask a government that's been in power for 2 months to pay the bill for the pillaging committed by previous groups and governments as the power cuts push many iraqis to the brink of exhaustion confidence that prime minister mr. government can resolve

deeply rooted structural issues is melting away leaving many iraqis to find other ways to escape the stifling heat see wonderful to al-jazeera but get out now german prosecutors are investigating one of the largest accounting fraud and recent history and why a card was an online payment services company which crumbled into insolvency last month after admitting that $2200000000.00 went missing out on mccain has more from ballin. until recently this man's company wire card was worth tens of billions of dollars and a lucrative investment option now the firm is insolvent and marcus brown and several of his former colleagues are in custody on suspicion of manipulating accounts that's given to conduct up on. the suspects and further accomplices agreed from 2015 to inflate why a card balance sheet and sales volume through fake income reported through business

with so-called 3rd party acquirers. wire cards core business was online payment processing over the course of several years it expanded its business around the world but it was his activities in asia which raised suspicion journalists like dan mccrum of the financial times discovered that the vast sums of cash the company claimed to have just could not be found the business didn't really seem to exist and then we started looking at these accounts what company it's sad and these various business deals which it in singapore and other places in asia and really what we found just didn't add up so we started publishing pieces which raised questions about these things and that led more people to get in touch and us to raise more questions about the company's accounts when wire cards filed for insolvency a few weeks ago that share price plummeted many of its shareholders found themselves facing serious losses both going share is

a burden based lawyer representing thousands of them it starts with who was a grandmother who has invested some of her pension fund money in a card or maybe just 2000 euros and has lost everything and go it goes up to huge private prisons and also institutional investors who may hold 2 digit 1000000000 euro figures or even hundreds of millions of euros the man accused of masterminding the alleged fraud has denied any wrongdoing as can the arts at least it can't be ruled out the wild cards the company grieved party in the case of florida's considerable proportions. on a wider scale the scandal has highlighted the role of the regulators in germany and the behavior of successive governments. the official response here at the finance ministry is a 3 point action plan firstly to strengthen the financial regulator baffin to give it the sovereign power to intervene in public companies secondly. the order has

regulator half assed through allows it to him. post sanctions on route prices and finally to oblige all companies to change their order says every 10 years but right now there remain many unanswered questions about what really happened with wild card dominic cain al-jazeera burnim. again this is out of there and these are our headlines the c.e.o.'s of facebook google amazon and apple have been defending their business practices at a u.s. congressional hearing they're accused of stifling competition and avoiding liability under the current law alan fisher has more on how that play that hearing played out the tech companies are essentially saying that they're very american in that they're innovative they're smart and they make big profits and they see that they've had to be innovative and they've had to include people because if they

didn't they would disappear in the way that 10 years ago if you were talking about the take joint he'd be talking about my space and friendster remember them no no one does because of course they fell away when facebook google and others took that space so they insist that what they're doing creates jobs it creates wealth it creates opportunity for many people now the death toll from the carnivores pandemic has surpassed 150000 in the united states that's the highest number of fatalities in any nation by far and accounts for nearly a quarter of the recorded global toll 2 of the most populous states california and florida have also recorded their largest single day death tolls and brazil has reported a new record daily jump there in corona virus infections and deaths nearly 70000 new cases and 1600 fatalities were confirmed just in the past day brazil is the 2nd worst affected country in the wild after the u.s. . hong kong police have arrested 4 students for allegedly posting secessionist

content on social media this is the 1st operation in forcing china's national security law since a prison posed 4 weeks ago the students belong to a group called student localism and are accused of advocating for hong kong's independence the new police powers to arrest suspects without a warrant and turkey's parliament has passed a social media law which rights groups say will give the government grace the power to increase online censorship sites like facebook and twitter will be required to have local representatives and taki and they also need to store news this data inside the country making it easier to access companies that break the law or could be fined or effectively blocked all those are the headlines and i'll have another news update for you hit on al-jazeera off the inside story stay with us.

loaded for defending the environment the rights group says a record number of activists well killed last year so while an environment that's being protected is a. polo welcome to the program on the wrong call and around the world environmental activists are being arrested jailed even killed for trying to protect our planet the u.k. based group global witness has recorded the highest number of murders since it began its annual survey a decade ago 212 people killed in 2.