ari on al jazeera a lot of the stories that we cover are highly complex so it's very important that we make them as understandable as we can as al-jazeera correspondents that's what we strive to do. this is al-jazeera. peter wu watching the news our live from doha coming up in the next 60 minutes a student who escaped from boko haram kidnappers in nigeria recounts his ordeal but there's no word yet on the fate of more than $320.00 others still in captivity we have a special al jazeera report coming up. the french president emanuel my home tests positive for corona virus prompting leaders of spain and portugal to go into self

isolation. the u.s. records more than 3 and a half 1000 the highest daily toll since the pandemic began an expert panel meets decide on whether to approve a 2nd vaccine. the u.s. government confirms its computer networks are under attack from a significant hacking operation that is still ongoing. and in sport russia has had its banned from major events come by the years but the doping penalty will still prevent the country from competing at the tokyo olympics and the next football world cup. ok we begin this news hour in nigeria where it's been 6 days now since gunmen stormed the government school in the northern katsina state and kidnapped more than $330.00 students a faction of boko haram has claimed responsibility for this mass abduction 17 boys

have been rescued so far but the fate of others does remain unknown one of them a 17 year old who sama amino managed to escape his kidnappers he recounts now what happened. yes you know it to me i'm one that after we scaled the fence we were hearing voices saying that we should come back thinking they were police officers unknown to us it was the band that they then gathered us at a spot that was when we realized that would bend its wearing military uniform. a more can for so long i was already exhausted i'm a sickle cell patients want to hold my friend shoulder on to my right the other to my left before i continue the treacherous walk into the bush as the bend its continued to flood people from the back so that they move faster al-jazeera has made interests outside the school in the town where the boys were kidnapped. it's mixed feelings here in town with many parents who have recovered their children and parents who don't. a traumatic experience for both of them now what we know is that

what the locals are telling us is 400 meters away from where i'm standing if the chemical pans to my left over there 400 meters from here that is where the gunmen set up a roadblock and from there they've been fighting it to get out of town to stop vigilant is from coming into this area why behind their lines other gunmen moved into this school be going to science to come to school and were hurting the boys into a group from there they moved them into the forest and from what i have right now we're hearing that hundreds of them are still in captivity now it's a traumatic experience for many parents and a lot of parents with spoken to since our arrival here and going to town are calling on the government to do more than what they're doing now to recover the children a lot of them they say are sick and the weather is really really cold a lot of the children who have come back a poor king about tough conditions dems killing mountains hills and crossing

forests so as to as the abductors pushed them deeper and deeper into the forest while coming together we saw large movement of troops and large presence of troops on roadblocks along the way so the officials here are telling us they want to keep things tighter and tighter under control one official was saying that they have denied those people holding the children freedom of movement and they've kept them in one place parents went when they heard that they were hopeful but a quick resolve to this issue will be done many people are wondering whether how whether it will end peacefully but the prayer of most commute most of the people in the community is that it ends peacefully and successfully and they have the children back. french president emanuel mccraw is now tested positive for coated 19 and is self isolating after he developed symptoms he's canceled

a forthcoming trip to lebanon and will quarantine for 7 days mr micron's office says it's not known who he contract the virus from the prime ministers of spain portugal and belgium say they are now going into quarantine as well after they met the french leader earlier this week the french prime minister john caustics and the european council presidential michel are also in self isolation live tonight joining us here on news from paris natasha mitchell macro clearly thinks he can carry on working as normal despite having symptoms. that's right i mean as far as elisei is concerned it's business as usual because the french presence a man or macro has already held a number of meetings and some visit ministers today we understand though the ministers arrived at the lease a palace but were placed in separate rooms and spoke 5 video conference also

holding a video conference with several charities it was shared jewel to be an impersonal meeting but of course that is taking place of chile so the message really from the least say is that the french president is for the time being at least able fully able to work he will work in isolation though for the 7 next 7 days that's in accordance with the rules here in france we understand that his symptoms are mild in fact one leader of the party leader i should say the leader of his party here in france chris of kasztner said a short while ago that he had seen him out of my home wednesday night had worked with him and him and a white cross seemed in fine form so if this stage it seems the french president has a mild form of covert 19 of course that could change and the lease is saying there will be tracking that day by day other members of the french government of course being tested we already know that the french prime ministers are cast x. is going to self isolation because he has several meetings with him back on

wednesday so those clearly are kind of a big track and trace operation going on in france but also across the borders i mean mr macro he's known as a handshake or he's known as a sociable outgoing kind of an individual so the domino effect here just when it comes to track troops and potentially people going into isolation goes across europe. well i it's one of the risks i imagine of being a world leader is that you do come into contact with an enormous number of people in a battle mark or as you say is quite a tactile president's away have seen him over the past few days meeting a number of leaders here in paris on monday the spanish prime minister shares the e.u. council chief john michel both of them lunch with mike on monday and they have both gone into quarantine the same with the portuguese media antonio cost who is here in paris on wednesday and a number of others who have come in contact with mark or over the last few days

they will all be tracked they will all be tested because he has been at many events and ceremonies including the 60th anniversary of the o.e.c.d. here in paris and i think we'll probably hear from more leaders over the next few days because in the past few hours the luxembourg's prime minister bentyl also said that he is going to self isolation as far as we know none of those european leaders have tested positive they are taking all the precautions and following the steps that they need to stay need to follow in accordance with the rules of their country but of course as you say a domino effect when one person has over 1000 everyone around them needs to be tested and take precautions the tasha thank you very much natasha bottle there reporting live from paris. to the united states the us registering new records for deaths and infections in just one day more than 3 and a half 1000 americans died on wednesday and nearly 250000 new infections are being reported as well a panel of outside experts are deciding on whether to endorse the emergency use of

maternal coronavirus vaccine in africa several countries are now experiencing 2nd waves of the pandemic that to south africa has reported its highest new daily cases since august and restrictions have been tightened in the democratic republic of congo in europe germany has registered its highest number of new infections and so has austria as well but there are signs of some relief with vaccinations that start across the block 2 days after christmas. standing by for us in johannesburg with developments out of africa 1st to alan fischer who joins us from washington so alan in the numbers going in exactly the wrong direction we say it every day and on the news out is this as far as the u.s. is concerned is this a post thanksgiving holiday spike in effect. the experts saw it coming they warned her and this is exactly what has happened it is put

a strain on almost every hospital across the united states that are very few states that are reporting that hospitals are close to capacity and of course when you put pressure on hospitals like that it means that ordinary cases like heart disease and cancer elective surgeries they simply can't be entertained at this point and many horse battles are seeing their staff is simply exhausted they're not able to cope with the hours that they have to work to make sure that everyone gets the treatment no donald trump had been talking about the death rate was going down even though the number of infections was going up that's simply not the case no what we're seeing is infections no 3rd 3 times greater than the where in september when the 2nd wave started and almost twice the number they were doing that the peak in this spring we've had a number of instances where. chris christie who of course is the former new jersey governor is know putting an advert which is being aired across the united states

are doing people to wear a mask he of course in itself was hospitalized in intensive care back in october he says the big mistake he made was coming to the white house and taking off his mask he was here to help coach donald trump for one of his debate appearances he said he really should have worn a mask and are doing people to do that particularly as we're very close no to the christmas holiday were more people expected to travel again but it's also a double whammy too because we're seeing the number of jobless figures those claiming job list help going up as well 885000 in the last week if you go back to just before corporate struck you were talking about 225000 the week so you see just how big the problem is and was more than 800000 last week as well so employers are laying people off which is going to put pressure on congress to come up with some sort of financial solution at the are under pressure to pass it corporal lead. bill there is talk that there may be some sort of deal by the end of business on

thursday but it still seems there's a few problems to iron out and then we have the vaccination donald trump says he's open to it certainly that's what his press secretary said on wednesday but there's no sign of him doing it in public mike pence will take the vaccination in public he wants to do on friday in front of all the american t.v. networks this coming 6 months after he wrote an op ed saying there was no 2nd wave and the media reporting that there could be such a thing was simply hysteria alan thank you very much. for joining us from joburg so what's the plan there to push back against curb it 19. well the rise in infections was expected especially when long done measures were eased a few months ago so we saw schools reopening businesses reopening of people being allowed to move up and down the country and so that because economy couldn't really sustain a long drawn out locked our things had to open up because the economy was pretty

much dire straits even before the cove it endemic and the unemployment rate here is more than 30 percent sentence and had to cover 19 they've been many more job losses that government officials are saying that they expecting many more people to leave the big cities of northeast of season and go to the rule to spend time with their friends and family so they putting in place certain measures to try and bring down these infection rates these include for example a nighttime curfew many parts of the country the sale of alcohol for example will only be sold on certain days at a certain times in shops that number of public gatherings to be limited to as little as 50 in some cases the big concern of course here it's a big tradition in south africa people flock to the beaches in the country with their friends and family during the festive season they have big parties thousands usually attend the governesses because these infection rates are rising so quickly this time those parties would not be allowed many public beaches will be closed

please do not go in the question of course now is worth a listen to what the government has been telling them. thank you very much there live for us in jo'burg. still to come for you here on the news hour including where the world's richest nations are reporting near unprecedented levels of hunger. and congress questions the owners of a drug company accused of fueling the opioid crisis which has killed nearly half a 1000000 americans. and its court a bad day for an olympic legend in his bid to win sailing his america's cup and he's here with that story in about 35 minutes. the european parliament has voted against imposing sanctions targeting the government of egypt a resolution was put before the parliament raising concerns about egypt's human rights record among other topics it condemned the kidnapping torture and killing of

an italian research julia regina in cairo in 2016 life now to brussels and my colleague need barkha why did the decision go in this way. firstly quite a resoundingly defeat for this resolution 608261 and the european parliament the resolution was brought by 2 italian m e p's on behalf of the socialist and democratic alliance was just to explain is a left leaning bloc all of amy ps across the european union within the european parliament it's difficult to say exactly what the reasoning was for it to go so drastically in the other direction for those who brought this resolution but the feeling is that the arguments were perhaps not strong enough in piling extra pressure on the education or thirty's when it comes to holding the government to account for alleged human rights violations but the italian government has been

very very vocal in recent days accusing the egyptian authorities of deliberately interfere. in the case of julio regina he was murdered in 2016 he was a cambridge university ph d. research or he disappeared in january of 2016 his body was found several weeks later with signs that he had been repeatedly tortured the italian investigators concluded that this was a state sponsored killing that's been denied by the egyptians but last week we saw 4 high level egyptian officials accused of being involved in the kidnapping and murder we believe now that a trial will be on the way with these accused being dealt with in absentia when it comes to this way solution though it comes very much as a blow to human rights groups who believe that more should be done by members of the european union when it comes to piling on the pressure on egypt regarding its human rights record the finger has also been pointed at germany france and also the

united kingdom for continued arms trails to their sales to egypt while all of this background business happens all of these accusations of violations knave thank you very much need parker there for us in brussels. sudan's military has accused ethiopian forces and militias of ambushing its officers during a security patrol close to the border on tuesday and says a number of soldiers were killed in an area bordering if you open his tikrit region where the ethiopian government has been carrying out an armed campaign against local forces sudan's prime minister went to ethiopia on sunday and expressed concerns about threats to sudan security along its border with tikrit. rescue teams have recovered bodies of 4 children after a boat carrying migrants sank off the coast of libya the libyan red crescent got reports of a sinking boat carrying 30 people near the coast of zawiya west of the capital tripoli the search for other bodies continues and no survivors have been found

libya is a major transit hub for migrants mostly from sub-saharan africa trying to cross over to europe. be used top court has ruled hungary is guilty of breaking asylum law the european court of justice fund migrants and refugees were denied the right to apply for asylum and forcibly deported to the serbian border it also found that no special protection was offered to children or the vulnerable hungary had implemented anti immigration policies during the peak of the syrian refugee crisis in 2015. the owners of the company blamed for fueling the deadly opioid crisis in the united states are being questioned by a congressional committee de sac close family owns purge you pharma maker of the addictive prescription painkiller oxycontin last month purge you admit its responsibility for the opioid epidemic raging across the united states castro joins us now from capitol hill so heidi what kind of questions are they asking there.

well this was the 1st time that we saw members of the sackler family themselves being grudgingly dragged out in public in a sense to take accountability for the 450000 people who have died in the united states since the beginning of this opioid crisis but if it was an apology that people and congress people were trying to get well that's not what came out we heard from 2 cousins who were members of the purdue pharma board david and kathy sapp were their cousins and given an opportunity asked point blank to apologize to the american people today they said they were sorry for all the pain and suffering for the deaths but that if they were able to go back in time they would not change their own actions over the years oxycontin has been on the market produced work to reduce the risk of addiction and abuse in

a number of ways. in the past 20 years produce spent more than a $1000000000.00 on anti abuse diversion initiatives. instituted what i understand was the 1st volunteer you busa in diversion to television program in 2002 this program was expanded and indorsed by various state governments and later with choir keep the program in place and i understand it was used as a model for at least one of the reforms you company to follow and while there has been much talk by these witnesses about the efforts that purdue pharma is taking to try to address this crisis peter of course it's still ongoing we're always talking about a covert pandemic but before that and after there will still continue to be this other crisis happening in the united states and namely oxycontin will continue to be prescribed. if and when this comes to the concept of

financial. money being given compensation being given to the families of people who've died we could be talking about millions or billions of dollars yeah. yeah potentially and that is also one pressing issue why members of the house oversight committee insisted on bringing in these at these board members today because prior to a legal settlement that was just in court a month ago there are records showing that the sackler family with drew up to $10000000000.00 out of their. the form of the pharmacology will company to enrich themselves and the question that the committee has been giving to these board members is whether or not they did that namely to enrich themselves knowing that a bad judgment was coming their way and that they would be less money now for the victims to happen in the way of

a settlement ok heidi thank you very much for us in washington. well the u.s. government has declared the opioid crisis as a public health emergency it started in the late 1990 s. when doctors began to prescribe opioid painkillers a greater rates in the mistaken belief that they were not addictive but 2018 according to the most recent figures available around 10000000 americans were misusing the medication more than 800000 were using heroin many of them addicts who turned to illicit drugs when they could no longer get prescriptions filled the u.s. department of health says more than 130 americans die every day from opioid related overdoses that's 48000 people per year let's talk to marcus he is chief medical officer at the association of state and territorial health officials he joins us on skype from charlotte north carolina marcus to share welcome to the news is the central allegation here or the central suspicion because i don't want

to push you into saying anything that's strictly speaking illegal is the central suspicion here that the company knew it was addictive as soon as it started the process whereby the drug was prescribed to people. yes i think that's the basic premise of the legal actions we've taken and you know that has been a concern. the information that was provided about this medication earlier was not accurate and you know many providers health care providers physicians other clinicians acted based on you know misunderstanding or misinformation about the medications in particular this issue of whether it's addictive or not i mean it could these medications are quickly very addictive but there was early communication that they were not particularly for people who were suffering from pain at point of delivery a point of contact why did the medical world or why did state government or

a federal government not get involved in this i mean clearly if somebody goes back to their i would say g.p. but goes back to the pharmacologist all the doctor and says i really need this drug at some point surely there must be a doctor patient conversation with the doc so much of thought this person is addicted and that's clear to me as that person's doctor why did nobody raise the alarm bells sooner than the alarm bells were raised. well actually the the my profession and state governments and to some extent the federal government have been reacting to this problem for quite some time for you know probably had a decade or more you know we one of the early things we did was put in his place monitoring systems so that you could go online if you're a clinician you could go online and when somebody is requesting pain medication you could check to see when they last got pain medications so this practice of shopping around and going one place and another to get the medications could be stopped many

of the systems were built you know a decade or more ago so we've known about the problem i think we've also done a lot to educate positions over the last decade so there have been actions but there's not been anything as significant as these legal actions and these liability suits and hopefully these are the kinds of things that clearly puts this particular practice to an end but also hopefully discourages that in the future what does this tell us about this specific drugs company and the drugs company business in general in the united states. you know it's i think it's part of a. pattern that we've seen for decades now of you know how how pharmaceutical companies market and advertise their products and i think what it tells us is we really have to be attentive to that and we have to set some limits on how they advertise what kind of access they have to the medical community

and what kind of information they're putting forward and we have seen that improve i mean you know the access that the pharmaceutical industry has to medical care provisions has changed dramatically since i started my career as a young physician i mean and that's been a very very good change and some of that comes from society some of that comes i think from the medical profession stepping up and realizing this is not the way that professionals can behave some of the sort of gift giving and really eating out of the lavish. encounters between clinicians and pharmaceutical representatives that's been put an end to it but i think we need to continue to be really cognizant of that and take steps to continue to have a bit of a barrier between the folks who are marketing these drugs and the professional people whose job it is to prescribe and monitor them as you're talking to a small because we're looking at pictures of people protesting i suspect either

side congress and or side to the particular this particular companies head offices perhaps trying to raise awareness of what they've experienced what they've witnessed when it comes to family and friends so we're seeing questions on call in congress today in real time this may yet go to a legal case it may go to a class action we've been hearing that as well today in a perfect world what will be the outcome of this when people have got compensation when they remember the people who died what will be off to that. well the i think the potentially the greatest benefit of a significant civil action and particularly if the judgment on that were severe you know it is it raises the liability and makes it very clear to pharmaceutical companies that there could be significant liability if they're not careful with how

they marketing communicate about their drugs so i thought although i think it could be beneficial to people to have some kind of compensation for the suffering they've had i suspect most of these folks are motivated by the idea that they want to have a significant judgment that would discourage this kind of behavior from corporate entities in the future an important story that needs to be told not this place yes thank you so much for joining us here on the news on al-jazeera. well as you were hearing there the opioid crisis has devastated the lives of hundreds of thousands of people john hendren has been meeting some of the victims in chicago. tim ryan was the recruiting director for a chicago consulting company and he founded a multi-million dollar executive search firm and he was also a drug addict people of this misconception that an opiate addict is the homeless person on the corner with the brown paper back that's 5 per cent you know the

average opiate addict 22 year old white middle class male a 23 year old white middle class female the disease of addiction does not discriminate after using for years he caught his son using heroin and opiates enjoying him my son and i that's how we get by on did by doing drugs every day then for tim came addiction prison and soup rioting for his son nick a cycle of addiction jail rehab and relapse on the day tim recorded his 21st month of sobriety nick suffered a fatal overdose dr talked me into the room right next to where we were and i walked in there are indices. mike's one year old son called blue lifeless body just lying there with us as she talked to us shasta is still have the device in a smile for they were trying to ask write him. i mean tears just started slowing

down now with his wife former supermodel jennifer jimenez he helps former addicts through their substance abuse program dope to hope often losers begin with lou we prescribe pain killers after an injury then when those run out the move on to heroin or fentanyl a powerful or dangerous synthetic opioid bought from street corner drug dealers for too many opioid users the journey through addiction in like this you know when you're. in overdose on a street corner. the lucky ones survive to end up here in the emergency room now seeing more opioid overdoses than ever overdoses are up 55 percent in 2020 compared to 2019. years city be more challenging time recovering because drug use or very little in their communities one opioid manufacturer oxycontin maker produced pharma has acknowledged its role in the

opioid epidemic the company has paid 634000000 dollars in fines and pleaded guilty to contributing to thousands of opioid deaths now surging is the pandemic drives many back to drugs they need carcass and connection they need a human interaction and unfortunately a lot of people are going back to abusing and using opiates and when you're asked what opiates you know you're gonna die it is an epidemic growing within a pandemic as the number of fatal opioid overdoses continues to rise john hendren al-jazeera chicago. still to come on this program for you. a decade after the arab spring began engine is here we look at what has and has not changed. and adelaide is the stage as one of this year's most highly anticipated cricket matches gets under way details coming out within the in sport in about 15 minutes.

from. now i once again the weather remains slushy dry across a good part of the middle east we have got some showers still leaking the way out just pushing over towards the caspian sea northern parts of iraq you see some rain from time to time maybe wanted to showers into the west as well as south of that it is generally dry national day here in concert on friday temperatures around 24 celsius a light wind has a little bit of the morning mist and folk to watch out for that will shift by saturday as the winds pick up maybe a line of wetter weather just sliding outs of more than parts of saudi arabia for a time not too much on this but some rain there a possibility nevertheless just some rain to just around the gulf of aden some a wetter weather and play him will see that western weather just a fight to the north of somalia as we go through the next day or so i want to see

showers just sliding towards the horn of africa elsewhere across central africa plenty of showers around the rift valley sliding down across as to wards botswana will see some heavy showers for a time to into zimbabwe some pass' in bob we see some heavy rain central and southern parts mozambique also looking pretty just over the next couple days that rain in some amazing pick peping up for saturday with the possibility of flooding. the virus is indiscriminate yet those living in poverty are far more vulnerable to the dangers of cold with my deep alley re-examine the reasons for this disparity the social and economic inequalities that surround us so much deeper and much more problematic than we thought whether lessons learned from the global pandemic could lead to positive change the plan to fix the killing of it all hail the law

exposing privilege or poverty during a crisis on a 0 following 2 fatal crashes in the past year boeing decided to brown the brand new 7 through 7 max but this wasn't the 1st time that grounded a new aircraft back in 2013 in the 787 dreamliner ran into trouble when a battery caught fire that is out of the us investigative unit discovered there was more to the problem than just smoking batteries. rewind broken dreams the boeing 787 on al-jazeera.

welcome back let's just recap of your top stories for you here on al-jazeera a nigerian school boy who managed to escape capture from a factional book says he and others were abducted by people wearing military uniforms hundreds of students were kidnapped from a school in northern katsina state last week and 17 have been rescued. the french president emmanuel mccall has tested positive for cope with 19 itself isolates and continue to work remotely the french prime minister will also self isolate after coming into contact with us from my home. the us is registered to corona virus records in one day the number of new deaths and cases really 3 and a half 1000 people died in close to 250000 have been infected. u.s. government agencies are rushing to tighten their computer security systems after confirming they've been hit in a long running at a sophisticated hacking operation it's acas a suspected to be russian they pierced cyber defense isn't accessed e-mail and internal files at the treasury and commerce departments and possibly elsewhere an

f.b.i. investigation is ongoing in order to find out who was responsible the treasury and commerce departments were among the dozens infiltrated john bryson is a professor of ethics and technology at the hurty school of governance she says plentiful hack on this scale would require significant expertise and resources. it is the 1st the kid i've been reading where the microsoft has blogged about this and that they do a lot trans national cybersecurity of course and they claim it's not only that somebody did a reasonably sophisticated job of getting into the softer itself but also that somebody had to then physically and site to get access to the tokens that like the security. bits that made it look like people were atheros to have made those changes to the code so it is reasonably sophisticated i mean it's kind of like

september 11th you know you think how hard is it to find a plane is this really in the state of course that was the amount of organization that it took. the state level and the fact that it includes physical intuition as well as the fact that they put the suffer together in a way that wasn't immediately well immediately for months the russian president vladimir putin hasn't spoken specifically about this particular hacking incident during his annual media conference but he has denied that russian hackers ever meddled in the 2016 u.s. elections mr putin has been fielding questions at his annual media conference from his private residence outside moscow addressing a wide range of issues when asked about his future plans mr putin said he's not yet taken a position on whether he will run for the presidency again in 2024 in july mr putin change the constitution to allow him to rule until 2036. the u.s. is expected to unseal charges against one of the suspects in the 1988 lockerbie bombing

that killed 270 people a libyan intelligence officer identified as. it must suit and is accused of making the bomb that blew up the u.s. aircraft over the scottish town of lockerbie most of the victims on the london to new york pan am flight $103.00 were americans masood is reportedly in custody in libya and is expected to be extradited to the u.s. to stand trial there. was global attention remains focused on managing the qubit 19 pandemic the united nations and several charities are warning of an unprecedented starvation crisis the world food program says 690000000 people do not have enough to eat 130000000 more are at risk risk of being pushed to starvation by the end of the group identified 10 countries facing the worst food crises in 2019 with yemen south sudan and afghanistan among the most severe fear the impact of covert

19 could trigger multiple famines in zimbabwe drought the pandemic and an economic recession of left 4000000 people facing acute food shortages it's not just developing nations facing shortages either unicef is helping to feed hungry children in the u.k. for the 1st time with 2400000 living in food insecure 100 souls and in the u.s. more than 27000000 americans say they do not have enough to eat as food bank demand continues to. line today for the cars was over 2 miles and there's been people have been waiting here since 530 this morning so people are driving upwards of an hour to 2 hours to get here and then sitting in a line for 3 to 4 hours before they're able to get their box of food so that says a lot of what's really going on in society the people are that desperate i am pharmacist i lost my job this year just due to layoffs and cutbacks and you know my

husband is working full time but this is really really helped just with staples girl from a double income hosel to a single income my mom is a work in amman only one work in because my mom have to stay home my daughter full on one school in so it helps out a lot because this is like 4 or 5 meals i don't have to worry about ok joining us here on the news i need to move is the c.e.o. of world central kitchen that's a nonprofit organization which uses food to heal communities and to strengthen economies in times of crisis he joins us on skype from washington d.c. nate welcome back to the news it's wrong to say this but it's true we are used to hearing about food insecurity tipping into famine in countries like yemen in countries like afghanistan but why in the 1st world are so many people going hungry

. you know it is it is something that is really hard to grasp and it's something that i think our leadership in in the u.s. government is also struggling to comprehend and hence act upon unfortunately but it is something that we've been facing in the united states sense the beginning of the pandemic we started to see this unfold as millions of americans lost their jobs and you know there is not this social fabric and social structure in the united states to support families when they're out of work and unable to buy food and all of that pressure then goes upon food banks nonprofits that have to fill that gap and unfortunately as we were intruding into now the most critical time with the number of cases rising to record levels number of jobs continue to be lost nonprofits really have hit their limits of what they can do we've been doing this for 9 months now and unfortunately you know donations have dried up and the lack of

support from our federal government is really compounding the problem and families as you just heard are incredibly desperate is it almost nate as if there are 2 americas ok the trumpet ministration is about to be a thing of the pos but we've got ivanka trump saying we're creating jobs we're creating prosperity we've got donald trump although he hasn't done it recently saying we're looking after all americans and then this is the real america where people are just a couple of months away from real serious problem areas because they can't get enough money because they haven't got a job haven't got a job and that 3 paychecks away from slipping through the cracks. you know we've been seeing growing inequality in the united states for ears if not decades now and i think what kobe has done is really accelerated that you know it's the folks working hourly jobs folks in the service industry including the restaurant and food and beverage sector that have lost their job you know bought by the 10s of millions

and so what's ended up happening is you know folks that have maybe perhaps a more stable and secure job folks whose money is in the stock market you know the stock market is going up and so you know certain folks can say well our economy's doing really well but then you go to a city yesterday we were in miami florida which is a fairly wealthy city as you probably know and there was a distribution of gift cards to go to the grocery store you know thousands of people lined up to get a gift card to buy food at a grocery store they actually came the night before and slept in their cars because they didn't want to miss this opportunity so absolutely we're really seeing this divergence where you have a growing desperation amongst working hard working americans just trying to get through and sort of a bit of an apathy by from those that really are doing much better that don't have to worry about all of the impacts of code on their lives and in fact can benefit from some of the some of the things like the increase in the stock market who's

failing whom he and nate i mean at some level maybe 2 months ago or 3 months ago perhaps even back right to the beginning of the pandemic shoni local politicians with telling congressman they were telling sentences maybe you've done this i don't know tell us if you have please people like you must have been having conversations with local politicians who were reporting it up the food chain saying look we have got a big problem coming here because we've done the interviews on this program you know we've had people on the show saying the american economy is constantly broken anyway because to go back to what i said earlier you know it's people a 2 or 3 months away from not being able to live hand to mouth. absolutely i think there's been failures on multiple levels you're seeing failures at the local and state levels from from officials who initially did not take the crisis very seriously and that compounded the problems because it led to additional

shutdowns and lock downs that are needed but ultimately you know the way that the system should work is that when the states can't handle a crisis or a disaster like this that's when the federal government has to step in and support and this is what happens after hurricanes after wildfires this is a very normal course of action in the united states unfortunately with coded this is not happened our federal emergency management agency f.e.m.a. has been missing in action despite this being a national disaster declaration the united states we have not had additional funding or support to states sense the springtime when the last stimulus bill act. passed and now we're you know really it's just been a long sort of depletion of that support at the local and state level and you know we have been absolutely pushing all the way up the chain and you know the disagreements at the federal government level have created this paralysis about how

best to support and in the process the folks that are really getting feeling the impact of that are the families are the hard working americans that are just trying to get through the day and you know there's not really any clarity that there is any hope or any support coming from up above now certainly that could change with the new administration you know incoming president elect joe biden has said that there is going to be a big effort to support to get the american economy going again and to support americans in just getting through the day getting through the month so you know perhaps there's some light at the end of the tunnel coming especially with vaccines on the way but we still have a number of hard months ahead of us this is not going to suddenly correct itself immediately in fact it's going to. it worse before it gets better so you know it's unfortunate we've been pushing at world central kitchen for the federal government to unlock existing disaster funds that have literally just been sitting in a bank account not being spent to support those hungry families and we've been

hitting a wall and so you know it really is a challenging time to get anything done politically in this country and the fact that it's in the middle of cope with that that's happening is is simply an american tragedy ok tonight good to talk to you at this difficult time thank you very much nic nic there in washington thank you so much. 10 years ago a fruit seller in tunis c.s.'s himself on fire in a desperate and a fatal act of protests mohammed was easy actions tapped into frustration and fury at home and across the region leading to what became known as the arab spring tunisia is an arab country the transition into democracy but many say things have only got worse and they were muted commemorations in city boozy and a chin as he is revolution began bernard smith is there. they're looking for a way out of city boozy the specially choreographed dance is being staged to mark the 10th anniversary of the start of the tunisian revolution its performers hope

that their skills will get them work outside tunisia the revolution has failed them the eldest here is $24.00 that's young to be disillusioned. they called trees going to the wall really going to the world nothing change it's like there was no revolution we only changed the precedent that it though it has there is too much freedom now but with it the others there is no security like there was before you can be killed going to the stadium to watch a football match this kind of thing never happened before. he set himself on fire to protest against police in city booze eed who often demanded bribes so he could sell from his street car was the spark for unprecedented protests the forced an autocratic president to flee. led to the arab spring that toppled regimes across the middle east. is there. tunisia is one of the only arab countries where democracy survives but incomes are fallen by

a 5th over the past decade and. can't leave on where the jobs may. life is more expensive $100.00 a month job is only enough money for yourself if you have a family it's very difficult. this is the memorial to mohammed who is easy tunisia's unemployment rate was 11 percent when he died today it's more than 15 percent there's been a 4 fold increase in the amount of illegal migration to europe just in the last 12 months. this generation protested against the wall for a tarion rule of xena bettina ben ali their anger and frustration at how things have turned out is clear. life is really very beautiful and we have a very beautiful life we lived happily together we loved each other we used to have everything now we don't have anything only crime in of a bad thing. the economy here is expected to contract by 6.5 percent this year that's

a significant challenge for any country but there's arguably more pressure to get through the downturn in tunisia where it's jasmine revolution is often held up as an example of how popular uprisings can succeed in the middle east bernard smith al-jazeera city boos eat. still to come here on the news. the verdict is in as russia appeals against its 4 year old major sporting event and the story is waiting in the wings in about 90 seconds it's.

oh. to.

make way for andy with the sports news thank you so much fateful russia has had its ban from major sporting events reduced it serious after an appeal hearing the world anti-doping agency had given the country a 4 year penalty last year i want to believe that a lot of data handed over by russia during an investigation had been tampered with now despite the suspension being hauled by the court of arbitration for sport russia will not officially be represented at next year's tokyo olympics all the 2022 football world cup in qatar now joining us from berlin is one of the journalists who broke the story about systemic doping in russia back in 2014 great to have you on with us just give us the russian are behind this ban being reduced is it any sort of victory for russia. i'm not sure to be honest i would say it's a surprise little. cuss the national court of arbitration sports has refused about quarter to 3 years. but i don't know is the official reasoning so far because it's

not available ot the web so we don't know what spectrums it's just speculation of the moment but what i would say is still clear and russia has achieved that sense russia has many benita it's you don't need systems sports system was still being poor not a few years at least since 2012 maybe so it's very tricky as that situation is as clear and that's russia is guilty but. the appeal the decision by wada mother. is on hold and i believe that there might have been some influence from international sports federations were close to russia and just building up on that what does the main because we will actually still see russian athletes at the next and thanks for example. yes we will see a russian how to get the olympics and also what other major big sports event sports

event but with no russian jerseys was the old russian flex no russian from is allowed no victory ceremony was russians there are symbols oh yeah and so if that is a punishment that is one observer major parts of as punishment section and also russia is not allowed to bid in this 2 years period from no 160 don't use them for 2 stars or 22 to bid for any major big global event and not also not sure if you're a mix and russia is not allowed to host any big event like world championships and edge might be a big discussion in the next couple of months because for example some sports federation have already. granted their a big advance to russia and know you have such discussion if state these events at russia have to be cancelled so the story is not over yet and we will have big trouble i guess the next couple of months when some sports federation will say we

cannot cancel the there because you can eat and was in terms of tokenization we are now so far that we cannot catch that you know because you cannot return as a place. joining us from berlin thank you so much as ever for your time high i thank you. now the head of european football has told al jazeera that you could be doing more to fight racism in the game but alex on that shefrin says football does need more support from governments to help tackle the problem football is a reflection of society many things football spectators coming. to watch football in principle they're very positive they're nice people they they are not racists. there's always a number of people who misuse football matches because of its impact of the reach to exercise these those. yes we are doing everything we can

we are trying to educate the people we are punishing but we need help from the government governments can see us if i should do something and at the same time they let. it happen in some countries without any any consequence so it's a big fight it's not an easy one but whoever says you are facing not doing anything or doesn't have a clue what you are face doing or has bad intentions i i can admit maybe we are not doing enough and we will try to do as much as we can but we are doing it we are dealing with it it's not easy to deal with it and we need governments to to join any of governments. are tolerating that kind of behavior then how can they expect us to police the police in their countries now australia and india have been playing their 1st test cricket since the resumption of the international game after the coronavirus induced shutdown india closing on 233 for 6 at the adelaide oval

captain very coldly hope be heading back home after this 1st test for the paternity leave he scored 74 before being run outs this is the 1st of a 4 match series up 227000 fans being committed into the stadium that's roughly half capacity. and not a great day for ford simon big 7 champion ben ainslie in his efforts win next year's america's cup is seen u.k. boat hit by technical problems and forced to retire from its 2nd race in this america's cup world series in new zealand this is a competition to find out who take on the defending champions that sleep while new zealand is not squadron next year united states challenging american magic or they've looked the most likely winners so far. ok more sport for me coming up throughout the night but that is how we're looking for and it's. and dave thank you very much we'll see you later on i'm sure lots more news on the web site al jazeera dot com is the address you need to i'll have 30 minutes of al-jazeera world news

for you in about 2 minutes from now hopefully see that. american people have finally folk in america is i split when america is off balance or will become more dangerous the world is looking at us live mixture of sadness and seek. with the election behind us will the republican party dump truck to the feel weak take on us politics and society that's the bottom line.

al jazeera where every. i was raised in france. these are my grandparents. these are my parents and this is mean. fighting both isis and us on. this 2nd of a teapot epic tale of a remarkable family. the father the son and the jihad. to on al-jazeera. 'd held for over 3 years in an egyptian prison cell denied their right to a fair trial no charges have been brought against al jazeera correspondent manager saying his crime journalism. to demand more neutral links and voice solidarity with all detained journalists sign the petition. 3

o'clock news saying. freshman sunny day and jury in government to secure the release of hundreds of students kidnapped from a school last week. and i'm peter w. watching al-jazeera live from doha also coming up the french president emanuel tests positive for corona virus prompting leaders of spain and portugal to go into self isolation. the u.s. records more than 3 and a half 1000 the highest daily toll since the.