sees the best opportunities in the heart of eurasia. although there's considerable uncertainty it may be up to 70 percent more transmissible than the old very original version of the disease. the u.k. alerts the world health organization to a new fast spreading strain of corona virus prime minister boris johnson has announced a christmas lockdown for millions of people. peter w. watching on 20 live from doha also coming up the government of central african republic accuses a former president of attempting

a coup before elections the un's peacekeeping mission puts troops on high alert. president donald trump makes his 1st comments about one of the biggest hacking operations in u.s. history and says russia is being unfairly blamed. we meet the park rangers in zimbabwe who are using drones to protect animals from poachers. ok let's kick off in the u.k. where the prime minister boris johnson in the last hour or so has tightened coronavirus restrictions off a new strain of the virus emerged in london and the southeast of england the world health organization has been alerted to this mutated strain early research however suggests it's up to 70 percent more transmissible but there is no evidence that it is resistant to vaccines mr johnston said he was forced to take action. given

the early evidence we have on this new variant of the virus the potential risk it poses it is with a very heavy heart i must tell you we cannot continue with christmas as planned in england those living in tearful areas should not mix with anyone outside their own household at christmas though support bubbles will remain in place for those a particular risk of loneliness or isolation. challenges our correspondent in london this hour so rory christmas has gone from 5 days to one day. well if it even exists at all i mean. in the week he said it would be inhumane to cancel christmassy mocks the leader of the opposition in parliament for wanting to cancel christmas and now he's done pretty much just that at least for people who live in

london and that's millions of them people who live in the south east of england and people who live in the east of invent these people are all going to tear for it didn't exist before it does now it essentially resembles the 1st national lockdown where you're basically told to stay inside you have to have a very good reason for going out of the house yes you can go to work if you really have to but you shouldn't be mingling at all with other families or other households and that time of year where that's the you know the main purpose of this holidays is getting together with the people you love and you can't do that anymore so what does christmas really mean in those circumstances if you devout size of these new tearful areas or the christmas the you had been looking forward see which was 5 days of being able to gather with 3 other households that is being reduced now to one day just christmas day itself of mixing with 3 other households

but yes this is a big step that the government's taken and a step that i think many will say. it didn't have to or it should have made though those if shouldn't of got itself into the position where when it was being are asked to counsel christmas by those who thought that it was a bad idea 10 days ago it didn't want to take that decision and it's left it to 6 days before christmas to take the decision that many said was inevitable anyway not sure e any of us we or anyone watching the prime minister quite understands the reality of this when he talks about it being 70 percent more transmissible this newly identified mutation of the corona virus by definition if it's 70 percent more transmissible surely it's 70 percent more dangerous because that's more people who are going to get the virus and have to battle back against it perhaps. well yeah i mean if more people are getting it and it is. as dangerous as the other strain of

the virus then you would thought that the near the death rate is going to go up and what they are saying is that this is not any more deadly. as far as we're aware of the moment in and of itself than the other strain of the virus and they're also saying that there is no evidence to suggest yet that the this new strain reacts differently to the various vaccinations. being developed and rolled out of the moment so you know the good news is that it doesn't seem to be any more deadly and the vaccines hopefully will continue to work but the bad news of course is that it infecting more people you know the figures that the infection rates in london has doubled in the last week and 60 percent of those new infections all of this new variant so clearly it is spreading fast and that's why the government has decided

to take this action it's going to be. a dark christmas period full for most of this country and i think that's going to be something is going to weigh very heavily on people's minds rory thank you very much for a challenge in london the u.s. is yet another record for new coronavirus cases almost 250000 cases confirmed on friday friday the number of people in hospital has surged to a record high for the 13th day in a row but there are small signs of hope with the approval of madonna's qubit 19 banks in. the u.s. president all trump has contradicted his secretary of state by saying russia is being unfairly blamed for a major cyber attack the secretary of state might pompei or says it's quotes pretty clear that russian hackers are behind an ongoing cyber attack more than 40 organizations have been targeted including 6 government departments cyber security experts say it could take months to undo the damage mr trump taking to his favorite

forum twitter the cyber attack is far greater in the fake news media than in actuality i've been fully briefed and everything is well under control russia russia russia is the priority charm twin anything happens because a lame stream is for mostly financial reasons petrified often then i suspect that was unless he lost the plot completely there was another tweet to follow but you can follow him on twitter if you want to keep up with that castro is our correspondent in washington so might pompei or says one thing and then his boss says something that the direct opposite of that heidi. that's right peter this is the 1st time that president shrum has said anything about this massive security breach which experts are characterizing as the most severe wish in 2 decades against u.s. cyber networks yet president trump as you said on twitter today saying that

everything was well under control which is consistent contradictory to what my pump ailes said yesterday when he said it would take months to fully and back the damage and just the day prior the cybersecurity arm of the department of homeland security issued a warning saying that the federal government may be at dire risk because of this breach and in fact they were they may be more tools that the hackers use that have yet to be identified meeting this rage could be ongoing as we speak microsoft saying that 40 companies half of them private half of them government agencies were targeted in this breach that began as early as march perhaps even sooner than that and these include nuclear laboratories it includes companies that oversee the power grid so certainly of potential danger to the american public but as you just read president trump's tweet and if i may follow up with a 2nd tweet he did send

a paraphrase that he went on to again allege that he won this election and again he said that russia may have been whoever the hackers were china he said possibly had targeted voting machines which again comes out of thin air there is simply no concrete evidence to support that when you talk to u.s. intelligence itself which all says in this last month in office of president trump in the white house behind me he appears potentially will not take any responsibility over how the 6 this mess instead of passing that off to president elect joe biden who did say that whoever wrist is responsible for this hack will incur the. nethercutt costs peter at any point over the last 4 years 4 and a half years heidi has mr trump ever said anything that you could interpret as being even slightly critical of russia vladimir putin.

you know it's hard to come up with a list peter because the list of him saying flattering things about putin or defending russia's role as much longer and certainly that has been a head scratcher over the last 4 years of this presidency from the beginning people were claiming that that trump was a puppet of latin america who didn't to the end he certainly is not doing taking all the measures that some would hope he does to defend what is very apparent to be a task against the united states from russia many things heidi jocasta there our correspondent reporting on the developing story from washington the u.n. secretary general and tony has called on armed groups in central african republic to put their weapons peacekeepers were deployed ahead of elections on december 27th a number of armed groups have banded together 3 of them so form a new alliance the president forced in are changed whatever has been accused of

planning electoral fraud to secure a 2nd carcass covered the situation in ca are extensively for us here on al-jazeera he gave me this update from senegal just a little earlier. we know that 11 armed groups some of the signature we have this of this statement against the president essentially have started deploying their troops have called on armed groups to head towards the capital bangui and as a result the 12000 strong un peacekeeping force have taken position on main arteries leading to the capital so has been deployed the central african republic army that was trained by the russians that is out in deployed to try to stop any of these forces from entering the capital just one week before this much anticipated presidential election so why are they all marching towards the capital simply because they say the president is not respecting the agreement that they had signed in 2001000 and khartoum which was in effect to give these armed groups leaders

a position in government but also funds so that they could disarm remember these armed groups have control over large territories i mean we're talking about central african republic is the size of france there are some of these armed groups that have control of areas that are the size of wales or scotland and that's what's at stake in this election is to try to restart lish the rule of law in the government in places where it has retreated but also come to help to these millions of central african republic people who populations have seen little of their governments helping them ok let's stay with the story to get a vehicle on cool news the french institute of international relations observatory of central and southern africa he says the unrest in could make it difficult for elections to go ahead and splenda. possible both he's a was the main challenge real president where the law was a teenager from the electoral raid by the constitutional cool thought that convened

. some of the armed groups president bush he's a supporter and actually the electrical bit. then we lose your legs or. competition and the. there won't be a new room for them i think it will be of course very. period between the 2 rounds of elections but the problem presently is that the 1st runoff election is very gone from i and i don't see happening next week because it is scheduled on 27 of them but that given the security situation right now would be the of course impossible to organize elections they are russian missile batteries in some shore up again repeatably their reserve a russian security advisor with the president where they are actually both russian

. also clearly engaged he does the are fighting with the president so that when the all you receive all the gold silver the gift from russia and played build will he call the bomb we will send a signal that is good a good forensic bore. still to come here on this program a harsh winter at the ministry of tens of thousands of syrians displaced by war. 2 years after the revolution in sudan thousands are gathering to them on a more formal will happily says from. hello the weather maze pretty quiet across the middle east we've got some wet weather just sliding across possibly iran for a time we have got

a few showers coming in here some what's the weather there into afghanistan pushing up into took many stop and elsewhere across regions you can see it's lossie dry for little on the cool side getting up into the mid teens over towards the levant maybe a 19 celsius the 4 beirut hearing the winds picking up as we go on through sunday 25 celsius by time we come to monday we may will struggle to get to 22 degrees but hopefully the winds feeling a little lighter at that stage could catch want to into west central parts of saudi right but nothing much to speak of. just around the southern end of the red sea and again on the other side of the water you might just can't see around your beauty around the ethiopian highlands plenty of showers meanwhile into the hostel of africa the seasonal rain 70 pepping up now some really wet weather coming into that eastern side of angola will see some wet weather just spilling out to botswana and makes its way into namibia and some really heavy right on this one actually it will

gradually sink its way further south was as we go through sunday monday going on into choose day with a chance of fighting for central pass south africa. frank assessments you've got colleagues on the ground and in the canaries what is the situation there is only one doctor and one nurse for $2200.00 people informed opinions how big does foreign policy figure in the early stages of a buy ministration he comes into office with a huge amount of foreign policy experience in-depth analysis of the day's global headlines how will a place like it'll get the vaccine when there's no money at all the rest of the rich countries are fighting for an inside story on al-jazeera.

ok let's just recap the top stories for you this half hour on al-jazeera the u.k. prime minister boris johnson in the last hour or so tightening coronavirus restrictions after a new strain of the virus most in london and the southeast of england the world health organization has been alerted to this mutation early research suggests it's up to 70 percent more transmittable. u.s. president donald trump in the last hour also contradicting his own secretary of state by saying russia is being unfairly blamed for a major cyber attack by com peo earlier saying it's course pretty clear that russian hackers are behind the on going cyber incident. demonstrations are taking place in sudan's capital for 22 years since the uprising that ousted the president omar bashir from office some groups are voicing their anger against the current transitional government al-jazeera said that morgan is with the protesters on the

ground in. it's not just the 2nd anniversary author of that started in december 18th eventually led to the president on a pursuit it's also the adverse of the declaration of sudan's independence from parliament so it is quite a significant day but people here say that there will be movement in their living conditions in terms of because they have a transitional government in place a transitional government that's 18 months old but i was brought to power by revolution by protesters our political parties that met the protest movement so they were. very disappointed at the fact that their health conditions have not improved their living conditions have not improved the economic situation in the country has not improved so a lot of disappointment lots of hunger there has been a displacement that have been passed by the sons of over the past 14 months as well . more rights to the people here in the country but that's day to day.

living conditions so still the anger is there and then there's the issue of justice for those who've lost their lives over the past 2 years sense of the demonstrations began more than 300 people have lost their lives the more the majority of them during the attack on the 2nd are doing this thing that they're demanding the government makes 1st thing it does is provide justice and accountability for the families also the fact that. there has been an investigation but there has been no one charge that is frustrating the people here. some of these 344 boys who were kidnapped in northern nigeria describe more about their ordeal than back home with their parents in the state of siena men raided their school and took them last friday holding them in a forest full details of the rescue still aren't clear including whether a ransom was paid. to be honest there was no shoot or water through no shelter no break and the friday we were taken we spent 2 days without sleep. it was

leaves and after 2 days without food we were given fresh potatoes and pieces of ground not cake. when you see him alive frankly speaking i feel like his conscious me paradise because i'm so happy after spending 2 days without eating anything a mother is more than 90 years old and i am lost and she stopped eating and drinking in addition my 3 sisters would mete to hospital. well. with the boys in their homes and their families have told him the children will not return to school until the government guarantees they will be safe. the mood is festive in the home of muslim character over the city is minimal and then the sun pink this is what they have been seeing in the last 24 hours labour's friends and one was just coming in to congratulate and felicitated with them on the safe return of their son and this is the mood or the scene repeated in almost every home impacted

by the events of the last one week since the return of the boys 344 of them yesterday the mood in canberra has changed from a mournful mood to that of festive shelves are beginning to open long faces are replaced with smiles and activities going on as normal in can get out but one thing they are talking about is that they need more security a lot of the children we've spoken to since our arrival here say they don't have the confidence to return to school now until they see tangible results on the ground in terms of security put in place by the government to protect them. heavy rain and strong winds are adding to the plight of syrian refugees living in overcrowded camps the u.n. says at least 21 camps in the last rebel stronghold have been destroyed by severe weather regular mohammad has more. to run children in floods into this refugee camp in northwest syria families are doing whatever they can to stay warm in makeshift

tents covered in mud hallock now say the of our condition is very bad we have no proper tents nor a proper living i have 10 children and we do not get any and we collect firewood to run the heater. aid agencies estimates nearly half a 1000000 people are huddled in camps like this in italy and the last rebel held area in syria rains are affecting this area particularly badly the drainage system is poor and flood water is seeping into overcrowded shelters basic supplies are running out. our situation is dire we do not get aid and we don't have heaters or fuel roads that lead to the camp a cut off because it's based on an agricultural land it's been described as the largest mass displacement in almost 10 years of conflict in syria millions are now homeless after a russian backed syrian government offensive this year and now the u.n. warns the harsh winter could become a breeding ground for the coronavirus and other deadly diseases overcrowding in the

camps is making it difficult to keep a social distance. we were displaced during the regime's last campaign we are suffering a lot and are going to be tense would fall in us and we'd have to keep on resetting them applaud the night look it's like upon and it's as though in venice would need to go from one tent to the next where are the humanitarian organizations. many of the people here have nowhere else to go and they're desperate for help from the international community they've lived through harsh winters like this before now they cling to whatever hope they can find in this camp facing another battle in a long war they're hoping to survive. mohammed al jazeera a former french modeling agent and associates of the late u.s. billionaire jeffrey epstein has been charged with sex crimes 74 year old john bruno who ran an agency in paris has been in custody since his arrest earlier this week

the prosecutor statement says he's been charged with the rape of minors and sexual harassment. u.s. prosecutors in a federal judge to reject a near $30000000.00 bail deal for julian maxwell a friend of epstein has pleaded not guilty to charges of helping him recruit and groom underage girls to engage in sex acts prosecutors say maxwell should remain behind bars because the evidence against her is strong and they also fear she could flee the country rescue teams in fiji are working to reach people in remote areas after cycler and yes it made landfall on thursday as a powerful category 5 storm forcing thousands to evacuate their homes reconnaissance flights are found entire villages destroyed and crops damaged rescue workers fear the death toll of 4 will rise sharply once contact is established with outlying areas a huge dust storm has covered parts of central argentina video shows the cloud wharf in trees and everything else in its path in colonia bar on it didn't cause

big problems but there was a tornado and damaging winds in areas not far away 2 endangered the back home in indonesia 3 years after they were taken by smugglers to thailand they are being kept for health checks before hopefully being released back into the wild between $2.30 during the times are killed every year mostly by poachers. zimbabwe's national parks and are using drones to patrol vast areas and would be poachers that's because the government doesn't have the resources to carry out the patrols themselves has more now from one gate in the northwest of the country. with zimbabwe's economy further damaged by the pen demick patrolling its biggest game reserve is a challenge to make up shortfalls in funding. drones are now being used in one game national park it covers an area of more than 14000 square kilometers

approximately half the size of belgium game warden say these drones are proving effective where there aren't enough boots on the ground we are green for trialists of these drones they of announced our week and the quality of the picture i will take in the event that we find illegal activities is crystal clear and in terms of iraq coverage we've increased our coverage so always came through in a way that can be done with 345 rangers in a split off like in 20 to 30 minutes one challenge faced by rangers is the limited flying time of the drones they can only stay in the air for about half an hour with a range of or at least 16 kilometers conservationists home to about 800000 elephants that's around a 5th of africa's total population in recent years poachers of use cyanide to poison elephants birds and other animals in this national park wildlife officials say parts nativity declined this year thanks to the use of drones the introduction

of tougher sentences on poachers and the shift to kill policy covered 911 restrictions have also deterred local and foreign poachers i think there is directions in terms of movement of people that is a big draw in terms of all. pushing. care flows. movement rather blocks. the number of people who come to this. normally most of the people come to kim long long long long long distance from. according to statistics from the government agencies and parks this year 20 elephants were killed by poachers down from 30 killings recorded last year and only 8 rhinos down from 29 in 2019 officials say that's a big step towards conservation efforts not just in zimbabwe but the whole region. wangel. street has developed new characters to support children in the world's biggest refugee camp in bangladesh the puppets nor under the tender to

support children who fled. explains. your children have got to new friends just like them 6 year old nor and her twin brother. they see so many street markets and join the forecast and cox's bazaar bangladesh to provide education for young revenger refute. children in bangladesh after their last exhibitors in 2017 there haven't been anything done for them their education has been ignored for many years so this is one of the 1st life for our young children 800000 revenger live in cox's bizarre half of them are children it's the world's largest refugee camp many experienced extreme trauma fleeing me en masse after a violent military crackdown in 27 taking. my name is so my

are my home this summer cool refugee camp they called us foreigners we fled burma crossing tall mountains when i remember those days i get scared and can't sleep for many these camps have compounded this suffering the new show wants to help them process these emotions through plague it's not the 1st time the t.v. show has tried to help young refugees in recent years 6 in the street has teamed with n.g.o.s and governments to support other children to her grave or i am from sesame street push their agenda at the un seen here with the nominee for u.s. secretary of state tony blinken refugees are just like us. to afghanistan with a launch to local version of the show and created sari a 6 year old afghan girl. who enjoyed sports and this year welcome say some of the show in arabic and kurdish to support children displaced by the syrian war.

sesame street was created half a century ago as an experiment in early education for a hinge of children nor an aziza welcome friends but with a big task ahead challenge ballasts al-jazeera. this is al-jazeera these are the top stories the u.k. prime minister boris johnson has tightened coronavirus restrictions after a new strain of the virus emerged in london and the south east of england the world health organization has been alerted to this retreated strain early research suggests up to 70 percent more transmissible given the early evidence we have on this new variant of the virus the potential risk it poses it is with a very heavy heart i must tell you we cannot continue with christmas.