their entire life. a ceremony has been held in lebanon's capital to remember those killed in the august port explosion people released lanterns at night in a suburb close to the site of the blast hundreds of people were killed and thousands left injured after the explosion. 'd 'd for let's have a quick check of the headlines here on out is there are several european nations are banning all restricting travel from the u.k. trying to stop the spread of a fast moving strain of coronavirus even parts of the united kingdom if british government has put millions under tough new restrictions the u.s. senate majority leader says a deal has been reached on a massive covert 19 relief package for millions of americans politicians will vote on the $900000000000.00 deal on monday this comes a shipments for the 2nd approved cave 19 vaccine have begun across the united

states how did to castro has more from washington the senate republican leader mitch mcconnell speaking on the floor saying that the coded package has a deal as well as the very important bill to keep the federal government open past midnight now he says all all that's missing is to finalize the text and to bar any last minute obstacles. spyware sold by an israeli private intelligence firm has been used to hack the phone of dozens of journalists research's citizen lab say the unprecedented cyber attack is likely to be noticed by saudi arabia and the united arab emirates british and european union negotiators are to continue trade talks in the belgian capital brussels on monday past the latest deadline they still have to sort out 2 issues the block fishing rights in british waters and fair competition rules for businesses and no deal breaks it would lead to tariffs on goods crossing the border and possible shortages of some foods and medicines in the united kingdom

. ceremony has been held in beirut to remember those killed in an explosion devastated lebanon's capital 4 months ago a short time ago lanterns were launched in a suburb close to the site of the august blast of the city's hundreds were killed and thousands injured when the explosive material night. somalia and kenya have agreed to hold talks to restore diplomatic ties off the east african leaders held an emergency summit in djibouti smiley cut ties with kenya on choose day accusing it of meddling in its internal affairs leaders of the intergovernmental authority on development or it get it may dealing with the dispute a priority a bloc is also looking to tackle the humanitarian crisis in ethiopia is going to great region. so today with headlines more news here announcer right off the inside story from.

hong kong and macau to a special administrative region of china and just a short ferry ride between the 2 but while there's resistance in hong kong to beijing's tightening control macau has embraced the one country 2 systems rule so why have they taken different paths this is inside story. hello and welcome to the program i'm. a tiny former portuguese colony macau has marked 21 years since its return to china it was agreed in 1909 that the territory would be governed under the chinese one country 2 systems rule as is the case with

hong kong but this is where the similarity between the 2 in many people in hong kong criticize china for undermining freedoms which were meant to be guaranteed for 50 years when sovereignty was handed back by the u.k. in 1970 macau on the other hand has remained largely unaffected by the pro-democracy protests in hong kong and beijing has hailed it as a role model for how the political system works dave you go on reports. this is a tale of 2 cities macau a former portuguese colony now a casino powerhouse the other hong kong a former british colony and an international financial center both returned to chinese rule in the late 1990 s. . but while hong kong pushed back against beijing's tightening control in the following years that with little opposition in macau macau has a large population with a very strong mainland chinese attachment emotion the politically and culturally

having said that in the reason years there are a minority of young people in macau who tend to support western style democracy and one of those is 29 year old sulu sue an opposition member of my cows legislative assembly who says gaining support for the fight for democracy is an uphill battle. for. china many people. started. while the british in hong kong instilled the idea of democracy in their final years the portuguese largely recognise china's sovereignty over macau. mainland china is crucial for the city's economy bestowing favorable policies to sting tourism and

building major infrastructure projects like the $20000000000.00 hong kong macao zhou highbridge perhaps this is the most tangible symbol of the communist party's push to integrate hong kong and macau into mainland china when it was launched 2 years ago it became the 1st physical link between the 2 former colonies and set them up for the next phase of unification the greater bay area development plan it's part of beijing's efforts to knit hong kong macau and southern chinese cities into a tech. home. and . so. it's left west a strong china. i'm to. china's

leaders sheeting paying called macau a shining example of the one country 2 systems policy one that beijing says hong kong outspoken people could learn from difficult poland al-jazeera hong kong. alright let's bring in our guests in hong kong we have andrew alone an international china strategist steve saying is director of the trying to institute as a way as university of london and he joins us from nottingham and joining us from hong kong is stephen vines a journalist and author who specializes in china's politics welcome to each of you stephen vines let me start with you today mccowan the hong kong have a lot in common but why are their views and stances toward democracy seemingly so different. a lot of it's to do with the history of the 2 places is as your report that we've just seen showed it's a very small place it has

a very different history from hong kong but i think most importantly more or less now the majority of the people in macau come from the chinese mainland they're much closer emotionally and politically to the communist system that prevails on the mainland and indeed they haven't had the long tradition that there's been in hong kong by a long i mean a few decades of being part of a democracy movement having pressure on the austerity is to enhance the democratic governments of hong kong none of these things that happened in macau so you know there's actually quite a big divide between the andhra loan is macau really a one country 2 systems success story. well i spend my boyhood to cull supplies and to the qualifier myself formally or some occult citizen as well so i know because pretty well say the mccall isn't

very very different components on in this political makeup course this is tree and it is various institutions. but because of the lack of interest in taking part in ever so real politics in a cult and because of people they are all mostly employed by one single industry which is the. gambling and convention industry. you know they're not really interested in politics so comparing hong kong and call is really comparing talk with cheese they are very very different. and of course because of the compliant kind of. come out population. one country 2 systems seems to be. succeeding reasonably well but in the sense of of course

because of the kind of legal system based on the portuguese kind of all before ringback they had over they were culled. the portuguese got them oh the chinese government actually before they had over trains all the potential legal offices in in in portugal and even some of the future administrators so them a current administration was not prepared to become to return to the motherland under the one country 2 system of a cow. steve saying let me ask you you heard what andrew was saying there about you know how macau being more pro trying to many people attribute that to the fact the portuguese were proactive in integrating communist party of china elements into macau is governance ahead of the handover do you think that's correct what is so to me and imminent or true in the us the portuguese colonial ministrations

was much more willing to work with the chinese authorities even before 1990 but to meet a really big difference between hong kong and account was the reality that in the late colonial hong kong it valid a very large and libron and increasingly well of middle class and it is the middle class that would assert right ste those they were given to understand as a beta boat in the late british colonial era with a very strong will for all political system so you're talking about a place where you have this normal strong why bring me to come it mundingburra rights and therefore going full democratic rights which simply did not exist in macau and that's also why macau after 999 could be so readily

compliant with the expectations of the chinese authorities in beijing and in that sense beijing would be considering macau assess it one country 2 systems but not you know one country 2 systems is to learn to be and the student in the sense of what it was going to kuwait conditions 2 are now. hong kong or macao 2 biggest danger the sekret and disdained fundament of china stephen vines by and large how did the people of macau react to the protests in hong kong and was there a generational split in how the people of macau perceived what was going on in hong kong well i think that's very interesting because the the fact is that there have not been widespread protests in macau but there have been among younger people

but a lot of interest in what's going on or what has been going on in hong kong incidentally quite a lot of young people from account came over to hong kong to take part in the protests among the older generation maybe not so much interest but i think that although you haven't seen anything like the kind of protests at any level in macau that you have seen in hong kong that doesn't mean that there isn't a generation of people there who aren't interested in the inherent seeing democracy and indeed in asserting the autonomy that was promised to them under the one country 2 systems i think that perhaps as macau develops but this of course assumes that they won't keep filling it up with people from the mainland but as macau develops we're probably going to see more in macau on that side of things and you

learn over the years how much of an effort have macao as political leaders put into enacting legislation that would curb dissent. well there's not much that is said to occur in the 1st place in the call. because the population was largely compliant and then they've seen a huge sort of economic and job opportunities and there is this in the beginning about well you know without worrying about where the ordering above there's the soriano politics which of pain in hong kong and also of course because the. in hong kong the what was not in the joint declaration that universal suffrage was included in the homes basic law. but the election of the chief executive there's a catch to it in the eyes of b.j.

that he can do this he could be prescreened in fact that there's a state that say that in the basic law that. is the election of the chief executive the candidates have got to be selected by. election committee. but this is regarded as not democratic and that the package for universal suffrage was rejected and that wore it through the kind of birth of walkman and later the kind of anti extradition bill kind of movement and the whole city is now. absolutely divided and that's not the same as in the car steve saying are there freedoms and liberties that exist for the people of macau that do not exist in mainland china. i think you do have a higher degree of all individual freedom and autonomy in the couch then you have

on the mainland of china i think what we're dealing with here is a trend of irony the comments party of china is about control china proper i mean and china is completely under the control of the colonies. and they are very cautious in terms of allowing for much of school or any activities that were amongst to any challenge of authority of the chinese state now in macau and in hong kong they are actually willing to allow for more school of their kind of activities polite it those activities do not amount to any challenge who don't already of the communist party and that is where you have to distinction. in hong kong people asserted it much more and as a result of which a chinese government a communist party imposed very stringent control now in hong kong which it hasn't

even holds in macau because the people of macau i'm lot asserting that right so much so what we are is that we've the people of macau word to assert the individual rights promised to them under one country 2 systems morto then they would face what people in hong kong face as well stephen vines if we're talking about china seeing macau as a model example of one country 2 systems let me ask you this does china see macau as a model of that one country 2 systems that could perhaps convince taiwan of following the same path. well i mean let's look at the history of this the original concept of one country's systems from china was paramount leader done shopping in the 1980 s. was actually aimed at taiwan it was conceived for bringing taiwan back into the

fold of mainland china and hong kong and macau was seemed to be the testing grounds they thought you know we'll give it a go there and the people of taiwan will be persuaded that it will be a good system for them the reality is that security since the crackdown in hong kong is that the people in taiwan have become more alienated from the mainland and indeed as we saw in the presidential election that occurred at the end of last year in time where the winning candidate president cheney one made a point at every single rally that she held of saying if you want to be like conk all vote for the opposition don't vote for me so i mean the p.r.c. has done a fantastic job in mobilizing the people of taiwan away from its primary objective and taiwan is much more important to mainland china than hong kong or macao and you

learn does china hope to make macau a replacement for hong kong as an international finance center and financial hub. well i don't think that there's any equivalence between hong kong and macau. and least of all i don't think that beijing wants to use macau as an example of reuniting taiwan because that taiwan port things are entirely different because a lot of the people who. buy one born 'd in taiwan and their little kind of empathy with the brain that but as far as the cow this concern and there is no comparison even though because. in per capita terms is the 2nd richest territory in the world does. a little less simple and is.

twice as rich as all kong or the per capita basis but in terms of international look at activity in terms of being a vital center in terms of. being held up as a. metropolitan city there's simply no comparison so i don't think that beijing's. could be used at the example even though beijing could be satisfied with that how things are going because of the one country 2 system but the letter to the very very different struck from cheese steve saying nearly half of the population of macau were born in mainland china and you compare that to just over 20 percent of the population in hong kong do the people of macau turn to mainland china more when it comes to the purposes of identification. i think people in macau accepted the unification and with china they have

i think as one of your other guests say some people who also want to develop democracy in macau but they are the minority and they know that and therefore they are much more willing to work with the chinese government i think is . a slightly dubious assumptions that eve somebody were born going to mean and of china and then to relocate us to i don't call all know how they would necessarily continue to simply support the chinese communist party system i think you have very mixed picture there some of the people who are left mainland china for hong kong all macau wanted to have a much freer. political and bowman's to live and work now some of them don't so they are also very very mixed and i don't think we should go into is kind

of communal divisions and assume that somebody born in china won't necessarily support the communist party system signifies a me ask you to expand our on what steve was saying there as well i mean is that a faulty assumption that because more of the population in macau were born in mainland china that they would have more sympathetic views toward the mainland. well i agree with that in principle but i think that there is a very important element to the hong kong protests which is due to the identity of people as hong kong is something which beijing dislikes very considerably they think that people in hong kong should just identify themselves as being shy needs so it doesn't quite matter where people are born what does matter is the community in which they live and the community that's developed as hong kong has

a very very vibrant civil society a society which prides in its identification with the car when the big slogans of the protest movement was very simple it said the hong konger and this in macau doesn't exist whether it's to do with where people are born i'm not so sure but it's the state of civil society sieved earlier said this is to do with the development of a bigger middle class in hong kong well i would argue because i was very much on the ground during the protests a lot of the people taking part in those protests were not middle class at all they were from working class areas and what motivated them to be on the streets was their sense of identity of as being on corners and you know i don't know whether that would develop in macau i think there are many reasons as we've seen in this discussion why maybe it won't but you know i'm not over exercised by the question

of where people are originally from andrew and i saw you nodding along to some of what's even vines were saying there did you want to jump in and add to the point he was making. what it really that i did t. . is extremely important ringback because that's the part of the reason behind the the hong kong protests but i think that this is not just a simplistic picture although hong kong home hong kong was saying that they're just on call persons without that sense of nation very strong of nationhood come on if you ask me because i hold a book of citizen card as well because i lived there long enough. to be aware that i'm a cult person or a chinese person i can say it all sort of a cult person because i swear by or would there but the sense of identity is not or it's why sense or or or being tiny's or being belong to the chinese nation

so i think that this kind of conflict between that i did team and nationhood is not a lot stronger in hong kong where it's a recall they seem to co-exist steve saying analysts have said that macau faces challenges in developing financial services what are some of those challenges and also going forward how much of an impact has covered 19 has had has it had on the country and on the economy. right well in terms of in terms of the obstacles for macau to develop into a financial center i think the question can be asked in terms of cain las vegas become a financial center like new york because that is what we are comparing to hong kong like new york has all the infrastructure is in place both in terms of the legal framework the service sector and the educated men powers to become

a global financial center and they are all lacking in macau and therefore macau simply cannot become the global financial center that tone call is in terms of. the impact of coal with 19 i think what we are looking at is that china has contained 19 quite effectively very stringent measures at the early stage of the and then and then make. macau and hong kong has contained it a bit less successfully don't mean and china but they are using less stringent measures. but they will there will be efforts by the chinese government tries to work things out with hong kong and macau and they will still be integrated into part of the chinese mainland economy i think that is where you go to bay area

concept is very important from the chinese government's perspective for the development and the future of both on the phone and they see both on conan macau now as part of the debate area which is centered around sion journ very very different from the $980.00 s. or ninety's when one country 2 systems were being promised and hong kong and macau being allowed to develop a special administrative region in their own right they are now not. being allowed to get out of india all right they are going to be part of a growing baby area under chinese control will be all right we've run out of time so we're going to have to leave the conversation there thanks so much to all our guests andrew long steve saying and stephen vines and thank you too for watching you can see the program again any time by visiting our website at 0 dot com and for further discussion go to our facebook page that's facebook dot com forward slash a.j.

inside story you can also join the conversation on twitter our handle is at a.j. inside story for me my mage i'm going the whole team here bye for now. afghanistan is on the cusp of a new chapter in its history. after the u.s. and the taliban signed an agreement to pave the way for the withdrawal of international troops. the high cost was paid to get to this point though. over the past few years the us has increasingly conducted its part of the war from

the sky was more bombs dropped last year than any other year in the past decade. but with that came a rise in civilian casualties. this is all accidents to happen at mistakes do happen and that this is about owning our mistakes says about things in this about accountability in a in a largely unaccountable war for families we interviewed not receiving adult humans from the us left them without closure. they told us that they so like what happened to their loved ones was a crime. and they want justice and answers something war too often denied. when all that seems to matter is the headline there is always 2 sides to a story when narratives and counter narratives of just curiosity the leader on the one hand the enemy is all believe there on the other hand the listening post strips away the spin what kind of reporting if you can see it on the ground misinformation is right lays bare the biased

a lot of people believe things because they want to believe that a done covers the uncomfortable truths if you think they did enough to scrutinize the case a war the listing posts on i'll just see it up. i don't look like in doha the top stories here announces error and several european nations are banning or restricting travel from the u.k. and trying to stop the spread of more contagious strain of corona virus seen in parts of britain millions in the u.k. are under tough new restrictions as night in baba reports now from london. with a week to go until christmas goodwill in some parts is being strained to the limits in much of the u.k. a planned relaxation of indoor mixing rules has been cut from 5 days to one day and in england a 3rd of the population is now in new to hear for restrictions meeting people can't mix at school with other house.