be the hero the world needs right. washer aims. campaigning wraps up and fears of violence escalate but a court rules that sunday's election in central african republic will go ahead. barbara starr you're watching al-jazeera live from london also coming up a mask ovid immunization program starts across the european union as cases of a new grown a virus variant increase in desperate times for millions of americans as their jobless benefits expire joe biden accuses donald trump of an abdication of

responsibility and an emotional homecoming for guatemala deportees from the u.s. who find conditions in the country are even worse than they left. hello thank you for joining us one of the world's poorest than most unstable countries is going to press ahead with elections despite the threat of escalating violence a top court in central african republic says voters will go to the polls for presidential and parliamentary elections on sunday opposition parties wanted it postponed and the queues the president of vote rigging rebel fighters have also rejected the legitimacy of the government and are threatening to march on the capital bangui 3 un peacekeepers meanwhile have been killed in rights groups are warning that violence could reach levels last seen in 2013 when thousands of

civilians were killed catherine so is in bangui and says there are concerns fewer people will show up to cast their ballot. we have spoken to u.n. officials who say that 80 percent of the country if they cannot people to go to vote they did that all the process of the electoral process is how smoothly in these are the parts of the country they say that the trouble areas are just few if you speak to the government spokesman and we spoke to him yet the day he said that he expects there's going to be a little. but he hopes that this town out is not going to be so low as to discredit the electoral process if you speak to opposition leader does and we've spoken to several of them that say that they had disappointed by the ruling death saying that there are a great many people likely to come out to blow and particularly that

the one of the you mentioned then that into the other ones who filed this petition . to postpone the election that particularly up to one of them one of the presidential candidates with the group did it because of security issues but wanted is that people are very afraid and not just in areas where they. in places like here in the capital bogey where i am would be speaking to central african who are saying that they will not go to the polling stations until that absolutely sure that they will be fake. the european union has launched a mammoth vaccination efforts while a new coronavirus variant detected in the u.k. continues to spread across the continent hungary was the 1st to announce that it's already started vaccinating doctors and health care workers germany and slovakia

have also kicked off their campaigns well the 1st batches of the pfizer bio and take vaccine arrived across the e.u. including countries like italy and spain which were once the continent's worst hotspots and the new coronavirus variant meanwhile the one that tested in the u.k. has now also been found in spain and sweden the variance freds up to 70 percent faster and resulted in dozens of countries banning travelers from britain paul brennan reports. the refrigerated vans drove through the night destinations including rome paris spain and hungary the precious cargo the vaccine developed by pfizer biotech kept at between minus 17 minus 80 degrees the mass inoculation is due to start in a coordinated launch later on sunday but the 1st job went to work at a hospital in budapest but. she had a vaccination plan is ready with help because the other front of the queue those working with patients in intensive care and emergency care units will be vaccinated

1st so they can continue the heroic struggle to see of the. europe has seen 16000000 coronavirus cases and suffered more than 400000 deaths the approval and distribution of this 1st vaccine is reason for considerable hope across the continent. we have in total $19500.00 doses which makes $3100.00 vials these those will be stored in our freezer at minus 80 degrees which will be done distributed to the different elderly homes and public hospitals . if you start in the companion because we will start the immunization campaign on a large scale 1300000 doses of vaccine this will be delivered all over germany before the end of 2020 and then from january it will be even more each week almost 7 100000 doses every week in january more than $10000000.00 doses in the 1st quarter the relentless spread of the covert $1000.00 virus in the news that more

infectious variants are evolving as lent even more urgency to the vaccination program variant 1st identified in the u.k. has now been discovered in other european countries to try to contain that variant thousands of truck drivers have spent christmas stranded at the u.k. port of dover and prevented from crossing to france unless they test negative for the virus the backlog remains stubbornly large despite the efforts of military reinforcements and lock downs have ruined the festive period for traditional high street retailers with shoppers ordered to stay at home coronavirus has hollowed out the u.k. high street this is oxford street london's primary retail avenue and instead of hundreds of thousands of people out a good vantage of the boxing day sales the shops are closed instead of festivity and bustle it's full on and barren the street empty with coronavirus europe has enjoyed much the same torrid 2020 as the rest of the world the hope is that from

sunday things will start to improve paul brennan al-jazeera london at least 35 people have been kidnapped in northeast nigeria armed men dressed in military uniforms set up a road block and abducted the travelers heading to my degree it's believed the incident could be linked to boko haram. up to $14000000.00 americans will lose job benefits by the end of saturday after u.s. president doesn't trump refused to sign a $900000000000.00 covert $1000.00 relief package president elect joe biden has called it an abdication of responsibility but some didn't object to the bill which would have extended unemployment aid before it was voted through congress on monday but he now wants payments to increase from $600.00 to $2000.00 his refusal could cause a partial government shutdown next week chevron can see is in washington d.c. for

a says she of it seems incredible that it's come to this it just remind us of how we got here well as you mentioned after weeks of negotiations between the republicans the democrats amdahl trumps treasury secretary steve minucci and with great found vernon downs but it was made last week that agreement had been reached on $900000000000.00 in covert relief and $1.00 trillion dollars to fund the government till the end of september. and see even action treasury secretary great deal of the checks will be still so going out next week then donald trump releases a video where he calls the $600.00 checks are being sent out to those early lessons of a $5000.00 ridiculously low he says he wants $2000.00 checks and he complains about the government funding bill as well which is own government in fact had requested for many of these many of these provisions and everything's just been in limbo ever since because no one quite knows what donald trump plans to do now he hasn't actually specifically said whether he will veto the bills and in the means or in the meantime really sort of paralysis in some ways because they don't quite know

how to because i don't know what donald trump intends to do but so does that mean that if they don't know what he's going to do there's no hope of resolution of that basically they just have to wait to see what he does end up doing. well yeah and then we have like 3 scenarios one he does eventually sign sign the bill that he doesn't signed by today as you mentioned 14000000 americans will lose out on employment with their extended unemployment benefits or he does he doesn't sign the bill and vetoes the bill at least that gives some certainty about what congress can do next in the house and the senate can meet next week and try to override the presidential veto by getting a 2 thirds majority in both chambers or dull time does nothing and just let the time run out and and this session of congress will run out which means that everything has to start again negotiations have to start again in congress and congress in the new session in early january in the meantime there are the house democrats sensing sensing some political capital perhaps 3 maybe they are having

a vote on $2000.00 bills $2000.00 checks for americans say ok if you want $2000.00 we can we'll do this and that is expected to pass in the house which now leaves which will leave mitch mcconnell in a very difficult position in the senate because not clear whether he will then bring that bill to the senate for a vote which means potentially he is facing down donald trump at a time when there's a sense when there's a senate runoff election in georgia which is what mcconnell is really worried about that's his main concern that's why even agree to $600.00 checks in the 1st place he doesn't like stimulus checks for the poor but he did in this case because he was worried about that georgia runoff race and if he is now being seen to not only be not agreeing not not between challenging donald trump and standing in the way of relief for americans this could have real consequences for the georgia race and that's where in conclusion we see perhaps what this is all about mitch mcconnell has now recognized joe biden as the the victor of the last presidential election and this appears in some ways perhaps less to do about less to do with helping

americans in need more about pure revenge. pretty worrying if you are one of those a merican need share britain see with the latest from washington d.c. thank you. still to come in this half hour communication lines are still down in large areas of the u.s. state of tennessee a day after a vehicle exploded in nashville. and the literary renee sounds in iraq from a new generation trying to write their place in the history books. hello there we've got some snowy weather the forecast for a couple of parts of here particular particularly down towards the balkans big massive cloud here a little area of low pressure brings a very stormy weather across the southern parts of italy but the other side of the age we are at stake we will see significant snowfall coming into the balkans over

the next couple days 20 to 30 centimeters certainly possible over the next 24 to 48 hours we will eventually see some snow to coming in across the british isles at the moment it's all about storm balla tightly packed i suppose damaging winds rattling through gales or even severe gales over the next couple of days and across parts of the u.k. think across southern areas of england and wales eventually that windy weather will sweep across northern france into the low countries rattling a shower is coming back in behind but notice the temperatures starting to fall away london at about 8 celsius on sunday came about 4 degrees on monday and by this stage said to be called enough for some snow showers just coming in across and across many parts of england well scotland as well we will see some wet weather and more snowy weather coming in across the balkans some heavy rain there for a time so it's a little bit of snow too into western parts of turkey by the end of the weekend.

3 jobs and now i only have one but i'm soo providing for my family. the 1st time i was admitted to hospital i didn't show any signs of m.s. . but at about my opinion the women have become very positive and stop thinking about the negative side so from the get on al-jazeera. he is from living with them and us in egypt.

the reminder now of the top stories on al-jazeera a top court in central african republic says voters will go to the polls for presidential and parliamentary elections on sunday the spite of the escalating spread of violence the european union has launched a mammoth vaccination effort while a new coronavirus variant of detected in the u.k. continues to spread across the cold hungry was the 1st country to announce that it's already started vaccinating health care workers and up to $14000000.00 americans will lose job benefits by the end of saturday after u.s. president donald trump refused to sign a $900000000000.00 kovan into 19 relief package president elect joe biden has called it an abdication of responsibility. emergency communications have been knocked out across large parts of tennessee as officers investigate a christmas morning blast in the heart of america's country music capital well

a news conference is taking place right now you see the pictures coming in to us from nashville meanwhile the streets of nashville have been deserted a day after all a motor home blew up ripping through dozens of buildings and injuring at least 3 people no fatalities have been confirmed police evacuated nearby buildings on friday after the vehicle blared a warning that a bomb would detonate in 15 minutes well john hendren is a nashville tennessee following the story for us so john any indications from the news conference which of course is going on now for who and what was behind this explosion. well f.b.i. officials say they have followed over 500 leads that have developed since this bombing happened on christmas morning but they're not identifying any specific individuals there have been reports in the u.s. media that there is a person of interest who has been identified who has

a connection with a recreational vehicle that was exploded and that may be simply that on the many surveillance pictures they have of that r.v. arriving outside of an 8 transmission building where it blew up those cameras recorded a number of things they could have simply gotten the license plate off of it this is speculation on my part but it somehow there are reports that someone connected with that recreational vehicle has been identified but we were told none of that in the news conference what we were told was that the f.b.i. was not prepared to identify any individual there one official likened it to assembling a disassembled puzzle because the that bomb was so powerful it destroyed over 40 buildings and so what they're trying to do now is go from the outside perimeter inside and they're trying to reassemble the many pieces of that puzzle and try to figure out what happened even as there investigators are trying to track down

anyone who might have been connected to that r.v. so that's what's going on now they are not identifying anyone as of yet but what we know is that this all happened christmas morning a little after 6 am you got these broadcasts emanating from that r.v. saying evacuate and then at 630 it exploded and then we heard being the information that there were possible human tissues found at that site and that raises the possibility that perhaps someone was inside or near that vehicle and john we are watching pictures right now of the impact of that explosion really horrifying john hendren in nashville tennessee with the latest for the moment john thank you. at least 5 people have been killed in an attack by syrian regime forces the victims were all farmers in a village near hama in the northern province of idlib one of the civilian was

wounded in the artillery strike the attack by president bashar al assad's forces violates a ceasefire that was signed in march turkey's the fence minister has made a surprise visit to libya to increase cooperation with the internationally recognized government there who see a crowd of was flanked by top military officers as he inspected turkish units in tripoli on friday turkey's parliament voted to extend that the ploy meant of troops to libya for 18 months but libya's eastern warlord honey for have thought has threatened to use force against turkish soldiers if on credit doesn't stop interfering in the conflict and no more are relevant passage of the decisive confrontation has begun to appear for the near future from what our scouts have to take today from maneuvers of the turkish misson aires and soldiers near the front lines piling up weapons equipment building military bases and operating rooms. which reflects turkey's insistence on war and the delusion that they will achieve

their dreams of expansion and influence and the ambitions to control the oil fields and export ports to cure with all wealth its collapsing economy and then the incursion into the depths of africa a new yemeni government has been sworn in more than a year after the signing of a power sharing agreement ministers took the oath in the saudi capital riyadh on saturday the cabinet is a coalition between yemen's internationally recognized government and members of the separatist southern transitional council the 2 sides had previously been locked in a power struggle but they have been working to unite against who the rebels who took over yemen's capital sanaa in 2014. a series of explosions have rocked afghanistan's capital killing at least 2 police officers and wounding several others at least 5 separate attacks were reported across kabul officials say

the officers died when a magnetic bomb attached to a police vehicle detonated in the city's west no group has claimed responsibility for the blasts this comes as the taliban and afghan government prepare to resume talks in. last month's ethiopia's military launched an offensive against local forces in the northern region of t. great the prime minister i.b.m. had called it a law enforcement operation but it spiraled into an entire ethnic conflict possibly killing thousands violence is also spreading among communities in other parts of the country al jazeera is malcolm web takes a look at where ethiopia stands now. where the theo paean government troops took control of the to grain regional capital of macquarie last month prime minister ahmed said the law enforcement operation against the to grain people's liberation front. was over of the said the conflict had only

just begun. he said no civilians are being killed by government troops both sides have been accused of rights abuses we've seen targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure with heavy artillery fire we have seen widespread looting of private property in many towns in west and we've seen extrajudicial executions of individuals and that's to be linked to the t.p.s. but also prominent business people we've obviously also seen a context of massive restrictions on humanitarian access the conflict has impacted the region. there are numerous reports of eritrean soldiers operating integrate eritrea's in ethiopia's government deny it more than 50000 people have fled to refugee camps in neighboring sudan that reignited an all border dispute

between the 2 countries last week sudan accused ethiopian forces of attacking its soldiers inside its border and within ethiopia there are an increasing number of reports of into ethnic violence in other parts of the country last week more than 100 villages were killed by an armed group in parish and region. a very frequent. those incidents have claimed the lives of. hundreds of thousands so really it. has been a recurring the last 6 months or a month and that's the sad reality of. it was mass protests part of the country that brought prime minister are being made to power nearly 3 years ago. before that decades of authours tarion rule had frozen generations old conflict

many of them on ethnic lines. abbie was credited with bringing in from democratic reforms that's led some of those conflicts to start boiling over his drive to unify ethiopia has conflicted with growing demands the various ethnic groups who are seeking more autonomy when you are. in a country you have to find ways of making. right so i mean you know. you know unity. is likely to course more. is just what. the t.p. left dominated the government for nearly 30 years before abby took over one of the triggers of the conflict into gray was the postponement of elections that would you 4 months ago because of covert now they're expected to be held amid growing tensions in 2021 malcolm web al-jazeera the united

states has continued to the 4th central americans back to their home countries this fight pleas from leaders for a pause during the coronavirus pandemic this year alone more than 20000 have been sent back they found conditions there are even worse than when they left as john home and now for ports. it's been a desperate homecoming for me gil said thought he was deported from the u.s. in september after 2 years of working illegally in miami. now he's back in his village ship in the guatemalan highlands to find the harvest has failed the young man 20000 guatemalans have been deported from the u.s. this year the cording to the country's migration institute and they're coming back to find the conditions they fled and now even worse the economy's projected to contract due to the pandemic and experts say the country's also increasingly affected by climate change some of its regions are part of

a dry belt spreading throughout central america and guatemala is also just been devastated by 2 november hurricanes they destroyed the crops in miguel's village and now food is scarce going out of pollutants midst those natural disasters many of those deported also struggling to pay off debt. that's because people smugglers often charge migrants $10000.00 or more to take the north the idea is they'll pay back gradually once working in the states. but it's a gamble and those that are kicked out have to pay the money anyway as the parents of miguel and his cousin who was cool with him and now discovering the business in cuba when my son arrived i feel glad that we still have this debt to pay we're suffering it $7700.00 now i'm trying to celeb it of land to pay it as a father i want to help my son but instead of getting ahead we only get poorer. but

in our hearts we have the pain what can we do what can we go now we have nobody to support to see the u.s. . the guatemalan president has recently said the answer to the problem is to create prosperity in communities like ship you so that people don't have to leave in the 1st place. being coming by the ministration this place to spend $4000000000.00 on central america to do just that but it's tough to make sure the money gets to where it's needed past efforts so that it won't be a silver bullet to stop migration john homan out 0 thousands of people have been evacuated from their homes on the portuguese island of madeira after severe flooding roads are completely submerged and rock slides have damaged property with at least one house the strong no injuries have been reported iraq has produced some of the most celebrated and respected writers in the arab world but conflict sectarianism and

political oppression forced many to flee and right from abroad now a new generation is the term meant to keep iraq's literary heritage alive charles stratford reports. mcauliffe has been writing about the momentous and often violent changes iraq has suffered for more than half a century the baghdad based author whose novels short stories and poems have been published across the arab world has had to navigate censorship political imprisonment and even death threats throughout his career he acknowledges his contribution to iraqi literature but he's saddened by what he says is the lack of impact his work has had. and the country has culturally regressed people who don't read or write might struggle to develop culture across the arab world is suffering terribly and their right has to without freedom to write how can of this learn i

feel have little effect on people's thoughts the bookshops along elements and up the street named after a 10th century poet have been immortalized in iraq in arab culture for centuries the crumbling alterman buildings have witnessed how the pressures on iraqi writers and readers have changed over the years the challenge of avoiding jail worse under the rule of saddam hussein to bomb attacks and kidnapping by al qaida eisel and various armed groups that still have much power in iraq elements an obvious street as almost a mythical status in the history of arabic literature a place where writers and intellectuals would meet to discuss politics and the office but despite the political instability and violence in this country continues to suffer there is increasing evidence of young writers appearing who are determined not to self censor and to protect and build on iraq's literary past.

but i'll be arty is a young recently published iraqi poet she owns a bookshop and one of a number of recently opened publishing houses close by she says half the book seen her shot by new young iraqi writers we're trying to wake people up from the hibernation for too long iraqis have accepted what we were told so as young writers we try to simulate minds without religion or focus on ethnicity instead we look at a reader's humanity we're not afraid because we have seen so much of course i sometimes worry about my family but we have to re stimulate ideas of civilized things a bank dad's annual international book fair young people who can afford to buy books including arabic literature history philosophy and translated foreign works but. it is difficult for our generation to find the correct road to walk along so we depend on ourselves and through books and reading i hope we can change the next generation to planted flowers not thorns that we find on the path we travel along

we have to read more widely to forge a new future young people here definitely seem keen to lead us to the world but i hope at least that iraq's literary heritage is being rekindled by a new generation who say their country's future stability and growth will be helped by young iraqis reading and writing more chance traffic al-jazeera baghdad. and now reminder of the top stories on al-jazeera the spite and the escalating threat of violence a top course in central african republic says voters will go to the polls for presidential and parliamentary elections on sunday opposition parties wanted it postponed and accuse the president of vote rigging rebel fire.