paul tane journalist signing the petition. us president donald trump backs down and signs a pandemic a bill after millions of americans lost unemployment support. hello i'm down jordan this is our jazeera blah you from doha also coming up libya's tripoli government is visited by a high level delegation from egypt spent years backing its rivals in a bloody conflict. a big turnout in central central african republic cities for elections but in some places rebels opened fire trying to scare voters away. and

more extreme and more costly the tally of this year's worst weather disaster shows more evidence of a dangerous be changing climate. now after holding out for almost a week u.s. president donald trump has finally signed a coronavirus relief bill which he earlier described as a disgrace the delays allowed some unemployment benefits to lapse adding pressure on millions of americans struggling with the economic hardship brought by the pandemic but been insisting that direct stimulus payments to people being creased from $600.00 to 2000 rows in jordan joins us live now from washington d.c. ross a trump may have signed the bill but he then sent out a rather convoluted statement which seemed to suggest he wanted changes to the bill what what exactly was he saying that. well there is an arcane law that goes

back about 40 years that allows the president to say that he wants to see things changed because they don't go exactly to the heart of the legislation that he is signing but that doesn't mean that congress passed has to actually pay attention and strip out those items in this case which donald trump would like to see removed the statement to which you're referring also points out that the president is very optimistic that he is now going to get an increase in the one time payments to americans who are struggling to keep take care of their families in the midst of this pandemic and that's because he basically does not have an ironclad promise from congressional republicans that they're going to go along with the increase of this payment which right now is going to be $600.00 to american adults to about $2000.00 which is more than 3 times that what congressional republicans have said they want it to spend so it's

a little bit convoluted but he's relying on an arcane law but also doesn't mean that congress actually has to give him what he wants because congress is now getting what it wanted which was a signature on this bill yeah and despite all the political dramas rose millions of americans will be breathing a sigh of relief tonight. well it may be bittersweet because let's put it this way the unemployment benefits that some 14000000 americans had been receiving that money ran out they got their last checks before christmas and so it's going to take a bit of a delay in order to get those extended unemployment benefits back on track and even then that money runs out at the end of march so instead of getting $11.00 weeks of additional support people are now only going to get about 10 weeks and so that is

somewhat bittersweet what has been prevented is this idea that people might get kicked out of their rental homes starting on new year's day because the eviction moratorium will now be extended this means that small businesses will be able to get some additional financial support to so that they can try to keep their employees on the payroll as it were and it is going to provide some continuity of funding in distributing the 2 covert 19 vaccines that have been cleared for emergency distribution that is money that the states don't have themselves in order to distribute to people who are lining up to try to get this vaccine but you know is it going to make the president look any better i will leave that to the analysts all right our rosen jordan live for us in washington d.c. rose thank you now senior egyptian officials a visitor to libya's capital tripoli for talks with the un recognized government it's believed it pushing to normalize relations after backing the government's

rivals and years of conflict training reports now from tripoli. it's the 1st time in 6 years that officials at this level have met libya's internationally recognized government in tripoli. the visit of the egyptian delegation to tripoli was carried out by prior coordination between the foreign ministries of the 2 countries the delegation was responsive and positive in the talks based on today's meeting we will witness a development in the diplomatic ties with cairo. the relationship between cairo and the government of national accord was cut in 2014 and around that time president of the c.c. of egypt began supporting order to flee from have to or who held dominance in the east. in april 2019 with rejection support have to begin a military offensive on tripoli the g.n.a.s.

asked turkey for help and with uncursed support g.n.a.t. forces successfully retook western libya in june but not before residential areas a field hospital and an immigrant detention center were shelled the attacks to accusations of war crimes. the visit by the egyptian delegation comes only a day after a visit by the turkish defense minister and senior military officials on cora has military experts on the ground and are training the g.l.a. forces. yet there are no now. it seems there is a political settlement and this visit by the turkish defense minister yesterday was not a coincidence libya's increasingly becoming important regionally and internationally egypt may now feel that they've lost a major partner in tripoli or maybe they now support a political settlement. some believe the visit by the egyptian delegation is a step in the right direction we need to ensure that the international community

remains united also key players like egypt and turkey are khamenei messages to the parties that they sponsor and to tell them compromise is inclusive reconciliation among libyans rather than launching a new and separate initiatives. the united nations is also working to build trust between western and eastern libya the rival sides agreed to hold elections next year but they have so far failed to reach an agreement on the shape of any new government although there is some anger over the visit by the egyptian delegation many here believe the normalization of ties between tripoli and cairo may help fuel a political settlement to the year long conflict now traynor al-jazeera tripoli votes are being counted in the central african republic after sunday's elections where people defied threats of violence to turn out in large numbers it's been

a tense lead up rebel groups threaten to march on the capital and disrupt a vote they say is rigged out of the u.s. catherine so reports now from the capital bangui. people in bunky have been on edge for days now that's after the armed movement. for change threatened to march to the city and destruct the vote the group's leaders didn't want an election but a transitional government and the full implementation of a peace deal signed between 14 on the groups and the government in 219 despite the . palling stations opened on time and voting in the capital was fairly smooth. i am here to vote for peace i had about problems in another part of the country but i had to do my beat president. has been arching people to help security forces stop the rebels the national army backed by un peacekeepers randon forces russian military instructors and private security contractors are all

on the ground france also has a military presence in the central african republic. every 5 years central african 3 to choose their leader responsible for this mission are there any in and the constitutional court and the date set is the 27th this is what all central africa is comfortable and i myself came to fulfill my civic duty. and there are 17 presidential candidates on the ballot paper but. to be president may challenge he says he's worried that people in the sound villages and towns in the provinces one able to vote because of the security situation. unfortunately i have the impression that more than half of the country did not vote which is what we feared when we asked for the conditions to be set for every citizen to be able to exercise their right to vote i have the impression that many

have been deprived of the right to vote and that is a pity want to have been deployed to troubled areas and the capital. we've been speaking to people in different neighborhoods in the city just trying to get a sense of the boarding part and many have told us that they have voted and they're voting for either say they are worried about the security situation in parts of the country. by some been safe he has voted in 2 elections that is not interested this time i was born in this country but i feel i have been marginalized as a muslim was the point of latina again some political analysts are concerned that i think stream of what a time out could affect the credibility of the polls open to officials we talked to say they are confident that won't be the case final results are expected in the coming days cathy zoi al-jazeera bunky. the f.b.i.

says the man suspected of setting off a bomb in the u.s. city of nashville died in the explosion offices started searching the premises of 63 year old anthony warner not long after a motorhome blew up on a nashville street earlier on christmas day the explosion injured 3 people damaged about 40 buildings and knocked out phone and internet services based on the evidence that we've gathered this point we've come to the conclusion that an individual named anthony. warner is the bomber he was present when the bomb went off and that he perished in the bombing. basis conclusion on forensic evidence including d.n.a. evidence that you'll hear about as well as evidence that was gathered at the scene of the bombing when investigators believe there's no indication that anyone else was involved as john hendren reports now from nashville. it is been 2 days since the christmas bombing that rocked nashville blew up a recreational vehicle and several buildings around it and it's only been one day

since police identified warner is a man of interest and now they say warner is their man they say this is based on d.n.a. evidence seized in a raid on his home near here on saturday that evidence was compared to human tissues found at the scene and they say it is a match winners a 63 year old man who lives in nearby antioch that is a short drive from downtown nashville he had a white r.v. authorities say based on the registration history no word on what exactly the motive is at least not from authorities but the concern was that there might be copycats there might be a whole group of people committing these kinds of attacks and authorities say in the end after investigating video of this scene after looking into warner and his

activities that he acted alone he died in the blast and that he had no accomplices so the continuing threat no longer exists they say this case is over time for a short break here not just iraq when we come back. a massive vaccination campaign begins in europe to protect hundreds of millions of people from code 19. stuck in biting cold maybe a 1000 refugees from maine stranded near the bosnia croatia or more in the states. hello we've got more wintry weather most snow coming into japan over the next couple of days we have seen it's a lousy dry recently with high pressure just about clinging on but as we go on through the next day or so bad of cloud will make its way further south which

gradually knotting down towards the korean peninsula 9 celsius in seoul on monday 4 degrees here on tuesday as that wetter weather that wintry weather that snow starts to push its way further southwards and east was it punches its way into central parts of china as well some what's the weather there around the east coast shanghai at about 12 degrees but that's all going to continue making its way further south which in the switch over the next couple of days south of that city i mean showers some active showers into the philippines crossed malaysia into indonesia more the same as we go on into choose day so what's the weather just making as well little closer towards vietnam by this stage we also got some wetter weather pushing towards us ranker southern areas of babbin gold looking rather disturbed at what the weather will make its way across a good part of sri lanka and then as it continues to drive its way further west was we will see the cloud add the rain increasing across much of dumbell now to eventually pushing across

a good part of kara. the ultranationalist marks connected with one of the world's worst humanitarian crises we don't have any gailey my ground joining with the military to impose a deadly political agenda we have to protect our nation what has happened to the revenge that's one of the biggest stains on the country as a whole. this is not religion this is a politic me and an unholy alliance on al-jazeera.

welcome back you're watching al-jazeera could come out of our top stories here there's a holding out for almost a week u.s. president donald trump has finally signed a $2.00 trillion dollar krone virus adan spending package the early described it as they disgrace the delays allowed some unemployment benefits to lapse. senior egyptian delegates have visited libya's capital tripoli for talks with the un recognized government it's believed that they're pushing to normalize relations up to backing the government's rivals in the conflict. and counting has begun in sunday's presidential and legislative elections in the central african republic voters defied threats of violence to turn out in large numbers. well more now on our top story president trump finally signing that coronavirus relief bill but bill schneider is a public policy professor at george mason university and joins us live from washington bill great to have you back on the program so listen trump finally signed off on the bill but then sent out this long rambling statement afterwards

which seemed to suggest he wanted changes to its provisions i mean how realistic is all of this. well he didn't sign the bill that's the most important thing he was under enormous pressure to republicans warned him that it would be very destructive of his legacy and also of the republican majority in the senate if he did not sign the bill let me quote a republican senator from pennsylvania who said pat toomey is his name i understand the president wants to be remembered for advocating for bigger checks but the danger is that he'll be remembered for chaos and misery and erratic behavior if he allows this bill to expire so the president was under huge pressure to sign it and he did and bill despite the political brinkmanship that this will come as good news to the millions of americans who are desperately in need of this money what does it mean for them i mean $600.00 which is not a lot of money most of them say is far from adequate to meet their needs but it's

something if he had not signed the bill there would have been no money he wanted congress to pay its $2000.00 per person but many many republicans in the senate said there is no way that could happen that would require unanimous consent to get that through the house and senate this week and that wasn't going to happen yeah and what's likely to be then the political fallout from this bill i mean many people say this is all about trump seeking revenge on republicans who didn't back his bid to overturn the election result. we will see the results on january 5th in 9 days when the state of georgia votes in 2 runoff elections to elect either republican 2 republican senators or 2 democratic senators or wonder beach if the democrats win those 2 c. so in january pitt the democrats will control the united states senate and that means the democrats will have total control of the entire federal government the president will be a democrat the house will be democratic controlled and if the democrats win next on

january 5th the senate will be democratic controlled that was a big threat to republicans just a final thought here bill i mean trump only has a few more weeks left in office so what's likely to be his next move and do you think he'll try and make political capital out of this standoff well one thing he's really interested in is well having objections raised to the electoral vote count which he insists it was it was stolen from him that he was duly elected president that's the one thing he really cares about right now and he wants the republicans in congress to deliver it would guess what they're not going to deliberate there's no way they can say we're going to reverse the popular vote the will of the people they're not going to do that and his presidency will end on a sour note. as always thanks so much for your thoughts bill thank you. now the charity christian aid says the world's 10 worst climate disasters this year have cost $140000000000.00 in insurance claims and here are some of the worst

bushfires in australia caused $5000000000.00 in losses and killed more than a 1000000000 wild animals on the u.s. west coast wildfires caused $20000000000.00 worth of damage and in china $35000000.00 people were affected by flooding in the young sea river basin and that led to $32000000000.00 in losses floods in india are estimated to have cost $10000000000.00 and $8.00 and a half 1000000000 in japan the atlantic hurricane season broke records with 30 storms that brought 41000000000 dollars in damage to the u.s. central america or cycle and led to losses of $13000000000.00 across bangladesh india sri lanka and bhutan and east africa's locust invasion was the worst in 25 years costing 8 point $5000000000.00 in crop damage let's bring in mark out and he's director of the climate change institute at the australian national university and joins us live via skype from canberra mark good to have you with us listen $140000000000.00 in insurance claims is

a staggering figure but the real numbers though are likely to be much higher are they because they only show insured losses or don't always account for other financial costs such as a loss in productivity and uninsured losses. are exactly right and what we see is often the uninsured losses to 3 or even 4 times higher than the insured loss . costs of these events is staggering. and these disasters as we've just showed have a significant dollar value against them but the real impact here mark is that they cause widespread deaths around the world and displace millions of people that may. or they do but they also destruct economies and they disrupt the environment which it will leave and the flow in and fix of that in terms of things like food security can be quite profound so it's not just deaths that are sore certainly morbidity the reduction in the livelihoods that occurs in

a sort of cascading effect often will outside the region where that extreme bit actually could hear and that's an important point to make because the financial cost may be greater in rich countries like the us china even australia where you are but it's it's the world's poorest people who pay the heaviest price for the consequences of climate change. absolutely that often is the people who are in very exposed conditions so that they're actually in places where they can get get in harms way they often have limited capacity in terms of response to these extreme conditions and consequently the impacts on american strawberry. that i think it's important to note that we have got much better systems for managing some of these extreme events such as plan early warning systems which allow people to get away from the point of landfall and that significantly can reduce loss of life let me just get a final thought from you mark i mean we know that the world's weather will continue to become even more extreme if we don't curb our greenhouse gas emissions and so

it's a situation like could get worse before it gets better do you think. absolutely what we're seeing is really significant changes in extreme events and the costs of those at just $1.00 degree global warming at the moment we're heading towards 3 degrees so that we're likely to see a lot more of these really important to note that just a little bit of global warming results in a lot more extreme events and more severe extreme events in many types such as heat waves so we really need to be prepared much better than we are currently mark out and get your thoughts thank you for talking to al jazeera. thanks to her now there are still a few signs of hope for thousands of refugees and migrants stranded in freezing weather in bosnia herzegovina they've been sleeping out in the open near the croatian border since a fire destroyed most of their camp last week many are suffering from frostbite and hypothermia there are warnings that amounts to a humanitarian crisis but politicians have yet to find somewhere else for them to

live. there are more didn't $500.00 and we were living inside the tent. will be responsible and you can see the. medicines and you doctor. is going to. take the responsibility the european union has begun one of the world's biggest coronavirus vaccination campaigns aiming to protect some 450000000 people health care workers and care home residents in the 27 member bloc are among the 1st to be knock elated donna came reports from berlin. when get good hospital was born good world was coming to terms with the so-called spanish flu pandemic now 101 years later she's become the 1st person in berlin to receive the bio on tech pfizer coronavirus vaccine as a resident of a care home she knows how deadly covert can be there are there several fairly for what it is very dangerous we hear and read about it and there are so many people

dying in other homes it's horrible and that's why it's so good that we can be vaccinated against it it is a big advantage for all of us who live here such scenes have been repeated in care homes in clinics across the european union recent that's made them i think that you know that the pandemic won't just disappear as of today but the vaccine is the beginning of the victory over the pandemic the vaccine is a game changer we have always known that in today's the 1st day of this new phase millions of doses of the vaccine have been dispatched to massive vaccination centers around the e.u. in the run up to the new year in some places there have been isolated reports of problems with the cooling mechanisms required to keep the bio on tech pfizer vaccines safe but overall in the e.u. institutions there is confidence all of us because we have made sure that in europe itself people get vaccines and we have

a broad axe import for europe to make sure that if a vaccine doesn't work that we then have other candidates for it in the german capital the government's aim is to inoculate as many as 5000000 people by next april this is another of the mass vaccination centers the former airport in temple hoff more than 70 years ago this place was instrumental in the berley an airlift when fresh supplies of hope millions of us now once again it finds itself in the forefront this time in the fight against coated dominant cane al-jazeera at berlin's old temple. israel has gone into its 3rd nationwide coronavirus lockdown all non-essential shops are closed and people have been told not to go more than a kilometer from their homes officials are hopeful this could be the final lockdown as they ramp up vaccinations and south korea says it will maintain its current coronavirus restrictions for another 6 days with an infection still stubbornly high

around a 1000 new cases are being reported every day most are in the greater seoul area gatherings of more than 4 people will remain banned until at least january the 3rd . for the pandemic has decimated tourism in spain's canary islands lock downs and flight restrictions on the hotels and resorts sitting empty so in the new era of working from home they're trying to turn that into an opportunity as bernard smith reports now from gran canaria the government wants people to stop their home office for one by the beach. is this your view when working from home during winter lockdowns. more likely in the northern hemisphere at least this is what you'll be enduring it doesn't have to be like this. the canary islands is launched a campaign to attract 30000 remote workers it's not been a tough sell you know my companies over in america are in some people of the city live in the mountains. and you know i think they've been supportive of people kind

of doing looking after themselves in the right spot for them it's really caring where exactly they are. empty hotels deserted pools and very quiet beaches european winter lockdowns means the canary islands is going to salvage very little from season one spanish banks says this region will be the hardest hit by the economic fallout from the coronavirus in spain. the canaries wants remote workers to stay months at a time here you can rent a bedroom and share space with other digital nomads so you're never too lonely i actually feel like i've gotten more done here. because i have this nice set up and i can balance it quite well with a nice life definitely not the strict then the word i would use would be inspired having the freedom to do things that i want to do according to the local restrictions rusia go for a $1000.00 a month they call it co living it's fully booked until february

a month ago or some corporations that were working remotely or least partially were even hiding it because maybe they were afraid of investors what people would think because a lot of people thought that remote work is not work and it's not only work but it's actually sometimes often more productive before the pandemic the european commission says that fewer than 5 percent of the e.u.'s work force usually work from home but as a result of the outbreak of covert 19 that's shot up to 40 percent on the. cover it has shown all the citizens of this planet that we can be very productive working from home at the same time we can balance our life our family in a better way from the caribbean to europe to the far east a growing number of countries are offering visas and deals to tempt remote workers the biggest risk is perhaps getting sand in your laptop bernard smith al-jazeera gran canaria. latest wonder woman film has posted one of the highest debut earnings

since the pandemic began it made more than $36000000.00 in theaters worldwide over the christmas holiday weekend it's a premier of hope for an industry that's been largely shut down since the pandemic began millions also watch the film on streaming platform h.b.o. . it's. tough a quick check of the headlines on al-jazeera after holding out for almost a week u.s. president donald trump has finally signed a $2.00 trillion dollar coronavirus aid and spending package earlier described it as a disgrace the delays allowed some unemployment benefits to lapse an impression on millions of americans struggling with economic hardship as he was raised in jordan explains what's behind trump suddens.