carolina where freezing rain felled trees along highways further north in chicago they're more used to this kind of weather at this time of the year but even here they're bracing for more than 30 centimeters of snow by the time the storm passes through the new york city region has already seen its highest snowfall totals in years but the storm that's sweeping through the rest of the country is now barely north and about to hit here leaving tens of millions of other americans in the northeast of the country bracing for the next one that also could include sleet and hail gabriels on doe. we hawk in new jersey. this is all just 0 these are the top stories protesters are back on the streets in me and more for an 11th day to voice their anger over this month's military coup

the u.n. special envoy is warning of severe consequences if the military steps up its crackdown on demonstrations scott hyder has more from the thai capital bangkok one group we are hearing today that's going to go out specifically we don't know what location they're going to go to is a group of monks about 50 buddhist monks are going to go out in protest within yangon you know when we look at what's been happening over the last several days in yangon that's we've seen the biggest the biggest groups gather there a couple of pinpoint locations strategic locations embassies the united nations office and then yesterday monday we saw them go out in front of the the bank the central bank there in yangon and that's we saw a pretty heavy military presence so that's probably something we're going to see again repeated today. the iraqi president's condemned a series of rocket attacks in the northern city of el billed calling it a dangerous escalation a shia group says it targeted a base for u.s.

forces one foreign civilian contract was killed u.s. house speaker nancy pelosi has announced plans to form an independent commission to investigate last month's assault on capitol hill the los he says it would report on the facts and causes of the attack in which 5 people died at least 60 people have died and 240 are missing in democratic republic of congo after a boat capsized it happened late on sunday on the congo river near lake my and calmly the world health organization has approved the oxford astra zeneca covert 19 vaccine for emergency use the decision will allow lower and middle income nations to immunize their populations against the virus and investigations being launched in peru into why government officials were secretly vaccinated ahead of health workers on sunday the foreign minister resigned after it emerged that she'd also been given a doll's those are the headlines coming up next counting the cost for by teaching you how to see you in english streaming night on the future gen. the last thousands

of our programs will be tweeting documentaries and didn't answer. subscribe to eugene would slosh al-jazeera english. sam is a than this is counting the cost of al-jazeera a look at the world of business and economics this week diet public services regular power cuts and water shortages where do the ranks all wealth go also this week the 1st covert vaccine to win approval was based on m r n a technology doesn't represent the future for investments into cures and nigeria's huge oil industry underperforming polluting and wasteful after more than 3 decades . on the industry.

now ranked as the 4th biggest all producer in the world you'd think iraq had the financial resources to weather the pandemic and drop in oil prices for that's not the case it's fragile economy is struggling to cope and they may have to turn to the international monetary fund for assistance it has already devalued its currency by almost a 5th enabling it to eke out more did ask for dollars or this is the syncs appraisal of the world bank a precarious political situation weak health care system ineffective social safety nets rampant corruption and lap updated service delivery all amplify this fragility and have fueled large scale protests across the country or that begs the question where does all of iraq's all wealth go

a lot to 90 percent of iraq's budget is dependent on oil exports this is budget is $113000000000.00 almost half of that budget is spent on the civil service but about 20 percent of those salaries go to people who do not exist in other words . corruption its deficit that's of course the difference between the money it raises in the money it spends is expected to be about $50000000000.00 bank data will fill the gap by possibly collecting $6000000000.00 from the i.m.f. by turning to international investors but also by raising taxes on civil servants and pensioners so iraqis are being asked to carry the burden of corruption again it's not only the people who are fed up with the government businesses of long complained about red tape and some provinces want to bypass the government and cut their own deals for investment and bob province is one it was retaken from eisel control 4 years ago al jazeera simona faulty in reports from ramadi.

for years after it was largely freed from eisel construction in iraq's western anbar province is booming. once complete this mall in the provincial capital of the mahdi aims to be the largest of its kind in iraq. these projects are needed in this province and according to our assessment in feasibility study we believe this project will be successful how precious the jobs have been created at a time when iraq suffers from economic downturn and rising poverty rates just minutes before this project started i was an employee to project how many young people to get jobs it has helped reduce unemployment in the province. it's estimated unbar has a non us sector investment portfolio worth $2000000000.01 of the highest among iraq's 18 provinces the director of unbias investment commission says the relative stability around ramadi over the past few years has created

a business friendly environment. and society believes in the authority of the civilian government because of that we haven't had any armed groups. no one is allowed to carry weapons except for the government security forces. the local government wants to develop vast untapped mineral and gas resources and says it needs to attract more foreign investors especially from the gulf but the sunni province is demanding more leeway to circumvent the shia led government in baghdad known for its cumbersome bureaucracy and widespread corruption. we hope the central government gives us more authority in energy and electricity production many international companies proposed projects in anbar because of a limited or a forest in the complicated procedures of the central government things are going to light with. the local governments push for investment doesn't just aim to

develop unbiased economy it also underpins its political ambitions for greater autonomy from the central government in baghdad. but some businessmen say decentralization alone won't solve their problems this investor says it has taken more than 2 years to complete the paperwork for this hypochlorite plant and blames the local and central governments equally. he has spent millions of dollars but is yet to receive a license he didn't want to speak on camera for fear it might further complicate the process experts say until the government overhauls its regulations few foreign investors will take the risk of setting up shop here al-jazeera simona faulty and reporting there from ramadi right let's discuss then where iraq's all wealth has gone joining me now from london is adamant about julie i met is the chief investment officer of the a.f.c. iraq fund and a board member of the credit bank of iraq good to have you with us. so our

colleagues at al-jazeera arabic have reported that about $9000000000.00 is going on salaries for people who don't exist i'm wondering how does a problem like this continue for so many years in iraq it's not like everybody doesn't know that there are these ghost salary issues going on in iraq well i think you've hit it on the nail everybody knows that we have a large number of ghost employees whether the figure is anywhere near the 9000000000 dollars i think that's open for debate simply because we don't have precise numbers we have at best at best guess estimates because the the government itself does not have precise number of its own employees that's one of the challenges we have the budget recognizes we have $3200000000.20 employees however no one knows that true or not so the $9000000000.00 is is maybe it's exaggerated but the the the damage it does to the overall economy certainly is not

exactly everybody knows there is this problem of go salarymen ghost employees where is the accountability this is been going on for years it's not the 1st budget where this has surfaced right absolutely absolute this is definitely something is going on 20 years however the important thing to keep in mind and to notice is that we are discussing the side effects i mean when it comes to this when it comes to corruption when it comes to all of these things the things that we all in iraq if you ask any iraqis as he or she would say we know about this stuff how are we looking at the symptoms. you know the this kind of corruption is a symptom of a system that is at fault so fundamentally we have a core issue of the system that our current system of. in which by every ministry every department every unit is pretty much taken up by certain parties that create a condition in which such corruption takes place is it deeper than the us or all

the quota system of divvying up budgets some might argue it's actually deeper than that it's that the politicians and the parties don't really represent the centers of power it's the armed militias and factions behind them in some cases foreign governments that really control the reality of iraq i think that that is always exaggerated i mean definitely it is the political parties that make up the system whether they have something somehow foreign or domestic or other affiliations that's secondary the nain issue is the structure of the system it's a it's a structure of the masses itself that is what is at fault because in a way if you think about the difference between what the masses are basically is the same illness that we all have in the middle east one way or the other which is the public sector becomes the way that citizens of get rewarded the difference

between iraq and everywhere else is that we have become you know we create a monster version out of that frank and version of it because we have multiple power centers and they all go after their own interests or it was the bottom line for this then we're going to have to turn to the i.m.f. to ask for money foreign investors are going to bring in the cash or is it going to be the taxpayers of. the thing as it's a multiple thing in a way the problem with iraq as as you know is that we are our budget is structurally unbalanced in that the public sector payroll takes over every. in a low to medium low oil price environment ok with we have right now is you know all right brant are at $60.00 and so we all feel relieved but that is a cyclical issue secularly long term there is less and less demand for oil so let's forget where all prices are right now because not this year we're talking of 60 last year we're talking of 20 so you know that's highly unpredictable however for

us or what is structurally imbalanced public sector pay takes over almost everything so at some stage if we don't fix our house we need to go to the i.m.f. and the i.m.f. would say sure but to give you the aid you have to restructure the public sector pay or another other items if that happens certainly you will get foreign investors just witness what happened 2016 when egypt embark on its own program that the i.m.f. approved of it gave it an extended front facility which was about $12000000000.00 and foreign investors flocked into egyptian bonds so if we fix our house if we fix our structural imbalances because unlike many other countries even when things are terribly wrong iraq is incredibly wealthy look at last year last year was a terrible year for us in terms of low prices yet we still sold something like $42.00 to $43000000000.00 worth of oil so for us it's not

a question of revenues it's the mismatch between revenues and expenditures that eat up all these revenues and that's really what what we need to fix if we fix it with the i.m.f. work and blessing in terms of a program that is actually real and credible then foreign investor would come otherwise we iraqis have to pay for it and we already pay for it because we allow the public sector to be everything leaving no room starving the investment in underlying infrastructure so in a way it's us and the government we need to wake up our thanks so much with the doctor thank you. that. is tradition and then there's innovation for a long time traditional vaccines were made by weakened or inactive viruses or parts of them and this certainly has been successful in helping to eliminate everything from measles to polio but the breakout technology of the covert 19 era has been

messenger r.n.a. it sends a code to your cells to develop an immune response the leaders in this field by on tech the german company owned by the children of turkish immigrants has seen its stock surge 300 percent in the last 12 months u.s. biotech company madonna produced a vaccine that was 95 percent effective the best of all vaccines produced so far its stocks surged 778 percent and it's not surprising that big pharma have been buying stakes in these manufacturers astra zeneca is the biggest shareholder in madonna the 7.7 percent stake and glaxo smith kline which had a troubled attempt with its partner to develop a coded 1000 vaccine has bought a 10 percent stake in german biotech cure back. this is where the technology gets really exciting you see it offers the potential to create drugs and vaccines for cancer which kills in 1000000 people worldwide well joining me now from about the

capital city of morocco is dr as a dinner brian me as the is the director of med biotech a medical biotechnology lab and the head of the biotechnology lab at the robot medical score good to have you with us so in technological terms just how important is m.r.i. and a to science in humanity or actually thank you for having me to talk about this technology but it's a great a think an m.m.a. is that we could do it actually this is the reason we thought it would be a dream for many years but no i think we are getting closer and closer to having this technology applied and actually been able to produce proteins and cure a lot of the diseases that we couldn't actually think about it but to make it easy to understand actually the technology is kind of the the software of life so what you do it gets you bring it and information genetic information to the cell and the cell will be produce in any property and going both that you need or to correct any

defect that you have through the expression of this protein so give me an example of maybe some of the diseases which we haven't been able to treat in the past which we might now be able to do with this technology and r.n.a. well actually all of the genetic diseases meaning that one gene is defective and in the cell it clear a clear will be able to do it so cystic fibrosis actually is one of them cystic fibrosis actually space than one protein that is the the safety are brought in that is a really have enlarged with patients and it's not working so it would be easy if we think theer a clear bar it's easy to bring this amorally that is correct form. well off the senate and bring it to the senate and the senate will be able actually to produce the right protein that we go to the membrane and be able to function correctly and that will save a lot of people and lots of pain so it's

a lot of examples but cancer would be another one that's we could come back to it all right i mean eventually cancer and cystic fibrosis how far are we away from finding a cure for those diseases where that's a 1000000000 question actually but then just trying to say that's a game actually the dream to have this kind of technology is not from today's for many years ago our and they think we were dreaming basically to reproduce what we could do the same could do naturally so we thought since the beginning if it would be possible to do the same thing to correct the defect that we have in people the only problem with that is just the the body on the says they have their own because i'm a defense and they've returned were brought up this ember in a the software of life for the 2 for the correcting the defects the bra the body or the says will be rejecting them so now we hopefully get to the point where

we can actually and that's one of the nicest things about scoring this will be able actually to bring these proteins the body will take them the sale will take them and be able to produce them so i think we have not that far from the 1st application and we have to combine that with another technology that is a really great or soul is the noble prize of the seed of chris because 9 and chris because my system is going dove correct in there actually the defects on the d.n.a. so that if we can bind us to technology i think the future will be i have no idea how can be the future. well outside of the united states and germany is anyone working on that future using this kind of technology particularly in the developing countries but i think now i think there's nothing that then is that many countries working on that even in developed countries actually because this technology stayed kind of in these 2 countries but i think now with the corporate 19 and the success

of the incredible success of this tour in a vaccine we'll never thought that we'd have a vaccine with 95 percent if it were say that something we wouldn't have bought and they sing in that lot of people are thinking about it's and they think the solution for all this country is it's too good to this technology new transfer and they think it's feasible let's end on a nice positive optimistic outlook especially since we're talking about covert thanks so much doctors and the thank you thank you both with thank you very much nigeria's oil industry has been dogged by allegations of mismanagement corruption and environmental damage the government is hoping to get to grips by rehabilitating refineries cutting down flaring and cleaning up oil leaks takes a deep dive into nigeria's oil industry. this is one of nigeria's government run or oil refineries in the city of port harcourt but most of his

operation has been shut down to upgrade equipment and facility the government plans to hand over these money losing ventures to invest just run after decades of mismanagement. africa's biggest oil producer has turned from self-sufficiency in refined petroleum products in the 1970 s. and eighty's to now a net importer of the product. it's for plans continue to operate well below capacity and sometimes shut down for months off we should say that has to stop what we have done different now just to make sure that we know what we're doing we know who would do it i would go back to go to the front of the to find a deal done such a way that you don't normally stick somebody delegate that project and that is well on cause there's a new urgency to complete the commercialization process nigeria has been hit by a lot on prices and a weakened global demand. the government desperate to shore up its revenue base

sees that he find a risk as a way out of an expensive fuel import regime subsidized at more than $2000000000.00 a year. all industry sources say between july and september last year the country imported more than 5000000000 liters of refined products. a subsidy program that allowed those connected to politicians to steal hundreds of millions of dollars annually has cost the government huge losses in the past it's crap the subsidy 3 years ago but still the losses continue to mount there we have a line of sight what does with that chip when good will be delivered and ultimately will come when i get out become the public it's all in for the good with the because of vision some nigerians say they are cautiously optimistic if this is not true fans i'm probably wrong. in spite of the age of the technologies that produced them over 50 years ago they are still refineries of that age around the world of

the us to fully functional so i think they can be rejigged to a point where they wish to come back to the functionality in such a way that the big government of nigeria if peoples of nigeria still have the us take in the refineries they do oppose the community has been living in the shadows of 3 gas plant points since 1970. people here say the flames damage their lives and livelihoods. everywhere. our roofs don't last. crops. probably. no good one of them. have moved because of that but. for us to get fish now would i have to. pay less. he says compensation paid to some has done little to ease their pain

and they aren't alone why as likely as birds throughout nigeria's or rich delta. oil companies still find it more convenient to burn away the gas even though it could be used to generate electricity an estimated printer 3000000 cubic meters of gas is being flared every day for 174 points like this costing nigeria about a $1000000000.00 annually the government says it's a waste and if stopped could add $3000.00 megawatts of electricity in a country that to struggling to generate $4000.00 megawatts. because of the difficulty in enforcing a total ban in 2019 nigeria launched an ambitious project to increase domestic use of gas and export this it hopes will cut the waste and save lives and the environment the fact that it's environmentally friendly it is cheap it also in there was quick industrialization and growth and we didn't do dis long feel out of time he said it's an issue where we can continue to lead men and that's why this

project will do 2 things one is to deliver on previous attempts to have a trust african got 5 plan which will deliver gas truly military into europe and also to deepen the gas consumption country in boosting domestic consumption government is also promoting the use of compressed natural gas and be cause by the most effort is to see a drastic reduction. in guest larry we are actually giving out those flares to people to manage and we believe that there will be able to take care of all the gas flares within the next few years as. the government is hoping that the petroleum industry bill in parliament for 20 years will soon pass and attract more investment in orland gas. say a boost to gas or tonight is asian and help me my splattering i'm told in communities like it was a cool may have to live with the damage caused by the gas players blazing at their

doorsteps. workers educate and eva but to flush out trucked oil in boulder creek as all comes to the surface a boom truss the sludge for evacuation it's a job the contractors hired by all john child must quickly accomplish before the tide returns the cleanup is due to litigation against the company following a massive oil spill in ogoni in 2009 is this walk used to remediate. creek. after the next phase will be to restore. among groups and monitoring so far is a $1000.00 hectares. while shellings contract to say they have done a lot to subsides the nigerian government led decontamination effort jointly funded by the shell company is off to a slow start. heavy machinery is now deployed farther inland to excavate and treat

contaminated soil we i'm not to take it for what we had planned but we're trying to see what we can do to catch up there's still a lot of work to do to catch up i mean to take. an assessment by the united nations environment program 1st published in 2011 shows that pollution from more than half a century of oil production was worse than or originally thought the report recommended a $1000000000.00 fund to clean up alone an area covering 1000 square kilometers the work which began success later could take at least 25 years to complete much of a is a wasteland this is dead fish and crustaceans no longer spawn here farmlands fish ponds and even underground water supplies have been polluted by hydrocarbons leaking from old pipelines we could buy some activists in the region are less impressed with the work so far how many.

people hope for. one. how many years. and that's not the only concern significant amount of all 3rd continues in the region further complicating the process of reversing the environmental damage experts believe 15 to 20000 square kilometers more of nigeria's oil producing region require the attention orgone is currently receiving they fear that unless the entire region is decontaminated or going as clean up me in the end be a waste of time and resources as re contamination could occur. i am edris from nigeria and that's our show over this way but there's more for you online of al-jazeera dot com slash c.t.c.

where you can catch up on past episodes that's it for this edition of counting the cost time sammy's a than from the whole team here thanks for joining us the news a noun just era is next. they may not be top of the table. they might not have the biggest stadium. but they stand just titans in the face of the fascist far right movement. you want to show the world that the good guys can sometimes when they are the force behind just simply. the fun to make football. you see. hidden away in the room a 1000000 japanese shun the outside world one o one east investigates why so many young and old feel lost in japan on al-jazeera

. al-jazeera. madison in doha the top stories on the protesters are back on the streets and me and maf are on the 11th day to voice their anger over this month's military coup the u.n. special envoy is warning of severe consequences if the military steps up its crackdown on demonstrations scott has more from bangkok we were able to make contact with our team on the ground there once the internet blackout was lifted we also know that they're gathering at the central bank again in yangon this is a place where they gather.