no where in india is situation worse than a daddy the number of queues daughter records were a desperate situation of the indian government set up a new commission to monitor sources of pollution across 5 known for d. the state's health experts and environmentalists had been warning for months that the easing of the lockdown would lead to an increase in pollution and the impact that would have on dogs because the 19 'd. the e.u. unveils plans for a vaccine passport scheme to allow travel to resume around europe this summer. and warnings of very high cova transmission rates in all regions of brazil after its deadliest day yet. i am. a low i'm maryam namazie and london you're watching al-jazeera also coming up on

the program president joe biden tells migrants not to calm as republicans accuse him of fueling the surge in unaccompanied children crossing the border. and despite curfew riots in a child benefit scandal the dutch prime minister mark rutte a looks on course for a 4th term as the final votes a cost in the netherlands election. welcome to the program hundreds of millions of europeans could be able to travel around the continent from this summit if an app on their smartphones shows they've been vaccinated proposed by the e.u. commission the digital green pos means freedom of movement being restored from june but some nations think the plan is too slow and the world health organization opposes the idea because much of the world is far behind in terms of vaccinations

domenic a reports on this now from bad. almost sunny parisienne morning walks his dog has recently been vaccinated and has the badge to prove it but he would welcome something more official. a covered 19 health pass would allow us to travel to get back a little bit of freedom by june those wishes will be a reality because the european commission plans a digital green pass which all e.u. residents would have on a smartphone proving they have either been vaccinated recently recovered from covert or had a negative test with this digital certificate we aim to help member states reinstate the freedom of movement in a safe responsible and trusted manner but for some e.u. leaders that goes neither far north fast enough we want to but we don't want to wait for implementation by the robber will take the 1st steps on the national level the health minister will give

a news conference on thursday outlining the necessary legal basis to introduce green stick it in austria as early as april many in the tourism industry welcomed the e.u. proposal as a. vaccine certificate is essential to make travel easier and it's important that it's digital because only a digital certificate makes it easier to check in at airports it's no good if there's big queues and lots of bits of paper on the flip side the world health organization is urging caution the requirement for certification of vaccination as a requirement for international travel is not justified as rexx a nation is not widely enough where level and is in equitably distributed throughout the world having a certificate on a smartphone is clearly going to transform the way people travel across the e.u. but in order to work as a proof of vaccination the person must 1st have been vaccinated and so far at least comparatively few europeans have been dominant claim al-jazeera.

well european union has threatened to ban exports of covered 1000 vaccines to britain because of a lack of deliveries from astra zeneca it is hard to explain to our citizen why vaccines produced in the european union are going to other countries that are also producing vaccines but hardly nothing is coming back to the european union we're still waiting for doses to come from the u.k. so this is an invitation to show us that there are also doses from the u.k. coming to the european union so that we have reciprocity if the situation does not change we will have to reflect on how to make exports to vaccine producing countries dependent on their level of openness or as the rollout of the oxford astra zeneca vaccine remains on hold throughout much of europe britain's prime minister is saying that it's the job he will be having barra's johnson confirmed

he'll get the answers anika job very soon as he voiced his confidence in the vaccine to parliament more than 12 european countries have stopped using it because of reports of blood crossing in some recipients just as covert cases are on the rise around europe on wednesday the world health organization reiterated its stance that it's safe though investigations are ongoing what germany has been defending its decision to hold astra zeneca vaccinations after it led to the biggest states france italy and spain following suit german government stress that the move is only precautionary. he's entitled to get out of these decisions that we have made sure transparency ensure that the concerns are being taken seriously and examined and his soon as these concerns are cleared up the vaccine can be used again without hesitation at the same time however the decision of the federal government shows that the trustee now control mechanisms is justified and mechanisms work this is showing by this action that is why this step could also strengthen trust it could

strengthen confidence that the vaccines we are administering the vaccines that have been approved a good. but this is pensions have already left many people wary of the vaccine these people in italy were keen to know which job they'd be receiving. could be the vaccine the makes me. i'm a little worried because my wife is due to receive the astra zeneca. oh a pan american health organization has warned that brazil has a very high rate of covert 1000 transmission in all regions brazil are just it 2841 covert related deaths on tuesday its worst day of the pandemic and more people died from the virus and brazil last week than any other country hospital beds and nearly full in more than half its states the health organization called on the government to improve protections let's go live to rio de janeiro and speak to monika yannick here who joins us now so it seems as though hospitals including

intensive care units have reached full capacity in many states what are we seeing a people still able to access health carol they've been turned away. well there are people that many people that are dying in line while they're waiting for a vacancy in an intensive care unit just in the state of some follow which is the richest state in brazil over 80 people died today in these conditions there waiting just to be admitted to a hospital because hospitals that all but it's 2 of the 27 states and brazil are add. at or above 80 percent of their capacity so it is a serious situation because the infections are rising and people don't really have anywhere to go at this point and what has been the political reaction to this the

country has yet another health minister but of course the president despite a slight shift of tone more recently has not been really downplay the seriousness of the virus. yes that's right marianne there is it was a strange situation today because we had 2 health ministers the outgoing minister was the general anything leaving basically because. there has been a lot of political pressure on the president to change the minister and he's made replaced by a cardiologist but this party ologist says that he obeyed orders also from the present and the president hasn't really changed his mind about what he thinks about the pandemic he is against locked down for use against curfews he has accused governors and mayors webspace committees with districts of measures of being acting

like think taters he says the solution is the vaccine and today the outgoing minister and the incoming minister they both announced the 1st batch of 500000 astra zeneca vaccines made in brazil. a brazilian lab will be producing the vaccine and delivering they say 6000000 doses every week but it's not enough so far result has been very fluid back to meeting its population it has and people are not respecting the basic rules of wearing masks and washing hands and keeping their social system and the government has not helped much because it hasn't set an example so if we're just waiting to see what happens next thanks very much whether you know on a piano can grant say that itis all not a situation that in brazil. the and the and

the and the it. was the united states now the head of homeland security is push back against republican criticism as he was questioned by a house committee over an increase of migrants at the us mexico border 100 majorca said his department is working around the clock to manage the situation customs officials say they stopped 29000 people in the month of february by nearly a 3rd on the previous month most single adults and families being sent back president joe biden's administration is struggling to accommodate a growing number of children crossing the border alone where u.s. media reporting the on average 565 unaccompanied children have been crossing the border every day this month that's up from an average of 313 a day last month more than 4200 children are and border patrol custody this week up by by about 25 percent on last week and almost 3000 of them have been held longer

than the 72 hour legal limit a number that's doubled in a week during the trumpet ministration about 4000 migrant children separated from their parents and authorities are still trying to contact the parents of about 500 of those children or president joe biden told a.b.c. news that his message to migrants is don't come. there was a surge in the last 2 years and 19 and 20 there was a surge as well this one might be worse no it could be but here's the deal we're sending back people for 1st of all the idea that joe biden said come because i heard the other day that they're they're coming because they know i'm a nice guy and i want their strangeness yeah well here's the deal they're not do you have to say quite clearly don't come yes i can say quite clearly don't come and we're in the process of getting set up don't leave your town or city or community.

we have correspondents covering this in by u.s. and mexico let's start with alan fischer has in washington and that was biden's message here is for migrants not to come want to send their children but of course it doesn't and they still have to deal with the situation as it is now which is that children are currently spending much longer in detention than is allowed under the law. and both sizably meet each other for the democrats they are saying look what donald trump did was essentially dismantle the immigration system over 4 years he put in a morally bankrupt system which is just exacerbated the problems and they are trying to rebuild it and they're not going to be able to do that in a number of weeks as for the republicans they say this is sold on to joe biden the see that on day one keep overturned a number of donald trump's immigration policies including stopping the building of the wall to remain in mexico. protocol where people have to stay in mexico if they apply for asylum all of these have built up

a problem including joe biden saying look we're going to reform immigration and there is the possibility of a path to citizenship. the republicans are calling this a crisis at the border certainly that's not a word that is being used by joe biden or his administration there's a few odd moments during the hearing with one republican congressman suggesting that the cocktails had 2000000 people ready to move towards the border it was pointed out that there have been surges before in 2010 when barack obama was the president just 2 years ago and 29000 when donald trump was a president even last year it was according to our 100 my office at something that is episodic at but they realize that this is something that they have to deal with and it is an issue that joe biden is going to have to deal with and he's going to have to do it quickly because there is growing pressure on him and growing pressure on the administration to do something though they might say look we're telling people back families aren't. getting through that it's not the same level of

immigration that we had but when you have unaccompanied minors some or even infants quite how that happens i'm not entirely sure but some even infants according to the homeland security secretary then they are going to have to deal with that because they knew all that bad publicity seriously damaged donald trump's immigration policies and that's not something that joe biden wants to deal with no you'd be forgiven if you thought that the home and security committee spent all 4 hours talking about immigration it only felt like that what was interesting is well coming from the one security secretary remember there's only been in the job just over a month he says that domestic terrorism is a bigger threat than the situation at the border he called it a lethal and persistent threat and said that a number of resources have been moved over to deal with that just in the time that he's been in office thank you so much alan fischer there in washington has now had to mexico city where money rapido is standing by as alan was saying that the number

of child migrants overwhelming the government's capacity to have any process and then transfer them to family members or all sponsors where they can be found what do we know than about the conditions these children are being held in. will authorities here in mexico been surprisingly quiet about the alarming number of migrants that continue to arrive at the u.s. southern border it's surprising they haven't spritely spoken about the conditions of the migrants about the efforts of the mexican government especially considering that many are referring to the situation on the border as one of the biggest migrant searches surges that the border is seen in the last 20 years now having that said the data that we're seeing from mexico's national migration institute is starting to paint a picture of the larger context the larger current situation facing both the united states mexico and countries in central america now between january 25th and

february 16th some 1200 central american migrants were apprehended during raids carried out by migration officials here in mexico 300 of those individuals were children now what we're hearing from some immigration observers is that they're going as far as saying that the rate and the frequency of these raids that are being carried out by mexican officials the scale of these raids is really without precedent so it is clear that mexico is stepping up its rounding up of central american migrants this is a policy that began following pressure from the trumpet ministration to stem the flow of migrants from central american countries such as squatter mala el salvador but it's a policy that's continued over the past few months despite the fact that mexico is no longer facing that same type of pressure from the by the administration that they were facing from the trumpet ministration regardless we're still seeing mexico carry out these policies now when we're talking about the root causes of migration there is this debate in washington that somehow this reversal of trump era policies

is being interpreted by migrants as a sort of invitation to try their luck at the u.s. southern border and while that may be the case it may be an influential factor we should not lose sight of the fact that widespread poverty violence political corruption these are all problems that have been made worse by the copen 1000 pandemic and lass. in november of last year that region of central america was slammed by 2 back to back hurricanes that really exacerbated in already dire situation so these are not the only factors that are driving migration from the region but they certainly are very significant factors thank you very much. you know watching out is there a life from london i had for you on the program but he said atlanta say there's no indication of a racial motive in the fatal shooting of 8 people at spas 6 of them women of asian descent. and ethiopian migrants tell to say that final press before a fatal fiat in some yemen since the rebels are blamed for the tragedy.

looking lassie found a drive for much of western europe over the next couple of days because got a nice big area of high pressure just not getting its way in round area of high for the meantime we are still running a few showers down the north sea it's a cool direction mostly wind so we'll see cooler who had just taken down into central parts if you have 4 cells just 7 celsius for vienna so the single figures you get the idea of some wintry flowers as well sliding down swards rumania wet weather there are still in place just around southern parts of italy and greece but over towards the west his now warm 14 celsius madrid not too bad 14 celsius in glasgow absolutely fantastic yes it does cool off a little as we go on into friday but more in the west sunshine and in light winds

it really will feel quite pleasant small wintry flowers coming into those central parts just around the czech republic austria switzerland still seeing some snow showers will continue for central areas to came mistral continues to filter its way down into that western side of the mediterranean the still a few shows over towards turkey at this stage where crashes see some showers just running into the far north of africa as you go on through the next day i would say 15 celsius announces 16 celsius inch yunis but to bad over to assist the side of the continent the car over the top temperature of 23 degrees. mixing the traditional with the modern mode where you knew what to expect ignoring cards divides the only being with you murdered their voice the music greek music blaring to the speakers wielding the power of music to turn up the volume on india's social injustices when i saw the performance i was like wow and shake

things out we went on stage of something brought us to just simple witness causeless collective on al-jazeera. the. the old. rocking back and main stories now the european union has proposed a coronavirus passport to help ease travel restrictions within the block the digital green certificate would provide proof travelers have been vaccinated. the pan american health organization has won the brazil now has a very high rate of covert transmission in all its regions brazil reported 2841

deaths on choose day its deadliest day of the pandemic. and the head of homeland security in the u.s. is hitting back at republican criticism over search of migrants at the us mexico border by the 100 mayorkas told a house committee his department is working around the clock to manage the situation. when other developments at least in the u.s. state of georgia arrested a 21 year old man charged with killing 8 people during 3 separate shootings at massage parlors they've been investigating whether it was a hate crime a 6 of those killed were women of asian descent shot ballasts reports. the 1st school came on tuesday evening local time they'd been a shooting north of atlanta at young's asian massage parlor then and now later another this time in atlanta at gold's spa as police responded a 3rd cool came in reporting gunfire from across the road at aroma therapy spa the crime scenes were all message policies and majority of the victims were women of

asian descent yesterday with a tragic day. across our state and as many of you all know there were several victims i'm who were tragically killed on yesterday. and our thoughts and prayers remain with phil's families police have arrested a 21 year old and charged him with killing 8 people they are investigating to see if the shooter was specifically targeting asian americans which would make it a hate crime and increase the charges south korea's foreign ministry confirmed that 4 of the victims were of kareem to seemed i know that many we've received a number of calls about is this a hate crime we're still early in this investigation so we cannot make that determination at this moment he made indicators that. he has some some issues. sexual addiction and. may have frequent some of these places

in the past and things but as chief indicated there's still early on crimes targeting asian americans have risen dramatically since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic organization stop a p.r. hague has detailed 3800 attacks in just the last 12 months more than half were against people of chinese kareem to st president joe biden interesting issue in a speech last week last president come on a harris reiterated her concerns calling the shootings tragic the investigation is ongoing we don't yet know we're not yet clear about the motive but i do want to say to our is an american community that we stand with you and understand how this has frightened and shocked and outraged all people while police try to unravel whether this was racially motivated or not it's a sensitive time for asian americans who feel increasingly vulnerable ballasts.

we had a most powerful but us monks association has called on the military to end its violent crackdown the government appointed organization accused in the minority of torturing and killing innocent civilians over $180.00 pro-democracy protesters have been killed by security forces since last month's protests continued across the country on wednesday with reports of police firing bullets in the city of yangon. but human rights watch is blaming yemen's who see rebels for a fire at a detention center in san last week at least 16 people were killed in the blaze most of them ethiopians under schip our reports. before a devastating fire ripped through this detention center in yemen's capital last week the ethiopians being held there confronted their guards to demand better living conditions that's when survivors say who the security forces locked them in a hangar and told them to say their final prayers before firing something at them

our luggage and that it has guided you fired to projectile at us through the hole and the fire on to the piles of pillows was sleeping on the room filled up with smoke and we all sort of just as a crowd for some of those thoughts had to faint and fall to the ground. i saw my friends burning to death i didn't receive any help after about an 8 minute. dozens of people were killed in the blaze after a tour through a hangar with 350 people inside mostly migrants from the horn of africa. with. the united nations is calling for an independent investigation into the cause of the fire. tens of thousands of migrants pass through yemen each year attempting to reach wealthy gulf countries in order to provide for their families back home they're exposed to kidnapping torture and abuse or navigating a deadly conflict survivors of the fire accuse the who these abusing them to feed the war effort well by the guideline i'm an awful lot going on when we told them we were going on a hunger strike they said they'd force feed us and send us to fight on the front we

said we would not fight because this isn't our country we are refugees our country is facing a bigger war than the one here we could live in our own country so we escaped here the international organization for migration has demanded the release of thousands of migrants being held at who the run facilities these young. under the age of the journey by smugglers and traffic and they are not i mean they. were here. or. one group at least was given a way out 150 ethiopians were evacuated on tuesday on the 1st repatriation flight since the pandemic began and al jazeera. or polls close in the netherlands general election in less than an hour's time opinion polls suggest prime minister center right the day posse is on track to win by a large margin despite his entire cabinet resigning 2 months ago over a child care benefit scandal it's also europe's 1st major votes as the start of the

pandemic and issues that has dominated campaigning as well let's cross the set of us news accounting station amsterdam so we're at our own course for a 4th time but how's the voting been going out they've been managing it. well this was of course a very different election than previous elections because of this growing up and that makes they actually have more polling stations but also much larger polling stations then before and actually also many people were allowed to already cast their votes before today so the last 2 days the polling stations were also small so people from risk categories and also people above 70 years old were allowed to vote by mail and this is what they have been counting here at this counting center in amsterdam for the last hours so they want to calculate these votes and ready to have them ready for the exit polls which we hope to hear in half an hour from now so for this whole counting process which is happening all over the netherlands and

will happen from a half an hour from now as well they are lots of volunteers and one of these volunteers here is sense on the phone the while and what i. saw was that the so many young people actually counting why did you decide to become a volunteer well i saw it on instagram it was an ad on instagram and i always wanted to kind of see how to voting and the counting goes so i thought it was interesting and you get a small compensation which is of course also nice when you're still a student. there that's kind of why but they specifically asked young people to help drive grams of corona well i think yes it was always i think more young people helping but usually there's also more elderly people who are maybe retired already and have some spare time but i think now given the risk factors were thrown out it's nice to have more young people and they need more people in general to sound a little 37 parties on the ballot paper write these ballot papers we just saw today

oh yeah they're used yeah i was that inconvenience i think yet are very big and they companies very well they come full the richest to unfold them and then we sort them based on all the parties and then they go back into these big bins and then we . through town yeah quite a challenge quite a challenge cheryl yeah just an inconvenience it had to i guess thank you so much for joining us so you are now finished but the real counting of the ballots that have been cast today will only start in half an hour from now that's also when we expect the 1st exit polls and then we're going to know if all these polls that actually work for addicting that brought prime minister mark with the will win with a landslide again and that then we will find out more about that really briefly step just tell us what are the challenges facing him in his 4th term in office because he's managed to overcome quite a few obstacles. well the main challenge will

of course be discipline that make it than allen's hasn't been handling the ferry well there's a 3rd wave happening at the moment so the pandemic is the main challenge and that's also the reason why you wrote it is still so popular because a lot of people actually look at the leader that they know to handle this but been battling to handle this crisis what happens after that a lot of people are also predicting he won't be in power for much longer because of the scandals that have tainted his government thank you very much to all the latest on those elections there in athens step bos'n. stories now hundreds of millions of europeans could be able to travel around the continent from this summer if an app on their smartphone shows say in vaccinated proposed by the e.u. commission the digital green.