union has poured more than a $1000000000.00 into refugee care in greece in the past 5 years and is now spending both in $300000000000.00 to build better camps on the aegean islands many of these asylum seekers now displaced several times over one day while europe with such resources cannot offer them a home jump several plus al-jazeera lesbos. there again i'm fully back with the headlines on al-jazeera at least 44 people have been killed and more than 150 injured in a stampede at a religious festival in northern israel it happened in mount meron where to 200000 ultra-orthodox jews had kept it fostered has more from mount merapi the prime minister's spokesman has been tweeting about it saying that it was the overcrowding that led to a stampede which in turn led to the partial collapse of

a structure that people were standing on so that is the closest thing we've had to sort of an official proximate cause of what took place but of course there are much wider questions being asked about the nature of all this as well. the 1st shipment of emergency supplies from the u.s. has arrived in india to help it fight spiralling coronavirus infections and deaths the number of infections reached another record high in the last 24 hours with more than 386000 cases and 3500 deaths brazil is marking another bleak milestone in the coronavirus pandemic after the number of deaths passed 400008 quarter of the fatalities were recorded this month brazil is only the 2nd country after the us to reach that figure turkey meanwhile has entered its 1st full lockdown of the pandemic amid a surge in infections and deaths people stocked up on groceries and left cities before 3 weeks of restrictions took effect on thursday. and the news gunfire has

been reported overnight on the southern border between. hours after a cease fire agreement kirghiz health authorities say 13 people were killed in fighting since wednesday fighting along the disputed border is the heaviest seen. thousands of people on both sides of the thailand's mob border are preparing to flee their homes as fighting between armed ethnic groups and the military escalates karen state has recently seen some of the worst fighting since the military coup in myanmar in february hundreds have already left the region in recent days and thousands more want to join them and palestinian president mahmoud abbas has delayed parliamentary elections scheduled for next month abbas claimed a dispute with israel over voting in occupied east jerusalem hamas rejects the decision calling it's a cool those are the headlines we'll have more news for you here on al-jazeera after the story stay with this. well if we cannot have palestina my government was

suddenly not allowed britain to control the french palestine would be an outrage but then we need to find another solution before we come to blows 100 years ago britain and france made a secret deal that would influence the shape of the middle east for centuries to come and so. now we can draw on the. psych speak of lines in the sand on al-jazeera. today on the strain what kind of a crisis in lebanon let me show you what that looks like these are groceries that you could have bought in 2019 for 10000 naira and then 2021 using the same amount of money this is what you would take this is what economic collapse looks like according to the bank are on about the population in lebanon living in poverty

so how are they coping what does this actually mean and also what are their leaders doing to help them that is our show today in a nutshell you can be part of the conversation by jumping on you tube i mean part of our comment section thank you for being part of today shared. honestly i believe . more than 50 percent of the lebanese citizens are not celebrating along and even if they did or they tried to celebrate ramadan i'm afraid of what's coming after. this months based on the unprecedented events the economic situation and everything that has been going on in the country whatever no need well basically we need the international support to have a better country and we forums and we change but now lebanese citizens are looking for their basic human rights needs they're looking for medication for food and medical assistance i think that my country needs and it could have been on needs

american now more than ever hello zaina hello awesome hollowly and we are going to dig deeper into this as lebanon need america what would that look like 1st of all zain i've got to have you on the stream introduce yourself to our international audience. well i am a correspondent with al-jazeera have been with since the launch back in 2006 i have reported from many countries and lebanon is among them the awesome welcome to the stream good to have to introduce yourself to having this i am the general it's a provides of lebanon crisis response plan and advisor to the ministry of social affairs for social protection and development thank you for joining us on the story we'll have an unknown valcke of your program tell everybody who you are and what you did. and the communication manager and your console for development and we're good stablish in 2011 with your bible being 1st syrian for the sea and refugee and

we've expanded all over on the call to thank you guest get to have here on the stream when you were listening to joe maloof write that you reached out picked up a patent on you what points poised to tell us what go ahead well he said you know lebanon needs international help the international community has repeated time and time again that it is ready to help but what they want to see is that the political class which really has been responsible to running the economy into the ground mismanagement and corruption for so many years there needs to be a new leadership a leadership that is ready to carry out in forums and fight corruption so the international community is ready to help america well know you're just going to need a political class to think more about the country and its people instead of their own personal interests awesome food the government's perspective how do you explain to people in lebanon what is going on right now with our economy how would you do

that. actually i was in a sad it's a community of over the years but nowadays in 2020 we had like all the difficulties of the years and all the problems of the years like happened today in 2020 we had the fiscal economic deterioration we have the pandemic of garbage we had also the explosion of the port of beirut so all these compounded crises left us with the situation we are and having poverty rates very high and more than 50 percent actually our numbers say and indicate that we have more than 60 percent of the total binny's population living in poverty and 25 percent of them are living below the extreme poverty rate which means that they are under the risk of starvation. this is a stepping portal to shopping for your walk in the engineer world what does this

mean what are you seeing can you share a story with us. definitely i would start with the most shocking story because i think the impact of the economic crisis has left many people helpless and pushed some of the people to take even extreme measures such as. committing suicide here's a story for example. one of the reasons story that happened is that there is this kid. who had been in the school activity of which the teacher asked him to bring a 1000 to be used to buy sandwich for box at the school and when the kid approached the father to ask him for the money the father did not know what to respond he was able to afford this amount of money to the kids and eventually he committed suicide so people are living in marks of stress that they're not being able to afford anything but they can eat people are exchanging they they're sending their furniture and they're selling. the home just for an exchange for food that they can

provide them by the end of the day when they do that there so really. the situation is really leading on the ground so you know i'm just looking at this report of quite recently that you take 11 and faces tough from a dam and made in saying food prices there was one point in a point when a woman said how are the poor going to eat how are they not not even a sort of a pathetic a question but a real we cannot afford food so you know yes it's not it's not longer just the poor it's the middle class the middle class has plunged into into poverty we've watched people wait for she would hand out there given kind of doxes with rice and and oil just to be able to survive through trances have increased 5 fold people are just dying their basic needs you just broke down you know commercial district shops are empty nobody is even buying clothes the other day i

was at night and i asked how much a shoe. as for her toddler a $1000200.00 lebanese pounds at the official rate that's $800.00 and the black market rate that's $100.00 but we have to talk black market right now because that's dominating trading because there's there's a lack of dollars in the country and i just looked at the shopkeeper and she looked at me and she says you are shocked it's not even my salary i can't even afford it and that's when they pay me my salary there's a lot of desperation unemployment is on the rise as the economy it needs billions of dollars and then that's why i go back to say you know politicians who have been governing this country for decades they have a responsibility for the sake of the people they need to move aside they cannot you know cling onto power because the international community is not going to help if they don't fight corruption and there's not going to be and i've heard this word time and time again from western diplomats they've been saying there's not going to be a blank check this time they need to take action so there are many stories like this

shopkeeper who you know she just looks at others and say ok you're buying that shoe for your toddler it's not even my salary so it's really really difficult times not just for the poor it's now the middle class and there's great a brain drain doctors nurses and they're leaving the country as well and lebanon prided itself with its you know medical sector it there was medical tourism in this country and now hospitals are barely able to call. it off to play a comment this is from professor lessing vassal and he is from an investor the american university of beirut who came up with the fire to show solid index it is a very simple idea it is a maze and chopped salad of all of these principles and. they've tried at american university a favorite how much it cost to buying gradients from one to another this is what he told us and you have a listen and then respond at the end of us and thank you. at the beginning of the

month of ramadan we wanted to see how inflation is going to affect the lives of people in lebanon so we look at the end there. are 2 shindigs which traces the prices of the main ingredients basic interest in the salad and we discover that actually it increased 210 percent from 220 to 21 when we looked into what could cause a basic standard or basic a start for a family of 5 including for doing this soup and other basic items we actually allies that will cause their family something like weiss or more than the minimum wage for a 2nd to be in the country is that he is challenging and we might actually see even more challenging times in the coming weeks and months. challenger has got a game on understatement yes go ahead mike my comment is that yes i

understand and he's the author you're right the devaluation of the lebanese pound made the prices get very high and also let's not forget the merchants monopoly over the basic ingredients and basic food so like it's something catastrophic and i don't want to be get us catastrophic at least we are presenting the problem and at the end of the this see this like stream i want to provide people with hope but at the ministry of social affairs we did 3 things 1st of all we have a national poverty targeting program that targets the people or the families that are below the extreme poverty line so we are providing now with the cards with vouchers for about. 2550000 tommies ok and we are a negotiating with the world bank in loan for a program called the s s an emergency social safety net program so that i don't say

so much every asians i hand this new program will will allow us to scale up the. the benefits 216-0000 families additional to the $50000.00 in general we will reach 210000 families also we are preparing now to launch a compensation scheme program for water. of subsidies because this prize of the 5th to show us are presented is because the goods or the ingredients of the of a douche are. not provided in subsidy the price so it's in the market rate price so when we provide the people with a car that allows them to buy these basic food and services then we will help them if you. gate. rising and problems and provide and going to be there for security we

are planning now to target 750000 detainees families by june so that's a very huge challenge it's the biggest logistical operation in the history of lebanon i know it's very difficult we will have so many problems challenges and grievances as well but we have to move forward in order to provide the poor with all the support and let's not forget the syrian displaced because also 9 out of 10 students placed in lebanon are under extreme poverty line imagine this number so lebanon basically nowadays is a country resided by vulnerable communities from all nationalities unfortunately so in be we in partnership with the university are you and d.p.w. be unicef and other you and agencies we are providing also a social safety net us and let me just saying is that enough ok. no i don't think that this is an else what is happening now is just

a temporary solution but it's not a permanent solution because. it's just more of a morphine shot if you provide people with subsidies you help them purchase. the items with them and this prospect but then what then what is the brits going to do happen so i think we should be addressing the problem that that as serious as we can. think sample. it put it even with the subsidies. i don't know if you heard about it but but. the prices are going up the price of the bread no going up but $3.00 times and the families they start a family and they start to move that. the hostess talk about symbols also likely to do with the subsidies so it's i don't think no it's not the solution and

it won't help solve the economic problem needs to talk of the quabbin more seems to allow me to say that you are right in the in the way or another. now we are made this storm so we have to provide the people with that was do mitigate and be resilient in order to build of the storm so that they rise again after the storm passes away so we have. to do this now and at the same time in part of all this work on a better little programs in order to provide us with an exit plan out of the poverty it's not that we are providing cards and that it's wrong we have to have an exit plan. that provides us with the tools in order to get out of our perspective we here our respective we're here at supply let me bring you something from the heart of the storm this is on that and he was talking about what he's been

doing recently in lebanon have a listen i just traveled back from lebanon last week where we went to visit syrian refugee camps we were distributing food packs fresh meat fresh bread to these refugees and we also asked them how they're coping with on this year and what a lot of them said was it's a struggle for them especially because they don't have an income one of the syrian refugees don't have an income so they struggle and they rely solely on charity aid and as you can imagine due to the current economic crisis that's not helping any of them either. so you know there are so many layers of challenges that 11 has right now including the lifting off food subsidies including. the list goes on and on and on for. yet remote multiple crises how do you even communicate that and how are even lebanese people living for that. well it's very difficult but yes and finite understand you know you want to help the poor but

these are ad hoc decisions and i mean when you're taking a lot of time the world bank you used the word negotiations there is already a deal the world bank has set conditions the lebanese government has not met those conditions other asking is to genoa let me to say is and i know you are you are not right because i was negotiating with the world bank and they know exactly what is going on we did yes and we signed the agreement but the parliament of lebanon did have like some. some insights or some justifications for the deal and then now we are waiting to be sent to washington d.c. they had quarters of the world bank so that the board of trustees of the world bank like confirms the agreement and you have to go into consideration and be sorry that the have you vetted the families who are supposed to receive this i mean the world bank and everybody else for that matter is there a bit concerned that only supporters of the government are going to receive this

aid they need this you know i'm not going to get into no that's not the damage because we are we have did we have done a b m t testing question or in collaboration with the world bank b. and others as well so we have 50 questions we will do household visit and all this is monitored we did and we had a grievance for the 1st time in history of lebanon so we have to to give like credit when we work properly and we have to criticize when we don't so let's be clear we did i meant eager events and for the 1st time in the history of lebanon technical audit so we have to do to say that we abided by all the the standards of the international scene and i'm sorry i meant i haven't had a lot of people on the want to talk to all 3 of you time got to ask you briefly to respond to some of the comments that you have inspired right now and i want to start with this is from my possible possible that how is lebanon coping after the

blast the painful blast. this is falling. yeah it's not coping. i'm going to talk 1st of an in-joke perspective being heard when the blast was a. changing point in the past that we're doing. we changed our interventions so so here's the thing. all the programs that we've done throughout the last 9 years are just being shattered after the blast because after we've reached a point where 80 percent of it is only focused on education protection and the likelihood now it will buck 2.0 where we have to focus our it think it is on providing the basic needs for the people but if the provide him with the catalyst and we need right in the shelter so basically we are now under survive and everyone is knocking everything people do not care about education anymore they do not care

about the issues of gender based violence. it seems like all of the effort is gone and this is paving the way for really alarming problems so for example child labor is on the rise again many of the people are forcing the church and state to quit school because they need to work to provide their families with a piece of bread on the table by the end of the day and you have early marriage on the rise again we've done a really good progress but now with the economic situation forced to do that again i think that there's so many evil people do you mind if i just share some more of those questions with your copilot just all right so this is your highness yeah he says and i'm going to ask him for a very quick response here international help is essential for lebanon to overcome this crisis you don't have to agree but i'm really interested in your instant reaction that. definitely international community the international partners and

friends have contributed a lot in the past for lebanon especially in those 3 but definitely the needs are massively increasing and also we have scores if you have resources nowadays in lebanon and we cope and play and we really really need this help from the national community whether it's huge of you are on point with your questions this one is for you saying or this is from vali unemployment corrupt politicians who have been governing the nation for many years we need men i'm going to add and women of integrity who have a true love for the people instead of themselves to editorialize they're the politicians like matthew say and i go ahead. well they ran the economy into the ground there's mismanagement corruption and governance. i mean people have lost hope have lost faith in those who are in power who are lowered who turned into politician who it's been 8 months since the government resigned in

august in the aftermath of the beirut explosion and yet these politicians are fighting over influence and in the next government and it's not only internal power struggles there's also reach to all dynamics at play because lebanon's politicians are tied to regional international players and lebanon is a battleground a proxy state where we're basically lebanon is is a card so for these politicians lebannon and villepin nice people are not the priority. people take to the streets yes they were not the majority a lot of people still you know follow their their leaders their sectarian leaders far far different from many different trees and some are afraid of the tentative or the alternative really has not presented itself people are still afraid you know because there's this lack of loyalty as as a nation as a nation state but that this protest movement fizzled out it was met by

a militarized state people found it useless really to keep on taking to the street when you're up against power which is ready to use all forms of violence you know to keep people off the streets so a lot of lebanese have lost hope those who can have left the country and that's why i talk about you know brain drain and s. and i wasn't criticizing you for the sake of criticizing but it's been a year and a half what have you you know not you what have those in power done for the people to 3 months ago people young men were in tripoli and demanding jobs saying that we cannot survive when there is a lockdown if we don't work today i can't put food on the table that any government official respond to them. no they shot at them they killed one young man so this is what i am studying i'm not saying you know and people are worried and the world bank is worried and they're rightly so who are the families who are going to get these these foods uganda are they going to be people who really need help or people

who are going to vote for these politicians in the upcoming elections next year so lebanese have lost hope i've reported from many countries across the world conflict zones i've covered wars but watching a country slowly die slowly collapse watch people the depression the anxiety and watching the leadership only thinking about themselves and not the people that i have not seen you know in my career and i can say that i've i've seen i've seen quite a lot also i personally agree with you is coming i think you are coming in and sitting in the hot seat basically on the strain and talking to not just asked remotely in south his audience and also to officer paper in lebanon as one more comment i want to share with you and let it come off the back of that and that will wrap up i shall have a listen. despite all of this the lebanese government is stubbornly refusing to take any meaningful steps progress in a crisis daily invited to people's right to an adequate standard of living.

how do you want to grandma's combination i had my respond to zena and to the lady i'm not here to defend the government but also it's nice to. like to be to be objective ok this government came in february 2020 ok and in less than 6 months they experienced the deterioration of the economy and they give you a shot of the pound also the pandemic of coverage that affected the biggest and strongest countries in the word and then the explosion of the port of beirut and let's not forget that in lebanon 40 percent of the population are not only binny's from displaced syrians and palestinian refugees so all these compounded crises led to this also thank you so much we appreciate it with thank you very much

we appreciate you being on the show you claim and also saying as well each of your questions were on point thank you for the part of today's discussion is why not be the last time you hear from zeno awesome really appreciate and thanks for watching us the next time on the story. one 3rd of all the food produced is wasted with tens of thousands of food outlets tower in south korea has been transformed from west of founder into a global leader in food recycling i have a reporting on how new technology is making this possible. in kenya i mean the farmers and scientists what he had been in the soil the livelihoods depend on was. a phrase just. a weekly critique of the stories hitting the headlines the news

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dance the famous one came from the office of politics and culture go undercover to hear allegations of corruption by those in power and if you're in a hurry get your news in 2 minutes from al-jazeera news updates on home for. the. at least 44 people were killed an estimated at a religious festival in israel emergency rescue services describe it as a national catastrophe. this is al jazeera live from doha for the battle also coming up desperately needed foreign aid arrives in india as the country registers another record number of coronavirus cases.