right direction. we were putting african communion from the continent like would've been there. they're doing big things out that we've seen this thing lucille ball out there. treble know out that when they say trouble the 1st african comedian to perform at madison square garden, he won't be the last. it just opened the yeah, it just made it easier for someone to come in. like i feel like i can do it. they say home, it comes from the moment the know that there's no point to continue. that seemed like more than enough that we believe that we will find new people. and what if we have amazing stories here and the more we keep on pushing, the more we keep on doing this, the michelle, we shall blow up. ah, your challenges there with me. so robert, reminder of our top stories, at least 50 people, have been killed in a rocket attack in easton ukraine. it is

a train station in cover thaws being used by civilians for evacuations, for the lead demands. lensky colds, russia, an evil, with no limits. the carrying of house moscow denies involvement. the head of the european commission has visited ukraine and coldly act the attack on come or tolls . a polling slow von july was also shown mass graves in the time the future by russian forces are accused of committing atrocities against billions. she promised to see that the process of ukraine joining the you. russia will be sent in economic, financial, and technological deal. a, b k, while ukraine is marching towards these europe in future. this is what i see. we stand with you as you defend your country, and this is my 2nd point. indeed, ukrainian people are holding up the torch of freedom. for all of us. you can, as president, as warned al jazeera of renewed attacks on key by russia,

belgium incidents. he says that will happen if the ukrainian forces fail on the eastern front. but he says, seeing towns liberated as giving many people hope. in these boxes, the parliament will be meeting on saturday morning to consider removing prime minister run cons office. the supreme court ruled on thursday that con, broke the law by trying to have the president dissolved parliament and colon election. judges also said that kind of decision to block lesson, there's no confidence that was unconstitutional. and the 1st private flight to the international space station is blasted into orbit 3. 10323 businessmen who each pay $55000000.00 to take part. and after all, to those who bought the mission as a collaboration between muskets, space ex, nasa, and commercials blaze face light company ex sealed headlines war news. and often i would make long to stay with us or china in the us sleep walking their way to war

in the struggle over ukraine. here's the test for president joe biden, when prison is really trying to do is rewrite the security architecture in your personal united states. you seriously get a walk into gun at the same time your weekly take on us politics and society. that's the bottom line. hundreds of thousands of americans are experiencing a homelessness, and as eviction protections enacted during the pandemic come to an end. many worry that the crisis will worsen. but how do you solve a problem? when politicians, even within their own party, can't seem to agree on a way forward. that conversation is coming up. but 1st, south africa is the most unequal country in the world. $30000000.00 people are living in poverty while the top 10 percent of the population own 86 percent of total net. well, the result high levels of housing and food insecurity. fighting against evictions and for land better housing and the dignity of the poor is a check. well as movement called the avalon boss, them john the low, they are the largest grassroots organization of the land was poor in post apartheid

south africa. but they faced dangerous and sometimes fatal consequences for their activism. just last month, 2 members were killed and what the group says were politically motivated assassinations, this week's headliner to pay level happy. the secretary general of the abeline boss image on the look the pelham will help you. thank you so much for joining me on up front. you are the secretary general of abala bus. him and joe little by lately, members of your organization have been facing threats. physical attacks in early march to members, a yonder, in gila and c, a bongo mac, willy, were actually killed. your movement has said that the killings were carried out by people connected to the african national congress, the correct governing party. they of course, have rejected these claims. why has your movement face such violent repression when you're fighting for what are seemingly uncontroversial things? a basic human rights, housing, food, and things like that. mom's medals formed installing 5 of them don't, don't know,

stands for a, for to pull and my son lives in this country difficult in generation. we have to focus on generation. we live under buried in human conditions in the ship settlements. we have no access to what we have no access to a mutation. beth is that reality that we faced as the people running and checks the dimensions of africa post up in south africa. and our father did not fight for these. nelson mandela did not fight for. they fought for us to have a better life than before. about b, i and, and gala idea owned a young man who was please, it was leading a commune, shooting to call the twin level if you kind of all over to where. and instead of praising such a brilliant leadership, the agency fees and the i'm, you know, as an enemy because he's a poor young man who is from the settlement informal agreement who's organizing

outside of the states. or we can say that the people have been killed by the id totally amc because in 2016 to what kinds of the amc were convicted and sentenced to life in prison. and right now, as i speak to you, they are saving, lack in prison, in the maximum stock prison for having queued, one of our own attributes. so we, our cubicles are exposing corruption. we have cued because we are exposing corruption when it comes to a location of houses that are built by government. what, what are the pool? but in state officials in municipalities, in the form of what kinds of those are sitting you've houses to meet people who do not want to bypass going to the banks. but the houses that have a mentor to put a stop to poor given to people who do not deserve them, and you find that homelessness continues to be, oh,

don't stay for us and we are leaving. and that is a home that i'm in very in human condition. i wanna, well, i want to talk to you about about housing for sure. but i don't want to skip past this question of the a and c being directly involved. ah, in these killings, you've talked about killings for which members or people connected to the agency have been arrested, convicted in sentence, but the answer is also rejected. ah, quite formally the insinuation that it is involved in the systemic elimination of abala bus. and when you're the leaders and members, in fact, the spokesperson for the agency in a causal the natal where the killings took place that we referenced said, you cannot say the a and c has killed people or the agency has sent people to kill other people. if you have got evidence that so and so killed your leader or member, you have an obligation to go to the police and open a case and give evidence otherwise going out in issuing statements that a and c killed people are is reckless. and when we're talking about these killings,

particularly the ones in early march, what evidence do you have? what can you offer? ah, to substantiate the claim that they were killed by a and by the agency where the n c as in government. and we are not saying that's the, the agency is, is, is, is killing the people who are using the name of the amc. and the answer should come out and say, don't people are not representing us. so the person who has been behind in the attic of the communion in canada, and you know, in the end of the people they're taking, people targeting people is an agency chief who sam's in the executive branch of the a and c. and use is the name of the amc. so the answer, if they're not involved, they should be the one who are condemning these. in fact, we've never had them condemned window to what counselors and no statement was issued when the 2 are counselors, way we understand. so you, we have proof of to a and c position at hiring well rested today. daisy never even leaves the statement

. so we have been reporting cases and the cases of the to you what comes on us, where you put it re investigated. and they thought they were found to be guilty. but some of the cases are in fact we have the more on the commission and which of the commission that goes investigating political killings and wasn't that. and we went into it and brought up some evidence. today we asked you to waiting, but you know, you are fighting against the government and that is investigating. and so i want to get to the, the root of this question of land, which you referenced a moment ago. because one of the main promises opposed to part time south africa was to redistribute land to black south africans, we've been forcibly removed from the land during the apartheid regime. can you talk about the breakdown of land ownership in south africa today? who benefits from access to urban life in an opportunity? well the, the issue of that is, and sort of the guy is did

a major crisis. and i don't think that's the, the, the, the legislation that we have put in place and have done any justice. you know, charging gets i mean, we are talking about 10 to 7 years later since the amc has been in power. that he has a peasant that myself can. she can claim that cannot claim that their own level does come in while the 10 percent and each wides, who wear privilege during the update continue to owned the majority of the land and just country we are. we are just then less we. we have no future. amen. i inhibited the chance settlement where i leave and the ship that i live in is a ship that belongs to my parents. so we in had his poverty. we're asking poor is deflect. if people have just kindly, the majority of black people still suffer the consequences of living and that is in human conditions where we are faced with files in, from our sentiment and with how does this, how does this happen right? in a post a part type moment, many people celebrated the shift in leadership,

the face of black president and government officials. and yet i'm hearing you talk about a, a persistent inequality in terms of access to resources, access to land access to housing. how does this happen when lewis sold this idea that we're going to city and we do have freedom of movement? and i don't, i just, i think that i to excess economy. it adds to excess housing data to access to land that use it. that way we can glance food, so we can stop by is not day for black people. a young black peasant, like my sam, is still saying today that i don't have a place where i can pull it home and my kids will and heading their face. the very same fact if i don't fight today. so that's why we are fighting and saying that we will occupy men we need to when needed to do so, because we are doing this for kids. we are doing this for our next generation

because it seemed like can be those who have negotiated during the holidays. i did not discuss that. ready land, and which was the most crucial being we went these, pull it off our land, and we are living under these conditions that you are living under because the color now a system is still day visible for us. and if you go to a place like cape town, it's been difficult to access the fleet you, when you are black and, and now we have in no, it's no longer about the color scheme. it's about how much you have so, so you can access our cities. so we occupy land that has to go to the c too because we believe that people who have been deprived, looked at i 2 x. if you can give me a bit, can you describe that for me a bit because, you know, from an audience is benefit you're fighting against the evictions. you're finding

the access land as you mentioned, and to do so, your lead occupying vacant and unused lands in urban areas. and you're trying to sort of bill communities in, inside the spaces out there in formal settlements. basically, what do they look like? who's in them, or how are they structured when the infamous settlements are shenzi houses built out of wood out of desperation because we have no other ways of occupying, let em. because so sometimes we are forced to forcibly removed by the answered end . envision when needs done no enforcement as well as the am john inspected that and it's where people are to move into gunpoint and some of them have been killed during the process. and by the way, we've lost 22 interviews, you know about some jungle. and since 2009 when we're being attacked and, and of course, and these shantee houses,

obviously washed away by flaps. we've had people who have been in buried alive by the flags. and in the province we have people who are dying ship files because our which is because the fire. so dan, this is the kind of life that black majority is under for, can be. and you talk about how they're threatened by, by nature, but they're also threatened by violent evictions in 2020 your organization reported that a private security firm acting on behalf of the quine municipality carried out illegal evictions using live ammunition. several people in the community were hospitalized . 1 and this is just one example of many, oh, where do people go after eviction when they have no way to go? and that's why we, we, we encourage our existence and which is called economy in. this is because we have no way if you, if we leave that no delenda do occupied. do we have nowhere else to go?

but it is unfortunate and anonymously, it is very unfortunate that a government that is supposed to be a pro pu walk, the government that is supposed to take care of the government communist a better life for us. and our opinions, judy before about 8 am today is the very same government that is doing and what the about the government was doing to our parents when they 1st moved and i took their cd. so we are based with the government that does that. and they are prepared to shoot and key for such. and if not, they will use the local agency at branch lives to deal with those. well, you're paying let for somebody else to buy and land for somebody. there have been proposals in government to expropriate and re distribute land to address racial land inequality most recently there was one in december of 2021. the proposals all

failed. who is blocking the redistribution of land to black residence and why? and the installation of land without compensation for us as a movement, we are state that it will fade because he gets trade in many ways. it is like taking land from the wagon and giving it to black any because it does not speak directly to the people under ground. we believe that people on the ground must be done. voices of this expectation is it must not be something that is in parliament because what is what they might have been in parliament, you know, like half the problems of south africa. we don't know a cast a and seen pounds. and the other thing that we, we do think lead with is the effect that the land must be in the hands of government for the benefit of the people. we know that it doesn't happen in a corrupt government. it will still be a black leaks. and the black and he would be have control over it that the is

the next policy. can we try to address the issue and then do this company. and it is only when the people ok eyes from below that we can try to be able to extra credit learn without organization discuss the payload will help me. thank you so much for joining me on up front. thank you. it must be a great pleasure. ah, more than half a 1000000 americans are currently experiencing homelessness. when the coven 19 pandemic hit millions of people lost their jobs, prompting the federal government to place a moratorium on evictions. but that was a short term auditorium that really didn't do enough to just the crisis or did it. and what happens next now that those protections are nearly all gone? to any me to discuss this r, rob robinson, member of the campaign to restore national housing rights in beth melanie, the director of legal aids eviction defense project. thank you both for joining me, beth. i'm going to start with you when the federal are more time on evictions ended

on august 26th of last year. but many people predicted that we would see a so called eviction soon army. but so far, most of the data indicates that didn't happen. why? i think the main reason we're seeing this in the district of columbia is that the federal government came in with hundreds of millions of dollars of rental assistance. and so that helped. i'm in dc, we've had about $400000000.00 and rental assistance distributed to landlords on behalf of tenants. and so it may have just kind of held off on a soon army that's gradually gonna come. maybe it's not going to be a see now me, but it's going to play out over time. but that money has made a huge difference. well, that there's actually encouraging news it, despite the fact that the data, at least seems come somewhat encouraging. the fact remains that in 6 states of 31 cities, oh, the organization eviction lab tracks those places and more than 8000 people have been evicted in the past week alone. does the perception that the snobby never

happen. make the work of advocating for housing rights actually more difficult. i think it does. i'm. i agree with beth that there was federal money to sort of slow . that's an army. but i think certain states play out different. we've had stronger protections in new york, which ended january 15, 2020 till our protections in new york was stronger than the federal protections. however, we just had a protest in front of bronze housing court in new york because there are 20000 cases in the hopper ready to be activated and started evicting people, you know, in bronx new york. but i, i think in other places around the country's similar is going to happen. we will see once the courts open up, we will see a rush to with it. and speaking of courts, beth, when the supreme court blocked an extension on the eviction moratorium, many understandably responded in protest. but the court said that the moratorium was going to continue. it had to come from congress. ah, does the court have appoint? ah, it doesn't seem unreasonable to many that congress should be making the laws mean

that is the legislative branch branch i again, should we be putting some pressure on congress for this? so sure, of course we should be pressure in congress act. but congress has made the laws, so congress has passed laws that say the center for disease control. and prevention has certain authority to act, including in an emergency. congress has made laws about the health care system and health care workers, you know, being vaccinated and those kinds of things. and so the point is, congress has acted and said, we have this huge nation. we have all these different actors trying to protect health. and we're going to give agencies some authority to act when they need to quickly on the ground, knowing what's happening on the ground best. but what do you do with those who do end up in court as one judge put it? it's pretty clear who could do something about this problem. the courts don't make the laws. you're the director of legal aids eviction defense project that you represent. clients for landlord tenant issues in washington dc right here where we are. are there ways to protect tenants in courts?

that don't necessarily require legislative perform. absolutely, and our court and d. c has done some of these things, i'll mention a few things. so before the pandemic landlord tenant court, and d. c, you would have 15200 tenants showing up in the morning at 9 10 am. they're there for the whole day missing work having to deal with child care. and sometimes just didn't come because of those issues. also, the tenants didn't have to be served court papers whole week before the court date, so i didn't, you know, that you have to go to court in a week. you have to make all these arrangements. he may not be able to do it. so our city council has changed the law, so you have to get 30 days notice before the 1st court hearing, but what the court has been doing is scheduling hearings and one hour blocks. and so, you know, that's your hour. the court has allowed proceedings to be remote and really as committed to continuing to allow that. so if you need to be at home and come to court, if it's just kind of a status hearing or something where there's not gonna be testimony, there's not gonna be a trial. you can do that from your home. so i don't necessarily have to choose

between, for example, childcare, eggs that and going important, protecting my whole claim. when they learn new york city could barely make ends meet. and i'm just give you an example when she worry that she might lose her family home after hurt and it's stop paying rent. it left her short $70000.00 to cope with the loss of income as a result of the eviction moratorium. some local landlords are selling their property to institutional investors many way that this will only mean higher rents and fewer options for the very people. the moratorium of the victim moratorium was supposed to help us does support for local landlords need to be a bigger part of the conversation. definitely needs to be a big part. and i think the movement, the right to counsel coalition and housing justice for all have made that clear in new york city and new york state that is deaf part of their struggle. they support the small landlords, what they are arguing against, as a bigger landlord, to use eviction court as a factory to mass produce evictions. because we have things like rent control in new york if i can get the tenant out. and so some places keep it empty for 2 years

in new york. right? control goes away, then they bring it back as a market rent apartment, right? so we need to preserve, you know, those rent controlled apartment. so i do think the movements, any of the social justice graduates community support those small landlords, but we also need to get a wake up call from our elected officials. the other thing i want to just add to, i think beth makes a significant point about the number of cases in a particular court book. if a judge in this is not unusual in new york has 100 eviction cases on the desk. and on a given day can be mass production man, i'm going to get these cases of my desk as fast as possible. and that's what it a problem. i agree, we need to slow that process, definitely slow the process down, but also again focused on these local landlords. there was a, a survey done and it showed that 23 percent of small landlords only between one in 3 single family homes plan to sell at least one property due to the difficulties

caused by the eviction band. and again, they're not selling to other small landlords, right? they're selling to big companies who can afford to wait out the game or to just take whatever hits in order to raise the rate and push other people out. what do we do? so rental assistance, i think has been a big part of writing this i, you know, i think small landlords potentially should be looked at differently. i will say small landlords however, i think something we have to keep in mind. they are the ones we often see in the district who are having tenants living in terrible conditions. they are threatening tenants. they are doing things that are illegal. they are locking tenants out. and so i think it's really important to have that full picture that got to man a size, a small local lane lawyer. and there are 2 sides that issue be of, look, you know, a small businesses are a form of wealth creation, so forth in communities and for people of color. and we need to have that full picture. i think it's important to keep in mind there's another side to that story . and so in d. c, we have

a small landlord lobby and they actually have been kind of the most vocal, the most vitriolic in fighting against any protections for tenants. and so it's just important to keep all these things and balance. look at the picture overall when we try to come up with solutions, that's an important right, because i think we would all agree insecure housing is a problem. even people on the extremes of each political party would say, yeah, and house people is not a good thing that the problem is agreeing on a solution to this. that's where you go. and it was a subject for example, but donald trump, to blame democrats, right? but it's also something if the vice of in the democratic party also it doesn't seem like the people who were hearing from the most or the people who are catching the most pain from the right people who are actually experiencing housing insecurity. so talking about what we're getting wrong now and again, you're speaking someone formally unhealthy. you know, what, from what, what from your own experiences, shapes, how you understand in addition to being in the shelter and understand the shelter

system. what else being brought to the table in my voice, nattering right? have a, have a voice in the decision making policy. the problem is you tend to romanticize that individual voice. you need more voices like mine and others to come to the table. what kind of voices romanticize that was the person pulling up by the bootstrap is the person so here his rob, right? so rob came from a family, right. he was once living in you know, middle class america, right? family stable family. he went homeless for 2 and a half years spent 10 months in the shelf a found his way out. anybody can do it. no, not anybody can do it right. i had an infrastructure around me. i had knowledge of how it was to live non homeless. many of the folks who was suffering had lived in poverty and struggle their lives. so they need help. you can't just pick yourself up by your bootstraps, you need support, right? and your voice needs to be heard in your voice needs the matter. so when you make those decisions, when you're in front of a politician who's signing off on legislation,

who knows nothing about homelessness, doesn't make any sense to me. i once said to me, a bloomberg in new york because i was bought to a table with 30 individuals who were going to address the housing problem in new york. and i asked him before i started mayor bloomberg to jump asleep on a piece of cardboard. he looked at me bemused. i asked him again, he says, i don't understand what you mean. i said what i mean is you have a bunch of people around the stable who never went through this issue. but then making decisions about the meeting ended abruptly. when the meeting was brought back, 6 months later, the table was divided. 505050 with decision makers, 50. what people when lived experience? well, those voices have to be brought to the table they have to manner. and they have to be part of that decision making process throughout. thank you so much for joining me on upfront ranking with everybody that is our show up front, we'll be back next to the

on counting the costs by then orders. what he says is an unprecedented release of oil reserves will it brings life is down. again, germany when itself off rush and gas in 2 years and taxing crystal currency profits in india. how will it affect investing? counting the cost on al jazeera, it's rush hour at the local community center, in lieu batch of 15 kilometers from the border with ukraine. that note that got jack is a retired russian language teacher and is collecting goods donated by people from all over europe. thought a, we are helping people on the other side of the border. the ones who stayed behind who can plead since russia invaded ukraine. nato has been driving across the border every day. crossing the border is always tricky, but the women say that today they have a lucky day because the border guard is someone they know and they're going to be

hopefully much easier to bring the goods in the know to is we leave to find a less chaotic situation that in the past few days, people seem less exhausted. this time i'm not crying. as you can see. the new dos mission has been accomplished now, but you will return with more goods as long as russia's missiles and rockets forced people out of ukraine. in 2018, a journalist lead 40 days of civic action against the armenian government. and president, soc, is hands for upon power on going to labor. cuz we're a new documentary follows his nonviolent campaign to bring down a corrupt regime. and it's astonishing outcome with a democratic world. i am not alone, arminius, velvet, revolution on al jazeera, you know, you could watch out as they were english streaming live on like youtube channel,

plus thousands of all programs the world documentary, and to death please. of course, ah, subscriber take you cheese dot com forward slash al jazeera english. ah. at miss all hits the train station in ukraine, filled with people escaping the threats of a russian offensive in the east walden 50 killed. ah. on the clock, this is al 0 live from dell ha. also coming up the e unveils new sanctions against russia, including freezing the assets of president vladimir putin, daughters b cranes. lita says that's not enough.