this is d.w. news live from berlin their buddies in beijing it seems but will china and the u.s. crack the north korea crisis the u.s. secretary of state gets a warm welcome from his chinese counterpart and tillerson says the u.s. is in contact with north korea also coming up. confrontation in catalonia as the

independence referendum approaches rallies take place and both madrid and barcelona to oppose sunday's vote for the catalonian government insist that the vote will go ahead. and in the bundesliga better braman and hamburg's inability to score has cost them points can tonight's match spark life into their attacks. i'm happy quite often welcome to the program u.s. secretary of state rex tillerson says the u.s. is in contact with north korea over its nuclear weapons program and is probing the country's willingness to talk tillerson made the remarks in beijing where he's held meetings centering on north korea and trade the u.s. use china as crucial to attempts to stop nor. korea developing nuclear weapons

china has strong economic ties with the anyang accounting for about ninety percent of its foreign trade to discuss this further let's bring in correspondent stephen borowitz who is standing by for us in seoul in south korea stephen good to have you with us rex tillerson says today the u.s. is in contact with north korea probing its willingness to talk now how important a role this china play and diplomatic process as delicate as this if u.s. and north korea were in some kind of direct contact and presumably that's a diplomatic process that's going ahead without china's direct involvement and whether or not that you cite sit down to talk will depend on a variety of factors particularly the preconditions that they place on any kind of talks north korea has historically resisted talks that were predicated upon its taking steps towards the nuclear as they should that being said china is of course very important to any sort of approach north korea given the amount of economic

power that they have or north korea and i think some u.s. policy makers and analysts have in the past assumed that china has this sort of magic ability to affect north korea's behavior but history shows that that isn't always the case. now as you mentioned china is obviously an important actor in this situation and they've also adopted u.n. sanctions against north korea and seem increasingly willing to cut those ties of over its nuclear weapons program but how much further can washington push beijing to exert power on north korea. to answer that it's important to distinguish between economic and political power china has a lot of economic power of chris he said given that north korea's only active land borders with china and so much of its trade depends on interaction with china but that being said china north korea is still a sovereign country and when it comes to what policies they want to carry out and if they choose to pursue nuclear weapons or missiles there's not much that china

can do to change that so. is it will be able to assess the extent to which the two sides are able to cooperate and just how much the u.s. is able to get china on board with carrying out u.n. sanctions and other kind of punitive measures on north korea now look you had president trump will visit beijing in november of course currently there appears to be warmer ties between u.s. and china but could anything be derived now from between now and that briefly if you can. the calendar is full of big events between now and then china will have its communist party congress and north korea will be celebrating the foundation of its ruling party and south korean officials just said this week that they expect more provocative actions between from north korea around mid october so the question will be if tensions do arise if u.s. and china will seize on that urgency to cooperate more cohesively and to make a more united front or if the more tense situation leads them to break apart in

some way and they have some differences on the best way to move forward so well after states you know over the next couple weeks and see how things develop with a full calendar i'll certainly be watching that closely steven burrill way console thank you. to spain now were tensions are rising ahead of attempts by catalonia to hold a referendum on independence on sunday madrid says the move is illegal and has sent thousands of police officers to the region the cattle on authorities say everything is in place for the vote to go ahead however there are plenty of voices in catalonia and elsewhere in spain that do not support the referendum. prejudices gathering in madrid demonstrating against sunday's referendum on catalonian independence. but cuts alone officials say they have to tend to go ahead with the a motorized vote on friday night thousands of guests campaign is turned out for

their final rally. we will vote they chant such as to control the sea the campaign has stoked the regional president claimed a victory before a single bomb that had been cost i will you know what yeah. well today we won. today we won against the fear and threats we won against the pressure the lies and the intimidation we won against an authoritarian government who didn't want us to get to this point. it may have been a party atmosphere but the build up to this weekend has been marred with acrimony and antigun is of the spanish central government or the police to confiscate ballot papers rate offices and block polling stations and and barcelona's port the ships hired to accommodate additional police forces sent by the central government . at schools this weekend there was plenty of time for

extracurricular activities as families and children occupied classrooms said to be used as polling stations. the goal of being here is to keep the school open until sunday but the school and we believe that there are rights that must be respected. ruling separatist coalition has vowed to make it unilateral declaration of independence if the yes kevin wins on sunday. with catalan officials that said to the vote the regional government and spain central government in madrid are on a collision course. for more we have journalist jose miguel who is in barcelona the regional capital of catalonia jose government sources in madrid are now releasing details of how they plan to clamp down on this vote with huge fines for volunteers directives to remove people from polling stations now how

tense is the situation with just one day to go. yes you know with us tonight actually here at first and on situation is nothing really tense maybe in the back of people's minds there is some fear or or some tension but actually it right now most are not everything is happening is high school many schools are being taken by it but to keep them open to try and prevent these as you said up in order to acquaint them so right not situation in which they are nice these nights the feeling is people are excited and the feeling here is that the vote is going to happen no matter what are the same i would say ok and we're hearing reports that the spanish police raided the cattle and governments telecommunications center earlier today what more can you tell us about that. yeah that's just through this morning this and each one of us even which is one of the spanish police force is

separated from the other not one when this morning there to try to make sure that the online applications and services based there that were going to be used by. go online voting and to calm the votes all can be used so according to this. person for the government this is a very serious bro a for him by debates tomorrow votes again pick up on the thought that these are saying that even things i think these that vote is going to count and he's going to go ahead so it's really up to more so if the vote does go ahead tomorrow as catalan officials are saying and a majority of voters come out in favor of independence what can we expect to happen next. what could happen one day is really the one medium that are honest i'm. just how it's. friends.

from the greenhouse that we see forty eight hours they will declare independence day yes but it's most likely late leaving just days they have been sending mixed messages saying that maybe the commission will help them a while. for it to go but i have to begin with every house in so far. to any kind of conversation so if we don't know what's going to happen tomorrow morning is what may happen. jose miguel i used in barcelona thank you and now for some of the other stories making news around the world the u.n. says the number of refugees who fled into bangladesh has now topped half a million it's caused a humanitarian crisis and aid groups have warned of disease outbreaks the world health organization is shipping almost a million color of vaccines to bangladesh in the united states the environmental protection agency says an unknown amount of the dangerous chemical dioxin may have

washed down a river near houston during the flooding from hurricane harvey dioxin is linked to birth defects and cancer the spillage started from a site grow government agencies stores hazardous waste. the united states is point more than half of its staff out of its cuban embassy after a series of mysterious sonic attacks in the worst cases victims have suffered mild traumatic brain injury cuba's government denies responsibility and says it does not know what is causing the incidents. to sports now bundesliga match day seven got underway on friday night when shell co-hosted leverkusen the home side got on the board first when midfielder lay on stepped up to take a free kick from twenty three metres out. and then leverkusen tie things up just after the hour mark when jamaica international leon bailey shot looping in off

a defender's boot his first bundesliga goal one one was the final and the saturday night match this weekend going to sleep gussie's hamburg host verda braman in what's known as the norm derby it's one of the fiercest and all this rivalries in the german league the neighboring clubs are both sliding down the table and looking to grab three crucial points tonight. tension is high head of the north darby it always is before the most play tie in but it's league history hamburg won their first two matches this season but the team followed it up by losing four in a row next up archrivals venda. clint i think that in order to have be a little bit more explosive because of the history it brings with it. it's a feeling annoyed debbie will always electrify it interests everybody lack of goals has been hamburg's make concern in recent outings they've created chances but

haven't scored in their last four matches. have chances sometimes we've hit the side netting or we've been just a little bit off when we're through on the goalkeeper so we have to get lucky back on our side we have to work hard for it and play with intensity and then the goals will calm and braman has similar concerns only three goals scored so four and still without a victory this season the green and white are ready to fight. we definitely expect it to be a high intensity match plenty of tackles fast transitions from both teams lots of scrambling for second balls all those battling qualities come to the top. hamburg are ready to join the fray because one thing is clear the loser in this darby is in for a bumpy ride in the coming weeks. and formula one racing lewis hamilton will start monday's sunday's rather malays are grand prix in pole position hamilton

clocked the fastest time in qualifying edging out ferrari's kimi reichen n and red bulls max first option hamilton's title hopes received another huge boast after his main rival sebastian fattal experienced engine trouble the ferrari driver will now start the race from the back of the grid. and a media report says basketball player and atlanta hawks point guard dennis schroeder has been charged with misdemeanor battery it's been said to have happened after a scuffle outside a bar in an atlanta suburb according to a police report security cameras caught the twenty four year old initiating physical contact. we'll leave you now with some very cute panda cubs from china's sichuan province the oldest is five months and the youngest just two months old see again at the top of the hour.

she's long been a symbol of hope.