there's. a. point where you see the surfers fighting against unseen police. started january seventh on the job. as do you have the news coming to you live from berlin syria's power broker say peace talks in sochi next month russia iran enter the agreed to move at talks in the casa capital us dhamma this is human rights watch accuses russia and syria of targeting civilians in the air strikes on rebel held enclaves get the latest from

a researcher who's been in touch with trap civilians in eastern. plus catalonia is almost a president makes an offer after winning a slim majority carlos pushed along once in dialogue with the spanish government but prime minister marianna oil is playing hardball he says he'll meet the leader of the biggest party and that he's not pushed more. staying in spain the festive season is all about children singing songs that bring billions of euros el gordo the fat one is here again the world's biggest pig water it is bringing celebrations and cash to the streets of spain. i'm sara harmon welcome to the show it's good to have you with us major power. ours

in the syria conflict say they'll hold peace talks in the russian resort of sochi at the end of next month russia turkey and iran so the meeting will involve both rubbles and the government damascus has confirmed it will attend but the opposition hasn't confirmed yet of the u.n. special envoy for syria staffan de mistura so the initiative would be assessed on the contribution it made to the mandated political process by the united nations in geneva and that as rights groups warn of a fresh humanitarian crisis in syria human rights watch says the government and russian forces have been pounding rebel forces near the capital damascus among the worst hit areas eastern gaga the group has released these pictures showing the attacks it says have killed dozens of civilians. over russia's sports minister says the country will host an alternative competition

following its ban from february's winter olympics in south korea suspension came after the international olympic committee found evidence of a quote unprecedented and systematic manipulation of the anti doping system. in less than fifty days around two and a half thousand athletes would descend on pyong chang for the twenty eighteen winter olympics the question is how many russians will be here among them earlier this month i.o.c. president thomas bach announced a ban on russia because of state sponsored doping. this elin pickett launch now appearing some more crime mature russian athletes will be allowed to compete in pyongyang under a neutral flag if they can prove they're clean but with some russians calling for boycotts the country wants to stage an intensive games for those choosing to stay behind. but it's it'll hold a number of competitions for athletes and we're working on it now the competitions will also be an opportunity to invite foreign after. the last winter games in sochi

in twenty fourteen were meant to be a display of russian sporting prowess they've since turned into a russian nightmare. evidence from gregory wrote chunk of the former head of russia's anti doping lab revealed cheating on an unprecedented scale this year an i.o.c. investigation finally confirmed that evidence to be credible. the year has been an intense warm hard warm. believe we've never had a harder year for both soviet and russian sport. but still russian president vladimir putin continued to deny state involvement until that changes the country may find itself left in the cold pariah of international sports. here's a look now at some of the other stories that are making news around the world u.s. president donald trump assigned

a one point five trillion dollar tax overhaul into law the legislation was adopted by congress two days ago in a major political victory for the republicans it provides big tax cuts for corporations and wealthy americans as well as smaller reductions for those lower incomes. the united nations security council has voted unanimously to impose new sanctions on north korea the move follows the country's latest intercontinental ballistic missile test the u.s. draft resolution limits the supply of petrol and crude oil to the isolated nation which could have a significant impact on its struggling economy. french president and manuel mccall has held talks with palestinian leader mahmoud abbas a paramedic daley's a palace in paris to discuss the u.s. has moved to recognize jerusalem as the capital of israel meeting comes after the u.n. voted to reject donald trump's decision. in gaza there's been renewed

violence in response to trump's move forward he said two palestinians were killed friday in clashes with israeli forces along the border with israel brings the total number of deaths to ten with dozens more wounded. turning to spain now we're just a day after original elections in catalonia it's still difficult to judge who won a pro independence party such a slim majority but the party of x. cut along president carlos pushed law is not the largest in the new parliament that honor went to the liberal citizens party which is anti independence prime minister marianna conservatives were nearly wiped out but he's still refusing to talk to the separatists despite pleas from pushed law pushed him all made his offer from brussels where he currently resides to avoid being arrested by the spanish for leading october's independence referendum. i'm

ready to meet prime minister high in brussels or in a different place in the e.u. except spain for his reasons aren't ready to do that because it's time for catalonia for the spanish state and for europe to start a new political phase and this phase needs to be defined by political solutions not by the but no my delusion is depression we've been seeing so far as your i know. you know you don't spain's prime minister mariano rajoy had different ideas. you'll get the person i should be meeting is the one who won the election and that is mrs ottley mother. in estonia mother she is the leader of the c.e.o. donna's party which had the best individual results on thursday so you think about it at the union those is the sun yes life in cut the lonia has certainly been affected by the divisive political situation with many locals hoping for some kind

of breakthrough. on fender there you go there's no progress because i believe we must take a step further and that the gainers of spain and catalonia put themselves in our place and understand they must solve the issue and leave the most extreme positions aside. because not those mom. me steps because and i think things have remained as they were and they should look now for a different solution to solve the problem but obviously. the hoary has made it clear he would talk with the new leaders as long as they don't violate the country's constitution despite separatist parties winning a slim majority forming a government is still a long way off. or more on the forming government efforts in just a minute but first it's the festive season and in spain that means one thing in particular a few lucky people are getting a big cash payout it's time ordo the world's biggest paying lottery celebrations

broke out across the country after the fat one was announced in the traditional fashion by schoolchildren in madrid singing the winning number and totals some two point four billion euros we paid out divided amongst many smaller cash prizes and some one hundred sixty prizes in all it's no wonder that practically the whole country is the flutter. the numbers of every winning ticket a song each year it's the world's biggest lottery held as madrid's. so so total prize payout is more than two billion euros many spaniards believe that being present at the drawing improves their chances of winning it. hello merry christmas we came here tonight all the way from anybody in the three generations. to define when i'll quit working

with the money the. games you don't need and the money when you leave here really slowly. so that people won't notice and you know maybe you know but not even sleep at. all you need is twenty euros to play and spaniards are crazy for the lottery in madrid alone more than three times as many tickets have been sold as the right residents everyone dreams of winning big. the four million euro top prize this is the day when supposedly loses can become one and two years ago for example el gordo went to a region suffering for mass unemployment and the second prize more than a million euros went to a betting syndicate in an old people's home and the spanish state always wins big as a drugs in up to two hundred million euros in taxes. over one hours of el gordo are clear but the winners in the country's political situation less so it's been a day since racial lectures in catalonia and it's still difficult to judge who the

real winner is pro independence parties to a slim majority but the party of x. cattle on president carlos pushed want is not the largest in the new parliament that honor went to the liberal citizens party which is anti independence prime minister marianna recoils conservatives really wiped out but he still were fusing to talk to the separatists despite points from pushed along we can cross now to lisa lewis she is in barcelona following developments for us where so for a whole year were injected a meeting with pushed him on a separatist later offering dialogue does this mean the standoff is just going to continue. it looks like it yes there seems to be a deadlock really i mean if you look at what's the outcome of these elections yes the independent supporters have won the elections they could form a government with seventy seats in parliament but forming that government will be very complicated this coalition would be made up of three parties two large parties

that can see him to be able to greet on the common leader i mean it is very complicated right colors put them on is an exile in in belgium he can't come back without going to jail and the other head of the other party of the year see party care as he is in jail in spain at the moment so it's not really that easy to find someone new to replace them and then on the other hand you've got the smaller coalition party the c u p party and they are saying you know we will join you but only if you really go for independence now that would be very complicated for all of them to go for independence right away because they have seen over the past few months and then madrid would intervene right away. there was a record turnout in a selection eighty two percent how significant is that. that is quite significant in the sense that before hand the independence opinions were always saying you know what yes the in and independence supporters are winning the

elections but that's only because the other guys are not turning out to vote you can't you can hardly argue that's the case now with eighty two percent of participation so it seems like really a lot of the catalans are in favor of independence or at least opposed to the other parties that are not in favor of independence so where do we go from here what's the situation going forward. well obviously the different parties will now try to form a coalition the parliament will come together will stand normally until the end of january and then they have to elect a new leader of catalonia they have until they would elect that new leader in february and if they haven't done so by april that would trigger trigger automatically new elections so we could see new snap elections in late may or early june and just briefly pushed him on how relevant is he still of his party didn't get a majority. well he is very relevant because amongst the

pro independence policies his posse got the highest share of the day says normally that policy would also put forward with the new leader but as i said it'll be very complicated because he's an x. and there is no obvious number two people are really listening to what he's saying i mean from here to say all right excellent that's lisa lewis she's reporting from barcelona thanks for bringing us up to date. a group of international artists have come together in germany to create a new exhibition made entirely of ice around two hundred seventy tons of it was used to carve iconic landmarks and famous faces in the statue of liberty to go americal this year is will need to wrap up warm the exhibition hall near berlin is being kept at a chilly negative seven degrees celcius. definitely

something to check out over the holidays and don't forget you can always get your news on the go just download our out from google play or from the apple store that i give you access to all the latest news from around the world as well as push notifications for any breaking news you can even use the v.w. app to send us your photos and videos. and that's the news at this hour i'm sara harmon in berlin thanks for watching we'll see you again at the top of the hour for more by now. the whole g w o one. for the global insights the news out for local euro.