this is deja news coming to you live from berlin serious humanitarian catastrophe the deaf children eastern ghouta is rising with no end in sight to the government's bombing campaign children are among the highest casualties. and it is decision day for does it cause a german court is set to rule on whether to allow bans in major cities. go to strict cost which is being sued over its air pollution.

good to have you with us international concern is going over the killing of civilians in syria that's as the us a regime carries out want the fiercest air assaults in the country seventy a conflict the syrian military says it's talking what it calls terrorists in the besieged area of eastern ghouta near damascus but independent monitors say the shelling has killed more than three hundred people there since sunday many of them children. hell on earth and there's no escape this hospital now a graveyard government were planes have been pounding eastern cuba for the fifth consecutive day children are under siege in one of the most brutal bombardments this war has ever seen. and we were unable to evacuate our patients or treat them. we had to do one of the operations under the rubble and if

. we couldn't evacuate we had to do it under the rubble. rage is palpable speaking to germany's parliament chancellor angela merkel called the assad regime's conduct a massacre. the horrifying events that we're seeing in syria the fight of one regime not against terrorists but against its own population killing children destroying hospitals all of these constitute a massacre which needs to be condemned and we say a clear no to this. that. but an opposition politician said that without action words are hollow. it's not enough just to say we are condemning it she said that germany going to try a bigger role there no idea what she's talking about i want to see the consequences

. that's the airstrikes continue relentlessly russia a key ally of the assad regime blames the rebels holding for the region's humanitarian crisis the u.n. security council is due to vote on an immediate fifty days humanitarian ceasefire for syria later today the u.n. envoy for syria says there is quote no alternative. to me now is sonia khush she's the syria director of save the children in amman jordan welcome to our program so nana pictures we're seeing coming up from east and go to a devastating give us a sense of the magnitude of the tragedy unfolding there. sure well you know our partners that are currently working in peace and described a situation in which there is so much fear on families especially on children you know they've been living under siege since december twenty twelve so they already

had very volatile situations in recent months we had seen levels of malnutrition rai's we had seen no medical supplies getting into the area and so now this mumbai home is really compounding the separate of the people there one of our primary said everyone in eastern goods has an underground now and that means they're taking shelter in basements in tunnels we even heard that people are digging holes with shovels in order to have somewhere to hide from the body. security council is music to do it on a humanitarian ceasefire for fighting in syria what do you have to say to the council especially the veto powers ahead of that vote. well you know we've been calling for cease fires inside syria for seven years now and we really hope that this time is different than their previous attempts because to a circle people three hundred fifty thousand civilians who are trapped and have nowhere to go it really is going to take being at

a political level to make this stop and we need not only a cease fire to end the ability to get supplies in the area has been under siege for six years now and we need ways to get eighty in safely and securely to help the injured help them out nourished help protect people who have been living under these conditions so how difficult is it for aid organizations to get access to the area and what do you see as the most immediate priority is there. it's very difficult to work in eastern looked at because it is under siege you know there have been some stuff piles of food that people managed to get in over the last several months but now the warehouses are being hit and whatever supplies are available it's hard to move them from one town and he's in good at to another because the roads are being targeted this is nothing ambulances for example from the ferry in did to every clinics are even less so not only is the cease fire

warrant but the access really needs to be addressed and that can only be done by a concerted effort at the political level so here kristie the director of the organization save the children thank you very much for talking to us this article some other stories making news around the donald trump says arming teachers could prevent school shootings like the one that left seventeen people dead in florida last week the u.s. president was speaking at an emotionally charged meeting of the white house attended by about forty students teachers and family members affected by the massacre on february the fourteenth. and this international has named the philippines president as one of the worst leaders in terms of human rights for the second they are running the n.g.o.s says the widespread killing of alleged drug offenders and. war on drugs may constitute crimes against humanity. congolese refugees in rwanda say soldiers shot at them and wounded at least two

people this as around two thousand refugees try to march out of their camp in protest at a cut in food rations some seventeen thousand people live in the camp. today germany's high's administrative court is set to hand down a landmark ruling that could lead to a ban on diesel cars in major cities and the case was started by an environmental group would save the salmon german city of stuttgart has not done enough to limit the harm caused by diesel emissions dozens of german cities have recorded annual levels of nitrogen dioxide emissions above it freshens in the last twelve months toxic air pollution is linked to thousands of premature deaths every year the court's decision would dramatically hit the value of diesel cars on german roads reporter christopher springeth is in stuttgart and sent us this report. it's the

busiest time of day at this family run bakery in stuttgart dozens of customers throughout the city awaiting for their morning deliveries. like many small businesses in germany it's invested in diesel powered delivery vehicles which are cheaper to run due to years of tax breaks for diesel a ban on day use would hit the company hard as of industry if a ban on diesel powered vehicles covers the whole city then we have a problem in principle we have to shut down. we can deliver our products by public transport so we have nowhere to go. next under this. zinah blames the sheer volume of traffic in german cities and has some of the country's worst it's in a city absorbs over four hundred thousand commuters every day this busy stretch of road in central stuttgart is called the necker talk crossing and it's become something of a household name in germany that's because with an average of almost seventy

thousand vehicles passing through in both directions every single day it's now one of the country's absolute hotspots for air pollution. last year the monitoring station at the nec atoll crossing measured an average of seventy three micrograms with nitrogen dioxide per cubic meter that's almost double the legal limit which is why activists are calling for tough measures. a lot of people here suffer from respiratory diseases old people in particular and. people move out of this area as soon as they can afford to and that's why we urgently need to diesel ban here it would have an immediate effects. to the cart is keen to avoid diesel bans so it's introduced traffic reduction schemes and public awareness campaigns encouraging people to cycle to work or use public transport policy makers are also progressively reducing the cost of public transport.

and the city is also hosting this pioneering project using a wall of moss to suck cum pollution out of the atmosphere the walls about one hundred metres long three metres high whether it works though isn't fully clear yet . germany's powerful car makers are also firmly against driving bans but in the wake of the emissions cheating scandal that tightlipped at the moment. and some on this story joining me from up bottom of the studios is kirsten human she's an s.p.d. member of parliament and also a member of the country's transportation committee welcome to you muslim on the court ruling comes against a backdrop of strong environmental concerns some seventy cities in germany have nitrogen oxide levels above you see if it's precious is this not an issue that the government should be addressing. yes but first of all in germany we have the principle of the supposed autonomy this will mean the government the federal

government can't say the cities what they had to do or not but the government ten and we have done in the past years we can make programs for example force financial support for the cities to buy electric buses to buy for for example the guy in your film that he may buy an electrical small lorry of something else that we had done in the past but now we knew it wasn't enough obviously so not so how much responsibility should germany's powerful car industry take especially in the wake of all these diesel emissions cheating scandals we've had. i think if the car industry uses all the possibilities for clean cost the progress on clean air in our cities would be much higher but our industry in the past they need the

gaps the european law has to produce costs which are cheaper but not ask clean as they may so now they have the responsibility and all opinion that support all the consumers was old cars but they aren't old you're a five or euro six cars they are about four years old five years old and so the under street had supported consumers for technical support that these four five year old cars half the same technique like the modern diesel cars so an oil pinion the diesel ban is possible that we stop it and the government is often accused of being too close to the car industry here in germany where does this leave the consumers who will protect their interests. we have a federal ministry especially for consumer riots in the past we tried to change our

law in america we have a totally different system of law the consumers have much more right than in europe not only in germany it's not a german problem and this is european wide problem and we try to change our law to give the consumers more rights but the last government has no time to put this law on the on the parliament but the new government decided to make these changes of laws the first things they will do the right question do when an esper the member of parliament and also member of the country strong position committee thank you for talking to d.w. thank you now without a head and to take a look at the financial fallout of a potential disease then indeed amerasian we're talking about a potential diesel ban we could see an economic fallout across germany as well so potentially a dark day for the car industry and the employees working in it as well and we're

talking about germany's largest export industry so let's take a listen now to what those working the carmakers have to say about it this device measures nitrogen dioxide levels the legal limit is forty micrograms per cubic meter but that figure is regularly exceeded in over half of measuring stations near major thoroughfares in germany. and surprisingly the prospect of a diesel ban have been met with stiff resistance from those whose livelihoods depend on theirs but just expect presenters have even warned that banning diesel guzzling trucks could hamper deliveries to the city's. germany's oldest automobile club has also been speaking hours. this is about people's livelihoods to say suddenly that they can no longer drive into the city was almost amounts to expropriation. it's always the people who can't afford an expensive electric car or who can to buy a new diesel that are most affected comfort. while pollution is

a major problem in high traffic spots it's a different story in residential areas. where we see mid-range figures between twenty and thirty micrograms per cubic meter so significantly under the limit higher than permitted rates are a real problem on busy roads and fuel before. an analysis by the u.p.a. environmental protection agency concluded the thousands in germany die prematurely as a result of respiratory illnesses each year that was based on a nationwide study of the effects of nitrogen dioxide. stupidity i think lawmakers aren't really interested in this study is if they were there be a far bigger push towards driving. but critics say such studies failed to establish a causal link between nitrogen dioxide and primitive death. other factors affecting

mortality rates are not always taken into account. well for more on this let's bring in our business correspondent jeanette dumas allow now you know this court verdict which we're still waiting for comes months off to you and i sat here discussing in a organist that cost summit with german politicians and the industry heads months down the line i mean was that summit century not invade you know if it turns out to be the way the industry really only has itself to blame it just didn't do enough now after that summit no one was really satisfied with their solution to put software upgrades in five million these old vehicles it seemed to many at the time that the industry bosses really just got together and said to themselves what is the minimum we could do in the face of this gigantic mess now meanwhile you have germany's fifteen million diesel car owners wondering whether their cars are going

to be worthless since they can't drive them into city centers and they can't resell them either as resale values plummet but that's of course assuming that cities are even able to enforce the ban what are they supposed to do or are they going to install checkpoints that they just hang signs so they'd all have to come up with a plan and from where i'm sitting industry could have done more earlier in order to avoid a potentially mad scramble germany's is europe's biggest car market is also the most important export industry for germany this is a serious economic issue if a ban was then handed down from the court what would the signal be to other cities essentially would it be the message that diesel is dead. you know in this case it might actually be germany that's having to play catch up you have cities like paris madrid athens all announcing moves to ban diesel from their cities in the medium term and you also have the world's biggest auto market china where the demand for e-cards is also the greatest so that in turn will influence global supply and so

the fact that environmental standards the world over are getting more strict and it will simply become harder and more expensive to produce and to use these cars from the manufacturing and from the consumer side so that all of that taken together does indicate a shaky future for diesel catch up seems to be the name of the game right now for the german car industry if it wants to manage to stay afloat do you get the sense you've been covering this for a long time now that essentially the automakers missed a beat they dropped the ball they should have been investing more in and artificial intelligence well after the emissions scandal emerged german car makers a did come up with electro ability strategies twenty twenty seem to be a magic year of electronic billeted for them but that already follows a years of fixation on these that even now there's still a lot of talk on improving the tech but as we know change is hard and obviously the switch to electro will have far reaching consequences for the car industry from

a manufacturing perspective if you take a car as they have two hundred parts something like that compared to one thousand parts in gas and diesel vehicles so if you are a parts automatically means that you need fewer people to produce them and out of course would have an impact on germany's eight hundred thousand auto sector jobs at the same time there's also been a problem with consumer interest they just have people in germany just haven't been that interested in e-commerce they're worried that they're very expensive and that the infrastructure is poor so still many challenges on the road ahead. thank you very much indeed. so let's check in with our financial correspondent on this is well conrad who is an in frankfurt conrad what a trade is they're saying about the prospect of potential these will bands. you know have a many of the people working here right behind me come to work with a diesel car they are not very fond of the idea of prohibiting diesel traffic and

in terms of the industry and investors of course they are concerned about cost for example if you bought at these old car not very long ago where the car maker cheated about the emissions it's very likely that after you know it's getting prohibited to drive your diesel in a german city you would even more want compensation word for this you want compensation for the damage for the loss of the value of the car you also want the car maker to pay for a potential transformation of your engine all this is estimated to become very very costly estimates out there one i read today says that it would cost the carmakers at least fifteen billion euros all right conrad we've also heard from german chancellor angela merkel speaking in balance parliament today giving a key policy speech how's it going down where you are. the people here like her talking about investing in future technologies making the european union more

competitive and also of course people here noted what she had to say about her idea of linking the cost of the many refugees in the euro zone to the expenditures that are given to some of those countries it's a sure looks like some conflict is there. between countries who you know take care of refugees and some countries who don't. kind of had to send first aid frank but good to see. and it's back up to amrita now for the latest from the bell and that's it the bird an international film festival many movies vying for the prestigious golden then one of them is an iranian film called cook known as big in english it's a black comedy about a blacklisted movie directed challenges to types but yvonne and iranian women did

on your cock has this report. it was a generally seventh's night to be out on the red carpets director money heikki and his cast with their only fleetingly celebrating the premier of his turbulent comedy peak at the berlin film festival. not just then focuses on director haasan who was listed by the government but that's not what's troubling him most and unknown kiddo's talks to be heavy filmmakers. why shouldn't he be murdered as well. but again. the billion dollar without an iranian movie and on thinkable prospect in previous years iranian directors sometimes had to bypass ukrainian censors by smuggling

their movies out of the country that was not the case with this pick was officially approved by uranian all story without any changes at all what's more the movie will be screened in a ring in cinema despite its focus on the difficult situation often faced by filmmakers in the land of the last we heard on the house and was portrayed as a weak men trying to be in the center of attention while the women in his life was with brilliant minds no big deal to director who seemed slightly frustrated by the question put to him during the press conference you seem to be asking me how come there are these strong women in your well because there are strong women in iraq and i chose to show them. as opposed to conforming to this usual image that. that is presented of iranian women as victims you know. it is.

comedy it's in the running for bear as long as the jury members and the viewers share his fondness for you. time now to look at chong in the winter olympics with me in the studio with all the big stories is chris huntington from us both as well as kim chris i know you're a finalist taken because of an event which is featured in the olympics for the first time snowboarding big ad that's right the big air event in austria and our neighbor walked away with the goal ama gasser and she saved her best jump for last she scored a ninety six on what she called a cap double cork one eighty you take a look at that wow. give me that one eighty eight that's a tent and not to be confused with a hardware tool or something like this is what that is called and it's great she's very enthused about this sport she's picked it up eight years ago when her cousin

introduced her to it she became a fanatic her her actual philosophy is telling everyone you know sell your phones video games buy a snowboard because it's more fun than anything else so it's nice to see someone so enthused about this for you saw it on her face and she deservedly walked away with the gold ok now we will have a house skiing what for what happened there was an aspect as big as the yes yes i think it was it was david wise he's an american and he dominates this competition he won at sochi in two twenty fourteen and this particular event he won by doing double course in all four directions and get this wise had a problem with his skis and failed the first two jump so his focus pretty much led to a flawless last jump and he managed to walk away and it's nice for him he does a lot of social things there he is celebrating and he only has gold in his sophie case ok he's won several of the competition only gold so kudos to

a fellow american who does to him it's all about concentration as you see that had been funded by ok now two events were they special for new zealand which hasn't won a problem medal in the last couple of decades who were the heroes for the kiwis the kiwis teenagers is. there was a double you know accomplished by teenagers the first one was sixteen year old zoe . not ok only sixteen she started when she was nine years old and there she is a double wide old cat is what you call the maneuver she's high in the sky right there in this you backed it up with a solid jump she was new zealand's youngest ever olympic medalist until hours later a male fellow country kiwi nico per tedious skiing halfpipe right there he scored a bronze and his focus was even crazier because he vomited at the top of his first two runs talked to a sports psychologist got his things together and he ended obviously on a strong point picking up broads to two medals only the third in new zealand's

history of the winter olympics so that means the future looks bright and kudos to the youngsters for doing their duty to doing their base instructing this stuff ok that's trying to must feel it says thank you very much having us up to date with all the action from. here's a recap of the top story that we're following feel international concern is growing about the number of civilian deaths in serious at least in kuta and strikes by pro-government forces on the besieged and heavily held on claims have claimed hundreds of lives since sunday. i'll have more news for you in half an hour i look forward to seeing you then do when we can always check out our web site as dot com about. moving.

from the. center of the conflict zone. after seven years to newseum remains one the power of country two and much from the so-called arab spring as a functioning democracy does it margaret steer the munich security conference to scare my schedule the country's foreign minister mr sean finally come off the revolution and would be the hope of a better future of. the food. chain

of it kitchenette will. host. the constitution is a business all three of us he has become famous really by bringing his exquisite christine to company canteen such. let others have failed her steps if she's going . girl may feel cut. cut cut cut. cut every journey begins with the first step and every language but the first word american. is in germany to learn german one. simple. d w z e learning course. german. sometimes you just have to pump up the volume. on.

the music magazine. after seven years two new zero remains the one arab country to emerge from the so-called arab spring as a functioning democracy or does it my guest here at the munich security conference is. the country's foreign minister has the shine finally come off the revolution and with it the hope of a better future. for makes you know.