darkness city's. starting march tenth. this is d.w. news live from berlin no end to the fighting in syria a brief truce in eastern huta collapses after just a few hours leading to a resumption of violence in the rebel held on clay the u.s. lashes out at russia for its involvement but the real losers tonight the civilians who have received no way and remain trapped also coming up is it the death of

diesel environmentalist celebrate a court ruling in germany giving cities the right to ban diesel cars from their streets but who will pay the city governments the all of industry or the millions of motorists who are still driving diesel car. if it's good to have you with us tonight the war in syria rages on along with the war of words surrounding it's a top u.s. general accusing russia of quote behaving like an arsonist and a fire fighter in syria washington is convinced that moscow was playing a destabilizing role in the conflict u.s. army general joseph botha lashed out at russia after a temporary truce collapsed a truce that was ordered by russian president putin in the rebel held on clay of eastern ghouta near damascus moscow accuses the rebels in the enclave of being the

first to launch attacks. today the skies over eastern. supposed to fall silent but a five hour humanitarian pause brought little relief to besieged residents in the rebel held on klav strikes were reported during the polls and observers say that syrian government won't planes resumed their bombing as soon as it ended. up we pray to god for help what kind of ceasefire is this without attacks and barrel bombs. humanitarian corridors set up to allow residents to leave and aid to enter went largely unused rebels claim people are refusing to leave on buses out of fear of being captured by government forces. and i'm about to say i'm really meant to pick up the wounded from eastern guta and take them to the clinic in the suburbs of damascus on humanitarian grounds. be any of the much syria's ally

russia accused the rebels of preventing people from leaving and blame them for failing to uphold the truce ordered by president vladimir putin that the militants are intensively shelling the a not a single civilian escape to the humanitarian corridor or going to going to do it. moscow's plan falls short of the thirty day cease fire which was passed by the united nations but it's yet to take effect a group still waiting to deliver desperately needed supplies so imagine. that you have aid being able to be there that we can imagine it's really getting. the residents of eastern can do a little bit clear up the rubble and hope to morris pause brings real release. or we want to go now to start on mali he was the u.n.h.c.r. syria representative in damascus good evening to you mr marley so we are hearing that no one was able to leave eastern who did today and no aid came in can you

confirm that and what's the situation on the ground now. yes we were not able to deliver aid today. we're not sure if anyone came out. but to be have been trying our best to make sure that there is a stop in fighting the bombs start falling stop falling and the guns stop silent so that we can go in and deliver aid to these people who are in desperate need inside the enclave do you know mr mali where the fighting came from and we've got the russians saying that it was the rebels who started launching an attack and we've got the americans saying that the russians were starting i mean what did you what were your people able to see what we would not be able to comment on that it's we only see the skies and we only had the sounds and we only see the impact of such. fighting that is going on from inside from the group so from different parties to this crisis we can hear what's happening in there because we are not far from that

location and sometimes even see smoke coming out of those areas so we know that there is no force which was the basic fact of this old security council resolution that they have a pause for the eighty days that was is not there yet and i can imagine it must be very frustrating for you you're that close that you can actually see you know you can see eastern hutto from your window if you were and yet this ceasefire that was authorized by the u.n. still hasn't taken place. deeply frustrating and we know inside the situation is is tragic we have been there a few weeks ago to a place called. we saw hungry kids we saw injured be saw mothers in the basements trying to give some comfort and some food whatever is left for them to the kids we knew that we had to go in and have them out we know that the injured and wounded who need to be evacuated we have a bigger house is full of supplies we have one and he is on standby but we cannot

go in when when it's it's fighting is going on it takes time to offload our convoy is we have to go in sometimes the conway's and huge thirty forty fifty trucks and they cannot be offloaded in five hours so this five hours on is not enough for us to deliver assistance it's a peaceful time and we have to have a total of thirty days ceasefire as we had asked for the security council resolution so if five hours are not enough for you if we see another attempt at this pause i understand that maybe another one will come tomorrow in your opinion then will it just be a wasted effort when i eat it's the fact of the matter is that we have been delivering aid to these locations for many many years unfortunately now and these conway's that go in takes twenty thirty thirty five hours for us to be in there offloading supplies in garages in basements in shops in where ever he can find places to offload these things there is no systematic place in there that we can

offload things and warehouses machines and equipment this is all done manually and go off a lot thousands of missing tons of supplies in our simply not possible for us to do mr ali i'm just i'm trying to understand if you've got the experience you know how much time you need we're trying to understand why would russia then order a five hour pause in fighting knowing that that's not enough time for any she managed hearing aid to be delivered. we one be able to comment on that normally one understand that it was our request through the security council to have a last what they did is we needed a minimum of they days it's isa quote that it's a free which is equally destitute is need of assistance as well there is for this good friday it is rock group mom they any of that need assistance and we can't just be delivering aid on fire hours bases we need total cessation of hostilities but they did days for us to be able to deliver assistance but also then help it

recreate the injured and wounded from those areas. so genre leagues the u.n.h.c.r. country representative for syria mr ali we understand you're working under extremely difficult circumstances we appreciate your time tonight thank you thank you. it is a decision that threatens to cause huge disruption one of germany's top court has ruled that cities are allowed to ban diesel cars from their streets in order to curb pollution environmentalist have welcomed the ruling but it is a defeat for the car industry as manufacturers may now have to at least improve their all those systems and be forced to pay for that it could also mean millions of diesel owners are no longer allowed to drive their cars. at the moment most vehicles may be driven in germany cities regardless of what engine they have but following today's ruling cities with high levels of air pollution could opt to outlaw all but the most modern diesel engines

a clear victory for the environmental group that initiated the legal action. today is a great day for clean air in germany we have fought for clean air for people in cities. a comfort for years the legal thresholds for air pollution have been surpassed in many german cities the nitrogen oxides emitted mainly by diesel cars are highly damaging to people's health the german government says the fumes are implicated in six thousand early deaths every year so many germans support a ban. on the wonderful it's about time for the city center to just be made car free that would be super for ban the things immediately their dirty water. many owners now fear they will no longer be able to drive in urban areas. of the fifteen million diesel cars in germany the ban could affect some nine million. many trucks and delivery vehicles could be banned as well as private cars. it's annoying

so i'd have to take the train into town if i may not drive my car anymore if you don't fly and once again it's a blow to the little guy who has no money. the german government is keen to prevent driving bans. trying to calm nerves and said cities will receive help to combat air pollution is good i insist it is applies to individual cities where more needs to be done but this really does not affect the whole of germany or all car owners in germany i think it's important to make that clear today. there's still one way to prevent driving bans auto manufacturers could retrofit their diesel engines to make them cleaner experts say that is possible the costs might be high but the alternative could be millions of angry customers not an attractive option for germany's carmakers either. well the city of dusseldorf has some of germany's most polluted air it was one of the cities sued by environmental action germany for

repeatedly violating pollution limits of nitrogen oxide well the mayor of dusseldorf is thomas guys or he joins me tonight from dusseldorf good evening to you mr mayor so what does today's ruling mean for you will you now ban diesel vehicles from your city. well good evening well first of all it does not necessarily mean that we have to ban diesel cars i mean what the court has decided is that a ban on diesel cars is legally possible but it has to be implemented by maintaining what they call the proportionality principle that means only if a ban on diesel cars is the only efficient means to reach the threshold values for what is that nitrogen oxide as it is in english and nitrogen oxide only then it needs to be implemented what other means there are other officials

what are more are they what are they i mean you got there the dirtiest air in germany why not ban diesel engines that would seem to be the easiest the best solution for you. well the problem the main problem is that it is extremely difficult to administer and to enforce a ban on diesel cars i mean first of all to be i mean you you need to ban diesel cars exactly on those streets of course you need to also establish sort of detours you know how people can get through the city from other means and the most the biggest problem is really it is in the moment it is impossible to identify cars without looking at the actual papers of the car so i mean you have to need you need to set up checkpoints where you control each and every car if you really want to efficiently enforce a ban on the use of cars which is as it i mean it's virtually impossible i would say it's a big screen inefficient means because i mean you know if the cost and the effect

is proportional mr mayor who do you feel is responsible we do you feel why do you feel like the old industry has been like absolutely i mean who as you know i mean you know it i mean that is that is the worst thing you know i mean the city's. are affected by a ban on these of cars they need to administer it and. you know the diesel drivers i mean they they basically they they they have to bear the brunt of that you think which has been cost and this should not be forgotten and has been caused by the automotive industry which has produced cars that pollute more than they claim they do and it has also been cost by the federal government who is responsible to set up the threshold values off you know off. the cars you know that are admitted good public traffic and apparently they have failed to do their job and now basically it is it is the cities and it's the consumer it's the diesel car

driver who basically has to. has to deal with it bail out the government to deal with it and you know i mean it is experience going to use big time when they're out of what this have done wrong we know there's going to be expensive and we know that you know you've said that it's something that you could do now because of this ruling let me ask you before we run out of time do you want a diesel in your city now i don't want it i think what we them much more efficient means i mean we in this little we clearly put emphasis on public transportation we believe that the individual car should not be the means of transportation off choice in in the inner cities i mean they're much more efficient means of transportation by the way the bicycle is the means of transportation inducement over the highest growth rate and that is their mission free that is modern and i

think this is this is the strategy we need to pursue and then regards the problem diesel car it will resolve itself all right we were out of time tonight but we want to thank you for taking the time to talk with the guys all the mayor of dusseldorf thank you mr mayor. thank you. i'll be back at the top of the hour with more news followed by the c that. we make up oh but we watch as a focus on death but to. the civil service of. being one to shape the continent's future to be part of it and join our youngsters as they share their stories their dreams and their challenges the seventy seven percent platform for africa majority.