darkness' cities during the war. starting march tenth on t w. this is d w music live from for lead the u.n. warns of a planned apocalypse in syria's civil war the u.n. human rights chief says there is no acceptable justification for the syrian government's brutal assault on eastern. we will go to geneva for more i'll give you well just briefly will be the rights of foreigners. also coming up sierra leone is

voting for and new president of the west stopped the country is hoping for an economic turnaround after being targeted by a bold outbreak we'll go live to our correspondent. i'm sara kelly welcome to the program thanks for joining us the u.n. human rights chief has said that the syrian government is risking the lives of hundreds of thousands to target a few hundred fighters in eastern and there's no moral or legal justification for presenting the un's annual human rights report he also called claims by the syrian regime that it is trying to protect civilians ridiculous more than eight hundred people have died in recent fighting in the rebel held on clay. in eastern guta death lurks at every corner. the struggle for survival here is ceaseless

sustained shelling on the city has led to the u.n. calling this the deadliest week for the syrian town since a cease fire was brokered at the end of last month's time and the. children have been the worst affected. by this camera man stops to rescue a severely injured infant the image too graphic to show. the u.n. children's fund says the situation is desperate. the first two months of this year have been especially bloody for children we have received reports of over one thousand should one who were killed and feel usefully injured in the horse yeah only since the year began. monday brought some reprieve aid trucks reached the embattled area for the first time since the offensive began. despite the

excitement the world food program warns it's far from enough. up to four hundred thousand people trapped on the inside these people are living under siege and by that we mean there are serious shortages of medical assistance of food food insecurity is very high the un security council will hold urgent talks later today on the failure of the thirty day cease fire but with no end to the war in sight the people of east and go to remain in agony. and ahead of those u.n. talks i spoke with un human rights office spokeswoman shamdasani from geneva so i asked her who's to blame for the humanitarian crisis in syria. the syrian government first and foremost is to blame but the international community shares this thing it's been seven years now since the conflict in syria up again and there has been not one step taken by the security council to show that it is resolute and

concerted in bringing this conflict to an end and in bringing the perpetrators of these created by a nations of human rights and humanitarian law to account we're looking at pictures of destruction there hey you know syrians they have endured violence on a huge scale for years now how would you assess the threats to the population how have they changed over the last year. you know when it when it really struck me about your coverage and here it was that you said that the images of children in syria were too graphic to be shown on television let's think about that for a second when images of children are too graphic to be shown on television that tells you that something is seriously wrong these attacks that the syrian government and its allies are cleaning up to root out terrorist groups when you can don't show pictures of children on television these attacks are clearly not getting the targets they are hitting civilians and we know that the u.n.

that you have been involved in efforts to broker a cease fire we know that the last u.n. back cease fire failed to take hold in eastern good to what in your assessment needs to change for any truce to hold going forward. well the security council a understand they're holding a meeting today they need to talk about a cease fire that can actually hold the to put concrete measures into the cease fire for it to hold and they need to hold all the parties to the conflict to account to ensure that it's there's an urgent need for humanitarian age to be able to go in and as we saw that the convoy that did finally manage to go in not such an all time only partially succeeded to turn around there needs to be very complete action and and one of the things that we've been calling focus many years now is for the security council to take action towards accountability when the security council shows that it is so not to to push for syria to be urged to detach but in

court that sends a message to the parties to the conflict that they can carry on with business as usual i want to drill down and talk a little bit more about one of the parties in this conflict. and ask for your assessment on their claims because we know that the un human rights chief also dismissed syrian government claims about its campaign in eastern good to as being ridiculous what is the government saying and where do its claims breakdown in your view. the government is saying that this is. a targeted you know very targeted cappie against terrorist groups now we do not deny that there are groups that are extremists and there are there are jihadist groups but we are talking about a few hundred scientists this is an area that is utilize an area with possibly four hundred thousand these who have been under siege for many years now they have had access to their basic necessities has been a shortage of food medicine we now have reports of thousands of injured civilians

and these injured civilians do not have access to medical care and they don't know where they can go there is no evacuation possible then even if they want to leave so these claims that this is you know a targeted attack against terrorist groups as the high commissioner said it is ridiculous. we would like to thank you this morning for joining us to share that message as we mentioned you are the spokesperson for the u.n. human rights office we appreciate it thank you. let's get a quick check now of some other stories that have been making news around the world a former russian spy and his daughter are fighting for their lives in a british hospital after a suspect of poisoning which observers say bears the hallmarks of a russian assassination attempt britain has warned of grave consequences for russia serb investigations finds the kremlin involvement in the incident which moscow denies. in germany eight members of the far right group face verdicts today they

have been on trial over a series of attacks on refugees and left wing activists federal prosecutors are calling for up to eleven years of prison for the perpetrators and could classify the so-called group as a terrorist organization. this winter has been the art takes warmest ever with sea ice levels of record lows scientists say that the unusually warm temperatures there are part of a global warming driven cycle and that has likely played a role in i seen winter storms that have recently hit europe and the united states . now voters in sierra leone head to the polls today to elect a new president sixteen candidates are vying for the top job with foreseen as having a realistic chance including front runners from the incumbents all people's congress and the opposition people's party whomever wins will face the tough task of turning

around in the qana me that has been rocked by recent crises including the devastating a bull outbreak twenty fourteen did not use i dream create this report from mcafee home of the outgoing president. there's certainly choice in these elections it's a total of sixteen candidates are vying for the presidency. not that that's any comfort for desmond reese he's frustrated with his government but also says there's no real alternative. he is the. real so for me. we first met rees four years ago during the outbreak he was working as a volunteer having a red cross burial team. it was a high risk and it placed great stress on his personal life.

up to now had. the government promised to recognise reese and his colleagues efforts by granting them special payments once the epidemic was over so far though they've received nothing according to the country's auditor general at least fourteen million dollars in aid have simply disappeared an example of corruption corruption is a key theme in the election campaign to. there's so much we've never seen they've created a perfect place to proceed with a leak is using every ministry in every culture let me give you an example. it is only in my country that you spend five kilometer road in the middle of the country in the middle of the main city five kilometers he expanded. but the ruling party's

presidential candidates america mara is more relaxed on the subject. is the only country in the world. it depends on the monday today of groups who were good to. give activities like his girl expresses. a lot of efforts in strengthening the fight against corruption and what winds are going to do with. tomorrow was minister for foreign affairs until last year when he was nominated for the presidential race by the country's current leader ernest koroma koroma has ruled for ten years and now has to step down as the governing party a.b.c. is mainly trying to sell as such just as infrastructural projects and yet in the home base of the party they enjoy a comfortable majority but in other parts of the country people are not so happy about the situation. including desmond reads like many others he believes the election will be won by the main opposition party or even the governing party

itself and either way reece is certain he won't get adequate recognition for all his hard work during the in boulder crisis he does have some hope though that one day more funds will be invested in the country's health system instead of being siphoned off through corruption. and we're joined now by our correspondent frank chris we just saw there in that report reporting from mckenney he is now in koidu in the north of sierra leone welcome. we understand that you are at a polling station right now what is the atmosphere there like are people ready to vote. well you hear it a bit in the background it is quite tense and of course people are ready but the problem is they cannot work many of them are angry because they have been waiting four hours and the process is just delayed but we just talked to the person in charge of the polling station here he assured us that everybody will be able to vote they might just still have to wait for a bit longer how are they likely to vote on what are the issues that they are

looking at what do they care the most about. well one of the core issues is of course corruption and we have heard it was also a major point of many opposition parties who have been heavily criticizing the current government their way how they handle corruption issues that we had the missing money with the ebola fund then there was also a couple of infrastructural pro jacks that were commissioned by the government for example a new airport worth three hundred million us dollars that went to chinese companies for construction and a lot of people have complaining that this airport is not needed this is going to be a white elephant which talks to the candidate off the governing party and he actually told us it's not a big deal corruption within his own government he however said that if you will be voted for as the new president he is trying to fight corruption more and you will for example also introduce special anti corruption courts and i'm sure if you can just put that corruption problem into context for us how big is it inside sierra

leone for example according to international standards. well if you look at the statistics of transparency international for example sierra leone is on position of one hundred thirty amongst one hundred eighty countries in the world so there is of course a clear problem of corruption here and many people have the perception that it even got worse under the current administration as a man who's likely to win this vote and why. well there's two major parties who are most likely to win this election the governing party of the a.p.c. and on the other hand the biggest opposition party vs l p p those are the two parties who have been running the country since independence but for the first time there's also a third strong opposition force and to win the presidency a party here needs to have at least fifty five percent of the votes so it is quite likely that we are going to see a runoff in the next weeks ok decide that's the key number that everyone is hoping

to get at me and create their employer do in the north of sierra leone thank you so much. you're watching news still to come on the program or white house may have donald trump's top economic adviser gary cohen resigns as the tariff debate heats up are we all moving to an all out trade war how close to pay. pal and i'm free will have that and a whole lot more coming up in just minutes time i'm sarah telling a busy you can stick. with it and women may be lost. but the world is still far from complete gender equality. because the need to movement influence the world why did based on sexism international women's day twenty you see. our focus this week on d w.

d n a bumper sticker. it's all about.