this is the. president's call. roadmap for a new reform emmanuel mccraw is hoping for support from german chancellor angela merkel so will it be a meeting of minds is that also on the program. britain's foreign secretary says it's likely voters are russian president vladimir putin personally.

i missed an international accuses oil giants shell and they are responding too slowly to oil spills in the niger delta look at why so little progress has been made after so many years of control. welcome to the program german chancellor angela merkel is in paris for talks with the french president emmanuel micro about plans to reform the european union summit comes just days after chancellor merkel was confirmed in office for a fourth term difficulties in forming a coalition delaying to franco german talks on european integration but today the president said they would prepare a road map for reforming the e.u. and the eurozone in time for and e.u. summit in june. well macsoftware discovering those talks in paris welcome maxwell

will start with a nice to see shall we at times were medical spoken glowing terms about germany and france his track record of working together his shoes. my we want to find a common path in the history of franco german relations hard work an honest corporation have always brought success we don't always share the same opinion but throughout history germany and france have achieved a lot together we are intent i am intent on reaching our goals and i believe we will do that that's it is. so much often buses are the highlights what do france and germany want to change. all the emphasis on the sound bite we just heard was on hard work because the issues that they want to resolve are among the most difficult issues or the most divisive issues that start for example with a common asylum system in the european union something they have strife for for

many years it's not working at the moment because it would implicate that you need kind some kind of system to redistribute the migrants within the european union there's a huge divide over that especially between eastern and western european countries and yet the two want to resolve as you just said until june that's going to be very difficult then the reform of the euro zone micro-loan started the discussion in fall by saying he wanted euro zone budget and he also wanted a finance minister for the euro zone something that the european union for now does not have we know that the germans are not in favor of something like that of this design so although we always have the show of unity between michel and medical this is something where they will have to really find a real compromise how they work for get together for something like that we don't know yet but as we just heard the chancellor say it will involve hard work so how would so between them france and germany have to put together this this this road

map for europe i wonder how other countries feel about their roles being reduced to mere rubber stamp those of a franco german plot. you're of course referring to a discussion that is as old as the european union if germany and france don't work together than everybody else criticize them saying they need to work together to get something done if they do work together as they do now that many countries feel left out but of course you have to keep in mind that germany and france represent different parts of the european union for example the netherlands or the scandinavian country usually fall in line with germany when they hammer out some kind of compromise with friends now the southern countries usually are in accordance with friend so if those two germany and france you manage to agree on something than a majority of the european union usually at least in the past fall in line even if there is criticism beforehand after breakfast there was

a lots of talk less specially from chancellor merkel about europe's need for a new staats face doesn't look like because to outsiders this looks like just trying to make the old system a little bit better just thinking with aids. well at least you have ideas that have been around for a while for example the european finance minister or the finance minister for the euro zone that's not a new idea what would be new now is that the german french engine is working again and that's something that hasn't been the case for a long time so if they actually get things done now that would be new and it doesn't really matter how old the ideas are as long as there are good ideas everybody can agree on the commission president the commission president of the european union. recently said you need to repair the roof of the european union as long as the sun is shining and even if that's not the case here in paris at the

moment the sun is more or less shining over the e.u. economies are doing well you have the french german and back so if they want to get reforms and if they want to and they act ideas even if they're you know a little bit dated in some cases the time is now. when the new roof a new engine had paris we thank you. now there's so many other stories making news around the world former south african president jacob zuma is to be charged with fraud racketeering and money laundering the ruling a.n.c. party forced him to resign as head of state last month after years of scandal the charges relate to a multi-billion dollar government arms purchase in the late one nine hundred ninety s. . an independent monitoring group says russian astronauts have killed at least forty six people in eastern due to this as more civilians flee the rebel held areas outside the capital damascus russia says more than four thousand people left today

russia and syria launched an offensive on the region almost four weeks ago. north korea's foreign minister really young home has extended his unannounced visit to sweden to a second day but this is a prompting speculation that he may be laying the groundwork for some between u.s. president donald trump and north korea's kim jong sweden has been mentioned as a possible venue for the meeting between the two leaders. now for another salvo in the standoff between russia and western allies of the poisoning of a former double agent in britain britain's foreign secretary boris johnson i said it was likely that russian president vladimir putin personally ordered the nerve agent attack on surrogate script and his daughter is mr jones speaking. our quarrel is with putin credit and with his decision and we think it overwhelmingly likely that it was his decision to direct the use of a nerve agent on the streets of the u.k.

on the streets of europe for the first time since the second world war that is that is why we are at odds with russia. a company spokesman has described mr johnson's a statement as shocking and unforgivable a moscow continues to deny any involvement in the attempted murders and says it has launched its own investigation on friday russian foreign minister sergei lavrov accused britain of violating international law by expelling russian diplomats and threatened further fugitive measures he says that moscow was prepared to expel british diplomats at inter we also wish this repels a quick recovery it's not like it could be shared on what happened. well the temperature's he's you know in this dispute between these two countries let's get see if we shed more light on it with professor anthony glees who is the director of the center for security and intelligence studies at the base university of buckingham ivan that metra parang writes for the new york times he's a journalist he's based in moscow welcome but. ivan necia parental let's start with

you how does russia responding to the british foreign secretary is accusations. as usual russia is responding very aggressively it is denying any involvement in this case it is saying that it is being unjustly treated by the west and britain in this case in particular it is saying that it could never done anything like that and that it's being targeted for. before the elections in case that. it's some others that are in this case britain could have tried to vote in someone else's favor. and beyond to attach expulsions of diplomats or what else is russia likely to do. well very limited options of course. the trade between russia and britain has been declining in any case and.

if you take the presence of british companies in russia we know that b.p. on say huge stake in one thousand point five stake in it but realistically i don't see that they'll go beyond what the reciprocal measures undertake least russia surely has a point doesn't it beyond the swell of circumstantial evidence that is no smoking gun that is no definite evidence against russia. i don't think we can say that any longer i mean i've been one of those people who said you know we shouldn't rush to judgment but what the british government is saying most recently boris johnson as you suggested in that clip that way told about overwhelming evidence that president putin himself was behind these kind of statements made on the basis of secret intelligence assessments these kind of statements are made on

the basis of information that is shared only between heads of government at the very highest level to it france germany united states and possibly australia. these things would not be set if they were not held to be true with a probability that borders on certainty and that's as good as it gets and when we're talking about what we in the united kingdom might fear if there is further retaliation you know we're expecting diplomat to be thrown out but the further retaliate in that i've just talked about that could include for example a cyber attack a hostile cyber attack on the united kingdom the russians have done this before i don't need to say to whose judgment station they did it in germany and twenty fifty they did it in france in twenty fifty they're doing it all the time in ukraine they've done it in as tony and many other countries so we need to prepare in the

united kingdom for that there is as marked deterioration now that putin himself has been implicated by the british foreign secretary that's a big deal and it's not something that would be said if there were not substantial evidence to back it up and to be grateful they have that ivan and that's a prank as well thank you both thank you. british police have started a murder investigation involving another russian exile in the u.k. they say nicholai bush coffin was found dead in his london home early this week died from compression to the neck but they say that is yet there's no evidence of a link to the attempted murder of the script files. to nigeria where the niger delta is one of the most polluted regions in the world in the nineteen fifties oil was discovered in production began but since that oil spills of caused extensive environmental damage in

a report amnesty international has accused the oil majors shell and any of responding to the spills to slowly the w.'s west africa correspondent advent krege reports. this is a common sight in the niger delta. neighboring communities spills are a catastrophe farmers can no longer farm fisherman must sail hours from the coast in order to catch anything. brazilians often blame the international oil companies . in shells pipeline network alone there have been more than one thousand since two thousand and eleven according to amnesty international the outcome of it us is. ever to. be sure. all companies operating in iraq. are still failing to drive up. their

response shell for example takes irish seven days to respond just fills. a lot of patients lorries cation it should go to a larger should face. pressure because that means it is. the environment they lived close to communities. illegally the companies must respond to spills within twenty four hours that's why amnesty is calling for more grist executives. shell has described the accusations in the statement as force and without merit and claims that the majority of bills are caused by sabotage and theft. in which criminal gangs try to extract their share of the oil wealth. sixty years ago oil production started in nigeria as niger delta since then some people became extremely rich but the majority of the

one hundred eighty million nigerians did not benefit most people in the region consider the oil wealth rather than a blessing a u.n. study says that it will take at least thirty. more than one billion us dollars to eliminate the environmental damage just. under increased reporting i think you're up to date small at the top of the hour i'm going to. germany state by state. the most colorful. the liveliest. the most traditional. find it all at any time. check in with the web special. take a tour of germany state by state. on t w dot.