elizabeth and i work at. this is deja vu news live from berlin the u.s. says all options are on the table in response to the suspected chemical attack in syria but the white house says there is no timetable for military action this after president trump launches a tweet taunting russia promising to fire missiles at syria also coming up. major management changes at german companies this week christiane saving now heading

towards your bunk and have that diesel taking over a v.w. we'll ask an expert whether picking company insiders is the best way forward. and the number of executions carried out last year around the world fell compared to the year before that's according to a new amnesty report on capital punishment. i'm brian thomas thanks so much for being with us the trumpet ministrations says all options are now on the table but that no final decision has been made on military action in syria president trump took to twitter yesterday telling russia to get ready and that missiles will be coming fueling expectations that a strike on syria is imminent and a moment will be crossing to our correspondents for the latest on the international

dispute over that alleged chemical attack near damascus first here's this report. i'm in awe of. the rare moment of celebration for syrians at least government supporters they took to the streets of duma after rebels who had controlled the city left yet the victorious military action included a suspect in poison gas attack the attack for which u.s. president donald trump has vowed retaliation but the white house later appeared to roll back on his threat to launch missiles. the president has not laid out a timetable and still leaving a number of other options on the table and we're still considering a number of those and a final decision on that front hasn't been made. that's in contrast to the president's earlier incendiary tweets including russia vows to shoot down missiles fired at syria get ready russia because they will be coming you should be partners with a gas killing an animal who kills his people and enjoys it u.s.

warships left port on wednesday to move within striking range of syria. russia said it's keeping a close eye on the fleet and the kremlin hit out a trump's handling of the situation. we do not participate in twitter diplomacy we support a serious approach we still believe that it is important not to take any steps that may harm the already fragile situation in syria. we are also still convinced that the excuse regarding the use of chemical weapons in duma is made up and cannot be used as an argument for military action russia has moved fast to establish itself in duma this amateur video purportedly shows russian police investigating near the site of the alleged chemical attack moscow says it and the regime are ready to allow a probe but only one which shouldn't assign blame. our correspondents claire richardson standing by in washington and in moscow our bureau chief for shadow good morning to

both of you. if we could start with you russia is saying the alleged chemical attack is a fake and cannot be used as a reason for any kind of attack and if osama. well russia has been constantly denying any chemical attack took place moscow has invited investigators from the organization for that prohibit of chemical weapons to probe of the scene where that attack allegedly took place syria over the last weekend to moscow also had to send its own investigators who found her ball to gleen or the dens for any use of chemical weapons since yesterday russian military police military police is acting on the ground in the syrian city of what we just seed seen it in the report where the alleged chemical attack took place russian ministry of defense insists the situation in duma remains stabilized for the last few five days allegedly if there are there to guarantee law and all the however we

see a clear attempt by the russians to downplay the situation as much as possible by the way even russian state run broadcaster since yesterday it reduced the antti west and rhetoric significantly ok in this new information that we have russian personnel on the ground in dumas certainly is a new and important factor right now a close go to you know the white house spokeswoman sara huckabee sanders is saying there's no tying table right now for action in syria is the white house backing off of its previous comments. well her comments are quite troubling given trump's earlier tweets promising military strikes on syria and the fact that the white house is now saying that all options remain on the table suggest that trump was on twitter promising military action before anything had actually been decided now it's unclear not only what his long term plan is for syria but even in the short term what he really sees as

a solution in the region if you remember it was just earlier this month that he was saying he would like to withdraw all two thousand u.s. troops who are in syria that was against the advice of his military advisers who are wary of another situation like afghanistan or iraq who want to stay there and make sure that the islamic state can knock out another foothold in the region before backing out but this directly contradicts what he was saying earlier this month and so it's unclear from his words alone and from what the white house is saying what kind of action we're going to see. yuri you were mentioning there that moscow's dialing back the rhetoric how might russia though respond to any possible american military action. well brian russian law make us a warrant already of the united states that moscow would concede to and asked dr take on syria as a war crime and that could trigger direct military clash between the two form a call to walk countries i would say conduct a senior russian lawmaker for example south russia would engage its watch it in the

mediterranean sea to protect russian assets in syria in addition to ground based and defense systems that russia has in the region the top russian military officer general stuff chief of value to get us in off war until last month that russia would strike back against both missiles and their carriers three weeks ago i myself was embedded on one of the largest u.s. aircraft carriers on the u.s.s. theodore roosevelt there were more than five thousand people on board so kind of small town in the middle of the persian gulf if russians attack such an aircraft carrier americans can face huge implications. the stakes are very high right now are clear back to you the president has been linking the tensions with moscow to the probe into alleged russian meddling during the last presidential election what's he been saying. that's right he's been blaming what he's been calling a bad blood with russia on the russia investigation that's being led by special

counsel robert muller and the thing that originally made trump's tweets about syria so usual for the president the fact that he called aside an animal that he pin the blame squarely on russia is that he has been very reluctant to criticize putin himself directly this even as the u.s. administration has taken steps against russia in response to a series of what it sees as missteps it's expelled russian diplomats that it suspects to be spies it's levied new sanctions on people who things are in putin's inner circle but donald trump himself has been criticized on both sides of the aisle for being largely quiet and this is a big departure for him to come out directly and criticize russia on something like this suspected chlorine gas attack clear richardson for us in washington and you're a shadow for us in moscow thanks to both of you this morning rolled back so how does germany figure in all of this we're joined now from our parliamentary studios here in berlin by peter bio he's the german government's new coordinator for

transatlantic cooperation advisor to charles we're back on u.s. german relations with the bars thanks so much for being with us today your job is maintaining good relations between germany and the u.s. at a time when an american president derives another head of state in this case the charles saw as a gas killing animal how are you going to advise chancellor machall on conducting talks with president trump. well first of all the united states remain the most important partner of germany and europe as a whole on the other side of the atlantic go to international of the global scale that is the one fact on the other hand we see in the in the past the development that concerns us that brings a change to how we communicated across the atlantic are asking pair to form a time so we were facing new challenges we see that europe and germany have to

take over more responsibility by this itself to care about or know about their own security issues and but having said that the current situation that we're facing on my hope is that before any strike after the gas attacks in duma which for me are a fact you know can be answered that there will be diplomatic talks and also including the word security council ok and now talking about taking on bigger responsibility do you support the idea of significant u.s. military action in syria well again i mean this can only be the ultimate ratio but the fact is as well that some into main barbarian act as we have seen the killing of a lot of people including women and children and do month syria needs an answer the assad regime as well as russia who are the protective of power there they have to understand this ok now how would that affect nato and germany would would germany

join in. i don't see this now i think. we won't take an active role there but you might know this one of our ships has already been deployed say an accompanying ship if it is u.s. destroyer in the mediterranean but more than that i don't think we will see an active role by germany here ok now how do you view the possibility that a u.s. strike could lead to a direct confrontation with russia where the stakes are high and dangerous out there again first i hope we won't see anything like that that will not be necessary first being the second thing is you know from the language from the rhetoric that we see from putin that he's backing baking the little bit so i don't think that there we will see you strong escalation on the other him you see that

you're rushing ambassador to the lebanon he has used quite tough rhetoric one or two days before said you know we will down and the thing that comes from the u.s. side and its allies and so this is something that worries me and others as well. peter buyer german government's new coordinator for trans a lot of cooperation visor to the chancellor on u.s. german relations thanks very much for being with us thank you very much. now for a look at some of the other stories making the news at this hour algeria has begun three days of national mourning after a military plane crash that killed two hundred fifty seven people the russian built transport went down shortly after takeoff wednesday killing mostly soldiers and their family members the accident is the worst aviation disaster in algeria's history authorities have ordered an investigation. yemen's army says it has recaptured a key city from around back to the rebels the army said it had completely liberated

the city of middy which lies on yemen's border with saudi arabia the saudis are major backers of the yemeni government in a civil war with the who these. you know your script ball who was poisoned along with her father a former russian double agent in britain last month has released a statement saying she will not accept an offer of help from the russian embassy british authorities blame moscow for poisoning screwball and her father with the nerve agent novacek her father remains critically ill and in hospital pope francis has admitted he made grave mistakes in handling the child abuse scandal in chile in a letter to chilean bishops he said he was ashamed of comments earlier this year in which he accused victims of slander the pope's apology comes after victims testimonies were published he's inviting some of them to rome. this is the t.v. news live from berlin still to come on the show the number of executions carried out around the world fell in twenty seventeen more findings from an honesty

international's new report on capital punishment straight ahead. or first parents here in two of germany's scandal hit heavyweights are getting some new leaders that's right bryan physio a few brands stand for corporate germany more than these two but both folks bargain and bank the world's biggest carmaker and germany's leading financial institution keep making headlines and only for the wrong reasons folksongs diesel gate scandal cost the company many billions and put the whole german car industry in disrepute and dodge about insaf prices dropped by ninety percent in the last ten years a c.e.o. after c.e.o. has promised investors to make dodge a true global player and failed now both ships get new captains and both a homegrown clear the stage for the new head of volkswagen habit peace can certainly sell cars but is he prepared to take full control over europe's largest

automaker. after all folks wagon is in a world apart where politicians and unions have as much control as shareholders that's one of the things that current c.e.o. marty is mueller is learning the hard way and that's apparently why the sprawling companies diverse stakeholders think he can no longer handle a massive restructuring program that includes more electric cars and new mobility concepts but this is only been at the company for three years and presumably untainted by the addition scandal that still haunts the automaker. this man is facing another kind of challenge christian saving is the new boss of deutsche bank his predecessor john cryan was helpless to bring the company out of massive red ink and now it's in a life or death battle to survive saving says he wants to revive the bank's hunter instincts he started a dog nearly thirty years ago as a trainee but will that experience in the trenches help him at the very top of the company. to new men why not women one might ask

take the helm of two battered old battleships of the german economy well the new commanding officers be able to fix the leaks pump the excess water out and set a new course let's discuss this with thomas duffel bag a longstanding critic of german corporate culture himself or manager of the car industry here now a member of parliament for the free democrats misses of the back of those two men are coming from inside those organizations is that a good thing looking good morning first looking at the challenges which are lying ahead of the bank and folks racking i would say those people are not the right right choice probably you need it specially in the car business you need somebody who is disrupting and breaking up those incestuous structures and power engines which really run the

chairman car industry in those major major troubles and. mr saving having a hunter's instinct over the last thirty years obviously he didn't show that too much don't know. looks like it but xavi is seen as a rather sober and unassuming man inside the bank boss he spent nearly all his career isn't that dangerous. yes you know i'm i'm always advocating for a critical number of disruptors in traditional an established german corporates because they need to renew themselves the banking business look at commercial bank it's in a disaster still situation still but also the whole car industry and who if not somebody from the outside could bring in new thinking but german industry is no

never any good in letting outside is in really and they're not really comfortable with disruption all these problems are problems in those companies symptom of some to magic for a larger more general problem in german industry well if you do if you really look at the long history of scandals. at folks going back to one thousand nine hundred ninety six and indulge a bank robber be the last decade you you see that those companies the sites looking for new business models definitely would have needed a cultural reform and that is to add to magically for many large german giants that they really do not tackle old hierarchies old power structures bought also specially at fox fagen the incestuous relationship with the churning metal union

which probably even prevented that somebody from the outside would now run a c.e.o. it folks because they want to have their hand on the c.e.o. and that this union dominated selection processes so because of the back of the joining us from frankfurt this morning thank you very much thank you to. minutes from the u.s. federal reserve's latest policy meeting in march were released last night and showed the country's central bank has a broad agreement stronger growth in the u.s. means the fed can and should raise rates more aggressively in the next three years to my increases expected within this year making it a total of three rises so far and markets are looking for clues a fourth might be on the cards but the fed has two big unknown is complicating policymaking the impact of domestic tax cuts and by how much they'll see growth and

of course the effect of the ongoing trade tensions with china. russia's ruble is falling fast against the u.s. dollar as tensions mount between the two countries washington's new sanctions against russian businessmen and their companies along with the sharply escalating diplomatic crisis in syria have seen the ruble plunged to just over fifteen u.s. cents that's a level last seen eighteen months ago since news of the sanctions last friday russia's currency has plunged by twelve percent. the sanctions washington announced on friday against russia are already beginning to be felt on the streets of moscow the ruble seems to be losing value by the hour the us said the sanctions are in response to charges of russian meddling in u.s. elections and other ongoing issues but the russian prime minister continues to say they are really designed to give us an unfair advantage that. the latest u.s.

administration decision on sanctions is an attempt to fight us through unfair competition to limit our development going to create tensions on the economy and the currency markets. for the time being though the plummeting euro is a more acute problem that's because every day russians know that a weak ruble means trouble is just around the corner because. the sanctions will have negative consequences and the growing exchange rate of the dollar and the euro is a first indication that our economy will experience a drop in the president in the week which is then as the rhetoric heats up over the conflict in syria where russia and the u.s. support opposite sides the ruble continues to slide. the death penalty seems to mean to climb around the world boss there is a catch there is indeed gary hart the unit rights group amnesty international says

the number of reported judicial executions around the world fell during two thousand and seventeen but the group also warns that the true number of people put to death is not known that's because some countries treat execution numbers as a state secret china for example and as is often the case in china and in the handful of other nations executing its citizens capital punishment is often very public. iran responsible for carrying out small than half of the well it's not in executions last year that's a. cording to amnesty international's latest figures in dozens of those cases that meant public execution in iran drug trafficking and blasphemy are among those crimes punishable by death. at least five people were executed in iran for acts committed when they were still under eighteen. just four countries responsible for eighty four percent of all recorded executions last year iran saudi

arabia iraq and pakistan but the country suspected of being the world's leading executioner is china. it's thought to have put thousands to death last year more than the rest of the world put together the because data on the death penalty that is a state secrets exactly how many is a matter of speculation. but not counting china twenty seven thousand silva total number of executions worldwide full by four percent from the previous year. m the city international says that reaffirms the global trend towards a pollution of the death penalty last year a further two countries guinea and mongolia joined the one hundred four who have now abolished capital punishment for a second year in a row the us did not feature among the top five global execution is slipping from position seven to eight this is due in part to ongoing legal challenges of the use

of lethal injection. but as litigation in several states progress is that because the executions resume. well how much data does facebook collect on users and on non-users is a question asked by both the senate and the house during mark zuckerberg today testimony on capitol hill but the facebook c.e.o. sidestepped a direct answer he did though acknowledge the facebook collects data from users even when they're not on facebook is testimony has raised calls for government regulation. for a second day mark zuckerberg faced the cameras and sat through hours of questioning from u.s. lawmakers. accused of compromising the private data of tens of millions of facebook users he repeated his apology from a day earlier order it's clear now that we didn't do enough to prevent these tools

from being used for harm as well and that goes for fake news foreign interference in elections and hate speech as well as developers and data privacy it was my mistake and i'm sorry. zuckerberg gave repeated assurances that he would allocate more facebook staff to help improve data protection but he appeared evasive in response to committee members questions is yes or no if you could will you make the commitment to change all the user to changing all the user default settings to minimize to the greatest extent possible the collection and use of users' data congressman this is a complex issue that i think is deserves more than a one word and well again that's disappointing to me because i think you should make that commitment. while making numerous promises on improving data security sucker berg still managed to remain vague on specifics legislative hearings on solutions sports now and another remarkable night of football in the quarterfinals

of the champions league the big drama came in spain where italy's you ventus managed to come back from three goals down to tie the aggregate score against real madrid extra time was on the cards until the spaniards were awarded a controversial stoppage time penalty event as keeper gigi befall was sent off for his protests christiane rinaldo stepped up and he as expected made no mistake from the spot sending ryall through four three on aggregate and newly crowned german champions byron munich also reaching the champions league sami's there was much less drama there in their nil nil home draw with sabean. by and did what they had to do and the result gave them a two one aggregate victory putting them into friday's draw for the last four of european football's premier club competition. let's get you

a minder now of our top stories this hour russia's military says the syrian government has now taken full control of the rebel stronghold of eastern ghouta including the town of duma about location was the site of the suspected poison gas attack last week the u.s. has threatened a no atari response to that alleged attack. and the number of executions carried out last year around the world fell compared to the year before that's according to a new amnesty international report on capital punishment but the group also warns that the true number of people put to death is not. well don't forget you can always find out more about these and other stories at a website that's e.w. dot com you can also follow us on twitter and on facebook for now though for me brian thomas of the entire news team thanks for joining us.

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to. enter the conflict zone my guest this week here in kiev is stateless he's a former president of georgia a former regional government in ukraine i'm hanging over him multiple allegations of criminal activity and he's mikail saakashvili once the dawning of the west is spearheading the rose revolution in georgia that has you know made too many enemies and run out of road. the fifty sixty minutes of the delusion of. playing dortmund's leipzig a big a favorite seems to be got all the best goals we've got all the action the double is the home of job and the ball shared experience every match if someone does league of the weekend cheer on g.w. . g.w.

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ruins so non lasting. harm. first let's talk about sex now.