w. . visited every year news wise from berlin an armed man is reported to have taken a woman hostage near the main railway station in the west german city of cologne police say they have made contact with the suspect and are warning people to avoid the area also coming up must do better german chancellor angela merkel says she realizes she needs to do more to regain people's trust after her conservative allies in bulgaria suffered massive losses in a regional election but will this be enough to stabilize her fragile governing coalition and berlin. and the man convicted of helping three of the september

eleventh attackers it is released from prison in germany. i'm sumi so much going to thank you for joining us the main train station in the german city of cologne is on lockdown amid reports of a hostage situation outside the rail hub now police have cordoned off the area and evacuated the station and all in the end outbound passenger services have been suspended there is been no immediate word on whether the incident could be terrorism related. let's go right to the w.'s david martin he is on the scene in cologne he joins us from outside the station david what are you seeing and hearing there. good afternoon as you said i'm just outside you in central station where the whole area has been cordoned off by police we're seeing

dozens of police and emergency services i'm given says and even a fire engines we've talked outside no one is allowed to get anywhere near the inside of the station what we hear is that the perpetrator is still holed up inside we want hostage actually just about real home minutes ago we hate to gunshots ring out from the station so this is a developing situation david is there any indication who this person is and what a possible motive might be. for the time being no we don't know anything about about the perpetrator. police are trying to establish contact with him if you cite the station before they jump to ascertaining what his motive might be in favor of braintree now saying whether this is a terror related incident. david tell us more about the situation where you're

standing this is a secure perimeter i understand how much has this disrupted at this very central area. it's completely closed down the area so we are standing at one of the back entrance to the station which is where most of the press has gathered to watch what's going on here so we're surrounded by police public people from the public all right now to get up to where we're standing what i hear is that on the other side of the station which is the main entrance which makes it's right in front of the famous group of fetal what i'm hearing is that about ten fifteen minutes ago back to trial you mean split multiple searches nightly. possibly because that spring. any sort of policing gauge action adventure it would probably be from the main and. that's what i'm hearing. from david martin on the scene for us at cologne main train station david thank you very much for that update. and we will of course bring you more details on that story as

they come in to us now germany's governing coalition is facing an uncertain future today after uncle michael's allies in bavaria suffered a huge defeat in a regional election leaders of the three coalition parties are meeting to discuss the way forward after voters delivered what's being called a resoundingly slap to the government in a vote in bavaria that chancellor angela merkel spoke a short while ago at a conference on foreign trade and services it was her first appearance since the barren election she said it was clear her government has work to do and in the grand coalition has not succeeded in doing what it was i had tried to do so far and the lesson that i have learned from yesterday's elections is that i as the german chancellor behind the coalition need to do more to ensure that we've regained people's trust and that we deliver on our promises and i will do that as best i can . we have our political correspondent nina has a with us hi nina how much of that is

a concession that things really are not going well for chancellor merkel's government. it is definitely a concession that they have heard the message that they are going to do some soul searching all the partners involved in the current government coalition are suffering some damage merkel has gone out of this election even though it was a regional one extremely damaged and even though her party didn't stand to be elected in the very it was a system party and yet they suffered a historic blow a blow they suffered a ten percent decrease in votes a share and the social democrats who are also involved in this current government coalition here in berlin they also suffered a historic blow. course there will be lessons to be drawn and of course. ignore this a lot of speculation swirling about the chancellor herself and her grip on power is the clock ticking for the chancellor we've asked this question many many times in recent weeks months years she has always come out with some sort of

a strategy the big thing about is her very very distinct style of managing politics so she does see a problem and then tries and find a solution so she is not somebody to underestimate but of course yes pressure is growing she's in her fourth term as german chancellor and of course there are people already gearing up in her party and some voices are getting louder that now we really need to look at the state elections coming up and hence the big because after the elections is before the regional elections we have another important report card essentially coming up in two weeks time where a close ally of ungrammatical stands to. hopefully defend his position as state premier if he doesn't do that and of course her position is extremely weak and she said her government has to regain trust are we going to see any concrete changes to her government the way that they are willing things the social democrats i've mentioned it they lost tremendously they are the big losers of yesterday's varian

elections and they have already announced that they are going to do some soul searching after the elections in hessy where they say we have to talk about all the eventualities about all the possibilities potentially even personal consequences yet they do experience a very difficult situation at the moment and they wouldn't benefit from fresh elections so i doubt that they would lose. that confidence in the current government coalition and i doubt that they will leave it as you said another important report card coming up for the chancellor government in two weeks that regional election the state of hessen our political correspondent nina thank you so much. now on to some other news and an accomplice in the september eleventh attacks on the united states has been released from prison in germany. was arrested in two thousand and one and convicted on hamburg in two thousand and six of helping three of the nine eleven attackers german authorities say he will be deported to

morocco. on nine eleven two thousand and one al-qaeda terrorists took control of four passenger planes full of civilians and threw them into the world trade center and the pentagon a fourth crashed into a field in pennsylvania roughly three thousand people were killed the terrorist attacks were the largest ever soiled they were put into action by a group of young men in germany which became known as the hamburg terrorist cell one of the most sadik the moroccan student was the only man to be sentenced in germany in connection with the attacks it took more than five years of trials and appeals for germany to convict him he was sentenced to fifteen years for being an accessory to the murders of two hundred forty six people aboard the hijacked planes and membership of a terrorist organization but never denied being friends with the hijackers but says he knew nothing about their nine eleven plans he was brought from this prison in

hamburg to the city's airport for deportation to morocco he's banned from returning to germany until his ninetieth birthday by the authorities who still deem him dangerous back home in morocco his wife and children are thought to be waiting for him. to do that he is naomi conrad has been following story for us and joins us in our studio now we why is he being released for deportation now he's being released about four weeks early and he's also received an entry ban until his ninetieth birthday as we heard in the report which means should combat authorities can put him back in jail for the remainder of the his time so about four weeks. time they could try to figure out what to do with him next tell us more. who he is how dangerous is he you know what role did he play he was actually quite in the group i mean he did go to an al qaeda training camp in afghanistan that's quite clear while the group the pilots were training as pilots in america the ones who actually then hijacked the planes he was back in hamburg he handled the bank

transfers he tried to conceal their whereabouts and he also signed absence will say in a way he was quite small but then he's one of the few survivors the question about how dangerous he is is a little bit difficult i mean most experts agree that he's unlikely to join or maybe even the self-proclaimed state but he obviously does have some propaganda value in that they question what will happen with him whether he can and will be used as a symbol of propaganda as you know someone who helped at least was part of the group that perpetrated these terrible attacks so what awaits him now in morocco well he's going to join his family at the question is what the authorities in morocco do with him i'm pretty sure they'll keep very close tabs on him maybe even interrogate him the big question is what the americans will do will they spirit him away they'll at least one of be part of any interrogation if and when it happens that's clear there's quite a good cooperation between the moroccan american security agencies so pretty sure they'll be watching quite closely what happens in morocco. conrado following all

the latest developments of the story for us thank you. now some other stories making headlines around the world at least thirteen people have died in flash floods in southwestern france streams were turned into raging torrent says the equivalent of several months of rain fell in the space of hours worst hit is the region of the southwest where the river reached flood levels not seen in a century. the british and the e.u. negotiators say they have not been able to seal a bragg's that deal ahead of an e.u. summit this week despite a flurry of meetings on sunday that used chief negotiator michele bunny a treat tweeted that key issues were so low in particular the need to avoid a hard border between the u.k.'s northern ireland and the irish republic. kensington palace says prince harry and his wife the duchess of sussex are expecting their first baby in the spring the announcement comes as harry and megan arrived in sydney at the start of a sixteen day trip to australia and the pacific region. now

a deal to end the fighting in northern syria comes into effect today but it's already under strain with a key rebel group denouncing the agreement and vowing to keep fighting but in some places the deal is holding like in the town of marek. first fell to rebels four years ago government forces fought to retake it this is what is left after repeated attacks and counterattacks with strikes barrel bombs tanks and heavy artillery. yet amid the devastation there are signs of life. people coming back and trying to rebuild their lives and their homes this was muhammad ali's house. we're shocked by what we found destroyed houses no infrastructure no services electricity or water in the streets the schools the hospitals there's nothing in the city yet. families are bringing

their children home too many too young to remember what marek used to be like. because mark is in the demilitarized zone the number of families returning is growing fast. and we have so many more students now we were hardly able to welcome them or so the teachers decided to repair some of the schools themselves. if the buffer zone becomes reality and holds people in mark will be safe at least for a while but there's no guarantee that it will. ok we're going to return now to our top story that a hostage taking in the german city of cologne of the main train station in cologne has been on lockdown amid reports of this hostage situation just outside the rail hub a police had cordoned the area off and a factor of the station now police say they have the situation under control let's bring in our reporter david martin who is at the scene for us said david what more can you tell us. that's right that's what we just heard about five

minutes ago you say the situation is under control and each gunshots i recruited on just before looks like that was the police action going into the station going into the pharmacy and rescuing the hostage we're hearing that he was staged as a teenage girl she's been injured taken to hospital and speak we don't know much about the perpetrator yet we've been told is that the situation is now under control the area remains cordoned off so i can see the station is still closed off to the public and no one's getting anywhere near that it's going to need looks like fortunately that we have to do that the situation is just going to our right our correspondent david martin at the scene there at the cologne central train station thank you very much for that update. and of course we'll continue to update you on that story you're watching t.v. news still to come the e.u. is unhappy with italy over its big spending plans brussels says it is being

blackmailed. that story and all of your business headlines with and for the one coming right after. the. time for an upgrade. with. design highlights you can make yourself. tips and tricks.