the be . the bad. this is news coming to you live from berlin europe moves to destruct this information campaigns targeting the upcoming european elections there's been a massive push to get people out to vote but efforts to stop the spread of foreign and propaganda proved too little. also on the program. boris

still face for any child to get one in 5 live in conflict areas of warning from the age group save the children as it mocks its 100 kilos of service. and president declares a national emergency ban aimed businesses with foreign telecoms oppose a risk to national security the directive does not mean any specific company but is believed to be targeting the chinese tech giant. hello and welcome. good to have your company. europe goes to the polls next week and a massive push is underway to encourage people to vote 28 countries with 400000000 voters will decide who represent them for the next 5 years of the european parliament here's how it works the number of seats each country gets is roughly

proportional to its population now europe's most populous country germany with over 18000000 will be electing 96 m. e p's one of the smallest country in the e.u. which is more when have 6 any piece to represent less than half a 1000000 people now once elected members of parliament join a transnational a group with similar political orientation at the moment of the 7 such groups representing the center right the socialist greens euro skeptics and others of the n.e.p. is vote on new laws and approve the e.u. budget they also help choose the president of the european commission of the current president is somebody you might recognize is this manish or claude young the favorites to replace him are the german conservative m.e.p. manfredo verba and the dutch politician france to moments of the european socialists. but in the counter to next week's vote there was also in god

there was this dregs of shock and this also growing euro skepticism in some countries there's an additional concern online disinflation campaigns trying to influence voters lost to the e.u. commission set up a task force to deal with this threat but critics say its efforts may be too little too late whoever you are wherever you are you can get involved the european union institutions have poured enormous resources in to get out the vote campaign but have they invested enough in stay out of the vote effort in ways to prevent malicious meddling it's not like there was no warning 5 years ago the kremlin's internet research agency in st petersburg was revealed estimated to spend more than a $1000000.00 a month pumping out anti western spin 3 years ago u.s. elections were the target of that russian troll farm yet the european commission waited until just 6 months before the european parliament elections to launch its

action plan against dissin from ancient greece should have been doing much more kalinski spent 3 years in the european commission's struck on task force a communications unit created in 2015 to counter russian efforts to smear the e.u. now with an independent think tank kalinski says brussels is way behind expecting that we will solve the problem in the last 2 months before the elections or even in the last month of the elections when the russians have been working on it for the past 5 years i think it's very naive facebook google and twitter have a role in the commission's plan pressed to better verify users' identities and remove fake accounts faster and to make clear who's paying for advertising and content facebook has just opened its own war room in dublin to target in authentic activity ahead of elections let's go from the e use external action service says there has been progress it's not as much as we would have liked. but we have seen in terms of transparency rules and things are

really moving and i think the platforms understood that they also need to take a much closer look at what is happening there but not everyone is counting on bureaucrats and big tech to lead the battle out in the quiet flemish countryside is what you might call an antique troll farm with a staff of one. martin welcome. martin shanking debugs false online stories on his own website lead stories dot com and also as part of fact check e u a collaboration of european media outlets working to keep the record straight ahead of the elections anything that looks suspicious take a closer look at that. smells funny. especially the kind of story that makes people angry or upset or. confirms people in their bias like i knew. this or i knew. after shank brand speak content with

a big red banner on his website he also formally notify space book which immediately reduces the items visibility in its news feeds shank is convinced even small doses of dissent from asian can be dangerous for democracy if you can swing a few 100 foods in a certain district or in a certain state. that my balance and you cannot make this coalition or that coalition because of one move. so it will undoubtedly have an influence with so much at stake across $28.00 countries experts say we're likely to see intense disinformation campaigns right up until the final votes are cast. and that report was by attendees shills in brussels joins me now from there terry what do those who are carrying out these disks information campaigns really want to

achieve. all they really do need to do is to sow distrust and to meet people doubt what they know to make them uncertain about their leaders their communities the media and in that way these actors hope that perhaps the vote for more authoritarian leaders and if we're talking about the kremlin or or extremist groups they think maybe those leaders will be more amenable to their aims and so remember if you if you get all the way up to e.u. level major policies can be blocked with just one vote something like sanctions or energy projects so you really can make a big difference just by sowing distrust and that's what they're aiming for and what kind of specific information campaigns have been identified and have fact checkers been taking them down yeah we've seen a lot of campaigns debunked here in the days before the european parliament elections the fact checker that i visited martin shank which you saw in my story he

showed me how he took apart a claim that a muslim had been seen a man in white robes had been seen perhaps setting the noted on fire now you know how much emotion that event caused and what martin did is simply to find a longer clip of that video and then you can see very clearly this was a fireman not somebody wearing a long robe you know not some somebody that was was there. with malicious intent on the noted on fire and the other big successes have been have come from the online activist group avaaz who has hired its own elves to take down many many pages reaching millions of users spreading fake content they take this information to facebook and facebook takes the pages down given all of this how much of a tract could this information pose to the integrity of european elections next week. well the european union institutions have been warned for years that these elections have

a huge bull's eye on them and who could blame the bad actors you've got 28 countries 750 seats very powerful positions of course they're going to try to meddle but therefore begs the question of why they waited until 6 months before this vote to launch their dissent from ation plan counter this information plan and i think that we won't know until the very final days what exactly the big plans are of the of the dissent from asian campaigners experts tell me that it could be just a day or 2 before the vote where we see some huge drop of information that nobody has seen before coming from stolen e-mails or something like this we've certainly seen that in the u.s. elections and then it could be days weeks months even years after the elections until it's all unraveled what we do know is there will be some influence it just remains to be seen how great the regency teri schultz in brussels thank you very much that number you have to do it because some other stories making news around the bond as strikes by the saudi led coalition of kid to $36.00 civilians in

yemen's capital sanaa that's according to health officials links to hooty militants the strikes reportedly targeted 9 military sites in and around the city become 2 days off to insurgents claimed responsibility for drone attacks on to some of the oil pumping stations. 5 people have been killed after a building collapse in china's financial hub shanghai earlier rescue us pulled 14 people alive from the building which was being renovated when it fell on construction but because the cause of the accident is not known. a leader of the box separatist militant group eta has been arrested in france off the 17 year on the run. at an era is accused of involvement in several killings the group is responsible for more than $800.00 deaths during its campaign for bosc independence it disbanded in 2018. formal australian

prime minister bob hawke has died he was 89 in power through most of the eighty's hole close the center left labor party's longest serving prime minister he never lost an election but was toppled by his own party in 1901. not every war is a war against children that was the belief of eglantine jab when she founded save the children 100 years ago that every day children are killed or maimed abducted recruited sexually abused their homes and schools are bombed sometimes aid is denied to them in february save the children reveal that some 420000000 children are living in conflict affected areas it's one in 5 worldwide. today as save the children celebrates its 100th birthday the organization again wants to put

the spotlight on the impact of war and conflict in children and how to protect them . save the children's founders wrote the declaration of the rights of the child which was adopted by the united nations in 1959 the charity helps to feed starving children after the devastation of 2 world wars. there's no end to conflicts in the world so while child welfare has improved worldwide save the children says one and family children now live in conflict zones more risk of harm now than at any time in the last 20 years. most were just 12 years old and lives in gaza 5 years ago he played in the street there was an explosion nearby despite the best efforts of doctors he lost and i. think a lot of the soto's children make fun of me at school they keep calling me one eyed man even in the street. below them i keep getting infected and i wish the

infections would stop. and i dream and wish that i could go abroad and get a good eye for since it looks really in this it's not only children caught up in conflict save the children believes that every child deserves a future wherever they are whatever their circumstances place is at peace can be just as dangerous for children as places at wall. now for more on the story joining me is alexia pepper day care is she's a full was tough member of save the children and co-founder of the n.g.o.s safe space welcome mr kerry's 100 years of save the children today is this a day for you to celebrate. thank you for having me on today's the day so actually i think a good hard look at stuff has become a multi-national enormous charity around the world with over 2 and a half 1000000000 dollars worth of funding coming through and while it's very

laudable to grow an organization of that size on the back of a clean job's work we really need to look at how that is done and how it impacts the people who come up question charity because we don't always see for picture in the glass that is portrayed to the outside world you know and so the issues i mean we lay this to rich. and pardon me for interrupting you but the organization has done some great work but more and more children are exposed to risk of conflict why hasn't the ngo been able to prevent that. preventing can't children from being at risk of conflict is actually a much more political solution than the charitable world would have you got to stand. children are coming to conflict we are living in a time where more and more disharmony is being so it around the world including in the u.k. where i live and what we need to do is to see political solutions rather than charitable a cabbage charter which is really the last resort i want to see. my problem with the way we try to sell aid as the solution is that it comes at the very end huge

part of the work that really what we need to be looking at is empowering citizens to hold their own governments to account and we need to start by doing that you know in the countries that this money comes from as well as working to support and solidarity people and their children in other countries it's a much more complex picture than a charity sending you a 5 pound vaccination we'd like to see your point taken now there are allegations of sexual misconduct which have cast a shadow on the work of save the children you as a former staff member have to expose that scandal do you think enough has been done to deal with this issue. absolutely not there has been in fact almost nothing done apart from a good bit of p.r. there was a lot of silencing of myself and others who was speaking out in the media last year we've not been invited into the organization to discuss our experience it's either at the time of working at st children or our experiences of being whistleblowers afterwards and from what i can see that spent a lot of money on a very big academic report by somebody who didn't seem to really understand just

how deep the culture of power abuse can be within these large i and save the children is not operating in a vacuum we've seen multiple other complaints of misconduct of various different agencies every large organ. cultural problem oxfam has a very widespread issue that it is currently trying to suckle save the children on the other hand has gone very quiet it has used its political influence to keep all reports from really being flourishing in the in the news and i'm awaiting the results of a charity commission investigation which is being committed which is being commissioned at the moment to have a look at exactly what the trustees knew at the time and what they covered up and intentionally that nothing they disappointing ofi you specially on an anniversary like this one and they accept that the d. carries a former member of a save the children and co-founder of the ngo save space thank you for talking to us in the w. thank you. and later in the day we also get a directive from

a save the children come and talk to us about this issue that may not bring you remind you that we have lots more coming up including. this extremist far right group is campaigning for the european parliament which marches invoking germany knots the nazis boss and why have attempts to ban it. but 1st u.s. president donald trump has signed an executive order declaring a national emergency giving is administration offensive files to ban the activities of foreign telecoms the white house says the measure is not directed at any specific country or company but the move is vive be seen as targeting the chinese telecom giant while. the us government has long viewed the chinese company as an espionage threat and has sought to keep walk away from playing a major role on the u.s. telecommunications infrastructure market. this new move is likely to prevent it

from supplying the equipment being used to set up cutting edge 5 g. networks donald trump's decision has come at a key moment in negotiations with the chinese government about future trade relations between the countries where having a little squabble with china because they've been treated very unfairly for many many decades for actually a long time. should have been handled a long time ago and it was now. the executive order makes it easier for the u.s. government to directly regulate foreign telecoms which could theoretically exploit back doors and systems to pose a threat to communications and national security in addition the u.s. is placed to our way and 7 the associated companies on a blacklist firms on it have to be granted licenses from the u.s. commerce department to use components made by u.s. firms in their technology and the restrictions will come into force in the next few

days however a long way executives are taking the pressure from washington in stride. so. that our business in the united states is not that big due to our global operations any change in one country has little impact on our global business. you know me in the face of the possible challenges of cyber security in the future huawei is a positive contribution not a destructive force somewhat it's only for the one we are looking forward to the future willing to continue to invest more from innovation to cooperation as usual but i want to. but for now it seems while way won't be cooperating with many of its american partners. and for more on the story and joined by alan tilton business desk welcome alan 1st of all what do you make of this u.s. move to declare

a national emergency so its ministration can target big telecom companies well right now it's kind of hard to see exactly if it's a justified move or not because i mean a cynic could say this is just another step in the ongoing trade conflict between the u.s. and china and that donald trump is attempting to use while way to get a little bit more leverage over beijing however you also have to realize the concerns about security that have been raised regarding huawei are nothing new i mean they 1st came up in the u.s. context in 2012 under the obama administration and if you look around the world other countries are taking these allegations of security holes or even possible as quite seriously i mean a story in new zealand taken steps to ban their technology as well as has japan but that's also coming in the face of u.s. pressure now the united states for its part claims that it has information saying that huawei is engaged in a close information exchange kind of information with us i think we really don't know according to court documents there has been some some information gathered by

intelligence resources however that's under lock and key we haven't seen it we don't know if the u.s. or the international partners have seen it so it's really hard to understand exactly if this is a justified move or not but it's a political or a security move but you seem to share the view that this is targeting the chinese a telecom now does this mean if that huawei is banned that all kind of communication technology will come from domestic providers in the u.s. well we don't really know however i wouldn't bet on it because at the end of the day you know price in the market is going to decide and if you look at it you know there are only $2.00 domestic makers of 5 g. technology in the switches that are necessary when it comes the united states so at the end of the day is where it's going to be making the cheapest technology out there and that's actually something huawei keeps pointing to you know for a long time they have been the market leader the. produced in of the infrastructure and they were insane you know look this does this decision will have knock on effects inside the united states because especially in rural areas some of the

smaller internet service providers are dependent upon sheep solutions because the end of the day they don't have as many clients as their you know big city competitors and they have to turn to companies like quality now if that technology isn't actually available in north america they'll have they could have a lot of problems actually expanding their 5 g. networks and were actually created in the 1st place and bringing them to more rural communities now we want chua way has shot just the whole thing saying its presence in the u.s. is fairly small but how much of a setback is it for the company which has huge global ambitions well i mean it's definitely if you take it as a bellwether it's not a good indicator i mean here inside inside the e.u. there are telecoms who are saying that there are issues with white technology now they're not actually bringing up spying but rather saying that while ways a little bit sloppy when it comes to security in terms of their own technology and saying that they could that that those little holes that are in there could be abused by nefarious parties and hackers well and this is something wall way has actually admitting to and saying that they're going to invest some 2000000000 in

the coming years to try to make their technology a little bit tighter a little bit more secure. taking it back to the u.s. context i mean you have to realize what we saw supply chain is massive it's huge and while they may not sell as much technology inside the united states as they do elsewhere their supply chain still runs the united states so that means this could throw kind of a monkey wrench in there many of the partners in the united states will have much more difficulty doing business with them and that could make the cost of production for hallway go up in the years to come adult in film business says thank you very much for that analysis thank you. small radical far right parties trying to boost its. the country's nazi past. the candidates for the european parliamentary elections our reporters. went to a town where this extremist group has found follow us and it's cool it's that it should be banned. this is playing in eastern germany and the office of the

political party or 3rd path they sell secondhand clothing here for germans only the party caste itself as being a party of the people the german people the party also shares information here on its program it wants to see the german borders shift back to where they were before the 2nd world war and cut right through the middle of poland they say german women should have more children and immigration should be stopped. and my ideal germany is a place where politicians have the final say and they should always have germans we support closing the borders and we believe this foreign infiltration cannot continue. again and again the 3rd path has marched through plow and most recently at the beginning of may there marches are reminiscent of hitler's 3rd reich the torches flags and drums.

party has polarized the people of. kerry torches to our uniforms it was creepy i find it a bit frightening. some of their ideas you can't fault. it's horrible that they've set up base here and even worse the people indulge them. whether groups are allowed to demonstrate here is up to the local district office if demonstrators wear uniforms or if there is the threat of violence then a rally can be banned but so far authorities haven't active. local authorities have often been accused of not using the full extent of the law against far right groups many say they downplay the threat they pose or turn a blind eye the marches are repeatedly allowed. rights and the rule of law and i think it's important the playing field both legally is extended

as far as possible sometimes i would like to see more courage from local authorities political scientist says just restricting the demonstrations is not enough he is calling for a complete ban on the party. even though they are a small group i think they need to be banned because they audiology and the orientation is fundamentally the same as national socialism. but that's still far off because it's difficult to do so under german law so the 3rd path party is running in next week's european elections. and fantasy football and premier league champions manchester city have been referred to european football is financial regulators investigators allege the club has inflated the value of a multi-million euro sponsorship deal city claimed a 2nd straight english time at the weekend but reports say big could now face

a one season ban from the champions league the acquisition. declared sponsorship money. if the city have denied any wrongdoing. here was indeed a news up next with a special program upcoming european elections that i mentioned on behalf. of the out.

i'm. going. to. be. standing up joe orman. hater mark inside a small town mayor a hungry. beast for a progressive society. welcoming minorities and fighting corruption.

i mean a man that was proud to call himself like your appear. next. entered the conflict zone confronting the powerful the trial of countless separatist leaders of the best trial of independence food has laid bare some stuff divisions in spanish society our guest this week here in madrid is sprains foreign minister joseph corral hunters here on civil charge the trials how fundamentally to friend. conflicts so far in 60 minutes cogito from a. on. an action packed life. anything's possible as long

as our coffee and his friends can drink. this movie. refugee camp. his life story may have ground to. 27 years ago but there's no holding back his dreams. thank you for watching. cinema starts may 27th on the. $28.00 nations joined in one union and strausberg is the seeds of without parliaments welcome to a special edition of focus on europe with me peter craven and just days to go now

to elections to the poll amount with the euro's skeptic even and see european policies in the ascendancy in many parts of the continent.