everyone has the right to. rule. this is d.w. news life from europe goes to the polls hundreds of millions cast ballots in a mammoth election that promises to bring about big changes in the european parliament i'll bring you all the latest on this the fact of staying for the e.u. also coming up. sporting goods company nike said don't stop penalizing athletes and sponsors who become pregnant nike came under fire when it was revealed it baxley

reduced female athletes contracts and they decided to become mothers. come to the program millions of voters across europe are going to the polls to elect representative to the european parliament it's the final day of voting with $21.00 countries taking part today including some of the biggest germany france italy spain and poland results are expected this even an e.u. citizens across the bloc have been voting since thursday with some 427000000 people eligible to cast their ballots but with more and more countries using electronic voting machines cyber security has been a big concern in this election officials say they'll be watching the results for signs of manipulation. it's being called europe's most election and european

leaders are worried that the e.u. parliamentary vote is at risk they say a foreign nation could spread mistrust in the results or even hack the election system altogether. we have european elections coming up. now i don't want to conjure up or predict anything but we have to be ready to stop interference of these elections. to fall into so why are they so worried about this election is a big target. first citizens in 28 different countries are taking part. that means $28.00 different ways of counting and tracking ballots dozens of different 90 systems and vote tally machines and there's been no e.u. wide check on any of it and lots of voting takes place across the board day. that means there's more time than usual for a hacker to potentially do damage. and it's being called the most important vote in

decades with the direction of the union potentially at stake 4 nations will be tempted to tip the scales by clete towards parties that hope to weaken the e.u. . we should take the suspect seriously because in the end it is about our democracy and securing our democracy against those who have a huge interest in peace tablet i was saying that we are not trusting our institutions hackers have targeted european governments before election web sites in bulgaria poland spain and other countries have all been attacked in the last few years. earlier this year a 20 year old german managed to hack and release the personal information of nearly 1000 german politicians and if he can do it why couldn't russia. well back in 2015 russian hackers spend we. inside the german parliament's computer network and the cyber security company fire i recently discovered russian hacking attempts

european election monitoring systems. but you don't even need to hack an election to potentially affect its results this information is also a threat and 26 team a russian campaign on social media might have helped swing the us presidential election in favor of donald trump some e.u. member states are starting to find back with efforts to safeguard their vote. so i think sweden was a good example for what they've done prior to the election by example is 1st true on our alliance where they have an ability to use technical and then also you know maybe within the public and they have also created measures informing the public proactively on what technologies i used you know you should be aware that there might be. actors that want to influence you via just information they put out

leaflets and i think that's a really good proactive strategy on informing every single citizen the e.u. recently doubled its budget for fighting this information and set up a new system for sharing threats in real time between member states. the question is is that enough because in this election if the results in just one e.u. country are affected back a cast doubt on the entire outcome. joining me now from brussels is d.w. correspondent have there been any signs of meddling in the e.u. elections. it's around here on the part of the european institutions and that is why the european external action service has set up a team of experts a reputable lot team if you want to a swat team that is monitoring a social media and quickly once a point out if anything is happening there any signs of meddling so far and nothing

from that side also points in games for the nationalist far right parties are they really drawing that much voter support yes indeed it is a big concern that there could be a landslide victory for nationalist euro skeptic parties they could clinch up to 20 percent of the seats in the european parliament the big question of course how much of an impact if that would happen if that were to happen how much of an impact it would have depends on 2 things it depends on the overall turnout in the election and it depends very much on the question if they are able to form one political group so far they are divided among several groups in the european parliament if they could form one political group and work together they clearly could have a big impact in european politics in the future let's talk a bit about the turnout in past european elections turnout has been extremely low how big is interests in the election this time around

a positive sign so far from the numbers we're i have from the turnout around me today at the turnout in france came up from 50.75 years ago to 19.26 rumania is also up from 12 to 19 so quite a jump there and the belgian foreign service reports a record turnout of on among belgians outside the country and when i went to the elections morning there were also quite a quite some queues here in the elections in brussels it's this is also very much a proxy election on national issues which ones are the countries their watch. i strictly wherever there is an election and there hasn't been a national election for some time. voters in europe use this european election as a protest vote that is typical particularly interesting cases will be the united kingdom where conservatives are expected to be penalized for theresa may not still

live ring on brecht sit and so it looks like that nigel farrar just party will have massive gains whereas the labor party in the u.k. that has been sitting pretty much since breaks it on the fence looks like it will be penalized for that position as well and then also interesting will be austria for instance where the far right coalition partner of the could scotland had a video the so-called scandal and it would be interesting to see to what extent they suffer from that political scandal that led to the collapse of the austrian government. and wrestles thank you very much. now to some of the other stories making news around the world he was president. second day in tokyo golfing with prime minister shinzo ave and it's a sumo wrestling grand finale despite the friendly atmosphere there are tough trade

talks ahead as well as differences over the threat posed by north korea. new guinea prime minister peter o'neill has stepped down following pressure over a multibillion dollar gas export deal a critics say failed to protect the interests of national firms his resignation follows weeks of defections to the opposition is handed over leadership to former prime minister julia chan. thousands of israelis have protested against legislation that could grant prime minister benjamin netanyahu immunity from prosecution israel's attorney general says he intends to charge netanyahu with fraud and bribery who won a 5th term last month. he was sportswear company nike says it will change the way it treats its female athletes who are returning from pregnancy nike received criticism after it was revealed some of the female athletes it sponsored were facing financial penalties if they became pregnant now the

company says it will waive performance based targets for 12 months for any of its pregnant things. more on this i'm joined now by sports reporter jonathan crane. this is a huge scandal what if nike thing about this yes hugely embarrassing night because it came about after a new york times investigation various us run and spoke out against the way they were treated after they got pregnant. memory from a night. they were disappointed saddens to hear about the athlete's experiences and said it had been a court humbling event so they also released a statement saying we've recognized knight can do more and there is an important opportunity for the sports industry collectively to evolve to better support female athletes now we have to bear in mind that track and field athletes get pretty much all their income from commercial deals so to have that costs all of their contracts

or together overseas can be very damaging financially as a way there was somewhat of a backlash yeah backlash and actually surprise we know we can see some of the pictures as well knight makes a really big deal of championing its female athletes and being big on the gender equality but we heard stories of female athletes rushing back to action off they got pregnant sometimes not ready allyson felix a 6 time in pitt gold medalist said she had to have a very in sections had a complicated but felt obliged to get back on track quickly she austinite for guarantees that pay wouldn't because and they wouldn't give those guarantees and she basically said look if someone like me can get it we'll hope everyone out and i had a bit about accusations of hypocrisy remember knight released an ad back in february featured serina williams dream crazy it was all about targeting gender stereotypes it features some lines like if we show emotion we get cool dramatic and i think actually we do have a bit of a clip from that to show you now. competing in. double

4 to 8. 23 grand slam having to be in then coming back for more. crazy crazy crazy. so if they want to. show them what crazy can do. there as we had serena williams did give birth she returns to tennis for a successfully and we've not heard from her publicly on this issue yet so what's been the reaction tonight saying stop penalizing women after they give birth well obviously a lot of relief but also some caution carried out for one of the athletes is the new york times regretted that she rushed back on her son was ill after she gave birth she felt that she had to get back quickly as well she said she was really excited about the decision. she said well knight stop suspending women without pay

or is this just about reduction so she's yet to hear from them actually in writing and i do say future contracts will have wording that quite reinforces that policy now the hash tag 3 maternity which is the reform that dream crazy that has been gaining a lot of traction some people are saying look this is athletics dirty secret and this is not just about night this is an industry wide problem of course with a democrat maybe a change in the u.s. in particular is very it's a drop protection for women after they gave come back from giving birth. and the right direction 1st from staff thank you john thank you. and as far as firing you have won the german cup adding to their league title and sealing a domestic double in saturday's contest byron faced the lights excite competing in their very 1st final ever they had most of the early scoring chances we could see them here and the white jurors used the byron kept in mind on why it was unbeatable and goal the striker open the window speak proved to be clinical up front the 1st

half was followed by kingsley come on strike after the break before 11 dosti struck again to round off a 3 mil victory it's the 19th time that the record champions of won the german cup . the 2900 cannes film festival has come to a close with a star studded award ceremony the festival's top prize the palme d'or went to south korean director bond human who for his black comedy parasite surprise for parasite marks the 1st korean film ever to win the honor for best film at cannes festival 2nd place the war the prize went to french senegalese director monte film atlantic . and a quick reminder of the top story we're following for you millions of voters across europe choosing their representatives to the european parliament and an election for populist parties are expected to make a strong showing. through of course continue to follow these crucial elections very

closely for you special coverage throughout the day makes of this great stories for we need someone providing a bus that helps homeless people look at clinton at the top of the hour i'm culturally i mean everybody here and drilling into the chinese. sure of the big idea of what's become of us and what it looks like. today. things are going to.