connection and returning to doing some thinking for the next generation. as the environment series of global $3000.00 on t.w. and online. this is d w news live from berlin world leaders and veterans gathered to commemorate the historic d.-day landings that were to end in world war 2300 veterans will join me lizbeth and world leaders on the southern coast of england or the 75th anniversary of the largest land sea and air operations in history. also

coming up cardinal george pell begins an appeal against his conviction for child sexual abuse the disgraced former vatican treasurer is the most senior catholic clergyman to be convicted on such charges. and we're in the czech republic to meet one of the students trying to topple that nation's billionaire leader. is helping mobilize demonstrations against foreign minister andres bobbish some of the biggest since the velvet revolution of 1989. i'm brian thomas thanks so much for joining us world leaders are gathering today in britain and france to mark the 75th anniversary of d.-day that's the day in 1904 when allied forces landed in normandy and began to retake europe from nazi germany heavy fire. i think there resulted in more than 9000 allied troops killed or

wounded on the very 1st day alone as well as thousands of civilians german casualties are put at least some 4000 on normandy as coast today the allies will reenact the landings and some of the high points of the invasion which led to the liberation of europe and helped and world war 2. well dave began with operation overlord that was a massive naval operation to ferry american british canadian and other allied forces across the english channel to the french coast it remains the largest amphibious assault in the history of warfare some $7000.00 ships and landing craft headed for a small 50 mile stretch of the french coastline they headed across of course the english channel to normandy and the codenames of the landing beaches are etched in history utah omaha gold the juno and sword all those beaches on that small stretch

of sand in normandy well today's commemorations don't begin in france but at the english naval base of portsmouth where d.-day veterans will later today depart in a ship for france did obvious show lots of parts at today's event in portsmouth let's go there now live to date here there's a lot planned at these commemorations today can you give us a taste of what's ahead. so brian portsmouth is the town where many of those allied forces many soldiers left on their journey to normandy and 944 and portsmouth has seen many commemoration ceremonies over the years but this one being the biggest we can expect 16 world leaders attending today including theresa may president donald trump but also all of the royal family from queen elizabeth to prince charles and they will be commemorating this event together with the 300 veterans all now of course over at 90 years old we will see

a fly by of modern and historic aircraft here of course something that especially president trump will appreciate who is known to like this kind of military display of strength and we also expect the veterans later on then to go on that ship to go to normandy where the celebrations will continue tomorrow we are also expecting protests here but not on the side of the come aeration the protesters want to be respectful to the veterans but they nonetheless wants to protest the presence of president of u.s. president donald trump ok no president will be standing outside the queen and the prime minister as part of the commemorations today how will the 3 of them be marking this very important day so central to the 2 nations collective memory. well of course america and great britain the 2 key allies in d.

day without them it wouldn't have happened to reese and may prime minister theresa may and u.s. president donald trump who is on a state visit to the u.k. have a stress that special relationship between the 2 countries in the past couple of days and they will do so today the 16 world leaders have written a joint it said d. day proclamation and they have written that they don't want the horrors of the world war 2 to be repeated and that conflicts should be result at all times peacefully so we will we will see hear him call it smith today a show of unity off those western allies ok unity is so important such an important message there before we talk more about this let's take a look back at the events of 75 years ago today and that the legacy of d.-day. at 1st glance it's hard to see any sign of the horrors that this stretch of sand

played host to. about 75 years ago on june 6th the fate of an entire continent rested on the soldiers who came ashore here on omaha beach. operation overloads to a combined force of nearly 160000 american british and canadian troops land on the beaches of normandy. gaining a foothold in nazi occupied france came at a heavy price the fighting on d.-day in the weeks afterwards claimed the lives of tens of thousands of allied soldiers but their sacrifice hastened the defeat of hit his 3rd reich. commemorating the fall and became an important ritual for the victorious allied powers as a reminder that they fought on the side of right and adjust. the germans also suffered heavy casualties but it wasn't until 2004 that france invited a german chancellor to take part in the annual commemorations. what was once viewed

in germany as a calamitous defeat is now seen as marking the start of the long road to peace and liberation do you gloomy and rosy all the successful invasion completely changed europe for the best they brought us democracy we lost the war. the freedom we are you see we've had 70 years of peace here you know all the people lying in the cemeteries there. this is what goes through my head when i visit them on d.-day. the be do all those people died for us so that we could live in peace. live because. when france and germany 1st commemorated the invasion of normandy together it was seen by observers as a sign of deepening european unity in the face of strain transatlantic time as and faced with threats both foreign and domestic the bond of european unity continues

to be put to the test 75 years after the events of d.-day. a lot there we've just seen in that report how much has changed in germany as to how d.-day is viewed here and that makes the visit today by the german chancellor all america all that more significant at these commemorations. it really does we've just had no german leader has attended a ceremony before 2004 so this is quite a new thing that chancellor merkel is attending the ceremony and it is of utmost importance the day being the key day here that changed the course of history and created a new post world war 2 order to realism democracy but also institutions like the european union and the united nations and those institutions and values have been put in question by donald trump for instance but also by great britain with the

whole process leaving the european union so it is very important that those world leaders amidst those struggles are coming together today to really stress that they can stand few nights at 75 years after the nations have fought each other to the death. of for us from parts reports let's we'll have much more throughout the day thanks so much for national. check in now with some of the other stories in the news this hour australian police have raided the headquarters of the public broadcaster e.v.c. and said executives say the search targeted 3 journalists involved in a 2017 investigative report on the alleged killing of afghan civilians by australian special forces this is the 2nd high profile probe in the news outlets in 24 hours amidst a crackdown on sensitive government leaks. doctors in sudan say the number of people killed in a crackdown on pro-democracy protests as increased to

a least 60 this comes as sudan's opposition rejected a plan by the country's military to hold elections within 9 months opposition leaders are calling for a campaign of civil disobedience to force the army to hand over power. well the most senior catholic cleric found guilty of child sexual abuse has launched an appeal against his conviction the disgraced 77 year old cardinal george pell is asking an australian appeals court to overturn his conviction for molesting 2 choir boys in a cathedral in the 1990 s. l. was convicted by a court in the state of victoria last december he's now serving a 6 year sentence for melbourne president john. i spoke earlier with correspondent roger maynard in sydney and asked him what happened in court today. well most of it has already happened the hearing actually began about 6 hours ago and there's a just recently drawing to a close ready you know kerry alert alert costs during others 6 hours we've heard

from up those legal team and what exactly they're appealing on the the lawyer propellor brett walker says that the guilty verdicts and a done a lot of this here well right on reasonable and up the part of the appeal rests on questions of credibility. he said that among the reasons that bill should not have been found guilty was that the claim the call the abuse of the the that the child abuse happened while the then us bush was in full robe the argue that it would have been physically impossible to pull his rhodes aside to commit what he described as this allegedly atrocious act it was a pointed out that the victims' claims were impossible given the pearl was reportedly greeting parishioners at the entrance to the theater at the time he said it was credible evidence that the fellows at the western doors of the factory it's cathedral in melbourne which was some distance from the sacristy where the alleged

offenses were supposed to have taken place up there all the grounds of a bill to one of the logs that the judge should have allowed a video reconstruction of when everybody was in the cathedral at that time and that video reconstruction should have been played to the jury and finally the the the the pillars of lawyer argues that hell was not properly arranged in other words he was not given the opportunity to plead not guilty before the trial before the jury at the beginning of the trial roger maynard forced latest on that appeal scase in the senate thanks very much. it's to the czech capital prague where tens of thousands of protesters have demanded the resignation of prime minister under bobbish it was one of the country's biggest demonstrations since the fall of communism the multi-billionaire has vowed to stay on in power despite allegations he misused public funds of the was one student against

a billionaire. you last minnaar has been mobilizing big crowds for weeks i this evening more than 100000 came out to demonstrate against. obama some wasn't it we're afraid that the czech republic could become more like hungary oh poland a powerful oligarch because state institutions and puts them to his own use and if someone wants to call on him to resign he can't because he'll go to jail let's go put them in the soap and but there's more as it isn't. true the czech prime minister these demonstrations are a political campaign andre bauer is the owner of agro affairs holding now in a blind trust at least in theory the company isn't just involved in agriculture also owns major newspapers critics including the ngo transparency international say he has too much power. he's

a huge industrialist and at the same time he's prime minister and owns media interests he gets huge amounts of public money from e.u. funds and national subsidies he's sucking up all this public money that's a level of power that even below scorning in italy never experienced in his best years and if he thought even if you know people have. the e.u. commission is halting subsidies on data sheets companies according to a policeman ary reports they accuse him of conflicts of interest now parliament has raised the issue as well but bobbish is firmly in control of his party and his coalition partner. the social democrats bobbish says the report is baseless. the devil is the focus reporter's extremely questionable i consider it as an attack on the czech republic and attack on czech interests as a destabilization of the country this is. this stuff believe the 13 year old yeah

demonstrators say they won't quit as long as bad as it is in power but his supporters don't care the economy is humming along and they don't want the e.u. telling them what to do. this is deja vu news live from berlin up next doc film looks at thailand the holiday paradise danger i'm brian thomas from the entire news team thanks so much for being with us i'm rita will join you again at the top of the. ski school in the jungle. the 1st clinging lesson from the doors grand moment arrives. joining a reckoning on her journey back to freedom. in our interactive documentary.