in mexico many pushed. in the war right now climate change a different caucus story. basis much less a ways from just one. how much worse can really get. we still have time to. get some scribe like. this is the wus a show coming up today for links to the communist. china. is banned in the u.k. for being controlled by the chinese communist party china holds the banned ideological prejudice we speak to someone who's experienced 1st hand the. communist guerrillas plots. out of school common fleet. is

for children in india villages and education as daily survival takes. time to take on the way. we join a group of people in thailand just dying for a fresh start. i'm british welcome to the. glad you could join us china has threatened a response after the u.k.'s media watchdog last week banned chinese television network in the u.k. china a global television network for short was also to stop brought costs due to its links to the chinese communist party acting on a complaint the u.k.'s media regulator. said the links breached the country's

editorial control guidelines you might know c.g. had better bites for my name the state broadcaster c.c.t.v. c g t n was the be branded name given to c.c.t.v. international language channels including english the offical ban did not go down well with the chinese government which responded with these comments. of comus a procedure to broadcast in the u.k. on political grounds it politicizes issues on a technical level seriously hurts the survival of chinese media and seriously interferes with the normal exchanges between the 2 countries china resolutely opposes this idiot in power if the british side talks about freedom of the press but ignores the facts and interferes in the dissemination of c g t and in the u.k. this is a blatant double standard empirical suppression. and joining me now is peter dahlan he's director of the human rights group of safeguard defenders that filed the

complaint but of course that led to see gittins u.k. license being revoked peter welcome what was the complaint that your organization had fired and. thanks for having. the complaint filed was exactly one year ago held that c g t n has no editorial independence and is a direct tool of the chinese communist party political party and chinese police and therefore were in violation of the u.k.'s broadcasting law not been from the chinese foreign ministry called off coms actions court a blatant double standard and political suppression how do you react to that. well there's nothing surprising really about that since you t.n. like any party or political or state organ in china operates with pretty much total impunity and that's what they're used to when they're held accountable to existing

rules such as is happening right now they tend to scream up double standards but in reality of course is the exact opposite here for the 1st time we're seeing that c.g. t.n. is being held accountable to existing rules that they have show since you ignore for many years which particular rules are you talking about given that you had experience with trn why you would in china enter into 16. well the complaints what came out now and the results of that of course has to do with editorial independence or lack there of we've also filed a number of complaints concerning force televised confessions something that i personally had experience with that we show illustrates this lack of editorial independence where the chinese media is operating on orders from the chinese police and the political party to make and broadcast these kind of forced televised confessions long before suspects trial and they're often broadcast as

a direct foreign policy tool in my own case and even though i was kept in a secret facility and even the prosecutor was denied access to me as c.c.t.v. the parent company a journalist was given access to me to record one of these ludicrous confessions with the c.c.t.v. reporter and myself sat with the same paper with prebreathe then answers and question and sort of acted out like there was like a theatre drama. and of course c.c.t.v. n.c.t. and are well aware of this they're active participant in this quite severe human rights violation of denying someone access to to a fair trial and they then broadcast them on orders of the c.c.p. across europe so this is not only in violation of broadcasting rules but also the european convention on human rights which all the regulatory bodies in europe must and are legally bound to defend briefly peter does all forms actions in the u.k.

provide a template for action against the communist party's media negative. it does indeed the most important thing here is not to get c.t.'s off the air they have every right to broadcast their propaganda like everyone else but they must be forced to learn that outside of china they do not operate without be held accountable if there are existing rules to apply to shine on as well not just to the rest of us but i do believe this this drastic decision will raise a few eyebrows around europe where cheaper regulation is a lot more lax and the u.k. has a much stronger story framework but a dollar left leave it there with the timing but thank you so much for joining us meanwhile a chinese born australian journalist employed by c.g.m. in beijing has been arrested on suspicion of court supplying state secrets overseas a prominent business and currency to t.m. was detained by chinese authorities 6 months ago without explanation she emigrated

to australia as a child before returning to china and joining the state broadcaster in 2012 she now faces severe punishment were found to have broken china's national security laws here's what australia's foreign minister had to say. we have consistently right strong concerns about her detention regularly at the most senior levels and we continue to seek assurances of her being treated appropriately humanely in cordons with international standards and that will continue to be the case and trying his family released a statement saying they're convinced of it in a sense they said their respective china judicial process and the authorities to bring this matter court to a swift compassionate and timely conclusion. now like in many other countries covered 19 prevented children in india from attending school for most of last year while some schools have now reopened for many children

in india's villages going back isn't an option anymore. i sent them on started apprenticing 6 weeks ago at this furniture shop in a village in the tradition the shy 12 year old has been half heartedly listening to instructions. he's clearly not enjoying it. i want to go back to school. meet my friends i don't want to work here. but he doesn't really have an option nor does his younger brother who joined him here a few days ago. bought off following their father's instructions up to him on is out of work himself. with schools closed for nearly a year now and due to the could all know iris he has given up hope that education will secure them will be a man says he's only looking out for their future is cool but the way schools are

being closed they were starving but they aren't doing anything now we've asked them to work out of desperation so that they can learn something hopefully a livelihood schools reopen and they leave work to lose out if they stay and help to survive there's no advantage in going to school now. the state government has just announced the junior classes are set to resume but a sudden us just need to stay at school to support their family. high school classes resume back in october but children younger than 15 years have hardly studied for the better part of the year. at best the vital way that i'm playing with their friends at worst they are forced into labor or a bad adult. could have been told that he has flooded endlessly about this especially about the 400 children who attended his school his class is much smaller now he just helps his own daughters with their studies. private schools like saudis

educated close to half of india's children often feel very little money. now his own school survival is at stake tawdry waved his hundreds of be approximately bundle monthly fees jordan the lockdown he still feels that many can't afford to continue sending their children a lot about your will mombasa most of the children are accompanying their parents to work. i fear 70 percent of them will drop out we try to appeal to the parents to keep educating their kids but they just say if we don't have money how are we supposed to send their children to school. children on. the lack of resources also the without online education she says. if parents already can't afford a nominal fee how can they pay for multiple smart schools put all the children at home education has not been a priority in his village he says and the tag been an uphill battle even before the

lockdown hit chaudhry is excited to see the children again soon but he's also realistic he knows that even if just a quarter of them show up he can't count it as a victory. you can call it the ultimate fresh start dying to be reborn that's what many people in thailand try to experience by taking part in mock funerals and now during the covered. the ceremonies taking on a special significance. laid to rest to avoid an early grave at least that's the hope of these worshippers on the outskirts of bangkok more than $100.00 devotees visit the temple each day to undertake this rebirthing ceremony they hope it will improve their fortunes for at least give them a fresh start. to the ceremony aims to make people ponder about death.

it reminds people that one day we will die so we must be careful about the way we live our lives the big. under the monks careful instruction the hopefuls lay in the coffin facing west and switch sides to symbolize rebirth the 100 bart or 3 year 050 covers the flowers and candles it's a small price they say for a new start for some at least the pressures of life during the pandemic have given the ritual an even greater importance. and i have to admit i'm stressed these days because i'm earning less because of the pandemic. i'm sure everyone here is feeling the same. but that by. happy now i went to see a fortune teller who said my life is threatened this year that it made me feel

stressed that's why i'm here today because i want to feel better. i feel like i came back to life became a new person i left the bad things from my past in the coffin. to die and be reborn the ultimate 2nd chance. that's it for today there's more in our website did upper dot com forward slash back to more of the same time about. the phone against the corona virus pandemic. has the rate of infection been developing what does the latest research say. information and contacts the coronavirus update nineteen's. on t w. in the oh i climate change.

for the most of. the. good sense to keep. what i do use today have the future of. g.w. dot com for megacities for the multimedia. click. i knew more contagious variant of the corona virus could be behind a more serious 2nd wave in south africa. b 1351 could also be the 1st mutation to be to existing back seen a small study shows the astra zeneca inoculation only office limited protection against mild versions of the variant and that's the back saying much about africa

was banking on. in a moment we'll talk to overall just involved in that astra zeneca study and put this into context but 1st let's look at some of the other factors driving case numbers in south africa super spreader of aids and lockdown fatigue are also being blocked. as the developed world gathers momentum and vaccinating its populations south africa is fighting a corona virus mutation. so there we get has just come out of its 2nd wave of corona virus and fictions within the last period of 2020 and us is a research institute are very concerned that this may or may not be related to the new strain of corn of ours and fictions has been found in the country. very interest been associated with a higher bar load in infected people making it more transmissible and leading to sharp spikes in infections. south africa recorded over 15000 covert deaths in the

last month and its hospitals were filled to capacity. to go to a reasonable distance so we have had an unexpected really strong 2nd wave in south africa it came earlier than with anticipated and it was much steeper in terms of numbers there were 2 reasons for this one was we think mass gatherings before the christmas period there were young people getting together but also that we hadn't really controlled the numbers of people for example at funerals so mass gatherings drove this partly but that coincided with the emergence of the new variant which has indeed increased transmission from one person to another so 2 things at the same time. this seems to be confirmed by researchers on the ground. we found that participants particularly in our research that have not been compliant in one from the seats are going to be engines they would be non-compliant to travelling restrictions particularly across provinces they've also been

non-compliant to self isolation after testing positive as well as attending parties . durance to personal protection measures are also slipping like in my boning an inner city cultural hub in johannesburg. and having was somewhat walton had me changer and when i did. think it in my skull that makes the mask wait so that i have to move the mask but as i've been thinking the war singing is on the. locals are beginning to tire of some of the world's strictest lockdown measures and skepticism is taking hold. there's no koran that. doesn't exist. as a. prison to turn a mind to. while struggling entrepreneurs are taking risks in order to survive.

very difficult to adhere to the rules of social distancing and. fully so that's a bit of a challenge but you know you know i don't want to chase the last little crowd that i have so i'll do all that i can just to try and keep it keep you know keep the shop open. exactly what rolled recently discovered very interest playing in local infection rates remains to be seen. we are not particularly sure about what this puts this coronavirus infection strain will do in terms of the medication and the vaccine to have that's part developed we hoping to have some very exciting information in the next few weeks which will answer some of those questions and give us some more guidance around this particular issue. but until scientists can be sure south africa needs to remain cautious as vaccine rollout has only just begun. let's talk about new variants and the efficacy of vaccines with the role of

just penny mostly joins us from the once university at the national institute for communicable diseases she contributed to the laboratory aspects of this south african study on the astra zeneca vaccine what's the main takeaway from that study . the main takeaway from the astra zeneca study in south africa is that the vaccine provides little to no if it can see against what we define as mild to moderate disease and that is a setback and that as a result of that finding the south african government has for now suspended the rollout of the esters and it back scene which was imminent and very important to note that that study was limited by the fact that it enrol people who are generally relatively young and for that reason this trial was unable to define whether the astra zeneca vaccine was able to protect from severe disease from the let's not just point of view and from a public health point of view that is the primary aim of vaccination is to protect people from from dying from sars could be to and so that is

a major unanswered question with the asters and it could china stage in the meantime what does it mean for south africa unfortunately it means that we need to we need to start looking beyond the astra zeneca vaccine this is something that we have been doing as a country and so that it has been in trillion vult in testing several other vaccines and we have been trials in this country for the johnson and johnson vaccine the know that extra vaccine and so we are very well placed to understand how effective those vaccines are and continue will continue to be against both the older and in south africa but also importantly against the new variant that has been scrapped. but as for then it is back seen as also been seen to not be effective among older people in other countries then we have this problem with the effects on younger people infected with milder cases what's it mean for this actual facts and then at the end of the day. so with all that seems we

constantly work out the tradeoff between the efficacy and measured as a single number that we hear in the press and realistically high on how easy it is to cure all that vaccine out in the country yesterday because exene is very cost effective it's very easy to transport and so that that lack of if a casy against mild and moderate disease if offset by potential if it's in severe disease is balanced by that important need to be able to achieve coverage and that coverage is very important for achieving what we call her protection so with estrogenic and with all that scene's and this constant evaluation of all of the benefits and all of the disadvantages of a vaccine in a particular situation now this is a very it is already making its way around the world how how why should other countries be about this variant that's important to understand to 2 things in this

area that was that identified 1st in south africa is not going to stay in south africa viruses do not respect borders and in fact it has already been detected in several other countries as your beers are probably aware but i think the 2nd thing to understand is that it's not just the south african variants that is worrying us a similar variant has been detected that arose completely independently in brazil the variant detected in the u.k. has not acquired one of the new tensions that we most concerned about is for it for me tension and so it's clear that the virus is independently evolving away from the small sense of phenotype so more resistant state so it's not simply a matter of being concerned about one variant we have to understand in general how the virus is evolving and many just explain to me why it's maintaining to the same pattern. it may take to the same pattern because in general people have

a very similar response immune response to that ours so whether you studying somebody in brazil or the u.k. or in so that africa i mean systems tend to behave in a very similar manner and we actually have systems actively target what's called receptive binding demand and that happens to be exactly where these mutations are located and the fact that everybody has a very similar response that ours means that the virus we have you study it tends to have a very similar pattern in escaping from from antibodies and this is what viruses do best and this is the cat and mouse game that characterizes all our own infections of humans is an ongoing race between viral evolution and the immune system in this case but the immune response and therefore the viruses part ways are pretty similar or or just any more thank you very much for being on the show today thanks bill. time now for your questions of the ta science correspondent there. as the sars virus inevitably continues to mutate could it also mutate to become

less deadly. this is complicated but here goes the short answer is yes that could happen and we hope it will but there's no guarantee scientists used to believe that pathogens always evolved to grow less deadly because it was thought a deadly disease isn't an effective disease the reasoning was that if a pathogen kills its host especially if it kills that host quickly then it lowers its own chances of being passed on so less deadly more transmissible variants should have an evolutionary advantage right well the problem with that logic is that virulence can also be viewed as an advantage because the sicker the host grows the more likely they are to give their pathogen to someone else since they're shedding more of it some so we actually think there's kind of an

evolutionary tradeoff between transmissibility and virulence and there are certainly pathogens for instance the birkie loss' bacterium that have been infecting humans for thousands of years yet still kill large numbers of people to see what the future might hold for coated 19 therefore scientists have been looking at the other coronaviruses known to infect humans in particular the 4 that we think have been doing it for quite a while they only cause my old cold like symptoms interestingly that might have less to do with them and more to do with us especially with our children one theory is that repeated exposure to those other. coronaviruses and early childhood might be helping to prevent more severe cases of the sicknesses they could cause later in life the source code too does become an endemic background illness in our

societies then then later generations of children will be exposed to it early at an age when it rarely makes you seriously ill and that in turn should make subsequent exposures much less dangerous or at least that's the hope. they're calling him say i've been fizzling thanks for watching stay safe and i'll see you again very soon but like.

is cancer research benefiting from the fight against corona virus and doctors in germany are testing out in muzak the. that comes from the steam laboratories being used by pandemic researchers it's designed to help the body fight chancers cells on its own without any edge approach this vaccine is tailored to the immune system of

each patient to morrow to doing. it and to use to do. passive drama competition wife marketing numbers atmosphere by the time and technicians love fights money. fans friends 5 stamps and funds. because we love football. to golf on you tube joining us. live on meal and i'm game did you know that $73.00 men left out of all killed worldwide sure so that we can each of them but it's not just be animals of all suffering it's the environment we went on a journey to find ways out of the question if you want to know how when clicked off

the priest and the focus changed as we think this listen to our podcast on in the green fence. early. the morning. can actually be prosciutto forward in zuma the. in those polls smolder. to news lol the rules. use known lola for. of the workers. in the.

swing. state of the news line from the international concern as tensions in me and mobs boil over police use water cannon against peaceful protesters or for them to leave will be dispersed fight force demonstrators are demanding the return the theme ocracy following last week's military coup also on the program at least 18 dead and more than 180 missing in northern india.