with member states acting on their own brussels has reacted with a slap on the wrist. the commission sent specific letters raising our concerns to 6 member states which are. denmark finland germany hungary and sweden who are currently applying stricter measures than what is provided for in the recommendation in particular bans on entering or leaving the country while targeted restrictive measures on non-essential travel are necessary in the eyes of the e.u. commission blanket bans like those applied here in belgium do not serve this purpose the virus taught us that closing the borders does not stop it but we see the disruptions with spring on its way another fight among european leaders is waiting to break out greece in an attempt to save its holiday season had suggested an e.u. wide vaccination certificate other member states like denmark and sweden have

already begun developing their own passports with a bloc as a whole risking fragmentation on the matter but the biggest challenge of all is the rather slow rollout of the e.u. wide vaccination program production shortfalls and other stumbling blocks have left the e.u. trailing behind countries like the united kingdom and lead to growing impatience among its leaders. couple of not because the european commission should exploit economic power of the e.u. to put pressure on the operations. here from ramping up vaccine production to close recording nation a lot is on the table and brussels if alexandra phenomenon joins us now so alexander plenty to discuss for the e.u. leaders today but a slow vaccination rollout will surely be on top of the agenda. yes are you totally right and we also have to say that it's also true that e.u. leaders are on there are severe pressure to show concrete progress in managing

their pandemic and that is why many of them will be looking to the european commission for answers what the european commission is doing to speed up the vaccine rollout ward is the commission doing to make sure that there will be no delays no further delays in the liver is and the problem here is that it seems that the european commission president or the law for underlying doesn't really have a breakthrough strong report so we could expect her to stress that the distributions are steadily increasing that the goal of vaccinating 70 percent of the population by the end of the summer is still in place but the problem is that they've exene it all out remains very slow and this is of course bad news for all human states and specifically for those like the czech republic who are facing a brutal new wave of infections and whose hospital systems are on the brink of

collapsing and earlier we spoke with management team or he leaves the conservatives in the european parliament i just want to listen to what he said and get your reaction. mr cynical is really a big problem for us in the corporation and in these negative relationships is negative experiences we had in the past we have to say that the export ban must be on the table so we want to have open borders but if the rest of the world is not doing so because europeans shouldn't be naive and the 2nd point is that europe is spending a lot of money for research and use country companies who are not cooperating with us must also see consider that they're not anymore part of this big research union is putting the blame on the vaccine makers tell us alexandra i mean how we like to see the approach to this handled going forward what could we see in terms of you know rep or cautions if these contracts are are not delivered upon or the european commission is saying they are trying to increase the pressure on vaccine makers but

the question is how can they do that they can threaten them with penalties if there are not thorough fulfilling the contracts they can threaten to to cut the funding in the future but that is not going to help us right now so i think that the man for there has a point saying that there could be a member states right now who wants to see that you are pm commission not only controlling the exports of vaccines outside the european union but maybe preventing dixie chicks in a course of exporting their products outside of the e.u. ok we also talk about that talked about vaccination passports have a listen there freedom of movement is a fundamental right for all europeans and that is what we have to bring back and that's why this vaccination passport is crucial and is immediately necessary i have no understanding why in the european council conclusions there is only as if formulation of we try to work on this very big formulation we have to speed up because currently 10 thousands of europeans are every day dixon aided and you do

need be at them a bureaucratic nightmare to give them a passport after they have exceeded. why is the e.u. so slow alexandra because they want to have a common approach they want everybody to be on board and at the beginning of the pandemic the thinking was ok we don't have enough vaccines or the vaccination at the beginning of the vaccination process the thinking was that we don't have enough vaccine so why should we right now talk about about a vaccine passports but now the pressure is increasing with member states such as greece for example austria really saying we need to be on top of this topic right now we need to move forward so i think that it's also going to be a huge topic for today's meeting alexander phenomena. thank you. the spanish capital madrid is under fewer lockdown measures than many other european cities but care homes have kept tight restrictions on their residents movements

getting vaccinated has allowed them to trade pensioners in our next report to finally venture out on a trip and they made sure it was a special. service have today is cause for celebration. for a 92 year old milagro fitting that day it's her 1st time leaving the care home and almost a year milagro caught the coronavirus last spring but has since recovered along with a few friends she strolled along the bustling streets of madrid and heads to the theatre. i have. long since i've been to the theatre but i love the ground that's madrid just like me makes me feel at home. going to see a show is always a treat but it's a particularly special one for milagro and the other pensioners freshly vaccinated and for their revelling in this. period those who

spent the year cooped up in their care homes today symbolizes a return to normality. that will have to. give not us a lot of joy and it made us feel a little more alive it was really a very good movie a movie and. the chance to reconnect with those in the outside world. and. some other developments in the coronavirus pandemic now a large number a large study from israel indicates that the biotech pfizer vaccine works as well in the real world as it did in a clinical trial the study published in the new england journal of medicine shows the vaccine offers very. high protection against covert one team india has reported its highest number of cases in nearly a month more than half of them were recorded in my haas stressed state home of the

financial capital mumbai and the world health organization says we need more understanding of long term covert symptoms it says listening to patients affected by long cove it should be a priority for every health authority. let's turn to some other stories making news this hour mass rallies are underway in armenia's capital year a van with both potence and supporters of prime minister. taking to the streets earlier on announced what he called an attempted military coup after many as armed forces demanded his resignation he has faced months of protest since armenians defeat by azerbaijan in the conflict over nagorno-karabakh. at least 6 people are dead after a mudslide buried workers at an illegal gold mine in indonesia rescuers are searching for survivors in the mine which is located in a remote part of suv

a sea island officials say search efforts are being hampered by unstable soil conditions. in the u.s. state of texas residents continue to repair water damage following last week's extreme winter storm more than 1300000 texans are still facing water supply problems later in the day managers of texas' power grid will be questioned by state lawmakers over failures that led to blackouts impacting 4000000 residents. a german national has been charged with spying for russia at the german parliament the bundestag the case is likely to worsen tension between berlin and moscow the man is believed to have passed data relating to the bundestag sleigh out to an employee at the russian embassy in 2017 the suspect was working for an electrical firm that carried out regular checks around the parliament german intelligence services have issued repeated warnings about russian spying attempts or cyber

attacks for more on this story let's bring in chief political correspondent linda crane who is standing by for us so is there any more information on how this alleged spy was uncovered. no we don't know whether this occurred through normal surveillance or whether the prosecutors were tipped off d.w. did reach out to the federal prosecutor's office but they're not saying anymore for now perhaps we will get additional information in coming weeks and that the latest we need to wait for the trial and of course several notable vents have shaken german russian relations in recent years melinda put put it all into the bigger context for us if you will absolutely well we had a major cyber attack on the german parliament to the board just in 2015 we have heard from the chancellor that she feels she has been directly targeted by

russian cyber attacks in addition we had the murder in cold blood of a chechen rebel commander in the in daylight in a berlin park and then of course we have germany's involvement in the poisoning of aleksei nevaeh only as you know he was flown to germany for treatment in a berlin hospital immediately upon his return from germany to russia he was thrown into prison on charges of having violated a prior parole agreement by not showing up for parole meetings in russia while he was in the hospital in germany european union officials have just announced they are now going to be imposing additional sanctions on 4 russian officials in connection with the no volley affair but of course germany deeply embroiled there

as well so so a very rough time for germany russian relations indeed and what kind of political consequences could we talking about about these spying allegations. well we already have german sanctions on russia imposed after $24.00 to in connection with the russian takeover of crimea we also have additional sanctions that were imposed last fall in connection with the and again now this week the european union has announced new sanctions as i said so the question is how much further is there to go on sanctions certainly the chancellor has said that relations with russia are troubled and germany's foreign minister went further this week saying german russian relations are at a low point but how low they have to fall until germany reconsiders cooperation in a major cooperative endeavor with russia namely the north stream pipeline project

that remains open to question because the chancellor has said she does want to continue that project many many critics would say it's time for that project to be on the table and chief political correspondent linda crane thank you. facebook has removed all accounts linked to me on mars military social media giant said that the military was using its platform to incite violence against peaceful protesters the army has been imposing an increasingly violent crackdown against protesters they have been again demonstrating in major cities including the commercial capital yangon. keeping up the pressure protesters take back the center of young gone but they believe it is that you who have the momentum up to monday's general strike they gather for a spirited sit down protest near the school pagoda a rallying point in the country's pos pro-democracy uprising. long leave our

own song suchi the protesters chant in reference to their detained later and we united against. go to protest was one of several actions in young going on i sold just tried to stop students taking their protest off campus but they didn't succeed in the end. that wasn't the only confrontation on young on straights hundreds of pro-military protesters faced off with that de coeur activists national league for democracy supporters rising in fury at the sight of their foes on the streets. like to the death we received this video circulating widely on but may social media activists claim it shows a pro-government side stabbing in an opponent to deter pro-democracy supporters.

people who are committing the crime that. are so surely. and they were approaching people randomly and it seemed to i mean were approaching people who cares. i'm also in pictures of don't often see. human rights and they have a site like activists have been killed since the military coup on february 1st but increasing violence hasn't stopped the pro-democracy movement which has been growing wheat crop to wake. up. and here in germany authorities are assessing one of the biggest drug calls ever in europe customs officers in the port of hamburg seized a 16 ton shipment of cocaine it was hidden in metal canisters shipped from paraguayan as part of the same investigation 7 tons of cocaine were also seized in belgium police have arrested a man suspected of importing the drugs. these canisters imported from pirate why

were supposed to contain poti filler but instead they're stuffed with 16 tons of cocaine it would have sold for as much as 3500000000 euros that's a big. we were very surprised by the amount after we opened the canister as we multiplied the number of canisters by 9 kilos and came up with this unimaginable amount of 16 tons. another 7 tons were intercepted in the belgian port city of and where the owner of an import company in the netherlands has been arrested the find is the largest amount of cocaine that has ever been seized in europe politicians believe it's just the tip of the iceberg. billions can be made in the cocaine trade these illegal funds can easily flow into legitimate areas of the economy causing untold damage. organized crime only

attracts the attention of politicians when people are lying dead on the streets or when there is campaigns against it normally it's under the radar and that makes it even more dangerous. god is with all experts are calling on politicians to hold a summit on drugs the security problem is huge and police and customs are poorly equipped to deal with it and i'm joined now by benedict stuns a reporter with the german broadcaster and who has been following organized crime and the drug trade in germany for years welcome to the program and thank you for joining us 16 tons of cocaine wow how did customs officers manage to find it. well i would say that this is a very good example of a successful international crew police corporate collaboration because. according to my information the dutch investigators the customs were aware of. in both companies which acted in

a way suspiciously and they shared this information with the german colleagues and then when make up of containers arrived a couple of weeks ago in the palm of one of the german investigators had a close look on these containers they x. rayed them and that was the way they found the cocaine 16 tons with the value of something between 1.5 and 3500000000 euros wow so i mean it's coming into these containers where was it likely go away. well if you look at the cocaine markets normally like that if you ship cocaine to europe to let's say not and europe and the dry ice and the cold of let's say how both it is redistributed to the netherlands and belgium because there are still wholesale markets and afterwards it is share all over europe and it's easily to germany or ever you know what i want to say these are the criminal networks i'm not so much focusing on one nation they don't really care he in europe about mission was and just briefly

there's been an arrest so far hasn't there tell us a little more about that. yeah yesterday 280 young man was arrested in iran today. and that he earned this very old company and well i think it's no important for the dutch investigators to find out if he is really responsible for this cane operation who or if you is more like a strong one who didn't allow a criminal to appear on how about the big picture because we know that you've been following the track trade for years are we seeing an uptick in the number of drugs coming to europe where things stand right now in terms of you know both demand on the european side and also the level of enforcement by the authorities in order to

clamp down on this a legal. shipment and distribution i mean what we see is an. enormous increase in the figures in the last couple of years and when i talk to investigators not only in germany but also in other european countries with a series who we we're facing enormous coke a way floating all over europe and this is causing. norma's problem in terms of diction obvious but also security problems because this cocaine trade is generating so much money and this molly really empowers screwing the networks organized crime because all this money is reinvested rather crude of acceptance and moreover what we see right now is that this growing cocaine market. is leading to

a redistribution fights between different groups groups and these fights can become very very violent we see this for circle in the netherlands or in belle's so that's why security experts say this huge who can say sure here in the port of hamburg has to be a wake up call for german it for european politicians and it extends reporter with german broadcaster and they are thank you. for a painting by the dutch artist vincent van gogh is to be shown to the public for the 1st time after spending more than a century in a private collection the late 19th century artwork will go on display for a month before being sold off it's expected to fetch many millions. it's titled a street scene emo mask it's part of a serious bang produced between 19861988 when living in paris with his

brother taylor. the work is one of the artists very few that have not yet landed in a museum. this work by vincent van gogh is a real re discovery in the sense that although he has been listed in the catalogs devoted to the artist it has never appeared on the market since it was acquired by a french family more than a century ago. the painting depicts a couple's romantic stroll in the streets. at the time the heli parries your neighborhood was becoming home to another ray of international artists attracted by its bohemian vibe and cheap rent including himself. when your secrets a very interesting testimony of what looked like at the end of the 19th century when it was still very bucolic we can see the mills of the moon and the gullet a place of leisure very appreciated by parisians at the time you know. the painting

will go on display in amsterdam hong kong and paris before being sold off to a new home auction house called the beast estimates its value between 5 and 8000000 heroes. police in los angeles confirm that there will be no criminal charges filed against golfing great tiger woods over tuesday's car crash they say that the rollover quote remains an accident and accident is not a crime woods was also not on drugs or alcohol the 45 year old had to undergo emergency surgery after suffering serious injuries to his legs woods' most recent sporting success success came at the masters tournament in 2019. coming up next on news asia hong kong protesters intimidated by china right here in germany we report on how and what german m.p.'s want done about it and the igloo

cafe in indian kashmir that has proved a hit with tourists. a lot more coming up with my colleague there actually better jiang t w news asia i'm sorry kelly in berlin thank you so much for joining us here on the program don't forget there's always more on our website w dot com and all the social media thanks for watching take care.

lol. people have to say matters to us. that's why we listen to stories reporter every weekend on t.w. . every journey begins with the 1st step and every language the 1st word i'm looking for niko peace in germany to montreal.

why not permit him. to suffer it's simple long line on your mobile and free. w z learning course cause me german made easy. can you hear me now yes yes we can hear you and how last year's german song so that when you bring your uncle out man call as you've never have before surprise yourself with what just possible who is magical really what moves back and. who talks to people who follows her along the way i admire those and critics alike how is the world's most powerful woman shaping her legacy joining us from eccles la stocks. different on the islands of. here women are in charge.

archipelago as a trio called system for centuries. of society. differently . what do they do with their power. cleans up the rain. starts marching on w. . visited up produce feature up coming up today chinese intimidation on job i'm sort of. germany's 1st try not targeted hong kong goes during pro-democracy protests have in germany we also jump ball of that human rights through how she thinks germany should respond plus. south korean prisoners of war and baby sentenced to work to slow.