oh. this is g.w. news the live from berlin the hundreds of nigerian schoolgirls abducted from a boarding school in the northwest of the country have been released local leaders say that they secured their freedom despite many obstacles being placed in their path. also coming off international concern grows of the situation in myanmar the u.s. says that it is watching with alarm as the military steps up its use of force to

quell the ongoing protest plans by regional foreign ministers to talk to the clintons are proving controversial plus new travel restrictions come into force between parts of germany and france as corona virus infections increase in one quarter area but will limiting the flow of people help to contain the spread of the disease and in 2019 of the secretly filmed video brought down the government of austria now the man responsible is in a brawl in prison and fighting extradition to bring out our correspondent found out why he now fears becoming the victim of political persecution. oh. i'm sorry kelly welcome to the program we begin with breaking news hundreds of schoolgirls. kidnapped in northwest nigeria last

week have been released government authorities say that the girls are safe and well and on government premises the students were abducted from their boarding school by an armed gang last friday and this is the 4th mass abduction in less than 3 months in nigeria and has sparked anger against the government let's hear from the governor of some far state of the condition themselves heard you on. this investigation. goes to go to. our plane would be to us. oh when you see of your circumstances doubles employ people and thing to school and then getting out of the school. and correspondent fred move on the is following the story for us in sokoto in some far state close to where these girls were kidnapped fred what more can you tell us about their release. there where it is down

for him in the morning and. this morning there were. governments their guards were. dressed in a nice view of course because they didn't want to show them. i mean they have been in the bush for the dust for days unfortunate to be but now to 279 have been released and the question has been what about the does. what about the others fred tell us a little bit more about that and how the parents are reacting. oh of course it's a big for the pedants it's really big news for them they have been waiting there without notes repeating their way waiting for news about their good ties this is really big story for them this is a degree view but then i spoke to the government of his office to its about this

and they said that they'd be these $279.00 odd the ordinary abducted the initial number $200.00 ounce event was wrong because this school doesn't have. the top of of how many actually it's cool gods but we have ducted those ones will manage to escape but they believe they believe that these $279.00 girls that were abducted ok so they believe that they they have all of them now that they have all of them back fred joining us with the latest on that story thank you so much. now international pressure is growing on the on mars ruling military to stop its deadly crackdown on pro-democracy protesters foreign ministers from southeast asian countries are holding talks with the military hunta today in an attempt to tackle

the crisis police opened fire to disperse protesters around the country on tuesday witnesses said security forces have stepped up their response to demonstrators in recent days using tear gas and rubber bullets the u.n. says that at least $800.00 protesters were killed on sunday protesters are calling for a return to democracy after the military seized power in months ago. journalist dave going to bomb the standing by with the view from kuala lumpur so dave just tell us about the situation in myanmar which we know that you know well you've covered it for many many years foreign ministers from neighboring countries the us and a group there they're set to hold talks with the junta in myanmar today why is this meeting so controversial. so a call and some of us are basically saying that talking to the generals and the representative of the generals is giving legitimacy to a military government that is illegitimate and they should not be engaging in any

conversations with the military because they're saying they just don't deserve it but some of the ology foreign and other i should say clued in that group of people opposed to having conversations that include the military is a group of ousted myanmar lawmakers who say hey you should be talking to us but the foreign ministers have been saying look we have to engage with the military that ignoring them is not going to help us get to a solution to this problem is just going to isolate them and they're going to continue on their path so the only way they come up with a workable solution is to give the military generals a seat at the table but how much influence can they really have on these generals. so it is something you bring out there because while western pressure sanctions from the us really is not going to have much impact on the general's decision making me m.r. the generals included value their membership in the so seats in the southeast asian nations they value that membership more than they value their membership in the united nations so the generals will certainly listen to what has to say but i've

seen is generally been a toothless organization now short term the best we can hope for margin is that they can get the generals to commit to no more deadly force on the protesters of the generals commit to that and actually stick with it that would be a short term accomplishment but long term project that help come up with some sort of workable solution that all sides can agree on is going to be a huge undertaking because right now both sides are showing little room for compromise on their demands it's clear dave that protesting is becoming more dangerous meantime on the ground when you look at the situation there amid a crackdown that's been happening in the past days tell us a little bit more about how that is impacting resistance efforts. yes so you see some of the protesters are out there now they've got some sort of makeshift protection some of them are wearing construction hard hats goggles that you can buy in a hardware store and they've got sort of makeshift shields but you know against live rounds i'm not sure how much protection that's really going to provide which is why

a lot of the demonstrators they've written on their arms they've written their blood type and the contact information for their next of kin these demonstrators they realize how dangerous this is not only from the number of people who died on sunday. but also they know the who to in past years when they show no hesitation and gunned down hundreds of demonstrators at a time on the streets but some of these demonstrators have said if necessary they are willing to die for this cause because they believe if they do not stand up to this military government now and fight back against those who they believe that any hope of having a true democracy in this country will be lost for at least another generation that sense that sense of resolve is really incredible to witness journalists dining us with the latest on the situation in myanmar thank you. it's good to check of some other stories making news around the world the by administration is defending its decision to not go after saudi arabia's crown prince for the death of

u.s. based journalist jamal khashoggi white house press secretary jeh psaki pointed to the president and the need to quote recalibrate the relationship with a geopolitically important ally a declassified report reveals that prince mohammed bin saw a man like the approved she's killing 2018. crews in the u.s. capitol washington d.c. have removed barriers set up by the trumpet ministration during last year's black lives matter protests the feds except paraded an area used by demonstrators from a park next to the white house the 1st trial related to the police killing of george floyd which sparked a nationwide protest is due to start next week. former french president nicolas sarkozy has been found guilty of corruption and influence peddling accorded paris and since him to 3 years in jail 2 of them suspended sarkozy's lawyer says that he will appeal the conviction. a new british study says that the astra zeneca

corona virus vaccine is highly effective at reducing infections among people over the age of 80 some countries including france and germany had initially refused to authorize the astra zeneca shot for people over 65 pointing to the lack of clinical data about its effectiveness in the elderly. new restrictions along the french german border came into force today and a move to contain the spread of the coronavirus workers commuting across the border will now have to present a negative p.c.r. test in order to be able to travel in france's moselle michonne which shares a border with germany the corona virus has been spreading more rapidly than in the rest of france there's growing concern over the spread of the more dangerous south african variant for example and is part of a zal went to the border region in order to find out more. this year 2 of you feel

they have been no plays and no music since last year like venues everywhere instead it's been turned into a somewhat unusual vaccination center in the town's mayor who is also a doctor is impatient to get going. to control the cross border workers. but it's not through tightening travel borders that we will get on top of the virus. is through vaccination. the region has finally received some extra doses of vaccine because the infection rate remains highly with $300.00 new cases per 100000 citizens every week and dr clooney is ready to pitch in for the very 1st words what. right left arm it doesn't matter but why does he think his area is being struck so badly. good. question because the change of heart.

is a portal from cuba view the border town of schengen is just 20 minutes away where people move seamlessly from france to germany to luxembourg and back every day what worries authorities everywhere is the rise of the so-called south african mutation and differential part of was it. the south african predominant here. in paris where it's the opposite the english mutation. the outer red curve here shows the south african mutation but can this virus be stopped by further measures at the borders pretty dramatically. scientifically and i think it's not about. citizens however seem largely ready to accept daily life become even more complicated because who would actually do what i was going to say for peace. working in germany globally really difficult. maybe believes the epidemic

has already taken hold and it's rising why haven't they done it earlier. it's also normal when people are bit fed up. in the regional capital metz the mayor had feared a total border closure. would have extremely severe consequences to block everything there will be more controls it will be restrained but maybe it will be necessary in any case the main mistake in the pandemic he thinks has been made in paris. we are very disappointed with the slowness of vaccinations. being to move you look to clooney wants to personally change that and get his citizens vaccinated as quickly as possible. and let's bring in barbara vessel who you saw in that report a bit earlier she's joining us now from brussels barbara how are these border checks going to work. there are going to be checks by police but not every car will

be stopped by maybe like every 5th or every tends car because the problem in this region is that it is really warm and it has grown together economically throughout the last decades and about $100000.00 people are crossing the borders which are actually not an existence other than just a sign every day so huge amount of movement there so it's very difficult for the police and they're just going to pick out cars but the problem is for the cross border workers they have to present a fresh p.c.r. test every 2nd day already long lines were forming yesterday and front of those testing stations and then there's not enough of them and people are sort of desperate because they said what if i can do it in time can i go to work tomorrow morning so it is creating a lot of problems for people there and as we have heard there is doubt whether this could help creating a lot of problems also generating

a lot of criticism we have to say the e.u. commission has been critical to talk of this a little bit more about how this is impacting the principle of free movement in the block. that is the main problem here brussels of course is trying to defend the area the area free movement within the european union and saying you know you have to be more creative you have to think about other things than slamming the borders closed now in the case of france they did try that they did talk for about a week both sides and said done and said now what can we do and they came up with the sort of half cooked solutions of putting putting the pressure on the workers and the people crossing the border and saying you have to get tested all the time. everybody's things that that is not quite fair and it's going to slow things down considerably but for the e.u. on the one hand they say the member countries of course are trying to to stem the.

the rise of the infection and on the other hand we need to protect our economy and the free borders and that somehow doesn't seem to go together very well and ultimately the goal you know as you've mentioned there is to stop the spread of these highly contagious new variants barbara why do they think that this move in particular could work because you can't really catch it i mean there is no such thing as a border that will stop a virus people are moving people are going to shop across the street which is on the other side of the border and maybe somebody is infectious there and it's spreading from there now how will you do this so many see this as a political gesture is something that politicians have to do because they need to be seen to to be active to try to manage this but the point is that many in the area more or less everybody we've talked to say you have to vaccinate people this is the only thing and sort of checking people at the border that's just

a stopgap measure a bit of a sore spot for the e.u. right now barbara so thank you so much for that view from brussels for bringing us up to date on these new border check measures we appreciate it. let's have a look at some of the latest developments in the corona virus pandemic the world health organization's emergencies director says that it is unrealistic to think that the pandemic will be over by the end of this year the global number of new infections is on the rise for the 1st time in 7 weeks u.s. media reports that former president trump and wife melania received their coronavirus shots before leaving the white house both contracted and recovered from covert 19 in the run up to the presidential election and health experts in china say that the vaccine rollout there is slow because it has the virus largely under control officials say that the aim to inoculate 40 percent of the population is by

june. a man responsible for a secretly filmed video that brought down the austrian government in 2019 is making a final bid to avoid extradition from germany the video appeared to show the leader of austria's far right freedom party offering government contracts to russia in exchange for political funding now the man behind the video julian h. says that he will be persecuted if forced to return to his native austria. in s.f. or ports and spoke with him in the berlin prison where he is being held for. it was this covert recording that brought down austria's governing coalition the man on the couch soon to be vice chancellor heinz christiane's to discuss his plans with a wealthy russian to buy out a major austrian newspaper for political advantage. when the video was published by german media in 2019 straka was forced to resign and the

chancellor called new elections it was a political earthquake. and the video had been a set up the russian had been an actress and the man who arranged the sting remained unnamed. in december however the alleged producer of the video was arrested in berlin and is being held in this jail a whistleblower to some a conspirator to others yulian age faces extradition charges that appear to be unrelated to the so-called abuse if air cocaine trafficking an allegation based on the testimony of 2 witnesses. speaking to the w m o of the prison mr h. said the case against him is politically motivated. if all you need to lock someone up is 2 people with questionable reputations and strange statements and you

can lock up anyone you want to absolute. anyone and that's in austria which already has autocratic tendencies and danes. said in a b.z. he pictured having a system like or bonds hungry for being honest austria isn't so far away from that anymore and he says today. mr h. was also charged with making an illegal recording but a berlin court ruled that the video did not break the law mr x. believes the separate cocaine charge is being used to punish him for making the video while only appearing to be unrelated. the berlin justice department says it has no authority to get involved in an extradition case. left wing member of the german parliament believes germany should take a stronger position though you know it was there. i think we ought to look very very closely at the motives for this extradition request and whether we want to

comply with it. or whether that would set a totally wrong tone in terms of intimidating those who expose wrongdoing. or i believe exposing wrongdoing like this is extremely important and that should be kept in mind in this case. without an exceptional intervention from german authorities julian age might soon face a judge in vienna a city where his name is political dynamite. and let's bring it out of his honor in s.f. who filed that report on i as we mentioned you met with julian h. in jail he says that this cocaine charge is is trumped up is there evidence to support him. well his suspicion on that account is definitely speculation and he admits that but on the other hand there is not much hard proof of the cocaine charge so the the prosecution's evidence is based on just witness testimony and

both of these people are people that knew yulian age and one of whom was already convicted of giving a false statement against you in age another of whom was convicted of selling drugs so there's no cocaine no white powder so to speak no video evidence no hard proof now union h.'s lawyers allege that this was this is kind of thrown out the wall that people would stick for this charge seemingly unrelated to the b.z. affair is actually totally related in the sense that prosecutors want to get him in front of a court now it's interesting too that with a cocaine charge and on an international arrest warrant the court in berlin does not have to look to see if the case has merit they only have to look to see whether or not the charge would warrant an extradition and in this case drug trafficking is a charge that would warrant extradition ok so it looks like i'm at least there

might be a higher likelihood that he would think going back to australia there's a big debate about whether or not he is a whistleblower or a conspirator cults a little bit more about that. well you in ages lawyers have drawn parallels between him and julian songe the founder of wiki leaks who was stopped by the u.s. government for leaking sensitive top secret documents but he was ultimately arrested on sexual assault charges now if you will in ages lawyers draw the parallel here because they say that this is a tactic that's often used to get whistleblowers by. coming up with an related crimes now that being said there's a big difference between a whistleblower journalist on the one hand and these affair on the other i say a big difference but some people are arguing obviously over the technicalities here

the abuse affair the difference here is that you in age allegedly did not just stumble upon that conversation he set that conversation up but if this cocaine charge as julieann age alleges was thrown out the wall the see if it would stick was a device to get him sent back to austria that would nevertheless be a violation of his rights and claiming that a court in berlin as well as a court in vienna have already ruled that making the video was not a crime i mean i'd have to ask you just very very briefly did he mention anything to you about his motivation for making the video well he said that he was not motivated in the beginning by any political motivations he got into it as a job he was working as a private detective and was hired to investigate but as he became involved he was looking at how political corruption in the austrian government needed to be exposed

and so that's why he said he ultimately took that risk i mean s.f. on the story for us thank you. well the berlin international film festival is always one of the most hotly anticipated events in the german capital's cultural calendar but this year because of the pandemic the audience is limited to a select group of industry insiders watching the colts and bare contenders via live stream we're still bringing you the highlights starting with 2 entries inspired by the 911 attacks you need to tell me the truth you need to tell me what happens when i hit the bend you want to stand next to nothing whatever i say. it doesn't matter . a defense lawyer and her client mohamed 2 old slahi from mauritania is in custody in guantanamo he's accused of having aided the terrorists who carried out the 911 attacks but is he really guilty golden globe winner jodie foster place lawyer nancy hollander likely

a real person the character is based on she also believes in the law. you know how our country is shaped by that how the world to shape and if there was ever there was anything that made me believe in democracy in the rule of law it's been me from . the film copilot is also based on a true story having to do with 911 astley love say yet a seemingly perfect love story but then he becomes one of the terrorists on that fateful day september 11th 2001. was the she must have asked herself at some point was that a monster could i really have loved a monster how could i do that but on the other hand she knows very well that he was also lovable. momos to my dad learning to love. the film dissects the main character's pain without making her seem naïve that makes copilot into a successful illustration of the maxim love is blind even against the backdrop of

the terrorist attacks that changed the world. and with that now you're up to date on data news coming up next it is wonderfully good match day 23 up next on kick off i'm sara kelley in berlin and thank you so much for joining us to take care.

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