blame. blame blame blame blame blame blame blame blame blame blame blame. blame. this is either your news live from berlin a year after coronavirus forced china to shut down now it is setting out plans to bounce back the country ships its focus from fighting the virus to longer term economic goals beijing also outlining electorial reforms that will tighten its grip on hong kong. also coming up more sanctions are placed on the yanmar over the

military and deadly violence against protesters the u.n. security council is set to meet later to discuss the as collating crisis and germany's new phased plan to sweep open is met with criticism retailers say it is too cautious a public health experts warn it could lead to even though their wave of infections we will find out what the public thinks. as the 1st papal visit to iraq pope francis will urge the country's dwindling number of christians to stay put and to help rebuild after years of war and persecution and. place. blame. i'm sorry kelly welcome to the program. china is mapping out a new course as it bounces back from the pen demick the nation announced its growth targets for its economy this year and vowed to guard hong kong against external

forces those remarks were made at the opening of its legislative session in beijing china has rebounded strongly from the pandemic and was the only major economy to see economic growth last year it has contains the virus through strict restrictions and mass testing hong kong will be a key focus during the annual congress and beijing laid out its intent to overhaul the electoral system. the chaos in hong kong society shows that there are obvious loopholes or defects in the current electoral system and mechanisms of the hong kong special administrative region we don't want provides an opportunity for the china forces in hong kong to seize control of the hong kong as they are. and for more on this i'm joined by journalist mathias bolinger who is standing by for us in beijing and mathias we have to just mention for context last

year this national people's congress imposed a national security law on hong kong that has led led to dozens of arrests in the region tell us now reforming the electoral system is in focus what does that mean. well in the past or until now beijing not had a mechanism of what's tightly controlled who can be good chief executive and who can be in the government off hong kong but. it also ensured a majority for the probe ageing come in the legislature but the opposition always was able to gain quite a few seats in the legislature and use of course the legislature to promote their own political goes beijing has now driven out the opposition come out of the legislature that means they have disqualified some of the ledges laid his and then the others resigned saying they would not be part of

a parliament that would not repress and vote his will and they are making sure no that only people can get elected that are approved by beijing this is actually the end off off the parliament as we have known it before so there's no opposition in the parliamentary right now and we have the national people's congress spokesperson saying that hong kong's electoral system needs to be improved to guarantee that patriots and minister hong kong tell us what do they mean by patriots and what does that mean for the hope of democracy in hong kong. in their office. speech this means that anybody who is working to its secession independence off hong kong could not be. a member of any governing body or the parliament in hong kong it means thout they they they are accusing the

opposition comes off being secessionist and while there are people who promote on calling independence most of the opposition people just want to keep their one country 2 systems out as it has been on this stood until now but increasingly beijing is using the word patriot meaning loyalists aging is trying to eliminate the risk of opposition is trying to eliminate descend in public life in hong kong and it is just briefly before we go 6 percent economic growth that's the target now in china how do they plan to get there. yet this is what beijing. says it wants to achieve and it signals that beijing sees its economy back on track to normal how exactly they're going to achieve it is of course not clear the traditional way of achieving it is the investing public investment this is something beijing does not want to see it is the same extent as

before and they want to rebalance the economy towards more consumer growth how they are going to do it is probably something they do not know exactly themselves yet and it is falling and measuring thank you. the united states has tightened export controls on me on maher its latest move to sanction the military juntas deadly crackdown on protesters and fresh protests have erupted in several cities across the country like here in mandalay that's despite escalating violence that's off $38.00 protesters killed on wednesday the un security council is due to hold talks on the crisis leaders today the un special rapporteur tour on the maher is calling for a global arms embargo and targeted sanctions against the military rulers. for more let's bring in a man tom to a journalist who is joining us from young gone as we've been hearing of a crackdown on demonstrators traitors has really intensified this week with the

death toll climbing are there more protests planned for today and over the weekend yes there are more protests planned and they are currently already happening we are seeing a shift in protests from having these sort of static standoff with police into protesters are more mobile and more agile and so are hopefully at least from the protesters perspective a little bit safer and less likely to result in that the sort of violence that we have been seeing this past week international pressure is also growing on the junta the u.s. expanding its trade blacklist for meon mara how effective do protesters hope that measures like that will be. so targeted sanctions are one of the main things up the protesters this have been asking for from the international community and so they've really. sort of moved up the u.s. has been making as well as the move yesterday to block the hometown from trying to

move a 1000000000 dollars worth of assets from u.s. control bodies and you know even though the junta has a sense they come out and said that they will survive sanctions and they are not worried about them they also have invited foreign chambers of commerce to meet with them and were rejected in previous days and so despite the strong stance that they've been showing on the public face of it it's clear that the hunter really would like to continue foreign investments as we as the coup proceeds we mentioned also that the u.n. security council will be meeting on friday any hope there that that might make a difference. yes so what protesters have really been asking for from the international community beyond sanctions is a global arms embargo which we don't have yet as well as for. the international community to essentially deny the junta any level of legitimacy. we near mars

diplomatic missions in other countries in many of there have been staff members who have declared themselves accountable only to elected governments and you know other countries could help in that perspective by ensuring that they don't work with representatives from the one time and they don't meet with representing this from the one time except 2 at the cape for were turned to so they would move. in young thank you. thank you. and let's get a quick check of some other stories making news senegalese police clashed with student protesters in the capital dakar a police official was one person said that one person was killed it follows the detention of opposition leader song on wednesday so goes arrests has triggered the worst unrest seen in the west african country in here. spain has destroyed more than $1000.00 weapons seized over the years mainly from the basque

separatist group at the prime minister pedro sanchez presided as the arms were crushed at a ceremony in madrid the event was part of a tribute to the victims of terrorism. authorities in new zealand have downgraded a tsunami warning untold thousands of people that they can return to their homes they had issued an evacuation alert after a series of powerful earthquakes off the country's northeastern coast. there has been widespread criticism of germany's decision to extend its coronavirus shutdown until at least the end of this month chancellor merkel met with state leaders on wednesday and agreed to a cautious reopening strategy the plan also includes measures to make rapid testing more widely available and to speed up the vaccine rollout of so far germany has lagged behind many of its european papers and getting available doses into people's arms in a moment we will hear what the public think but 1st here's

a look at how germany has arrived at this moment i'm going to america has just resourceful of her strategy on corona trying a new daunting balance in the face of a 3rd wave. and we are taking steps to open up but they must not set us back in our fight against the pandemic a drastic departure from her strategy so far which so locked down after lock down when infections rose the term flu and her health minister yen span under pressure businesses are struggling and public opinion is shifting over the past year angela merkel has used lockdowns as hope prying tool to keep covert at bay now growing frustration that the slow rollout of the vaccination program here and many is mixing with lockdown fatigue and many are beginning to ask whether uncle americal still has the right approach when the chancellor 1st directly address the nation on

covert right at the beginning of the crisis she vowed that her government would think on its feet. these are standard this is a dynamic situation and we will continue to learn as we go along so we can change course and react with other instruments adam and any time. biotech pfizer came up with that instrument everyone wanted the 1st market ready vaccine but germany and the you had vaccinated just over 5 percent of their people by the time israel celebrated vaccinating almost its entire population taking the european way may have prevented an e.u. meltdown but it was painfully slow and the too late course the vaccination effort was slow to get going going off and it's only now that germany is adding rapid test centers and home testing to its pandemic strategy months after austria merkel's new approach of opening up as mutations gather pace is the wrong move says the

opposition i don't think that the measures which are taken between regional leaders and chancellor merkel yes that they will fit those you would situation and i think we are right into a 3rd way overall support for the government's coronas strategy is still solid at around 50 percent but it used to be more than 70. within 12 months i'm going to machall went from being europe's coronal leadership champion who managed to flatten the curve to a chancellor increasingly on the defensive over these coming weeks and months her legacy may be rewritten of a corona. our chief political editor of reporting there well we have a look now at the mood in germany when it comes to the pandemic pollster in for test gene map has just published its latest a.r.d. deutschland trend a monthly nationwide survey the poll was taken before the latest lockdown

announcements now despite general acceptance of the empty pandemic measures increasing numbers of germans want to see an easing of restrictions check it out 10 percent say restriction should be lifted completely 53 percent want the curbs to be lifted at least partially and only one 3rd of germans say that they don't want the restrictions to be lifted at all that's bringing political correspondent you know has a so what kind of easing do of restrictions do germans want to see the most you know. well the poll says that the priority for germans seems to be for non essential shops to open again 27 percent of those polled say restrictions should be lifted completely and 55 percent say that they should be opened at least prosody and not even one in 5 of those polled want us to stay shot and then the ranking goes as follows restaurants and hotels schools museums cinemas and so on and then

jim's but you have to keep in mind that for all those sectors even those ranking a bit lower that 2 thirds of some kind of opening to happen and that of course explains the pressure that the government is to strike that balance of keeping the virus of bay and the mutations of course and the desire by so many in this country that the need to be different solutions than simply extending the lock down so to massively step up testing and vaccinations both of which has of course been very slow ok so let's look at infection rates and hospitalizations now because they have heard widely in different parts of germany most of those polled here the figures most would prefer to see a regionalization of anti corona virus measures only 38 percent that the wrist say that the restriction should be consistent everywhere in the country 58 percent prefer the measures to be regionally variable so nina any

indication that the preference is expressed to break down along party lines for example you know how is this looking. oh yes this was extremely clear in this poll the polls always ask for party affiliations which party do you support and so we do have a very clear picture supporters of 5 out of the 7 parties seem to be clearly split in 2 when it comes to whether to stick to the current restrictions or to allow for gradually gradual opening if you take on the americans conservatives for example 43 percent want restrictions to stay in place as they are versus 52 percent who say that there needs to be some careful opening and that is of course very close 43 versus 52 years until america is in a dialogue with her own party and the same is true for the social democrats the greens the left party followers but then you've got the far right and the business friendly f.t.p. party where the picture is a completely different one where there is an overwhelming desire to open up or open

up gradually and that is of course not surprising because the f.t.p. is the party for germany's made a stand for hotel owners it said for many firms are struggling to survive absolutely and you know we're seeing some of the struggles actually playing out in the approval ratings we mentioned earlier that approval ratings particularly for chancellor merkel for her government have been falling just 50 percent of those polled say that they were satisfied with the policies of merkel's coalition 49 percent say they were not satisfied. so nina ultimately is there a chance that this pandemic could be ruining angela merkel's reputation now at the end of her political career. or you know she's not going to stand again as candidate for the chancellorship because germans of course go to the polls in september but if you look at her approval ratings at the beginning of the crisis and where we are now they of course they have somewhat gone down if you compare it

to the 1st wave when they were as high as they haven't been for 5 years because she was seen as somebody who can masa crises and that has to do now the fact that they've gone down with the slugger stopped of the vaccination campaign here the tug of war with them between the 16 state leaders and the performance of a cabinet health minister makes minnesota also had massive slums in that approval ratings but under matt medical's approval ratings are still higher than they were in the 2 years leading up to the start of this prices so yes she's not as popular as she was during the 1st wave but 64 percent approval still makes germany's most popular politician at the moment political correspondent nina has a thank you. and let's turn to some other developments now in the corona virus pandemic italy has blocked 250000 doses of the oxford astra zeneca

vaccine from being shipped to australia it is the 1st time that an e.u. country has blocked a vaccine shipment under export powers that took effect in january california is sending 40 percent of all vaccine doses to areas considered high risk that's based on metrics such as household income and education level the state governor says that vaccinating the most vulnerable is key to reopening the economy and new zealand will lift a lockdown in its largest city auckland on sunday it was prompted by just one new case of covert 19 parts of the government's go hard go early response. israel denmark and austria have agreed to join forces in the fight against kovac 19 they are forming an alliance to invest in the research and rollout of vaccines to protect people against new mutations of the corona virus this effort is aimed at getting ahead of another expected surge of covert 19

a middle certainty about how long and occupations will remain effective israel has so far vaccinated more than half of its population for. a visit to the gym is usually not top of the official agenda for international state visits but in this case they symbolize israel's success and therefore the ideal place to host australia and denmark's leaders and the fitness studios can only be accessed by those holding a green passport a digital certificate handed out to those who have recovered from covert 19 or been vaccinated israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu is the number one ambassador for this. war this is the rebirth. and this is the region. where america. israel is using the passports to reopen hotels theaters and restaurants half the population has had at least one vaccine dose and initial

data shows the shots are highly effective severe covert cases are declining dramatically but there's uncertainty about the impact virus mutations could have that's not only a concern for israel but also the austrian chancellor so he has joined together with denmark's prime minister to form an alliance with israel to develop more vaccines. we don't know how long. these vaccines will hold up is that after year is it a year or 2 years is it more or less we don't know and therefore we have to protect our people against the reemergence of. this pandemic or mutations has been then chancellor court sees israel as an inspiration corporation israelis. but the truth comes in the growth rates in neighboring its population. and

israel is the 1st country in the group that shows that it is possible to defeat a virus or hold denmark's prime minister met to frederickson says the aim is to guarantee supplies for the future and we have agreed today to bring all knowledge together in their kind of a collective effort to secure better and also more reliable access to vaccines this could be seen as a criticism of the e.u. bumpy vaccine will light but brussels is playing it cool. the prime ministers have made very clear that this is in no way in opposition to. agree to a strategy well israel is starting to relax again the e.u.'s far from being able to rest easy about vaccinations. pope francis is set to begin a historic tour of iraq today despite heightened fears over security and nationwide

coronavirus curfew the 84 year old head of the catholic church is scheduled to arrive in baghdad on friday afternoon marking the 1st papal visit to the country security has been beefed up after a spate of rocket and suicide bomb attacks in recent weeks francis will meet with political and religious leaders and visit the former islamic state stronghold mosul it is the pope's 1st trip outside of italy since november 29th team. vatican and iraqi flags going up for pope francis's visit. people here are working hard to fix everything up before he arrived. paving the roads fixing street lights and setting up crowd control barriers expectations are high. we hope for this to be a successful visit and that it will help this injured country. when his holiness

the pope visits any place there are a lot of positive outcomes from his visit. the cat of course church sits on the nineveh plain in iraq home to some of the earliest christian settlements centuries before islam established itself across the middle east. over time iraq became home to one of the world's most diverse christian communities featuring catholic how they in armenian orthodox protestant as well as other branches of christianity. then politicize. we are sending a message to the pope and to the world that we are here to do that now we need the christians that are remaining on our land that our roots are here so it is impossible to leave the homeland that embraced us let's see if that means they must go to joe hockey is so. there were as many as an estimated 1400000 christians in

the country at the start of the iraq war in 2003 sectarian conflict drove most of them away in 2014 the so-called islamic state started targeting christians driving hundreds of thousands of them from their homes those who remain belong to many different branches of the faith. but how much there is a crisis of instability our future is completely uncertain our faith has always saved us so far during the islamic state regime and the countless attacks on churches homes and villages it has helped us in iraq and it will continue to do so now through this phase. and we love our country and are rooted here but if the situation keeps getting worse we may have to leave. the pope's visit is supposed to send a message of support but who also meet with the head of iraq's shiite muslim community sending a different message that the different faiths can get along. now

to some winter sports scenes coming to you from the eastern swiss alps where women and men accustomed to catching ocean winds and riding ocean waves try snow instead and these athletes came together as part of something called the x. project there was no real problem with social distancing of course most of them were mass stuff anyway big stream sport includes snow windsurfing speed riding snowboarding of course and snowkiting. a quick reminder of the top stories we're following for you the biggest event on china's political calendar is underway the national people's congress the event is taking place with china outpacing other major economies after bringing the coronavirus pandemic largely under control china is shifting its focus from

fighting the virus back to its longer term economic goals beijing has also outlined electoral reforms that will tighten its grip on hong kong. up next pope francis his trip to iraq is the topic in our international debate show to the point do keep it here on d w if you can i'm sorry kelly in berlin thank you so much for watching take care.

the body. to the point strong opinions clear positions international perspective such francis is visiting a war torn iraq a country city it is the cradle of christianity it brings with him

a message of peace and reconciliation but who will be listening in iraq or the christian population this week database to find out on the point of going to the point. of the next truckload of d.w. . drinking water for everyone. costa rica has made protecting its springs a top priority. the secret to their success. and efficient waste management program that requires everybody to do their part. and it's paying off. 3000. and 60 minutes on d w. how

does the virus spread. why do we panic and when we'll all miss them. just 3 of the topics covered and the weekly radio program. if you would like any more information on the coronavirus or any other science topic you should really check out our podcast you can get it wherever you get your podcast you can also find us at twitter dot com or slash science. tension sound expectations are running high with pope francis the head of the catholic church visiting iraq the 84 year old home to face on a mission to bring peace and reconciliation to the war torn country including to northern iraq where between 20142070 thousands of christians were killed under the rule of the islamic state fanatics these days there are still great concerns about

the threat posed by terrorism and by covert 19 then the catholic church itself is in turmoil in many parts of the world.