ah ah ah ah, this is dw news live from berlin. russia has watched a new wave of strikes, targeting cities across ukraine. keep saying, at least 11 people have died to day, the strikes they come just one day after germany in the united states pledge descended battle tanks to help you crate against russia. also coming up tonight. tough questions for germany's new defense minister. as he meet with his troops for

the 1st time and global or enforcement authorities, shutting down the notorious hi ransomware website. responsible for helping criminals extort more than a $100000000.00 from victims all over the world. ah . i'm bring golf. it's good to have you with this on this thursday, and we begin tonight in ukraine. authorities there say at least 11 people that been killed after russian forces fired more than 50 missiles at targets across the country to day. officials who say that they were able to intercept the majority of the missiles. several infrastructure sites, however, were hit, leading to power cut across the country, including in the capital key strikes come a day after germany in the united states announced that they will send heavy tanks

to support ukrainian forces. earlier we spoke with keith mayor vitale. clear coat. we asked him how rushes attacks on infrastructure are impacting morale in his country. there are some threat of detroit our infrastructure right now. a small outside is pretty called, and the target, the target. it's critical infrastructure. the russian forces, threat to breathing care in our hometown, tried to make huge damages and destroyed normal life to be there and to make a house to try to bring the depressive mood to every one to everyone, our citizen instead, them the people were angry and read as a 5, listen, the i are like, great saying the hours better without let to stand, watching them with russians,

and we're still fighting for our and dependency for our freedom. and that why the russians, that's why we have a lot of honest cornish and we thank you one more time for the support of our friends to enter a system to no more than defense weapons. it's very helpful to rein 2 forces and to every regulation area. can we get that one was shut down tonight? that was the mayor of keep speaking with us earlier there. the tele, clear coat. i'm joined now by ed arnold. he is the european security research fellow at the royal united services institute. mr. arnold is good to have you with us tonight. talk to me about just the mindset that we need to have to understand

what is happening right now. in ukraine 24 hours ago, we were reporting the us. germany will send troops to ukraine. today we're talking about renewed air strikes from russia, russia, claiming new territory, a small town today. is this the reality check after of the sigh of relief we saw yesterday? no, don't think so. what we saw yesterday is a significant offensive capability in the form times which has to be used with all the deal, the and military assets of the western provided, linking to fighting vehicles and artillery. and that will have real use come spring and summer when ukraine is going to go on the significance offensive in terms of the strikes through scene last 24 hours, which has been striking the civilian targets for months now. and so i don't think that those 2 things are linked in terms of escalation of what the exams is,

the time commitment yesterday, and then on the 3rd and final points. yes, we're still taking some ground, but it's incremental. it's not much ground. it's of no strategic value in that bank and very, very heavy cost for it. are you convinced then that when once we reach a certain number of tanks in ukraine, that we will see the gradient military then be able to not only hold these foot lines, but be able then to push russian forces back? is that, i mean, are you convinced that it's going to happen? it's been the ukrainian defense plans, obviously come up with the $300.00 and that's what they assess that they need to take back the territory roughly 20 percent of ukrainian territory is in russian hands. so that is that over that they are provided at the moment in times of times, support from europe, and also the u. s. it's been over a 100, but i expect that to rise and actions a lot of the statements for these that, you know, there is a bit of an insinuation that these might also be of initial trenches. so you might

see more times in the coming days and months, but also in ukraine needs and offensive capability. they'll take a 100 tanks and it's also, it's not necessarily technical specifications. the times is how they use them. and ukraine have to decide whether they put them immediately into the fight. now it in the east or they hold them back for us with the largest or offensive and try and use them to, to train a higher echelon and use them in a more strategic way. that's a critical question. ukraine, them. and we've, we've been told that ukrainian soldiers, they obviously will have to be trained and how to operate these leopard 2 things. the can you give me an idea of the timeline we're working with in terms of transporting these tanks from where they are there? there are numerous countries across western europe. they have to be transported from they are to ukraine. what type of time horizon here should we be looking at

for the moment? so people say around 2 to 3 months for the lap and switch feels about why it says that she probably quite quick. given that the decision was only made 2 days ago, this decision should have me made in october last year, following the counter fences in the south and east in september with the ukrainians objective for that was essentially saying, you know, we can do the job. we just need the tools. so actually the west is delayed this decision already, which means the timelines are quite tight. the at 18 grams, which will come from the u. s. the 31 has a quite large that it just takes for prince just because of the size of the time kids launch of the method to challenge and to and also the way that the fuel system works. so it needs a lot more so that, you know, these are all issues and the logistics issues on not insurmountable. but i think for your now what they need to decide is, is this a transactional visual times. and that says, or is, is that she, you know, they need to sustain the and more times over a number of potential months and years and not to stage maintenance repair that

posed, for example, in poland. that's going to be a critical requirement now for the europeans to me. and before i let you go u. s. president, by the he until yesterday basically he had said that the abrams thinks they're just not suitable for what they need to do in you crate. he's now not saying that we don't know maybe the end of the year, we'll see the 1st abrams in ukraine. it did, he just maybe offer that to the germans to get those a leopard to takes where they need to be. yes, the any bell tanks from the west are suitable to ukraine just as is where they are in the current war and what they need to achieve, hopefully this year to try and get resolution of the fighting this year. like you said, the challenges in getting in was not insurmountable, but the u. s. did not want to do this. they'll be very annoyed with the germans. was basically forcing their hand in order to release leopards. if you look at what

the u. s. or providing in both ross says infantry fighting vehicles, high loss. i mean, mission, you know, it's totally 26000000000 now and stay later support package from the u. s. match the u. k. assistance package for the entirety of last year. the u. s. a. doing all of the heavy lifting in a european war again, and i think they'll be very annoying to the fact that there's now house to sort of be forced into providing the n was that they think they didn't want to provide. yeah, that is a point that has been made repeatedly and you are making it again tonight as well. mr. edward are, we appreciate your insights tonight. thank you for the delay in the delivery of western takes to ukraine from nato members. as we were just right. hearing it has exposed fractures in the alliance this week on conflicts on tim, sebastian asked julian smith, us ambassador to nato. why this decision took so long? you heard our president talk about the heavy engagement. we've had not only with

the german government but with other allies as well to see what more we can get into the hands of the ukrainians as soon as is humanly possible. so we have a pivotal moment right now for the alliance. i think the decision that was made yesterday was the right one. and you heard the urgency with which both governments are handling the situation. both chancellor shots and president biden talked about the need to move this equipment into the hands of the ukrainians. as soon as humanly possible. and you can watch that entire interview on conflict on with julianne smith. you can watch it here or you can watch it online at the w dot com forward slash conflicts own. you can also watch it on the w. news you to chance. germany's defense minister boris. the story is to day visited belinda's fear. troops for the 1st time since taking on his new role. the minister met with

soldiers and a military training area in eastern the eastern german state of saxony on halt. the stories confirmed that german made leopard chaise are due to arrive in ukraine sometime early the spring. he also addressed concerns that sending heavy weapons to keep could weaken germany's own military. forrest historian has been in office less than a week, but he's never been out of the headlines berlin's decision to send 14 german made leopard tanks to ukraine is welcome news to keith. but his stories acknowledges that it comes at the expense of german is chronically under equipped armed forces. don't want it on the roughly with the arms deliveries to ukraine are possibly going to tear holes in places where we already have deficits with ones. and so we have to make decisions that we can hardly sell ukraine. we're going to stop helping one because we'll temporarily have gap looking at ice. the defense minister announced he would be holding talks with the arms industry to discuss how these gaps can be filled as quickly as possible. and i'm good for one if we need to increase

production in germany in europe to fill these gaps, then that is what we should do or grad and listen, then voted as buffy. and yet, there are concerns about how long it might take to replace the leopard tanks promised to ukraine. it's not only german army units, he feared being left without the necessary equipment. the german public is also divided about the move to supply the tanks. in pat i'm with has a fist. i do think that ukraine to says help indigo, that it should be supported. but i think battle tanks are the wrong way to go. but more efforts should be made to negotiate. so i'd say okay, and your ukraine was waiting for this. we decided to support ukraine. so i think it's good. yeah. good. oh god is that though? god. it's so difficult. we don't know what retaliation that will be. i've no idea canal. no one can. i can only hope that things will get better for the people and enlighten us. mm hm. best i get. he dies on the defense minister also addressed the

doubters among the german public. except i have complete understanding for all the people who are concerned about the fact that we are delivering tanks to a country at war. that goes without saying, split public opinion and armed forces suffering from years of neglect, the war in ukraine. forest bas doris certainly has his work cut out for him. he wasn't he w still to come. hope francis has addressed gay rights ahead of a trip to africa, to take a look at why many say that his latest comments are a major milestone for the catholic church in africa. and with the world said to mark holocaust remembrance day will meet the israeli filmmakers using technology to ensure that the world does not forget. the nazi atrocities is coming up a little bit later. first, we want to take a look now at some of the other headlines around the world, the united states was formerly designated, the russian private, military contractor, the wagner group as

a transnational criminal organization. the move means that washington can now freeze the groups us assets for its activities in ukraine and other countries. the u. s. treasury has also placed multiple individuals linked to wagner. under sanctions, turkeys, a foreign minister has a queue, sweden of being complicit in, quote, a hate and racist crime for failing to prevent an anti islam protest in stock home last weekend. he says that holding talks with sweden or finland about their bids to join, nato is currently meaningless. the nordic countries need turkey's approval to join nato. hello, cindy officials say at least 9 people have been killed during an israeli raid. the occupied westbank on fire and explosions were heard coming from the jeanine refugee camp, which is a major stronghold for palestinian militant groups. the israel military said that forces and come under fire while attempting to arrest several members of the

militant palestinian organisation islamic jihad investigation by authorities from the united states, germany, the netherlands, and interpol has led to the closure of a website, run by a notorious ransomware gang. the u. s. justice department says that the operation known as high in july heavily targeted hospitals and other health care providers. it allegedly attacked more than 1500 victim stealing sensitive data, rendering their computer system software unusable and been demanding massive sums help for the release of those histories. the gang reportedly extorted more than a $100000000.00 us dollars. i ran the u. s. justice department says that since july of last year, they've prevented approximately a $130000000.00 in ransom payments. unbeknownst to hiv in a 21st century cyber stakeout, our investigative team lawfully infiltrated hives network and hid there for

months, repeatedly swiping decryption keys and passing them on to victims to free them from ransomware. for months we helped victims defeat their attackers and deprived the hive network of extortion profits. simply put, using lawful means we hacked the hackers of a moron. this i'm joined now by the cybersecurity expert, isabelle. she comes and is going to ask you this. we just heard, we hacked the hackers read as quite a statement for a government official to be making up. this was an international operation. how did they manage to shut down the ha, that's a good question. i cannot unfortunately give you the technical details of how they did that. but what seems clear is that they managed to infiltrate the

network, the ransomware network, already around 7 months ago, they were able to trace back an attack and then gained access to the network. they then observed the gang and the network from the inside and could basically look at how they operated as your report already revealed. they could also recover decryption keys and passing on to around $300.00 dixons, there by watching a damage around $130000000.00. well, i'm excited to hear more about well, what do we know about this, this high group? so the high group is the so called ransomware as the service group. and that means that they provide a platform to attackers and through which attackers can actually access

malicious code they can use and their attacks. and they also so the strengths and where the service type from also provides the operational infrastructure to conduct the tax. and in, in that sense they have operated since around june 2021 apparently. and as also stated, they have mostly targeted critical infrastructure service providers and especially hospitals. and what they did is that they did not only conduct ransomware attacks, so they did not only decrypt files and then demand ransom, sorry, encrypt files and demand ransom for decryption. but they also x for x tray to data and door that data in a different location. and then black males, the victims, to leak that data. and he landed a sum of money for,

for that as well. in order to prevent the blackmail. yeah, i mean it's amazing that law enforcement agencies were able to do this and it has a little bit of the matrix involved too. and as you say, many people will be waiting to understand and hear more about this, isabel skew her, we appreciate your insights tonight. thank you. thank you. frances has spoken out against laws in various countries where homosexuality is a crime. he said that those laws are unjust. now some l g b t q, right? advocates are calling this a milestone. the pope spoke ahead of his upcoming visit to self sudan. it's when a more than 60 countries enforcing anti gay laws, some of them punishable by death. so look to see who we are. all children of god. kidding and god loves us as we are. and for the strength that each one of

us has to fight her at dignity, cinemas, being homosexual, is not a crime. it is not a crime, cbs, but it to send you say, well, yes, but let's make this distinction 1st between sin and crime it. it's also an intellect charity with one another. so what about that? every man and every woman must have a window in their life where the content to the hope and where they can see the dignity of god and being homosexual isn't a crimes. it's a human condition is not oh my next guest tonight is one carlos cruise. he is an openly gay man who serves as an adviser to pope francis on l g b t. she matters. he is also a survivor of abuse by a priest in chile, it is an advocate for all such survivors. it's good to have you on the program. with this, we understand that the catholic church, when it looks at growth, in terms of numbers, size of congregations,

the strongest growth that it is seeing is in africa right now. that also happens to be the place where you are seeing even new laws that are being put on the books and some countries that criminalize homosexuality was this what we were hearing in this interview from the pope an attempt to maybe shepherd these growing flocks. is there were he was trying to do? well, 1st, thanks for having me. and i know you said it before the statement, the pope made yesterday is, is groundbreaking. no pope has ever done it in history. and i do think yes that it's not only for growing continent growing where catholics are growing in africa. but i think the pope has even a bigger ambition. i would say to make sure that human dignity is respected everywhere. the l g b t. community is persecuted,

is condemned. there's violence against the community, there's draconian, horrible laws you know, criminalizing almost a tragedy. and so it's important that the pope makes the statement, and that other public figures, politicians, other faith leaders, bishops, and cardinals follow, follow his teaching. and it's simple, it's important because he wants the church in africa to thrive. but at the same time, this is a dilemma, isn't it? you've got growing congregations that have hot politicians in them that support putting game in lesbians, transgender people in prison, or maybe even putting them to death for being homosexuals. he knows that he's got to that's got to be stopped in order for the church to maintain its legitimacy. i

would go even further. you're absolutely right, but i would go even further. there's even church leaders that support at the passing of laws that criminalize in some way that the l g b t. community that definitely has to stock. and the silence of that higher key sometimes leads to these draconian laws. like i said before, to bubble up to be bigger and people need to, to speak up. you've got, you've got bishops, you've got members of the catholic church in africa who they know that they've got the leverage now. they know they've got the growing congregations and then they point to the catholic church, particularly in europe, but also in north america. and they say, look at your, your child sex abuse scandals. is history of that. you know, you've got what they perceive as gay men who have prey to put in children. what

they're doing is they're telling their people they're asking us to bring that here . what's, what's your message to those church leaders who are passing on this horrible message? you're absolutely right, this horrible message, this criminal message that they're passing and i would turn it around for them, right? it's criminal, what they're doing. first of all, as a survivor of sexual abuse. you cannot equate that pedophilia with homosexuality either absolutely 2 different things. gay men are not kind of a, some are some heterosexual men are pedals? this is, this is not a matter of sexual orientation. would you like to say that there would you like to hear the pope say that mr. cruz isn't? yeah, absolutely, absolutely. i think, i think though he's

a big statement right now. i think the people that have the that have megaphones or that have opportunities. i have to say it themselves as well. it doesn't, it doesn't stop with just the pope, especially in, for example, i'll tell you something in, i don't want to miss owens to it, but, but i deal with, i mean survivors from all over the world. and i met them from one african country. they're heterosexual. survivors of sexual abuse when they were children, they don't dare to speak up about their abuse because there's laws against homosexuality in that country, though they're afraid that they are going to be labeled homosexuals and go to jail . so it's, it's, it's shameful. everywhere you look at it and it's

still, it's still hard though to get that message to these growing congregations. because even if the pope says, global sexual are not criminals, he's still saying they're sinners. and in a lot of people's minds, those centers and criminals are one of the same. yeah. but, but i, i, you show the interview and i, i'd encourage people to, to review it. the pope has a very singular way of when he preaches, when he speaks and interviews he, he was saying being homosexual is not a crime. and then he talks to himself like there is another person. he says, well, they might say that it's the same but compare a sin to them. it's a bigger sin to hurt your fellow human being or to persecute someone from the l d p community just because he's l u b. that's a bigger sin and the pope says that so i, i do believe that some people,

especially in the more conservative media, are trying to prove this. hi, mr. cruz. and i hate dinner, but we're running out of time. i wanted to, i wanted to thank you for taking the time to talk with mr. one of cruise advise you to the pub. thank you. take care. you're watching the w news. i'll be back at the top of the hour with more world news followed by the day of next is to the point with

who to the point to strong opinions. clear positions, international perspectives breaking with a long standing taboo. germany has authorized delivery of the leopard battle tanks to it conflict. so does that mean berlin is ready to lead to militarily or does it

remain on my guard to find out on to the point to the point with d, w. european. with sometimes the catching our tv highlights freshly rebuffing every week. not the mob. many of them would. i am st lana seattle's kaya. yeah, i am running for president of the republic of bella, rosie leaky with you. she is a wife of the upcoming petitioning. i think the 2 should been done in a moment where she tries to stand up for her husband's. her destiny changes and she, herself, becomes a politician. john dunder,

searches for the truth. again. this time, the exiled and turkish journalist meets a sweat on nancy huddled sky, exiled leader of the opposition and bela reuss. huge because i'm tired and tired. physically untied, morally, is too much on my shoulders, but i have to hold this weight because i'm responsible for the future fall country for the people far behind the boss. sh. guardians of truth starts february 18th on dw is germany is finally ready to make good on the turning point declared nearly a year ago by chancellor sholtes breaking with a long standing taboo. he has now authorized the delivery of german tags to a conflict zone. ukraine will receive leopard to battle tanks not only directly from germany, but also with berlin's approval from other year.