[000:00:00;00] ah ah ah, this is the w news live from berlin, accusations flying over a u. s. spine drawn that crashed in the black c. u. s. defense minister lloyd austin saying that he had talked with his russian counterpart,

sergey joy about the downing of the drone. the incident has raised tension between the 2 nations even further. also coming up his fighting rages in the embattled ukrainian city of buckland. we'll look at keeps plans to launch a potentially a potential counter offensive this spring. also tonight to our u. s. banking trouble spreading here to europe. the question comes and shares in switzerland, 2nd biggest bank, pretty swiss slumped to record low. investors are still spook after the collapse of california's silicon valley bank. and pakistan police to barely dropped their efforts to arrest him. ron con flashes erupted outside the former prime minister's home in lahore with his supporters blocking the police. ah

i'm brig off is good to have you with us us since secretary lloyd austin and his russian counterpart, sergey sure you have spoken to each other about tuesdays drone incident over the black seat. the u. s. military says that a u. s. m q 9 reaper drone was an international airspace when 2 russian jets dumped fuel on it, causing it to crash, defense secretary austin, and some sharp words for moscow. after that incident. on tuesday, russian aircraft engaged and dangerous and reckless and unprofessional behavior in the international airspace over the black sea to russian jets dumped fuel on an unmanned u. s. m. q 9 aircraft conducting routine operations in international airspace. and one rush and jet struck r m m q 9 aircraft, resulting in a crash. this hazardous episode is a part is part of a pattern of aggressive ris,

risky an unsafe actions by russian pilots in international airspace. now i just got off the phone with my russian counterpart minister showing as i've said repeatedly, it's important that great powers be models of transparency and communication and united states will continue to fly and to operate wherever international law allows . i look good at the washington or corresponding curly. it's moist. she is following this story for is today. it's good to see you carolina's so what do we know now that we did not know about this incident yesterday? love rental. we clearly see, we just heard it from secretary austin at that the us government does not want to escalate this incident today. yes, a criteria of defense, light austin, that he talked to his russian counterpart as we just cert. and he referred to yesterday's incident as

a troubling episode and said that it was dangerous and unprofessional, and reckless. but he also said that this is part of that pattern of aggressive and risky actions from russia. however, he added that the u. s. does not seek an armed a conflict with russia, and at that the u. s. will continue flying international space and that it's up to russia to encounter in the u. s. aircraft in a save and a professional manner. this is a clear alert towards russia but, but nothing more than that. they don't want to escalate of the situation. and in that a pentagon briefing, we also learned that they are not certain if this encounter a yesterday was intentional or general milly. he said that the aggressive behavior was intentional, but the actual that the actual physical contact off the aircraft that they are not sure if that was intentional as well. yeah, and that is

a slight change from what we heard yesterday. what about the drone itself? i mean, is the wreckage? is it still in the black sea somewhere? yes, the wreckage is still in the in the black sea it's around 5000 feet off water. and we know that it is also deep in the sea, and that it is very unlikely that they will be able to recover it. we also know that all sensitive information in the drone wants to lead us before the aircraft at westboro down. so if there was important information, brent in that drone, that is not the case any corresponding currently the 2 or more with the latest you know, from washington carlene is always thank you as ukrainian forces continue to hold off a months long attempt by russia to take the eastern city of bock mood, keith is now signaling that it is gearing up to launch a counter offensive and many are pending their hopes on new western weapons,

including german made leopard tanks due to arrive soon. the new hardware could help you crane break. the still meet in many areas and take back a lot more territory. russian artillery fires on past moot after months of attempts to take the city. ukraine has forced its enemy to commit major resources and take tens of thousands of casualties. the ukrainian military says it's buying time for a spring counter offensive. part of the preparations for that counter offensive are happening far from the front lines in spain. ukrainian troops are finishing their training on advanced western tanks. they hope the leopards will be a game changer on the battlefield until now ukraine has been using older russian model tanks. ukrainian troops are getting training from nato forces elsewhere to like here in the u. k. learning the art of combined arms warfare. how to

coordinate all the high tech weaponry with infantry assaults on the front. a tank commander has high expectations up north with the concept and tactics of tank usage and battle will significantly change because western tanks have a higher firing range and other capabilities like a digital information field. if this equipment is used properly, one can destroy the enemy before the enemy approaches its firing range of her pooler. analysts say ukraine will likely amount a major attack in shop a reason province. aiming at the russian held city of moleed upon a successful push would cut through russia supply lines to its forces. further west . there are factors like whether they can only be guessed at not controlled. spring mud can slow or stop tank advances, bogging down the russians and ukrainians alike. that means the timing and the target of any counter offensive are still a mystery. which is just the way ukrainian commanders wanting. i'm joined now by

the military analyst frank lead, which to talk about ukraine's planned spreen counter offensive frankness. joining us from oxford, it's good to see you again. when do you expect this ukrainian counter offensive to begin? what can be brent? i would expect this in early may. the vehicles that were mentioned in that report tanks, infantry viking vehicles, and so forth. plus the adequate training of the many troops required will be if not maxima, at that point, they will be adequate, i think. and you claims, needless to say, have to balance the, the troops available with the time time left as it were in the fighting season or later in the year. so yeah, early may out just late april and we know ukrainian troops have been finding your bucket now for more than 7 months could losses. they are jeopardize,

keep ability to launch an effective counter offensive. i mean, do the law of diminishing returns, begin to said in from what we're told or from reports, it seems clear that that's the view of the u. s. advisors or the u. s. high command . the utility or the balance of casualties, the diminishing returns. you talked about was, are starting to kick in now in other words, you claim these are affecting lots of casualties, but they're taking too many. but the overall answer the question, brent is no. this will not impact the overall thrust of the counter offense. and the reason is this, that ukraine is preparing quite a large force. currently, it's not yet as far as we know, but certainly it's not been deployed yet. reports are developing about 3 corps, which would be around 9 divisions or so we're looking at $60000.00 troops or they're about that kind of scale back of the envelope stuff. and it's that force

that will spearhead the counter offensive wherever. and whenever it is comprised, of course of those troops you saw in the report and many others that have been trained. so the but, but yes it's, it's, it's, it's a bleeding also, but it's not decisive. and i assume you're expecting them ukraine to be able to make some serious gains with this counterfeit. we shouldn't expect rapid gains. the russians had been preparing to receive this offensive. now for about 4 months, they have prepared some quite heavy engineering works to resist ukraine. and it will take some time and a great deal of effort to get through those. so this isn't going to it, this is unlikely to be assuming those in his operation, this country offensive to be a sort of rapid thrust with collapsing russian forces. russian forces, very stolid and historically tend not to collapse in the way the parts we, some of us would like. let's also not ignore the possibility effects that may not

go in to mother to poll to cut that road crime, it may go elsewhere. some people might say the button might be placed with a we can russian force that surprises a cheap but look, none of us knows the answer. the question is unlikely to be a rapid strike straight through to the coast and a lot harder than that. and we've talked numerous times about how the, you know, success levels really depend on the typed in the amount of western weapons that the ukraine forces have. and at what time they have access to those. so you've got all of these variables. is it any clear at this point what a victory is going to look like for you? correct? they stated very clearly that victory for us is the return of all our territories channels. ology said that last year it's been repeated many times since, that would include crimea. now the question for the west and particularly united states is what they tolerate. and this is

a question really of tolerate. would they allow, let's say ukraine to make that move into crime if in the happy event they managed to break through those russian lines. their strategy so far publicly, at least, is extremely unclear and often contradictory to us. so we don't know that i would suspect that there might be serious consideration given to the potential russian response. we're an attack on crimea to go forward, but a long way from that yet. yes. there's also he was presidential election next year that people are talking about. so we have to say we can't forget about that, drank lead frank leverage. it's always, it's good talking to you. we appreciate your insights. thank you. thank you so good . i. let's take a look now, some of the other stories that are making headlines around the world. russian president vladimir putin in his syrian counterpart basha. all the sod are hold. he talks in moscow focusing on mending syrian ties with turkey. and on rebuilding war torn syria, wednesday marks the 12th anniversary of the start of the uprising that triggered

the countries civil war. yet thousands of syrians have rallied in rebel held it lip to mark the start of the pro democracy protests. back in march 2011. the id live area in the country's northwest is the last major area, not under the control of president basha, allison's russian backed forces. trash is piling up in paris as french, st cleaners and garbage collectors. continue to strike over proposed pension reforms president emanuel microns efforts to raise the official retirement age, passed the 1st vote in parliament last week, after 2 months of protest. more than 2 thirds the french population, se they now oppose the proposals, worries about the stability of the banking system. it spread from the united states to here in europe. shares and credit suisse fell to a record low after its biggest shareholders sold a national bank, root out

a new cash infusion. the lender has appealed to the swiss national bank for a public show of support. concerns of been growing about banks, liquidity on both sides of the atlantic, following the collapse of silicon valley bank in the us. almost a week ago, more i'm joined now by william chit and didn't. he's the associate professor at the mccoy college of business administration at texas. state university professor, it's good to see you again. yeah, we, you know, we're meeting up now on 48 hour interval and it looks like there is something that feels like contagion that has crossed the atlantic. how do you see? i'm not sure this is really contagion. but it is definitely highlighting the, the issues that, for example, credit suisse has had, not just recently, but for years. and so it, i think it's just allowed folks to pause to take

a good look at some banks that have had trouble for a while. and unfortunately, this is another very large bank in europe that's been having trouble actually for a while. so it's not as if this is caused by what happened in the u. s. in terms of the failures of silicon valley bank or signature bank, but rather just the realization that in some ways it is a bit of hyper bowl, but it's been a bit of a zombie bank for a while now. well, let me play devil's advocate here. if we had not seen the bank collapses in the united states this week last week, do you think the saudis would've we even thought twice about giving an extra cash infusion to critics wis? well, that's an interesting question. i will take them at face value that given that they're already at a 9.9 percent ownership level of that there's regulatory issues with them going above that. and that's what's preventing them from putting additional any money

into credit suisse. we have heard a lot about the u. s. federal reserve and the connection between interest rates and what that is done to the help of banks in the united states. we know that the european central bank is expected to hike interest rates here tomorrow. do you think the events of the past week are going to impact their decision? i think the markets are, are showing that it's probably going to impact the federal reserves decision at least to a certain extent. so if you'd looked at the odds a week ago, it probably was about 2 thirds that the federal reserve was going to increase rates by 50 basis points in about a 33 percent chance that it would only be by 25 basis points. now that shifted so that it's about a 33 percent chance that they will increase interest rates at all in about 2 thirds chance go increase rate by only $25.00 basis points. given the decline in inflation in the us, you know,

hitting 6 percent. i think it gives the federal reserve cover to only increase rates by 25 basis points showing that they're still trying to get inflation down. because even at 6 percent is 3 times larger than their target and shows that they're, they're not going to be unduly influenced by some of these other factors that are happening outside of their direct control. so what does it mean for the european central bank? if there is no real contagion, danger right now, can they continue? am increasing interest rates because, you know, inflation is a, is a big problem here in the euro's zone. well, her well managed banks, these increases and interest rates shouldn't be hurting their investment portfolios . again, when you had a bank like silicon valley bank that was poorly managed and they did a poor job on their investment portfolio. didn't account for, you know, any changes and interest rates. well, run banks aren't going to have those same issues. they're invested

a much shorter term securities that are going to be nearly as volatile as what s b b saw in so many of european banks are in that situation where they kept their investments relatively short. and so these increases in interest rates aren't going to directly or they're not going to hurt them nearly as much as what we've seen for other banks. yeah, the words of comfort to a lot of people here in europe tonight. coming from you, professor, professor william jordan is always good to have you with us. thank you. they for me go. all right, we way go now to africa. u. s. secretary of state entity blinkin is on a visit to ethiopia. we can met with his ethiopian counterpart to make a make conan in the capitol. artist of the trip is part of a push by washington to support peace efforts in the country after 2 years of civil war in the t gr i reject. but it comes as reports emerge of a massacre that was carried out by government aligned forces around the degree and

town of ottawa just days before last november's peace deal was signed. he w news was able to gain access to the region and hear from survivors a warning. now that some people might find this report disturbing. i but i had hagler, survived and massacre when more than 300 villages were killed. it happened just days before a deal was signed ending the warranty gray. she had heard rumors of people being killed. so she and her family went into hiding near house and caster atlanta got other day when the cattle started making noises. my son and husband left for the house to see what was happening. i grew up in katy and for i ran a soldier, came in and killed them both i lo, the i think the one she heard shots being fired. it wasn't a retreat and soldier she says,

here's where he shot the door. maybe inside her hut, she found a blood bath, her husband, 70 year old betty you are by shot dead on the floor. holding his cross under his head. he had been a priest. you there at mann to hold my daughter. your father is dead. now. we carried him into the living room, but no one there. we found my son over to the home and also dead him. ideally, we were shot. i didn't i. yeah, we covered them and cried. her 28 year old son, gay billy who had been planning to marry soon. i abbot, her gauze, and her daughter were too scared of the soldiers who were occupying the village. they stayed in the house with the bodies before day sol center, then i went to the church to see if i could bury them there. but a high ranking, airy train soldier said, no. he said it was us who attacked them. i told him we didn't know at one young.

she buried her husband and son in her backyard. after 2 months they were finally moved to the church graveyard. since then, abd ahead, her goss hasn't slept well. she's overcome with grief hook and what did we t grands? do they must be held accountable. it was civilians they killed. they killed the people instead of fighting the soldiers. according to the administration of the town of arbour, the soldiers slaughtered more than 300 people in various villages, over the course of just one week. witnesses say a retreat and forces took revenge on civilians after suffering a defeat on the battlefield at cedar by a social worker recorded 90. 1 people who were killed in the village of mariam chevy to over 3 days. they kind of fell and a half to live with. i had of the 91 victims, 12 for women, 10 level inches lead us. when we looked at the ages,

they were from 2 years to 92 years old. they killed toddlers, little girls, entire families. often the soldiers tied their victims hands before executing them . in one case, both parents were murdered in front of their 5 children. miss ad goes the ad for their luck. they killed the mother named t k and mutilated her breasts with a knife. after they killed her, they put the baby on top of her coffee, m. at the moment. these findings are a testament to the gruesome violence that happened here. the heather at cedar are by hopes that her records were one day help justice to be served. artless bigler though it some of the other stories making headlines around the world. police have surrounded the home of senegalese opposition leader was mine, a sancho stopping him from leaving sancho thesis trial on thursday on defamation charge is brought by the countries tourism minister. the outcome could prevent him

from running in next year's presidential election. more than a dozen people have died in flash floods in southeastern turkey. many more are missing after heavy rainfall said water surging through streets in homes. more than 1000000 people are living in temporary shelters in the region following last month's devastating earthquakes. china has reopened its borders to tours, with answering that it is once again, issuing visas. the country closed its borders 3 and a half years ago to contain the spread of coven 19. but last month, the beijing declared victory over the pandemic. now visitors have begun arriving, and the 1st chinese nationals are preparing to go abroad. mrs. lees, shanghai souvenir sales struggled during the pandemic. now she's hoping the influx of tourists will help bring her business back to life. why to that guy? now i'm looking forward to the opening up to foreign countries as soon as possible . and people coming to shanghai yet because of the 3 year pin demik,

it was that many shop owners have lost a lot. yeah, they don't make money and they must pay rent, some or even bankrupt. popular shanghai tourist attractions like this are still not as busy as before the pandemic. but travelers who have already arrived say that they hope to come back again. yeah, next them i'm coming for a longer stay at home. i would be able to invite my husband and so no over have of it. they really want to come and see what we're working with here and also to tourist john. i am the area of course, pleasing is now reissuing all types of pieces and honoring those. granted before the pandemic, the goal is to attract more foreign visitors. beijing is also working with local travel agencies to boost tours abroad. these new measures are already having an impact as taurus look to europe for their next vacation. i, we want to go to switzerland, cal, there's no language barrier for us there, but we want to travel like locals. rather than going through tours,

we can even go to neighboring countries with the shang and visa there, around 6 direct flights from china to major cities in europe, france, germany, austria, and switzerland were among the top destinations before the pandemic. and now to a colorful part of japan's seasonal calendar and this year, people can enjoy it freely without worrying about any pandemic restrictions. also, this year the cherry blossoms have bloomed a little earlier as well. spring arrives in tokyo with a burst of color japan. so kuda or cherry blossom season has officially begun for locals and tourists alike. this year's blossoms are particularly special and a mile on me. i was still pregnant, less placid season, and it was also the pandemic this year. we can finally see the flowers with our baby one for the next 2 weeks or so. i want to keep going out and enjoying the

cherry blossoms in this warmer weather. now that pandemic restrictions have been softened. people can once again enjoy the season to its fullest i think it's really amazing. i really talks about the japanese culture. we're even though there's a lot of people here in tokyo and japan all around, they still get excited. we're seeing the site this year marks, one of the earliest starts to blossom season since reco it's began 70 years ago, bringing color back to the city just that little bit sooner. and i was complaining about that we go. his reminder of the top stories were following for u. u. s. defense secretary lloyd austin and his russian counterparts. ag, choi good have spoken to each other about tuesday drove incident over the black sea . the u. s. military says that the drone was in international airspace when 2 russian jets dumped fuel on it,

causing it to crash and worries about the stability of the banking system had spread from the united states to europe. shares in credit suisse fell to a record low after its biggest shareholder, salty national bank, rolled out a new cash infusion. the lender has appealed to the swiss national bank for a public show of support. you want to dw news of next conflict zone with tim sebastian, i'll be back at the top of the hour with more world news followed by the day i was even with ah,

with ah, with who

enter the conflict zone with tim sebastian? just over a year ago, the main russian attack on ukraine was launched from bella. rooms. composition still survives there, even though it's lisa is in exile in with you ania. she's svetlana to come with guys with her on roofing for a ukrainian victory. but she said could propel her group. how in fellow i'm horrible. conflict with on d w. oh blue with should we oh do we treat animals and why hasn't anything changed? does that this is actually a clear violation of animal protection. why do we love some as companions while

needing others? yeah, i never thought about how strange it was that i could pat my dog with one hand while i ate a pork chop with the other. what is the alternative? and how does it taste? it's like the real thing. yeah. will we all be beginning 50 years? i see your very shoes, strong arguments to keep eating animals. a documentary series about the future of food with the great debate this week on t w. just over a year ago, the main russian attack on ukraine was launched from bella. bruce, a country long, subservient to the credits will but opposition still survives there. even limits leader is in exile in lithuania,