what does your journey get in by the this is the w news line from berlin. serious 2nd largest city is now mostly in rebel hands, as long as spiders celebrate their advance into a level. and the biggest challenge in years to the regime of bush on a son, also coming up purchasers clash with police for a 3rd noise in the capital of georgia. they're angry about the government's decision to freeze talks to join the european union. the and welcome to you, our viewers around the world, michael ocho. we begin with the surprise offensive in syria's northwest. thousands

of revel fighters have taken over much of the city of a level and surrounding areas and just days, syria and satellite russia have retaliated with air strikes, including on the rebel held city of able to overnight killing and injuring a number of people. it's the biggest challenge in use of the aside, really fighting has force thousands of locals to leave their homes, including many children according to the un and other groups. these families here fled a level in the area around in the lab and consult sanctuary at the camp. for displaced people, violence has created the largest wave of displacement in the years. of my background is the regional media and communications advisor with the norwegian refugee council's middle east regional office. and he joins me now from. i'm on argument they are um, what does your organization make of what's happening right now? in northern syria?

of course, it is warring, worrying times for everybody involved for the families in these areas. the are seeing the city diesel, various environments, of course, for age workers who work across across areas in cities and towns to now have to suspend, you know, i depressions, i don't know. we do refugee castle. we've had to suspend the operations except for some lazy set and i've saving on chris corporations and think, what's, what's happening? you know, it takes us back to some very dream days and then modern history and cereal, probably the green mistake. serious recent history with, with all the different destruction that we have seen over the past decades. we hope this new cycle ends soon through the escalation of course,

because civilians will be caught up in this sense of unions of desperate for some known as normal life. and, and see what we are getting conditions for residents in alaska were difficult even before the most recent fighting. does your organization have a plan for what may come next? it's, it's all clear now because the situation on the ground is shifting, but we have been operating in other pro and other places. we have been in the north of syria for 4 years now. we have been providing shots as opposed to integration supports and you know, lots of services for, for people displaced. what we're worried about now is that, you know, this will only increase that we will see increase in, in, in the, in the number of people just nice to be, have seen that, you know, i've know the teams, 20000 people. the, the initial estimate saw that people have been displaced and we are worried that you know, with, with probably with winter as well, that things will only get was,

you know, there will be towards the bread shortages, the read pacific water shortages already and, and i've posted to you many, many in, you know, several 1000000 millions. of course people are, you know, large settings only for will. of course the see more of that pressure. so we need to pull that. yeah. you know, humanitarian situation from so a sense of, of what's happening. i've made a really compassionate observer, it might be forgiven for thinking with so many conflicts in the region. organizations like yours or already spread thin. and so there's little chance people on the ground are getting all the assistance that they actually need. how do you respond to that? are they not? i mean, typically if you, if you look at what happened to last you only the last year, this is the, probably the potential, you know, relative as to the diesel conflict that we see the region we have seen and you know, we have seen and because that that has full in way shots or

a supplies out for the way short of why is needed and nothing on the the mindset of the needs are, you know, off the chops now. and now it's in syria, which already has probably and a half of the population in, in severe situation. so, i guess, i guess, i guess diplomacy has to, has to play a role here. and we hope that, you know, more aids was coming to support these people. that's a document background from the norwegian refugees council. thank you so much. i to georgia's prime minister directly callback he'd say has said that presidents salumi zuba should be lee must leave office when her term expires this month. that's aft, as you are, but she really declared she wouldn't step down saying parliament has no authority to appoint her successor. following last month's disputed elections, the president has thrown her support behind the pro european opposition protests

that entered a 3rd night on saturday. a police fire deal gas and use watkins to disperse through your being protests outside the parliament in tbilisi housings of protest is across the country valley for toward night initial demanding that the government resume talks with the you. the thing is that for many days now, already hundreds of thousands of people are coming out to protest, self organized, sacrificing themselves, their health and life. for one reason, these people want to see themselves in georgia in the, you know, a little by i'm progressing russia 1st of all. right? sure. i was trying to provide whole georgia and they're charging by us by getting the government they want in georgia in taking us without any power they want to

slave us. they want, they want to do that, so we want peace, but we want freedom. we aren't able to quite grow afraid of the pro question george in president suit up is really quotes the government, legitimate in an interview to d. w. c. court of depression influence in georgia. that is a whole rest of the system that is taking a foot in georgia and that has worked at the georgia in pollution met simply is protesting, get introduced as these days. and what is the new in georgia? the protests are extended to all the major cities in georgia prime. and in fact, it actually could buy could for setting the sponsor the protests that the state will not allow lucian to be placed on the chicago. but the people on the streets make clear,

and we're to see the country in the future of the police. look now at some other stories making news. the european union's new top diplomat, kaya callous and the new head of the european council, antonio acosta or visiting ukraine and a symbolic show of support. both stroke office today. e leaders are keen to demonstrate it remains firm on backing keith. there are questions around continued us support. once donald trump tanks, office, voters and romania are heading to the polls to elect a new parliament. for right parties are expecting a boost after strong showing in the 1st round of presidential elections last week. the campaign has been dominated by concerns over the budget and the cost of living under the u. n. agencies supporting palestinian refugees is pausing the delivery of a through the main cargo crossing into gaza due to security concerns. its chief says, the road out of the co remish alone crossing has not been safe for months and large

convoys of a drugs are being stolen by armed gangs to at least 3 people have died after cycle and single smashed into india's south eastern coast line officials say the damages, otherwise minimal, while the storm is expected to gradually wreaking into a depression later, sunday, indians, weather bureau warrant of heavy rains across parts of india. so today on world aids day, the united nations is calling for easier access to live saving medication for all people according to the you, when this is the only way to achieve the goal of ending the pandemic once and for all the latest figures from the u. n program you and aids showed that 39900000 people worldwide were living with h. i v last year. roughly the same number as in the previous year. the number of new infections stood at 1300000. this is an all time low,

but experts say that the numbers are only going down very slowly. and u. n. h has expressed concern that in at least 28 countries. the number of new h i v infections was on the rise last year christine struggling is a deputy executive director for u. n. h e joins us now from homburg. welcome to a dw before we analyze the challenges of the global flight against this disease. what developments make you hopeful for the future? yes, thank you for having me. um, many things make meal bull. even the speakers too, just so you know, in 1996 we had about 3300000 people are getting new with the new, the infected with h i v each year. and now we have 1300000. so we have come a long way of, of for getting do preventing you in fact, is it a few years ago in 2004, we had over 2000000 people dying of aids,

relate to that or data age related diseases every year. and now we have our full, just over 600000 people die. so we on the right path, we know that there are a we know what to do to prevent new infections. we know what success looks like and we have also new technology. so we have new prevention technologies we have in the pipeline there and injectable pre exposure plus of alexis, which means possibly very soon, we could just inject people twice a year and then and, and to prevent new infections. and so we have lots of good things come on our way and other happened the we just need to stay on that path and follow that path. over the years we've all been learning. it's now possible to live a good life with age ivy. when using the right drugs, according to your latest report though, almost 10000000 people don't have access to them. why is that? yeah. why is that? and you know, it is really

a tragedy that we have to write our medicines. we know that people can, they are very fulfilling and almost are you alive like anybody else? and still to this day about a quarter of people do not have access to that treatment. so a lot of it has to do with people not being aware of this data. so we're still in some communities have low rates of testing. so people don't know that they need treatment. we still have communities that would like that do not come forth to health facilities to get the treatment or they don't stay on the treatment. i'm a lot of that has to do with stigma, discrimination love is still attached to each i b. and that is why i today or well they say, i'll report that we just launched last week is focusing on the protection of human rights. because we're saying you need to protect human rights who need to ensure an environment where people are not see a full way would become for to the the services that are like saving or that avoid new infections because they feel safe and comfortable. you've touch on this

a little bit, but i want to go a little bit deeper wire. there's so many countries where infection rates are rising, especially among girls and young women. so girls and young women to know how we called it, unless the girls and young women are especially prone to new infections in sub saharan africa. so we have $4000.00 new infections along less than gross and young women in the wealth every week and $3100.00 of those new infections are not free cuts. and a lot of that has to do with the really quality, gender based violence. and the status of young girls in communities. we know that when young girls finish or secondary school education, their likelihood of teenage pregnancy and their likelihood of getting infected with h. i be reduced that's, that's a substantially. so we need to look at a chinese not as a medical problem, but really as a problem that's a top should, is the social economic,

the political context in which people exist and why the lesson groups and young women. it's important that they finish secondary education, that the faith that they can always mean dependent that they have agency pull their life to enable them to avoid infecting, getting infected with h. i. d. our sincere thanks to christine struggling, deputy executive director at u. n. 8. thank you so much i. this is a reminder of our top stores this our thousands of rebel as long as fighters have taken over a bunch of series, 2nd city level, and also sees control of the airport and dozens of other towns and villages, syria and its satellite. russia have launched air strikes against the rabbits. serious president bush, all of us saw his voucher defeated the insurgents. protesters have clash with police in the georgia and capital. the police see for a 3rd night running tens of thousands have been protesting against the ruling georgia dream party. suspending talks of joining the european union

of next a documentary, exploring the world of bourbon rents incurred that right. unlike look, and thanks for watching the this is he is hungry for the future. so seeing in southwest china 32000000 people live here. many of them are young and dentistry. 3 and it's coming through making money, having fun with nice schools and some change of stuff. december 13th on d, w. the large scale research projects around the world are looking at the behavior of rats in big cities. and one of the 1st was

a model project launched in vancouver, the canadian red capital that allegedly boost the highest rank population, chose the hymns where it's a pioneer of modern rank research set out in 2010 to answer some basic questions. what are the things that interest me when i started the vancouver rock project is how little we know about rats. and i really wonder why that was the case. why these animals that live amongst us since the dawn of civilization, we understand so little. and i think the 1st is that they're a little distasteful or maybe not as glamorous as, as some of the other animals that scientists could choose to study. so if you have the option to choose between a rat or gorilla, you might not choose the rach, i think the 2nd is, is exactly this issue of co existence that we've lived with them for so long. we

think, oh, we maybe we know everything there is to know about them. and i think the final thing is our, our attitude toward the science of rats and rac management that previously had been considered really a blue color occupation. something you just get rid of. and only now are we recognizing yes, ross or an animal, a wildlife population, just like polar bears just like salmon. so we really were wanting to understand the basics. where to wrap populations look like in modern cities, how many rats are there in each block? how do they behave, and more importantly, what diseases do they carry? the goal is a future where humans can co exist with rats, with as few health risks and fears as possible. that means, questioning previous believes and taking a complex approach to the question of living with the rodents.

the scientists with the armageddon project have already begun to expose the secret lives of powers as rach what's on on on 100. this is a very small young wrapped up in the heath, what's known as a brown wrap to 6. it's scientific name is wrapped us nor vague because, and it's the right most commonly found in europe, in cities and in paris, specifically on public. this one is perhaps 2 weeks old, and she's just starting to venture out of her bureau, mazda southfield. this won't tell you. sound like a real, ha. uh, don't group individual true that this rat, one of the common rat, also known as a sewer rap, is quite typical in urban environments with me. you that it was that causes conflicts because it's usually considered dangerous and dirty girl fits it on

anybody. key questions that i commit on anybody don't show that there is no denying that it can post health risk who didn't have room on. but it's also an animal that co exist is with us. and then the roof was it was done in the mental. there was increased interest in it and when you, and even a growing goodwill towards this little animal, not a while ago, the presumption video. so if you do this, if it doesn't matter if you have a clue for mazda to push on that you drove off the point where the keystone does the computer easy for me. the armageddon project is an attempt at answering fundamental biological questions that have eluded us. to push it, it's the 1st for paris or even for france in general. there's never been a research projects that isn't, that he's rats in the city or paris in particular on them. another important topic is health. just seeing how high is the risk of reps transmitting diseases in paris here too. we have no information, no data, no, no idea really. they all found a pleasant through shaky promo sheet. and finally, the 3rd topic,

which i also think is very important, is understanding why some people hate radcliffe, and others loved them. and how to better approach these differing rad opinions and images. it is the most difficult. uh, do you have the, the. ringback the new york in northern england was a key part of the roman empire. and sewell archaeologist david norton is using 1000 year old bones to investigate what rats can tell us about human history.

the speakers where there has been people there for oh, we spin rach, who always like the idea of using small and unlikely remains to tell kind of big picture stories about human history. tiny wrapped phones, making 3 centimeters now, collecting them from lots of different places and getting together a story of what they can tell us about connectivity between different treatments estimates the nature of a settlement. and so the basic for it's tracing when, when they were understanding the presence is behind that, using those processes to understand the end of the roman empire and the development of medieval trade, the human side. and then trying to understand how much of a role they to, to,

to item take the. 2 researchers in hills and key are also studying the complexity of human rac relations. scientists want to develop a good rep management system for the finish capital and the li, fuse of the cities rach want threats are often seen as harmful and, and useful. but then again, we have pet rents and laboratory rats. so racks are they have multitude of meanings in human cultures to the present. a relationship between you mentioned rats, is, is quite heated and, and it's always important to look at history and look at the past relationship in order to understand why we have present day conflicts and discussions. often times people compare rats to humans and. 2 say that for us, quite similar to us,

the, the, using the project is laid by to most i below even though the cities rad problem is small, in comparison to other cities. either those team is ambitious and is taking an unconventional approach. when you look at the human evolution, can look the stories that that's what whatever is the situation. humans are able to add up to a mutual standard wymond and no one else that can be rough. i see very much of a similar situation. so the greatest thing with the rest is that how well they can take each situation and thrive. you and then the rest and going laboratory rugs which have been studied for $150.00. yes, for different. good bye bye. a medical uses a lot of the kind of like medical advances that we have,

because human lifespan has us as long as we get to the time of a kind of like medium. so for us to kind of like sacrifice their lives for the for the find the so we know that the rest of them are scared of everything new. but these look like that would be just new for me because i'm scared of everything you but they quite quickly learn what is the truth and what is it does come like it makes it easier to somebody in human environment. so going to like it's more difficult to say in another room so such and such. all right. but makes it very interesting from kind of like in order for the plan, which is quite a few the

understanding. yeah. a lot of different unemotional running around. for example, on the truck place up there, we had mice truck. so gonna buy balancing me last direct trucks, but they ask the smaller the bins and again on here you can see on these truck plays, we have red trucks. so we know the address, i'm moving around here and there is maybe one of the barrels inside the stone wall here. so they're running some of the here and then moving around the car, the car, and in here. so then we're setting up to come over here to see where that can work to make sure that this is a rock and whether it's the individual russell several ranch are very social animals. they bring food to the nations of weak family members. and when forced to choose between rescue and your fellow right and a piece of chocolate experiments show that rats will usually choose to help the

these cities aren't alone. a team in berlin is also interested in the parallel worlds of rach, they're working to assess the use of rec poison in the city sewers. for decades, berlin is bonet ranch, wood road, dentist, sides with severe consequences for the environment. 2 but no one knows that the pesticides are the right approach. and if it makes sense to guard the city with the industrial amounts of rank boys and yeah, the fossils clear. please now started our research project, right? control and sewers. we 1st had to catch at least 60 animals from different populations around for lynn to create a basis for genetic analysis to see if the animals are related the mutation analysis which huffman on that is to connect to, to them. and then we have very little a prior knowledge about wild wraps of mine,

just kind of kind almost as that's why i mean the last one has the most pressing. now for all flower, we had to meet strict requirements for approval as an animal experiment. and it took us a long time to find and the right traps. it has to be animal say, which is a very small market. i was screwed up today. we're placing and beating the traps and so that the animals can get used to them often. once the traps have been accepted, we trigger them and then we'll catch some grabs for genetic testing. we met, we used thermal imaging, cameras and wildlife cameras to select the 2 best methods for above ground and underground. would i see 5 as me told him i was given. 2 the, the vancouver researchers have already reached some surprising conclusions. in the most problematic district were apartment blocks are built on

a great rats move within, clearly defined territories that has some interesting consequences. the 1st phase was sort of a fact finding mission about what the health risks are that routes. how was in think hoover's downtown, the site. so really understanding where the robots and what diseases they carry. 2 we caught 700 rats and identified something like 1200 related relationships. so parents off spring full siblings, have siblings of all of those relationships. there was only about one percent of them that were in different city blocks. and that was quite surprising to see how little they move between blocks and of rats don't move between those blocks. they don't spread their diseases with them. so what we found using laptops for rosa's,

as an example, was that disease is found in some blocks and not others because those blocks are really reflective of family groups. they are reflective of transmission being with in families and that in different blocks you have different families that just don't come into contact with each other. and roads. interestingly enough, also sort of mark the territory for these families. this is my block. you stay in your block, and there's very little contact between the raf families. if we know that rats don't move much among city blocks, you know that your neighborhood rat really is your neighborhood, right. and you can target your management approaches to the scale of the city block the the, the don't get you. we often use this method.