>> hello and welcome to global 3000. murder or miscarriage? find out how draconian abortion laws are criminalizing women's bodies. that's our top story. here's what we have coming up. protests -- how a miscarriage -- protests in el salvador when a failed pregnancy lands a woman behind bars. building a ghost town. the bizarre creations of china's property bubble. and meet the dog helping to save

south africa's wildlife. in recent years, the global trend has been torn the removal of legal restrictions on women's access to abortion has been relaxed in a number of countries. but a number of countries -- in asia, africa and south america -- have laws which criminalize abortion altogether, even in cases of rape. of these el salvador is perhaps , the most draconian -- and the most zealous in its prosecution of women suspected of having had illegal abortions. as a result, women are finding that the state regards their miscarriages as murder and in some cases, they go straight from hospital bed to prison cell. >> i got up one morning and went to the bathroom. i must have fainted, because when i woke up i was lying on the floor in my own blood. at the hospital, they told me i was pregnant but that there was no longer a baby inside me.

i didn't even know i was pregnant. they accused me of murdering a defenseless, unborn child. it wasn't a miscarriage, they said. and i was arrested in hospital. the judge wasn't interested in my state of health. all he said was that first i would be going to jail for six months while they investigated the case. >> those six months turned into 12. only then did a civil rights organization manage to get delmi ordoñez released, thanks to an attorney who proved her innocence. conservative el salvador has some of the toughest anti-abortion laws in the world. miscarriages can mean being remanded in custody -- in many cases followed by draconian sentences. 30 or 40 years in prison are the norm rather than the exception.

17 women are currently serving such jail terms. we managed to get permission to speak to three of them. we were accompanied by daniela ramos, an attorney from a women's rights group. as cameras are not allowed inside jail, our report is based on what we witnessed. and what we witnessed was horrendous. this women's prison was built for 700 inmates, but is reported to actually house 2700 women. guadalupe vasquez was jailed 8 years ago. her cell is half the size of a tennis court -- a cell she shares with 216 other inmates, with one toilet between them. in 2007 she suffered a miscarriage. nine months into term, she almost bled to death -- and was then reported to the police by the doctor who saved her. she was given a 30-year sentence. attorney daniela ramos is appalled at the rank misogyny in

the justice system. >> we've received the good news that the superior court has permitted an appeal for pardon for guadalupe, to be voted on in the national assembly. that's a major step, and we hope the politicians use this chance to give guadalupe back her freedom. >> the women jailed on such grounds are all poor and uneducated. most, like guadalupe, are from rural communities. we go to see her mother in a village that is only accessible by foot. the attorney informs her of the upcoming appeal. if hilda does not seem overjoyed, it's because after eight years of seeing her daughter languishing in jail, she simply has no energy left. >> all i know is that my daughter is innocent. if she'd done anything bad, i would have been able to tell.

>> hilda vasquez is 43, and has three other children and five grandchildren. they all miss guadalupe. plus, the few dollars she used to earn were vital to the family. hilda rarely visits guadalupe in jail as she can't afford the $2 ticket for the bus trip. we took her with us to the capital, san salvador, so that she could be present for the pardon hearing. the country's political parties are currently campaigning for the elections in march -- a time when politicians are eager to be seen as humane. no petition for pardon has ever been turned down here before. although none has ever centered on a woman jailed on charges of murdering an unborn child. a small group of protesters are doing their campaigning too, outside parliament -- for guadalupe. hilda is touched to see strangers fighting for her

daughter. >> it's so unfair what they've done to her. 30 years! it's unacceptable for her to have to stay in jail -- to serve this sentence for something she never did. >> today, parliament hears nine appeals for clemency. one man stole a boat, another sold drugs to children. all of them are swiftly granted clemency. as hilda vasquez watches on, her daughter is last up. but instead of immediately voting on a pardon, a debate ensues. some parliamentarians are determined to prevent the abortion laws being compromised by a positive vote. >> a fetus is not some object! in the eyes of our law it's a human being.

this child would have lived. the mother denied it medical treatment. that's her problem. we cannot under any circumstances support this appeal. >> and even after having their say, some politicians continue to try to influence their colleagues' decision on this most contentious of issues. the yes-vote climbs promisingly, only to stop at 42 -- one shy of the majority guadalupe needs. one vote that denied guadalupe her freedom. all hilda has to cling to is her faith. our attorney escort has a more direct message -- >> our entire society is guilty -- all a bunch of machos. we're conditioned to behave like this in schools and at work. >> delmi, from the start of our

report, was released from jail after a year. but her life is no longer the same. society treats her like a pariah. in her case, even her family and life partner disowned her. no one will give her a job. him her only hope is change from the top -- the government. >> el salvador's parliamentary assembly has since issued a pardon in guadalope's case. amnesty international is now calling for the country to review the sentences against all women imprisoned for pregnancy-related complications. >> china's building industry is booming, with 60 million new developments in the pipeline. you might think this would be the kind of news to make a chinese economist's day, but you'd be wrong. experts are now calling for a halt to the building craze which, they warn, is built on a dangerous property bubble. across the country, around

20% of new apartments are left empty, many of them in surreal ghost-towns which serve as little more than giant showrooms for investors out to make a quick profit. from intricate iron balconies to fancy street lights and lavish facades -- there's a distinctly french touch here. >> there's even an eiffel tower. this is not paris but tianducheng in eastern china. this could well be a nice place to live -- although only if you like it very quiet. liu jihuan runs a little restaurant here. four years on, there's still little sign of many potential customers moving into the freshly-built suburb of hangzhou. >> this area has very poor transportation links. nobody wants to live here because it's hard to get downtown to work from here. >> the majority of apartments are vacant -- although most have

been purchased. the owners tend to have little interest in actually moving in, or even renting. the developer has been able to make money because the growing class of upper-income chinese see property primarily as a speculative investment. >> real estate prices have risen so much in recent years that owners have been able to make huge profits in no time at all. renting them out would mean a long-term commitment. many investors prefer to leave the apartments vacant, so that they can sell at short notice for the best possible price. >> "little paris," as tianducheng is known, is just one of many such massive construction projects across the country. billed as new towns, they immediately become ghost towns -- home only to thousands of new homes. one in five new apartments in china are currently vacant! >> then we have 60 million new units in the pipeline.

so imagine 60 million units. china sells around 2.5 million a year, so you can imagine how long that will take to digest. and that's in addition to the 20% that are already empty. so it's too late for moderation. it's time for an abrupt halt. >> but the warnings have yet to be heeded. it's saturday morning in shanghai, and the bus station is full of realtors trying to tempt potential customers with attractive offers. they put on free bus tours for people to see the new construction projects all around the booming megalopolis. people with an average income have to drive an hour from the center to find apartments they can afford. >> i'm looking for an apartment for my son and his new wife. >> these days, getting your own apartment is normal for young couples. many homes are paid for in cash,

with the two families pooling together. the sellers showcase their brave new world in swish presentation centers. instead of individual buildings or blocks, developers here tend to build entire neighborhoods in one go. ultra-modern, but with plenty of green too -- in the model, at least. china's building stock has a reputation for poor quality, however. and buyers have to pay before a single brick has been laid. these model apartments might look the part. but will the finished product actually resemble the promise? but for all the potential pitfalls, for many people real estate remains their best bet. prices are astronomical -- but have they yet to peak? >> i want to keep the apartment empty and hope the price continues to increase. the interest rates at banks are always changing. you can't make money that way. but an apartment is a real, solid investment.

>> tianjin is a two-hour drive southeast of beijing, and is set to be home to a replica manhattan. complete with banks, office towers, hotels and residential complexes. the local government invested billions in the undertaking, much of it squandered. some building contractors have since gone bankrupt. what's left is an investment graveyard, with little appeal for new residents. >> how do all investment bubbles work? as long as people make money from them, it's great. it's great for the government to invest all this money and build all this stuff. it pumps the economy when you get a billion dollars from a bank to spend on cement and steel and led lights and solar. things like that. you give it to the companies in your community, and they all employ people, and everybody has money and they buy cars and go to casino, and it's great.

and then it's not. >> and those doubts likewise apply to this project -- english-style thames town, on the outskirts of shanghai. most apartments are empty, as are the shopping strips. at weekends it's lively indeed -- flooded with tourists, especially newly-weds looking for a photo shoot with an exotic backdrop. the best selling point about the complex is the facade. >> whilst china's property bubble may have had some uniquely surreal manifestations, it is by no means the only one. in order to place it in context, our dw data bots have been doing a spot of number-crunching for you. here's this week's global number. >> experts have been warning for years of a real estate bubble in and around london. already among the highest in the world, property prices in some neighborhoods have risen by 340% over the last decade. a housing subsidy program

launched by the british government is facing criticism, due to fears it is exacerbating the boom -- and the bubble. detroit would love to have such a luxury of a problem. the former industrial powerhouse filed for bankruptcy in 2013. its population has dropped by 1.2 million since the city's heyday in the 1950's. but "motor city" remains upbeat despite the downturn. vegetables are now grown where derelict buildings were torn down. the low costs have also attracted start-ups and young creative minds to the city. the most expensive place on the planet is currently monaco. a square meter of property will set you back around 91,000 euros. the tiny principality has only two square kilometers of land. the city-state surrounded on three sides by france is now expanding in the only direction it can.

by 2024 an entire new neighborhood is set to arise, on land reclaimed from the sea. >> south africa's cape floristic region is home to around 7000 unique species, making it one of the most biodiverse areas on earth. its ecological importance is hard to overstate. nevertheless, deforestation, fires, pollution, intensive farming, and expanding urbanization are putting this habitat at risk. that's bad news for the geometric tortoise. already endangered, it needs all the help it can get. >> brin is a belgian shepherd dog, and an expert tracker, thanks to her nose. she specializes in tortoises. brin and her minder vicki hudson work for cape nature, a

government organization that monitors rural reserves in south africa's western cape province. >> we are trying to look for the geometric tortoise, the most endangered tortoise in south africa and possibly also in the world. it's very difficult to find. it's camouflaged really well and it's very shy, so any disturbance and it hides away. visually it is very difficult to find, but we use the dog which has a sense of smell as an additional tool to find these tortoises, 'cause as they are moving they leave a scent. >> the species are rare indeed -- so rare that even brin has trouble sniffing out a specimen. the encroachment of highways is just one of many threats to their survival. finally, she manages to find a tortoise amid all the vegetation. her dedication was not in vain.

>> the geometric tortoise is currently being upgraded by the iucn guidelines as critically endangered due to their very small population size as well as the threat to their habitat. so the habitat fragmentation and the habitat loss are the two major threats to the tortoises. >> the population of geometric tortoises is estimated to have now fallen below the 1000 mark worldwide. where cape nature comes in is buying up land through the help of sponsors to preserve the habitat of the tortoises, the last of their species. for brin and vicki, today only turns up the one success story. not far away, vicki's colleague tony marshall surveys the consequences of one of the bushfires that plague this region.

this fire destroyed the vegetation on half the mountain. >> there are basically three reasons for the increasing number of fires. it's burgeoning population. there are a lot more people close to the vegetation. there is a lot more alien vegetation around, which is making higher fuel loads. and then of course the climate seems to be getting hotter and drier, which results in more fire. >> but to combat that threat of bushfires, cape nature has firefighters on call and in action around the clock. >> good morning. how are you? very good. how's it going? >> fire fighters in working on fire basically follow the three aspects of integrated fire management. it's fire prevention, which is awareness raising, community counseling. going into the communities and educating and informing the people.

the protection aspect is looking at fire breaks which these people are presently doing. the fire suppression aspect is actually going out when a fire does occur. >> the group's conservation efforts also mean jobs for local people. the firefighters get quality training, meaning they can later work for public fire brigades. they also gain a lot of insights about the nature around them. >> now i see differently because i've learned a lot from cape nature, from working on fire. every time, there are new things that comes up, like in nature. i've learned about the trees, the kind of trees that we have here in our environment. things that i didn't know before. >> the cape floristic region is one of the biological wonders of the world. it's home to 9,000 species of plant, more than a tropical rainforest. and the majority can only be

found here. for tony marshall, protecting this treasure trove is a labor of love. tony: if for whatever reason this habitat should be destroyed or get lost, the world would definitely be a poorer place and it warrants and needs urgent conservation. >> which is why cape nature tries to recruit farmers such as tom turner to their cause. he has a vineyard, but also fields that he no longer uses intensively. cape nature persuaded him to leave part of his land to nature. >> all the fire we had. >> yes. >> you guys are over here. >> for the farmer, it's a win-win situation. >> we basically reuse our asset

of wildlife. instead of farming cattle and sheep which you are sell only when they are going to the market, we sell game drives and tourism products which we reutilize our products be taking photographs of them. the stewardship program has been very beneficial. >> kerry purnell is very pleased with how the program is progressing, with private land-owners now a key player in the country's conservation efforts. >> 80% of threatened ecosystems in south africa belong to private landowners. so we really need to get them on board so we can expand our protected areas in the western cape. we have 102 signed stewardship contracts in the last 12 years and the program is doing very well. >> and with further stewardships to be assigned in the future, the result is a growing network of private and public nature reserves, where the flora and fauna of the western cape will finally have the space they need to survive. >> for the latest updates from our global ideas reporters follow us on twitter, @dw_globalideas.

just time now for global living rooms. today's destination, the moroccan capital, rabat. ♪ ♪ >> my name is nora djemouni. welcome to the riad dar zahour. it's nice and cool in here in the summer. and in the winter it's nice and warm.

i have many pairs of slippers in various colors. but because i'm so small, i prefer shoes with heels. slippers don't have heels! tea is to us moroccans what wine is for europeans. you'll find tea in every home. we drink it all the time! for us, it's like our very own personal wine. i really like my house. i like maintaining traditions.

most people prefer to live in apartments. not me. i love these big rooms with high ceilings and all the ornamentation. plus the high doors. the doors and windows are from the 16th century. we haven't changed a thing. i adore my king, so i put his photo on the wall here. i hope i'll be able to welcome you back to dar zahour another time. au revoir. >> that's all from global 3000 this week. thank you very much for watching, and goodbye.

[upbeat twangy music] ♪ >> ♪ world go away >> hank cochran is, without a doubt, one of the greatest songwriters ever on earth. >> ♪ and i fall to pieces

>> it's important historically that people know who hank cochran was and what he did, and he always wanted to be the hemingway of country music, and i think he did it. >> it's stunning when you look at the body of work that he was able to accomplish and stay relevant for so long. that's way out of the ordinary. >> ♪ i've got everything ♪ everything but you >> they will be recording hank cochran songs way down the line and probably not even know who he was. >> i think it's really important for people to understand where country music came from and the era of the '50s and '60s, which is hank cochran, harlan howard, willie nelson, roger miller. these guys set the standard for writing songs. >> ♪ don't you ever get tired

♪ of hurting me ♪ he was responsible, really, for me going to nashville and getting a job writing for pamper music. hank had a lot to do with me getting started. >> i met hank. he reached out his hand and had a cd that already had my name on it. i kind of gathered that this wasn't by chance. >> shortly after he first met him, hank was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, so for the two years he lived after that, jamey would get off the road and pull his bus right up to the hospital, ran up to see hank, raise hank's spirits, and just--he was always--always around. up to the night hank died, he was here. >> ♪ now tell me ♪ would these arms ♪ be in your way >> it was shortly after hank died i got a text message, and it was from jamey, and he said, "would you mind if

i did a hank cochran album?" so i couldn't believe it, you know. >> ♪ so lay ♪ all your doubts aside ♪ when you go to bed tonight >> he should be in the country music hall of fame. he was very influential in setting the bar for all the writers that we have coming down the line. >> well, he was pretty much the foundation as a songwriter for a long time. >> you know, he was really an artist who chose not to be an artist. all of the artists respected his ability to perform a song. the singers wanted to see if they could just sing that good. i know i did. >> if i had to dream up somebody like hank to influence songwriters, i couldn't have done a better job. he influenced you not only as an artist and songwriter, but also just as a person. [upbeat twangy music] ♪

♪ >> memphis, tennessee. it has been written, music were religion, then memphis would be jerusalem and sun studio its most sacred shrine. and you are here with reverend horton heath! ♪ >> i'm jim heath, and i play guitar, and i'm a tax complier. [ laughter ] my bass player is jimbo