♪ brent: this is "dw news," live from berlin. france's new president emmanuel macron calls for a historic reconstruction of europe. macron was in berlin for a summit meeting today with german chancellor angela merkel. they both agreed to work for what they call deep reforms to the european union. we will have analysis. also, investigators at the u.s. state department say the syrian government has built a crematorium to hide mass killings. they say as many as 50 bodies

are put inside every day. we will go to washington for more. iran per touring for -- preparing for a presidential election. we take a look at the islamic republic's jewish minority and their push for greater rights. ♪ brent: i am brent goff. tonight, a shakeup for the european union. the leaders of the two nations known as the engine of europe, president emmanuel macron of france and chancellor angela merkel of germany, agreed the european union needs deep reform. macron called for what he is calling a historic reconstruction. he was visiting berlin just one day after his inauguration as the youngest president ever of france. reporter: a man on a mission. macron traveled to germany on

his first full day in office determined to make a start on reinvigorating european progress. it has unnerved some german conservatives but chancellor merkel emphasized common ground after talks. she said france and germany want to deepen their relationship and develop a new roadmap for the eu. >> we share the conviction that we cannot just concentrate on the departure of britain. rather how we should focus on how to deepen the existing european union, in particular, the eurozone, to make it more resistant to crises and more coherent. german french projects and the tax system could push the whole of europe to be more coherent. reporter: standing side-by-side, the leaders pledged to modernize the eu, saying this could include changing eu treaties if

necessary. macron said europe was at a historic juncture with a fresh start needed to combat rising populism. >> we need a historic period of reconstruction. i do not underestimate the difficulties that will come with that. our people have different sensibilities and we must find a balance. that can only happen through mutual respect and close collaboration. i believe in this historic reconstruction, i believe in mutual trust. to achieve what we need to, each of us must do what we have to. in france, i need to carry out far-reaching reforms. reporter: when of his biggest challenges at home will be jumpstarting france's sluggish economy. macron has ambitious plans to reform his country's should labor laws but to push them through, he needs his new centrist party to achieve a majority. macron appointed a conservative

lawmaker earlier monday. some see his choice of edouard philippe as an attempt to fend off a right-wing challenge in the upcoming vote. brent: in the studio i'm joined by our political correspondent simon young. i have to ask, why is it so important for the french president that he comes to germany on his first day in office? simon: angela merkel, emmanuel macron. people here are calling this mercron. it is a key relationship between the countries. it is extraordinary. just 24 hours after he has been sworn in he is already here in berlin, and that's before he even has his own cabinet sorted out back home. he has important elections to fight as well. i think it is sending this symbolic message of the importance of this relationship,

the fact that these two countries realize they need each other, they need to be on the same page. there are lots of little and big issues about how they work together, economically, foreign policy, militarily -- all sorts of things where how france and germany work together will be key for the future of europe. brent: who needs whom the most? can we look at it in those terms? simon: yes, of course. there is no doubt that a minimum across wants merkel's backing for his plans to reform. we talked a lot already about his plans. he once a european finance minister, european budget. these are steps -- which in principle are supported by the germans. they believe in europe and are always talking about that, but particularly conservatives and angela merkel's party, do key --

do see concern that germany could be the paymaster for the rest of the european union. that is something they don't want. the german finance minister says countries have got to get their house in order first, including france. brent: that leads me to my final question -- could france become a friend of germany that is simply too expensive? we could go to friend to fre nemy. simon: exactly. der spiegel said that. mr. macron once infrastructure investments to stimulate not just the french economy but also other beleaguered parts of europe. angela merkel's less keen on that.

brent: simon young him a thank you for your insights. we will see you -- simon young, thank you for your insights. we will see you in about 30 minutes. the german government is considering moving its troops out of a turkish airbase. that is after opera denied access to a delegation from germany's parliament. this is the second time this is happened. the airbase is being used in the international offense against the so-called islamic state in syria and iraq. reporter: this is the place german government officials wanted to visit. the airbase in turkey. 260 german soldiers are stationed here. jets and an aircraft are part of a support unit fighting the so-called islamic state. not with weapons, but with aerial imaging.

they warned in about-face would force berlin to reconsider its alliance. >> if turkey were two key blocking german lawmakers is unlikely we would continue to station our troops there. but we hope that turkey will rethink its position. reporter: germany says it is already looking into alternatives, including jordan and cyprus. in berlin, turkey's move is seen as the latest in a string of intolerable affronts. this is another reason are be need to pull out our troops come even if the turkish government were to give in, this proves they have become unpredictable. as both sides with her next move, the airbase has become -- weigh theye next move, the standoff between germany and turkey is becoming increasingly tense. brent: daniel from our business desk is here.

daniel: janel is here to break down the meeting of merkel and macron. the two countries are the cornerstones of the eurozone. what are market watchers looking at? >> macron made a statement that somewhat surprised market watchers. he said he was against eurobonds. eurobonds are a recurring theme within the eurozone. the idea behind them is allowing the eurozone as a block to borrow on behalf of all of its member states by issuing joint bonds. that is supposed to be a way of bringing down borrowing costs from poor eurozone countries like greece because bonds are underwritten by stronger countries like germany. it is also seen as a potential way out of a debt crisis. germany has been fiercely opposed to the idea of eurobonds because he argued it opens up a moral hazard as country stop being responsible for the debt they take on.

being a back to macron -- bringing it back to macron, he was seen as someone who could possibly soften, but he has defied those expectations. but they still have more to do with eurozone fiscal integration. he wants a eurozone budget, a minister for the eurozone. daniel: plenty to discuss for them. briefly, was there any progress made on the front of the criticism of germany's trade surplus? janelle: merkel said she was open to proposal to reciprocity in trade relations between the eu and other non-eu trade partners like china and the u.s. the german trade surplus is a hot topic. you have donald trump complaining that germany is selling so much more than it buys, and that impacts jobs. the international monetary fund said germany has to combat the

trade surplus. whether merkel's remarks mean we have gone further in that discussion, we will have to see. daniel: we will have more business news later on in full. now back to brent. brent: tonight, the united states is accusing syria of building a crematorium to hide mass killings. the u.s. state department released satellite images allegedly showing the crematorium at the notorious military prison north of damascus. as many as 50 detainees are being killed every day at the prison and that the crematorium was built to dispose of the bodies. here is what the state department spokesman had to say. >> beginning in 2013, the syrian regime modified a building within the complex to support what we believe is a crematorium. as shown in the photos we have distributed to you. although the regime's many

atrocities are well-documented, we believe the building of a crematorium is an effort to cover up the expansive mass murders taking place in the prison. brent: i'm joined now by a fellow at the middle east institute in washington. thank you for joining us. these are some serious accusations. how credible are they? guest: i think it is too early to say that the crematorium is proven or not, or if it is documented or not. however, the atrocities being committed by the syrian regime, especially in that prison, are well documented by many humanitarian and human rights organizations like amnesty. they released a report earlier this week -- this year, titled human slaughterhouse, said the prison is accessible to anyone

and documents all the details of the continuous physical and psychological torture committed by the syrian regime. tens of people being executed every day in that prison. i think today the announcement -- the comments of stuart johns have -- has political messages may be to russia to so that the united states believes assad still will not be part of a solution for the syrian crisis in the long-term and that russia should exercise its influence and put more pressure on the assad regime and its allies, especially iran, which is operating in providing unconditional support for the syrian regime. brent: that is also quite the indictment to make. that would then mean that washington is using the release of these photographs as a

political bargaining tool, if you will, in dealing with iran, turkey, russia, about syria. is it possible to say that they have known about this crematorium for some time and they just chose now to releasing pictures? -- release the pictures? ibrahim: yes, they probably have. the state department usually makes the decision based on political reasons, not only human rights reasons. i think this week there are three important events that could be linked to the comments today. the first one, a few days ago there were talks where stewart himself attended it. then we had the geneva talks tomorrow morning and the visit of the turkish president to washington dc tomorrow. brent: which we will be

following here very closely. thank you very much for taking the time to be here. we appreciate it. ibrahim: thank you. brent: you're watching "dw news." still to come, more news. stay with us. ♪

♪ brent: welcome back. our top story, france's new president emmanuel macron has called for a historic reconstruction of the european union. he was in berlin for a summit meeting with german chancellor angela merkel. both leaders agreed to work for what they call deep reforms in the european union. investigators at the u.s. state department say the syrian government has built a crematorium to hide mass killings. they say as many as 50 bodies are being consigned to the flames every day.

a massive hack attack has paralyzed businesses around the world. we had been hearing about that for about three days. daniel: i hope you back to your computer. it is perhaps the biggest ransomware outbreak in history. hospitals are turning away patients, hospitals -- factories are shutting their doors. reporter: the factory-ish us, grinding to a standstill. 3500 workers were forced to stay home as a result of the attack. many sites have been out of action for days now. plenty of other companies are also suffering. euro poll says 200,000 firms and individuals across 150 countries were hit by the attack, including the german rail firm, a spanish telephone giant, and britain's national health service.

eu institutions were spared the worst of the hacking. but the european commission issued a stark warning. >> the use of cyber attacks for criminal purposes is an increasing threat which requires a coordinated and global response from the eu and its vendor states. reporter: microsoft blames the states government and its intelligence services of stockpiling flaws in software security such as the microsoft windows operating system. this critical information fell into the wrong hands and the damage is so great, the financial fallout has yet to be calculated. daniel: we're going to bring in our wall street correspondent on this one. jens, is the federal government undermining american businesses by exploiting their weaknesses? jens: the damage has been done and now the blame game has started. microsoft does claim, as we heard, that the government agencies are hoarding the

vulnerabilities of the systems and not reporting back to the vendors, and that should change. on the other side, there is also some blame on microsoft, that the company stopped supporting older windows systems and that might be also a reason why we saw those problems. as i said, the blame game is on and it probably take some time before something actually might change. all that back-and-forth over the vulnerabilities of the systems. daniel: this particular attack has started to slow down, but our firms brazing -- are firms bracing themselves for further attacks? jens: people are saying we might see copycats or other cases. the financial times was reported on monday that the second classified cyber weapon has been

stolen. we have to wait for more details but right now people here seem to believe that it is likely that something like that might happen again, and i guess it is also the reason that the stocks of the cyber security companies gained heavily here in the monday session because companies and also some agencies probably would need to prepare for other cases. as i mentioned, the details are still unfolding as you speak. daniel: jens from wall street, thank you very much. that's it for your business news for the sour. -- this hour. brent: here are the stories making headlines around the world. the ivory coast government says it is not negotiating with muteness soldiers. this, after one was killed and

others wounded when mutineers fired on demonstrators. it flared up last week after a dispute over wages. australia is heading to early elections. they agreed in talks with the president that a date for snap elections need to be set. the 30 euros is the new leader of the conservative people's party. they haven't deadlocked over economic issues. -- have been deadlocked over economic. issues -- economic issues. tortoises were likely being smuggled from madagascar are and were stolen. this species is critically endangered because of poaching. iran is due to elect a new president friday. the incumbent is campaigning for

a second term in facing a challenge from five others. he held his biggest rally of the campaign in tehran over the weekend. the vote is being seen as a referendum on his policy and engagement with the outside world, which led to the 2015 deal with world powers on iran's nuclear program. he has held a steady lead but is unlikely to secure the absolute majority needed to secure a runoff ballot. that runoff ballot would take place one week after the first vote. our correspondent is in iran where she will be covering the presidential election for us. she sent us this report on the mood in the jewish community, one of the largest in an islamic country, just ahead of the election. reporter: it is very early in the morning and this residential area looks like many others in central tehran.

but i know i have come to the right place and entered into a different world. the morning prayer has just begun and i watch in silence as dozens -- no long -- the synagogue is one of the more than 20 working synagogues in the capital of iran. tehran is the center of jewish life in iran, housing a deeply religious community. after the 1979 islamic revolution its number decreased significantly, but with almost 9000 members left over the country it is still the biggest church -- jewish parish in the mi israel, and his numbers are growing. jewish life in a country under servia law --

the prayer continues. i leave the synagogue to find out more about this apparent contradiction in why the islamic republic does not raise the religion itself. as people of the book, jews are a recognized minority. that means they can practice their religion freely and drink alcohol. it also involves being set aside in a separate but equal system which is reflected in everyday life. jews can neither hold high offices norby judges, so they are pushing for more rights. we are about to meet demand was responsible for that. -- meet the man who is responsible for that. i find him in a jewish hospital. whenever he's not in parliament seeking to improve the situation of iranian jews. >> there is some limitation --

you can only be a soldier in the army. for example, we want to change this and we are doing our best to change it. reporter: that does not change the way he feels about his country. >> we cannot define nationality only by religion. i was born in iran. my native language is persian. i can only think in version. reporter: when i -- in persi an. reporter: when i asked him about the upcoming election he chooses his words carefully. >> according to the iranians

there is no difference. because everyone [indiscernible] there is no difference according to our religion. in our community there are people from different ideas. reporter: at the synagogue, the morning prayer is over and people are leaving to go about their daily lives. for them, economy is key. the candidate who offers the best solutions to economic problems is most likely to get their vote. in this regard, islamic jews are no different from their islamic countrymen. brent: here's a reminder of our top stories. france's new president emmanuel macron has called for a historic reconstruction of the european union. he was in berlin for a summit meeting with german chancellor angela merkel. both leaders agreed to work for deep reforms in the eu.

investigators at the u.s. state department see the syrian government has built a crematorium to hide mass killing's. they say as many as 50 bodies are being consigned to the flames every day. after a short break i we back to take you through the day. tonight, we're going to have an in-depth look at that meeting of merkel and macron. ♪ [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org]

♪ [theme music] ♪ [theme music] ernabel demillo: welcome to asian american life. i'm ernabel demillo. we're here at the noguchi museum and sculpture garden in queens, which features the works of artists and landscape architect isamu noguchi. in the 1960s noguchi was one of the first artists to move to long island city to create a gallery. today the museum houses nearly two hundred forty works of arts and installations in thirteen galleries including an outdoor sculpture garden. carved granite and basalt sculptures and carefully placed stones allow