anchor: the refugee crisis is putting european solidarity to the test. the european commission will present it plan for the fair distribution, but several countries have already said that a permanent quota system was already unacceptable. among those -- poland, hungary, and the czech republic. among those who support the sweden, andance,

germany. let's listen to german chancellor angela merkel. chancellor merkel: we welcome the proposition that jean-claude juncker will present tomorrow, the decision to share a set number of asylum seekers between eu countries is an important first step. but there is still a ways to go because these people cannot just be shared between germany and sweden. what we need is a system of quotas whereby those who have the right to asylum are shared between eu member states. "nchor: every day, "france 24 chester but a human face on europe's refugee crisis. our reporters have been traveling from greece where many migrants start their journey towards germany bringing you there stories, their hardships, and their hopes. today, we ask a simple question -- what is it like for women traveling this route? here is the report.

reporter: on the road to a better life. when she got a rickety boat to greece, she thought she would die. now, the arabic literature germanyis on her way to where she hopes to become a writer, but it was the birth of her two-month-old son that drove her to undertake the journey. had decided to stay in syria, we would have condemned his future. even though it is an arab country, he will not have a better future than in europe. in europe, they respect human rights. that future is expensive. sheep on her jewelry, and her husband sold their car to be the trip.nd

including smugglers fees, the couple will spend 5000 euros each. others leave their homes to save their husbands. wasislamic state group closing in on her and her husband was in danger, but the journey was not what she expected. unable to leave hungary, the family slept on a piece of .ardwood for days, her four-month-old son was sick. >> my son was suffering a lot. i would like to leave for him and for my husband who was a soldier. he refused to fight and kill people. people want peace, but -- reporter: the next night, she was able to board a bus to vienna. at the border between austria and hungary, a teacher from damascus could hardly believe she had almost made it to germany.

she is happy her family of five finally made it to austria, but she worries about those she left behind. >> i'm far away from my family. they are in syria in a war, a country in crisis with many problems. it is very hard for me to leave them, especially because i'm the only daughter. i had to choose between my parents and my children, the future of my children. reporter: her eldest daughter wants to study psychology. she herself hopes to teach again . on sunday, they reached hamburg, one step closer to those dreams coming true. anchor: we're joined now live by one of the authors of this report who is currently in germany and stuttgart. good evening to you. honestly, it was heartwarming

seeing the woman smile at the end of your report. how is it different following this journey when you are a woman as compared to when you are a man? what differs for women? obviously, it's a hard journey for either sex, but what we've been seeing on the road is that it is physically harder for women. on that much, you can see that at the back, there was just a lot of women. one of the reasons is mostly, they are carrying children, mostly young children, so that brings a whole new raft of problems with it, for example, how to breast-feed if you are sleeping outside or in a public space. changing diapers. women usually take charge of the children if they are with them on the route, so that also makes .t more taxing for the women if you look at the number of people fleeing from syria, looking at neighboring countries, 50% or even more are

female refugees, but the hardship of the journey makes the number even far lower. a heartwarming thing on this journey is that we found women who were willing to make a better future not only for their children but also for themselves. any people have talked about the desire to study, to work. they want to be part of europe, work in europe and change their lives for themselves as well as future generations. much andhank you very keep those reports coming. we enjoy seeing them every day. to let viewers know, you are traveling to northern europe, heading to calais in france, also one of the symbols of this migrant crisis. thousands of migrants waiting to cross into the u.k. there. france has carried out its first surveillance lights over syria. the policy change was announced yesterday by the french president and will likely pave the way for air raids against islamic state group fighters. president hollande -- >> i can

confirm that the decisions announced by president hollande yesterday have been followed up .y concrete action he spoke of a reconnaissance flight over syria and added that tose flights will serve deter action that will be taken when the time comes, and we will tell you when that time comes. france has two airbases in the region in jordan and the united arab emirates. tuesday's reconnaissance flight took off from the uae-based. -- the uae base. drone raids took place in august but had been kept secret until yesterday when the british prime minister revealed that the individuals had been killed the cause were allegedly plotting attacks against the u.k. the british drone raids are criticized by some as a dangerous precedent that could

be legally challenged since a did not have parliamentary they did notince have parliamentary approval. 'sporter: the u.k. parliament first day back after summer break and with it, the revelation of an unprecedented airstrike on syrians oil -- syrian soil. its target, a british citizen fighting for islamic state. heafter meticulous planning, was killed in a precision airstrike carried out on august 21 by a remotely piloted aircraft while he was traveling syria.hicle in reporter: killed alongside him, fighters,i.s. group one of whom was also british. both had previously appeared in propaganda material. david cameron explained to a packed house of commons that

they too had been planning barbaric attacks against the west including attacks on public commemorations in britain. reactions in britain are polarized. "the daily" is backing cameron, at "the guardian" warns of dangerous precedent being set -- "the daily mail" is backing .ameron cameron justified the killings as an act of self-defense under article 51 of the united nations charter, the first time the clause has been invoked for a targeted killing. amid questions over the legality of this broader interpretation of self-defense, the british defense secretary insisted it would be the way of things to come. >> there are other terrorists involved in other plots that may come to fruition over the next few weeks and months, and we would not have to take similar action again. reporter: cameron has said he

supports bridge extending its bombing campaign against the islamic state group to syria -- he supports britain expanding its bombing campaign against the islamic state group to syria. anchor: let's address this debate with our guest from london, who joins us over the phone. you are a director of international security studies at the royal united services institute. purely from an operational perspective, how efficient are the east road strikes, how necessary are they for the u.k. to protect its own security -- how efficient are these drone strikes? >> any professional you talk to will tell you these strikes give you a reach an capability to hit people that is otherwise very difficult to do. to launch this sort of targeted mission when you take out certain individuals from a battlefield, it is something you would have to do with soldiers on the ground and it would require a dangerous operation.

this way, you can take the individual out without putting people in harm's way. anchor: if we draw a parallel with what the united states has been doing, they have had drone wars going on in several parts of the world, and some have questioned the efficiency of those operations. where do you come down on that debate? >> i think it is different for each context. there's no denying the fact that the campaign of drone strikes, special operations raids and target intelligence operations against al qaeda has considerably reduced fat specific group cost -- that specific group's ability to act and move, but if we look at yemen, for example, there is evidence that there has been an awful lot of collateral damage and civilians who may have been killed. also, even worse, people on the ground may have been using the

american information about individuals to take out rivals, so in the end, the u.s. inns of hitting people who are not even really a problem. favors david cameron expanding britain's military operations currently taking place in iraq to syria, meaning air raids on islamic state fighters in syria. how efficient would that be? with that represents a turning point? -- would that represent a turning point? >> the u.k. is involved in strikes against isis and iraq already. we are seeing other countries already involved. the united states is quite openly undertaking attacks within area proper, so in some ways, the u.k. extending its role in that direction is not entirely surprising.

what we are really seeing is the government deciding to accelerate that conversation in the public space. we had not in much debate about this. the u.k. is coming up to some political inflection point, and it seems clear that the cameron administration wants to ramp up what it is doing and syria and iraq, and this gives them a way of encouraging that greater conversation. in terms of tactical utility and the specific impact of this strike, it is difficult to know for sure. the individuals that have been taken out for instigating isrorist plots abroad, which where we see a dangerous picture at the moment, but it is not clear it will have a material change on the ground. thank you very much for breaking it down for us. from the royal united services institute, thanks a lot. turkey's war on pkk rebels is spreading well beyond its borders. turkish forces crossed into northern iraq pursuing kurdish

fighters. this comes after rebels mounted several devastating attacks forces.turkish security at least 15 police officers were killed today in two separate attacks. >> turkish troops on her 16 other comrades killed by a road side bomb on hyundai -- turkish troops on her -- turkish troops their comrades. >> the unity of this nation, anyone responsible for each and every drop of blood that is shed will be brought to account. ,> in the wake of this attack -- [indiscernible] on tuesday, the government announced it was sending special ground forces to seek out the kk fighters in northern iraq, stressing it would be a short-term mission. this after two separate pkk

attacks. several were injured when a rocket propelled grenade hit , and overred vehicle a dozen officers were killed in an attack on their minibus. clashes between kurdish separatists and government forces have escalated in recent days. the government and the pkk have been on war footing since their cease-fire broke down. the probe kurdish peoples democratic party said over 100 of their buildings around the country were attacked on monday. the unrest comes as the country prepares for snap elections set for november. the white house

continues to seek support in congress for the iranian nuclear deal. three democratic senators announced they would support the agreement, bringing the total number of supporters in the senate to 41 out of 100. we find out what this means for the nuclear deal. right, he will tell us what that means in our later editions . a massive sandstorm has engulfed large parts of the middle east, even stretching to egypt. you'll see pictures from cairo cairo's cityter -- center. if you know the city, you'll see it's unrecognizable. it even turned deadly 11 on latina people died. in neighboring syria, it partially disrupted military operations. jerusalem's mountain of all its is usually a perfect spot from which to look out on the city. not so at the moment. hayes --eloped by fake

by thick haze. lebanon, too, has been severely affected. >> since yesterday, 50 patients have come to the hospital because of the sandstorm. old people and asthma patients are being admitted because of dust entering their lungs. we are treating them. >> the vast dust cloud comes from iraq. it is significantly thicker than usual and is rare for this time of year. authorities throughout the region are advising the frail and elderly to stay indoors. >> today, because of the dust and bad weather, the ministry of education has decided to let us go home early. we are not used to weather this bad. reporter: next door in syria, damascus, aleppo, and homes --

homs are particularly affected. the extreme weather has noticeably reduced the number of regime airstrikes with planes unable to fly in such low visibility. of the topeminder stories -- divisions in europe over a mandatory quota system. the eu commission will formally present its plan on thursday. 100,000 asylum-seekers could be spread out across the union. turkey's war against kurdish rebels spread across the region. anchor a sense special forces into iraq to pursue pkk fighters after new rebel attacks that left at least 15 policemen dead in turkey. and a massive sense norm sweeps across parts of the middle east. sweepsssive sandstorm across parts of the middle east. it killed to do people in lebanon and disruptive fighting .nd airstrikes in syria all right, i promised to you

earlier that markus karlsson would be back for more business news. deliver. good evening. what do you have for us? markus: we will start with lust fthansa lust anza -- lu and its pilots union. in 18 months as pilots walked off the job once again earlier this tuesday. 's 170 of lufthasa long-haul flights were grounded, and it is set to get even worse. we have more details on this .ery bitter standoff >> deadlock once again. for the 13th time in the last saar and a half, a lufthan pilots union has walked off the job. wednesday, hundreds of sa andhaul lufthan

germanwings flights will be grounded. >> we have used this noodling tactic in the past and will do so this time again. lufthansa does not budge, there could be other scenarios in the future, though we have to decide this at short notice. >> the union's 5000 pilots say they are willing to raise the toirement age from 55 to 60 contribute to cost-cutting goals, but they will only agree to go back to the negotiating table if the airline stops on non--union contracts. we arere determined going to take all measures possible in this situation. we've made various offers over

the last days on open questions. the union could have taken up negotiations with us. >> strike action has cost the airline's some 100 million euros since the start of the year. thansa sought an injunction earlier to end the strike, but it was rejected. as i said on wins a, we are looking at roundabout 1000 cancellations when it comes to those flights out of germany and into germany as well. next, the european commission has cleared general electric has planned takeover of alstom's energy business. the approval ends months of uncertainty. lstom agreed last year on the deal, but the commission said later that it was worried the deal would skew competition in the european markets. in the end, the deal was approved with some conditions. general electric will have to sell off the heavy-duty gas

turbines to an italian firm. let's listen in now to the reasoning behind this decision. here is the competition commissioner. thatr analysis showed without this divestiture, there was a risk of alstom turbines to disappear from the future european markets, and therefore, of course also for very important european technology to disappear from european markets. that is quite obvious -- a great risk of choice going down and prices going up anchor:. a fresh batch of data suggest the euro zone economy is strengthening and shrugging off concerns of greece and slower growth in china. german exports and imports, for instance, grew by more than expected during the month of july.

imports to germany grew by 2.2% to more than 80 billion. both of those figures are the highest since records began in germany back in 1991. by .4%ozone expanded between april and june, higher than a first estimate of .3%. withrowth rate was in line the larger european union. the updated estimate brought little joy for france, however, with its economy flatlining airing the second quarter. let's stick to france and to that theme of growth. the french president has announced his intention to reform the french labor code. his stated aim is to make it easier to hire and do business in france. it has been welcomed by french companies, but trade unions are not so sure. pages,uns to over 3500 the french labor law, detailed

for some, over comp located others. francois hollande declaring he wants it to be signified without damaging the protection it offers french workers. >> were going to broadly open the field of social dialogue between workers and employers. trust me, at the end of this process, what we call the labor law will be not just measured in the number of its pages but will be adapted to the needs of business. >> the plan is to facilitate negotiations between employee and employer on working hours, wages, working conditions, and the job itself. a signification broadly welcomed by employee groups who say the labor market's rigidity hurts their ability to hire. law covers an abundance of themes. too many. it has stifled initiative in the work lays. it allows the different actors directly concerned to take into their hands their own future. for us, that is a good thing. >> the french president and his

associate government will be wary of angering the left wing. in order to appease them, changes will need to be approved 50% of trade unions, and three key fields will remain out of bounds. the 35-hour working week, minimum wage, and employment contracts, which in france often provide open-ended job security. despite those concessions, some unions are already digging in their heels. beemployees will longer equal in front of the law. depending on their employer, workers will not be covered by the same labor law. >> francois hollande has promised to move fast. the new deal is expected to be ready within months. >> we will look at the markets next. shares in china staged a rally, which rolled over into europe and the united states. let's bring you up-to-date with american shares this hour. a real boost as the american markets are catching up after the labor day holiday on monday. we are seeing ge shares trading

higher as well after that deal was cleared by the european commission, the deal for als tom. that show you where european markets set up shop. a pretty healthy looking bounce wa

09/08/15 09/08/15 [captioning made possible by democracy now!] amy: from pacifica, this is democracy now! >> i would like to take this opportunity given to me by new zealand to express my deepest for theand apologize accidental death. amy: thirty years ago, french secret service blew up greenpeace's rainbow warrior