>> hello and welcome back to the france 24 newsroom. i'm thomas waterhouse. these are the latest world headlines. search and rescue teams continue to hunt for survivals -- survivors following deadly mudslides in colombia. 254.eath toll is that figure could rise. the u.s. president plans to reboot or lateral relations with

egypt. he is gearing up to host talks with his counterpart at the white house later this monday. middle east peace and international terrorism will be high up their list of talking points. protest leaders in french guiana reject an offer of one billion euros of aid from the government days of in a bid to end strikes and rallies. the prime minister is scrambling ministers for urgent talks on the issues. an army of over 1000 soldiers, police and volunteers are racing to find anyone still alive following deadly mudslides this weekend in colombia.

the president announced the death toll now stands at at least 254. 43 of them are children. a torrent of mud and debris swept through the town with little warning after days of heavy rain. more on those ongoing rescue efforts. desperate for news, residents gather outside the cemetery where forensic teams have been identifying the bodies of those caught in the mudslides. we are here waiting to see if the medical examiners are able to speed up the release of the bodies. only some have been identified by family members. >> many are still in shock after torrential rain swept away homes , bridges and trees and buried whole neighborhoods in mud. the colombian president has vowed to personally oversee

relief efforts. he has already sent more than 1000 troops to the region as part of a national emergency response. >> the mobilization has been massive. this spontaneous reaction from millions of colombians shows the character and generosity that sets up apart all of those who have mobilized and shown up to help, thank you very much. >> search and rescue teams have also been deployed to help take through the rubble and help those desperately searching for love ones. surrounded by three rivers, the town's vulnerable to flooding. at least 17 city districts in the province have been affected by the heavy rain. colombian officials have pledged aid to rebuild homes and help those communities hardest hit by the flooding. america,g with south it looks like 10 years of leftist rule will continue in ecuador.

with all the votes counted in the presidential runoff, the national electoral council says the socialist has bagged 51% of the votes. his rival took to the streets of the capital with scuffles breaking out with police. he is calling for a recount. >> it was a nailbiting vote count with candidates coming neck -- neck and neck. electoral authorities finally declared the socialist victorious. >> 48.85%.

51.15%. his rival immediately demanded a recount alleging fraud. possible that on the 19th of february the electoral commission said it takes four days to have the results of the presidential election. pretending that in 20 minutes 90% of the votes were counted. >> ecuadorians had to choose between a right-winger who campaigned on a pro-austerity program and establishment candidate, a close ally of the outgoing president. the 40 just short of percent needed to win outright in the first round of voting in february. it's a good result for wikileaks

founder julian assange, who has been living in the ecuadorian embassy in london since 2012. he will remain welcome. >> the door to the oval office was always shut to him during barack obama's administration. this morning the egyptian president will finally hold talks with donald trump. he has often been criticized for his human rights record. he is set to discuss the middle east peace process and the global fight against the islamic state group. more on what we can expect from his visit to washington this monday. our correspondent is standing by in cairo. what are egyptian authorities hoping to get out of this white house meeting? seesypt releases -- really

this as a key moment to mend the relationship which is soured under obama. he partially froze the military aid they receive every year over concerns for human rights abuses. he will likely want to have those conditions dropped. he will also be asking for more advanced military hardware. he is also bringing a trade delegation to discuss economic investments. it is facing its toughest challenge in decades after the have the value of the egyptian pound. really putting a huge pressure on the poorest here in egypt.

he will be offering help in the region and forms of fighting terrorist. donald trump has made no secret of saying he is a fan of the egyptian president. raise the dare to issue of his human rights record? >> this is something that rights groups have been pressing the u.s. to be doing. citizen,rican egyptian a man is in jail here facing a lifetime of imprisonment in a case human rights watch calls a travesty. veryll likely not be important to trump. white house officials said they did not want to press human rights issues and would pursue it in a private and discreet

way. trump sees egypt as an ally that is tough on terrorism. he might be willing to drop human rights conditions on military aid as trump has already done with bar rain. -- bahrain. beis unlikely trump will pursuing that given the statements he has made supporting him in the past. >> that's all we have time for. thank you. hasfrench prime minister called a special meeting in discuss the ongoing crisis in french guiana. protest leaders and strike organizers have rejected an offer of one billion euros of aid from the french government, saying that some just isn't enough to solve the territory's chronic social and economic problems. unions are demanding the heftier

figure of 2.5 billion euros. not good enough. that's what labor leader is said to the french government over their proposed one billion euro aid package for french guiana. they want to .5 billion and immediately. called forsentatives massive strikes to continue in the french territory. are calling on all business owners to close up shop. we are going to block everything with force. this is not against the population. please excuse us. it is meant to show our determination. >> after negotiations with the french overseas ministers, the government had been proposing more military police in the next three years, 300 million euros for infrastructure and 400 million for education. several million have been

allotted for health and agriculture. a with the proposal wasn't just monetary but how the over one billion euros in aid would be rolled out over years. is offering an emergency plan over five to 10 years. an emergency is taken care of over 10 years that i have to be worried. after rejecting the proposals, labor groups said they will continue striking, turning their focus ticky on a spaceus to gu center. >> less than three weeks to go before voters in france have their say on who they want to become the new president. marine le pen was in the southwest city for her latest campaign event.

she told crowds the forthcoming poll could herald a change in civilization. she described the euro currency she wants to get rid of as being a knife in the ribs of the french people. said theeft candidate french no longer found him frightening at his latest campaign rally. >> they are on opposite ends of the political spectrum. the far right and the far left. at rallies this past weekend both try to win over voters that are fed up with the mainstream party. in this election we are faced between the choice of civilizations. on one side there is france and on the other there is a disaster. an endless slide into decline. go, 40%t three weeks to of voters are still undecided. past theneady the

walk them on. -- then walkmong eked past benoit amon. we must not give up on the enthusiasm that has ceased us on the idea which a victory that seemed impossible but is now more realistic. >> the next man to be in the polls is francois fillon in third place. he has been plagued by corruption scandals, making room for emmanuel macron to take the lead. there will be no second-round runoff in serbia's presidential elections after the prime minister secured over 50% of the vote in sunday's first round.

the 47-year-old former radical nationalist declared that is andory is crystal clear shows which way the country should be headed. he campaigned hard on his economic record and on a promise to have serbia join the european union. with 55% of the vote it was a clear victory. serbia's prime minister swept to power in the first round of presidential elections. today is a very important today. it's important that serbia showed a direction in which it wants to go. victory is crystal clear. no one can complain or misinterpret it. the difference is not small. i have one 12% more than other candidates. build onl be hoping to

his track record as prime minister. he achieved 2.8 percent growth in 2016. unemployment remains high and the average income is 330 euros a month. he is likely to continue serbia's balancing act between the west and russia. he is pro-european union and hopes to lead serbia to join the eu while still keeping close ties with moscow and beijing. showed mostion people are in favor of the continuation of reforms as well as the continuation of the european path to serbia. while keeping our traditional friendship with russia and china. >> his closest challenger took 14% of the vote while the satirical candidate created by an activist came in third with 9%. his win is a political humiliation for serbia's opposition parties.

>> you are watching live from paris here on france 24. quick recap of the main headlines. search and rescue teams continue their hunt for survivors among the dirt and debris following this weekend's deadly mudslides in colombia. the death toll stands at 254 but that figure is set to rise. u.s. president plans to reboot my lateral relations with egypt. he's gearing up to hold talks with his counterpart at the white house. peace andt international terrorism will be on their list of talking points. leaders in french guiana rejected an offer of one billion euros of aid from the government here in paris in a bid to bring an end to days of strikes and rallies. the prime minister is scrambling ministers for urgent talks. time for some business news.

you are starting out with the first anniversary of the palomar pitbull -- papers scandal. from a law firm related to journalists. they revealed an intricate web corruption and triggered seismic regulatory shifts in government. the revelations in the panama papers sent shockwaves around the world. first in the central american country itself, which was forced to hastily adopted new legislation and belatedly enlist in the international fight against tax fraud. panama has since joined the multilateral tax treaty. a victory for international organizations that have long demanded greater accountability from governments. thand the globe of more

150 investigations have been opened in 79 countries into money-laundering and tax evasion . the release of the 11 million digital records from law firm have led to regulations closer to home. the problem hasn't gone away. european tax havens is still blocked by luxembourg. 1000 billion euros a year. >> the increased scrutiny on european tax enclaves has put pressure on offshore states like to bahamas and hong kong lift the lid on their own banking transactions. >> after a week of political turmoil south africa has a new

finance minister. what are the broader economic implications of that? we have marty seen the south african rand fall eight .7% last week. today there are no signs of recovery. it was down against the dollar a short while ago. there are fears the country's credit rating is at risk. after replacing the former finance minister, he is already calling for a radical economic transformation that will get the economy working for the people. here he is speaking on that now. >> in the coming weeks and withs i intend to engage business big and small. the establishment. managers and professionals. civil society. we remain very positive about of the south african economy.

>> talk us through how the markets are trading this hour. >> european markets started the week off strong. dax still making a strong showing up nearly .3%. the london ftse was completely flat. the luxury electric car maker tesla has exceeded all expectations on first quarter vehicle delivery. it hit a new quarterly record of 25 thousand vehicles sold. the company said it expects to deliver up to 50,000 vehicles in the first half of 2017. toshiba affairs fell -- shares fell once again this session. media reports the company would miss another deadline for its quarterly earnings. last week shareholders agreed to sell the company's memory chip

is this after its nuclear unit filed for bankruptcy. chip maker imagination technologies has seen shares fall 69% this morning after apple announced it would no longer be using the chips in new products. apple is the client accounting for half of the companies revenue. >> it seems that people weren't jumping at the chance to own one of the u.s. president's former cars. first time ae super car owned by a sitting u.s. president has gone up for auction. ferrari stopped at just $240,000.

>> thank you for that spin through the latest business news this monday. time for our daily flick through the papers. i'm joined by allison sergeant. you are starting out with an interview by donald trump in the financial times. >> he takes a very hard line stance on north korea. the quote been -- that has been making waves is if china is not going to solve north korea, we will. the interview has been picked up by nearly every paper. i pulled out an article in the wall street journal. trump has already been aggressive with china and north korea and has suggested the u.s. could strike north korea preemptively.

>> donald trump is having a meeting later this monday with the egyptian president. >> this is not the first time they have met. they met in the fall before donald trump came president. that's the photo in the egyptian paper. they say egypt is looking for opportunities in his visit to the u.s. an egyptian official says it represents a new stage in the egyptian american relations. not everyone is pleased about this. human rights advocates. there's an opinion piece today that says human rights advocates in cairo and washington are bracing themselves for the love in at the white house between the two presidents. administration had been pretty vocal about criticizing human rights abuses and they are calling on donald trump to do the same. in particular, an american citizen is currently being

detained in egypt on false charges. there's also an interesting article in both seeds that says trumps election dealt a fatal blow to the arab spring. election, the egyptian regime feels it has backing for all of its actions. have a quick word to say about the second round of presidential elections in ecuador. >> the left-wing candidate won the election by a small margin. one local paper says it was a hard-fought victory. theresults came in pollsters gave different figures so both candidates declared they were the winners for a while. he wants to vote to be recounted. there is one person who was very pleased that he did not win and that is julian assange, the founder of wikileaks. he had said he would give julian

assange 30 days to get out of the ecuadorian embassy in london where he has been taking refuge for several years. julian assange sent a sassy tweet to rub the defeat in his face. several papers are focusing on the participation rate. >> voter abstention is going to be the big winner of the election. it may be the lowest in the history of the republic and it could throw off the election results. the right-wing paper says much the same thing on its front page today. while nothing is decided yet. not only is voter turnout expected to be a record low of 40 percent of french people remain undecided on who to vote for. >> the street paper is reporting

that single people in france have gotten rather stingy and miserly when it comes to dating. it is really making fun of single people for being penny pinchers. it's equivalent to pulling out all of the stops. that means you are pulling out just a few of the stops or maybe none of them. french seduction tactics is to invite a date over for dinner at home. french peopleut tend to spend three times less than british people who apparently invests the most in dating in europe. >> thank you very much. if you want to dig deeper into any of the stories covered in the press review you can find more information in detail on our website. france 24.com.

quickgoing to take a break. stay with us. we will be getting the latest from our correspondent in brussels on one of the first diplomatic spats on brexit.