news life from berlin. tonight, the blame game over

britain's plans to exit the eu. after a phone call between angela merkel and boris johnson, a leak in london ignited claims that angela merkel told johnson his pledge leave the eu will not work. the chief ava? we will ask our brexit analyst. also, charges are being brought against the man s suspected of hijajacking a trucuck and crashg it i into a line of f cars heren germany. police a are now looking for a motive. we will bring you an update. the nonobel prize for p physicss been annoued. a trio of s space reseaearcherss fofor the c contributionsns to e ununderstandg ofof how the univiverse has evolved and of te place that earth has in all of it. ahead of germany's match against argentina on thursday, there is a new kid on the block. he has had a hot streak this season which could see him make his first appearance for the

team. ♪ brent: i'm brent goff. to our viewers on pbs in the united states and around the world, welcome. we start with the question, what did she say? did angela merkel really tell boris johnson that a brexit deal probably will happen? that is what a source close to boris johnson has told the british media following a phone call the story between the two. the league has prompted eu council president donatist to warm johnson that brexit should not become a plain bank. -- blame game. >> 23 days until brexit time is running out.

now, it is too late e to reach a deal with the eu. at least that is the latest mood music coming from london area and the british government no longer believes an agreement can be reached and that is coming from downing street area they are blaming angela merkel. donald tusk is oututraged. >> boris johnson, what's at stake is not winning a blame game. what's at stake is the future of europe and the u.k.. you don't want to deal, you don't want an extension, you don't want to revoke. >> that follows a phone call between boris johnson and angela merkel. the chancellor reportedly said an agreement was overwhelmingly unlikely if northern ireland does not remain in the eu customs union. did she really say that? no comment. she kept quiet on the subject later in berlin. the british government is making

a big deal out of the phone call. essentially saying if this is the new eu position, in principle an agreement would be impossible. that would make johnson's rush to present new proposals a waste of time. the eu remained unconvinced that they would do away with the need for border controls between northern ireland and ireland and in that case, brussels could not do without the backstop and a customs union with northern ireland. after meeting with boris johnson, he said no progress had been made. there were only two options left . an extension or no deal. >> take the story to london. it looks like boris johnson's plan to renegotiate the brexit deal before october 31 is not

working out. the question tonight, what does a prime minister who once said he would rather be dead in a ditch than ask for a delay to brexit, what is he to do nowow? >> bororis johnson himself still maintains that the eu, the u.k. is leaving the 31st of october. he also says he still wants a deal and he wants the offer from the u.k. that she says it was a significant step and a compromise. he does not agree with any sentiment from the eu that that was not a real offer. however, we don't know what he's going to do because parliamament has legislated against leaving without a deal. he maintains that he will leave on the 31st of october. that is only three w weeks from now. we will have to wait for his

actions and whether he will go to t the eu and ask for an extension because it is the law. he would be breaking the law in the u.k. if he did not do that. flex the british prime minister cannot or should not or may not break the lalaw. britain's parliament has passed a law to prevent a no deal brexit. checkmate boris johnson or notot question m mark >? boris johnsof options. one is what the eu would find nasty and is already not going down very well at all. that he has hinted or r sources arouound him have hinted that te uk's could pressure otheher eu countries to veto a deal be to an extension. if t the u.k. asked for an extension which he is bound to do by law. then the eu has to accept it.

brent: we lost the signal. unfortunately, it looks that we have lost our signal to london. we apologize for that. we will try to get reestablished if we can. now to hong kong where the territories chief executive carrie lam says that she has not ruled out asking china's military for help in quelling the territories ongoing unrest. for months, protesters has staged demonstrators -- our correspondent is looking into what businesses and he come a target for demonstrarators. >> protesters attack a china mobile shop. dozens of businesses in hong kong have been vandalized during clashes.

protesters often target companies from the mainland such as the state owned telecom providers, the big chinese banks and other industries tied to the beijing government. there are less obvious choices like this famous u.s. coffee brand. starbucks has been one of the top targets. this one has been vandalized twice. first, they trashed the entrance then the next day, the company set up these panels to protect it then the protesters took down these panels and continued trashing the shop. >> it feels saddening and frustrating at the same time. >> the consequences due to the government which didn't listen to the citizens. >> online group protesters push their thoughts about choices of targets area it seems starbucks

to the rest of the protesters when the founders daughter held a speech at the un's human rights council denouncing the protests. she has distanced herself from her statement saying she holds no official position in the business but to no avail. the logic of conflict has reached hong kong's busininesses between the ire of the protesters and repercussions on the chinese market, many of them are facing a tough choice. for this starbucks branch, the only thing to do now is to rerenovate and hope that they wl not be targeted a third time. >> here are some other stories. in ecuador, thousands of indigenous people have joined demonstrators in clashes with security forces. the protests have driven the president to move the administration out of the capital, quito.

the protests kicked off after the government cut fuel subsidies. only seven eu countries have agreed to join a plant that would fast-track the processing and distribution of migrants rescueued from the m mediterran. interior ministers meeting in luxembourg hope to recruit more countries to join the plplan. germany and france led the effort to satisfy demands by italy and malta. they claim other countries should take more migrants in. turkey says it is ready for an offensive against syria's k kurs that f flows donalald trump'ss decisi t to pull troops out of northern syria. trust now facing accusations that he has abandoned k kurdish forces who were key u.s. allies in the fight against the islamic state. prosecutors here in germany have charged a man who hijacked a truck and crashed into a line of cars with attempted murder. nine people were injured in that incident. it happened overnight in the

western germantown. police quickly detained the driver. they have identified him as a syrian national has been living in germany since 2015. the motive has yet to be determined. >> this is the truck that rammed into seveveral cars in the westn german city on whahat -- monday. police believe the person at the wheel pulled the original driver out of his cab. there was speculation that the case might be connected to terrorism that federal officials have dismissed the possibility for now. >> my latest information says that at the moment, there i is o grounds s to say there is a terrorist that ground to this event. that is the status at the moment. the truck's driver was a 32-year-old syrian national. he arrived in germany in 2015 and was apparently known for assault and drug charges.

>> police have detained the person behind the wheel of the truck. at the moment, we are investigating the reason for the collision a and of course everything else necessary to determine what happened here. >> police searched to apartments last night. the collected possible l -- evidence including what -- mobile phones and usb sticks. approach the cute as a say they cannot yet give information on a possible motive. >> for more, i am joined by our reporter who is where the incident took place. let's talk about the motive. have investigators ruled out terrorism? >> we cannot say they have ruled it out altogether but they seem to be stepping away from this assumption. according to what investigators

have so farar, they say the suspect had no previous links to potentially violent extremists or islamist groups. thisis is why there isis no gros to believe that as of now, this was motivated by terror. however, the suspect was known to police for his offenses like drug offenses and violent crimes as well as an assault. this is why basically, the police are investigating in all possible directions. next they are still looking for what could have been the motive. what do we know about this suspect? have we gotten more details today? >> yes. we definitely have more details today. we know that he has arrived in germany in 2015, he is a syrian national. he was not granted an asylylum status or a refugee status like many people from syria have been

granted. he was granted something called subsidiary protection. this status is granted to people who do not qualify as refugees but are still facing risk upon returning to their home countries. we also know that this permanent resident -- residents permit had expired on october 1 although it is unclear if he applied. we also know that he was involved in a previous harassment case in another state in germany. then he harassesed a 166 euro teenager and laterer got into a fight with her mother. he was also known to police there. >> the suspect then does have criminal records. thank you. brazil's president bolsonaro says the mysterious appearance of oil slicks off his country's

coast may be the result of a criminal act area the oil began washing up along the northeast coast last month. he is suggesting that another country could be to blame but he has not said which country. >> pools of oil covered beaches on brazil's coast. for weeks, they have been appearing along the shores of the atlantic. the state -- tourist spot internal covered in oil and they say it is the result of gross negligence. more oil slicks have now been spotted 2000 kilometers further south. overall, more than 130 brazilian ages have been hitit. >> the entire navy in northeast brazazil hasas been mobilized. we are trying to identify what is causing this and where it is coming from. >> a brazilian tv network is investigating whether an accident at a refinery belonging

to an oil company may have played a role. the site experienced in oil spilill at the end of august. the company is partly state owned and denies any involvement. they say it may come from a foreign tanker. experts have criticized what they see is a delayed response from authorities. >> there was no fast coordinated effort from the authorities and the oil companies. to prevent the oil from reaching the coast. >> and analysis of the oil will not be conducted with the hope that the results will shed more light on its source. brent: y you're watching g dw ns live from berlin. it still to come, three scientists are sharing the nobol prize for physics. nobel judges said their work has changed our understanding of the cosmos. stay with us and w we will find

out how the wobbly factor played into all of that. wildlife officials in thailand have discovered the bodies of another five elephants in a river in -- and the discovery while investigating how a group of six elephants into a waterfall over the weekend. >> these two elephants are the lucky ones. they survived the festive flowing waters this with the way the rest of their herd. officials initially thought six elephants died including a three-year-old cap area --calf. >> we thought they were trying to cross over the river. probably one of the younger ones slipped and the adults were trying to rescue them. >> another five bodies were revealed. authorities say it is the largest number of elephants to die in a single incident.

>> for now, we can say that based on these aerial photographs, there were 11 dead elephants in total. only two survived. >> pictured here before ththe devastating incidentasast weekend, this herd was part of a population of around 300 wild elephants in the park. the waterfall where the elephants died is known as the ravine of hell. authorities say they will now look at walkways over the waterfall for other solutions to prevent a tragedy like this from happening again. brent: here are some more stories making headlines around the world. german police are removing climate protesters who have been blockading streets here in berlin. climate activist group says several hundred people -- several hundred people camped out overnight as part of a wave

of civil disobedience. similar protests have taken place to governments to do more about the climate crisis. hundreds of h haitians have j jd protests in port-au-prince demanding the ouster of their president. the demonstrators are angry about corruption, rising inflation, and a lack of food and fuel. 17 people have been killed in the past three weeks of unrest. it is either something very wonderful for horrible. that is what one of this year's nobel laureates in physics says he was thinking when he got the phone call saying he had won the prize. three scientists have been named as winners this year. the committee says the prize is being awarded for their work on understanding the structure of the universe. >> it all began when the universe exploded out of a hot and state.

nearly 14 billion years later, half of the nobel prize in physics was granted for our understanding of what happened next. ask today decided to award the 2019 nobel prize in physics with one half for theoretical discoveries in physical cosmology. >> back in the 1970's, cosmology was largely a speculative science but since then, we have learned a huge amount about the evolution of the universe around us and james peoples was a key figure in that step -- process. his work in the field has helped scientists interpret traces from its earliest days and also help show the universe is expanding due to physics. dark matter and dark energy. posters were also honored. >> -- two other scientists were also honored.

back in the earlyly 1990's, it s stilill impossible to takake the detailed measurerements of a distant star that cocould show whwhether it w o orbited by a plplanet these two scientists developed cutting-edge methods to do so anand sparked a revolution in astronomy. more than 4000 xo planets have been pinpointed since their firsrst pioneeringng efforts ara the number that is steadily growing. the list now contains planets that could erratically conducive to life. circlingng distant stars. the discovereries made b by this year's physics laureates havave forever changeged our perception of the universe around us. brent: fascinating. to help us understand more about exo planets and how they fit into physics, our guest joins us

now. i understand you have worked one of the new laureates. tell us about the work and what makes this kind of planet different from an ordinary planet? >> it is a shortrt form for a extrasolar planet. there are thousands of planets orbiting stars nearby aroround otother ststars. that is what the extrasosolar planet is. >> how did they discovover the first one? >> thehe technique they used is known as the radial velocityty method. it is when the planet is going

around the star, it starts to wobble around a center of mass of the s system area if you have precise velocity measurements of the star along the line of sight, what you can seeee is the small motion of the star wobbling around the center of mass of the system because of the gravitational t tug to to te planet. this signal turns out to be extremely small. it could be anywhere from a few meters per second to tens of meters per second. back then, it was the precision of the instruments that wass dedeveloping t to make it good ough to be a measurement and this teawass -- had successfully made that measurement for the first time. >> they did the first wobbly planet detectors if you will. do people such as yourself get excited when anan extrasosolar

planet has a higher wobbly rate or not? does thahat signify anything? >>t is a huge revolution. we are more excited the smaller the wobble is because the strength of the wobble, the amplitude of the velocity itself is proportionanal to the mass of the planet which means the smalaller the planet the e smalr the wobble. so when we firstst did it, it ts a giant planet now for us -- for earthlike planets the wobble would much smaller. >> when we are talking about xo planets and the wobobbly factor, do you ever asask yoself i if oe of thehese planetsts has extraterrestrial life on them? do you think we are alone or do you think there is something out there? >> i would bet that there is somemething out there and itt is very l likely becacause we havae

found lots of plplanets thahat e small and could potentially hold life areas we haven't found life yet they have the right conditions for life to be present. it's only a matter of -- matter of time in my view we find something. think a lot would agree we just have to hold onto the life we have on this land in the meantime area our guest from cambridge university talking about these new nobel laureates in physics. iq. -- thank you. back on earth, germany faced argentina in a friendly football match. it highlights the decline of the two sites that raced off of the world cup final. it's a chance to get a look at young players who could boost his squad's chances next year. this one in particular who just can't stop scoring goals. >> he has risen through

germany's ranks. he made a scoring look easy at the european under 21 championships in june. he e earned plenty of admirers d a callout to the senior squad. now he is in line were his first senior appearance. >> i know how it feels to be part of the setup. i know how things work and i know the people i am pleased to be here again area. next he has carried his strike rate. start against the weekend. the sharpshooting has drawn comparisons with another a miss german left footer, his near namesake. exactly the kind of project forward the team has been missing. >> his best quality is his finishing area he is very

dangerous in and around the box. he has a lot of quality and doesn't need a lot of chances to score goals. >> the coach will be hoping those words ring true against argentina. brent: one of germany's football greats is hanging up his boots. he is retiring filing -- following the final game last sunday. he made his name in munich where he spent 17 years as a youth player and full professional winning eight titles and the champions league. he also played 121 games for germany and was part of the team that won the world cup in brazil. you are watching dw news live from berlin. after a short break, i will be back to take you through the day. stay tuned for that. ♪

. and it is working to live in pariris will use and analylysis from france twenty four. i'm margot in bc the main world news headlines. on balance is he's invited turkey's president to the white house next month this past criticism is. this over trump's decision to withdraw us troops in northeast syria and leave. the local kurdish fighters. us allies. to the mercy of present photo once military. allegations the trump administration stop the us ambassadador to the east you frm giving evidence to the house committees. in the impeachment inquiry it's clean the cool sunderland as important