♪ >> u.k. health authorities announced new areas of britain will enter tier for restrictions after another mutation of the virus was the tech did come a to be from south africa -- detected , believed to be from south africa. trump says the $900 billion coronavirus relief package is a disaster. we bring you an exclusive report antigornment activists.

the latest to be murdered on the 15th of december. thank you very much for joining us for this addition. there are unconfirmed reports the u.k. and the eu may be on the brink of a green -- of agreeing on a brexit deal. this comes as somewhat of a surprise after both downing street and brussels said they were nowhere near agreements in recent days. if any developments come our way, we will keep you up-to-date with any of those announcements. the u.k. authorities have warned british citizens many areas of the country will now enter tier 4 restrictions starting on boxing day. the decision comes after a new strand of the coronavirus believed to be more contagious spread through london and the southeast like wildfire. authorities have announced another mutation of the virus believed to be from south africa has been detected.

people who have been to south africa in the last two weeks have been asked to quarantine immediately. let's take a listen to british health secretary, matt hancock. >> we have detected to cases of another variant of the coronavirus here in the u.k. both are contacts of cases who have traveled from south africa over the past few weeks. this new variant is highly concerning, because it is yet more transmissible and appears to have mutated further than the new variant discovered in the u.k. >> nearly 24 hours after france reopened borders with the u.k., chaos is still prominent at the port of dover and the county of kent, despite drivers finally being able to move, it is believed the backlog will take days to clear. scuffles broke out between drivers and police. complaints of unsanitary

conditions. we have reports. reporter: freedom, they shout, with the hope of arriving for christmas growing increasingly vast. frustration increasing after being stuck at the port for two days. >> [speaking french] >> we were here 30's ago -- three days ago. reporter: after abruptly shutting the border with the u.k. on sunday, france agreed to allow essential travelers to cross the channel, provided they tested negative for covid-19 within the previous 72 hours. although fair is resumed

transporting passengers and goods, chaos is far from being eased. >> some cars will be denied entrance to the ports because some people do not have negative test results. they do not want to make space. >> there isto do testing. -- there isto do testing. there is no one helping. reporter: french authorities are accepting fast tests that are faster than the pcr. other european nations, such as germany, have decided to maintain their travel ban. >> the lsa palace confirmed the first vaccinations against covid-19 will start on sunday, along with many other european countries. the french medical regulator was supposed to give authorization for the use of the biontech-pfizer vaccine own -- n

january 24, but access has already been granted. moving on to another top story, donald trump has stunted u.s. lawmakers by refusing to sign the 900 billion dollars stimulus package asking congress to come back to him with able that puts americans first. the president argued the $600 payments was too low and took issue with billions of dollars going to foreign countries. trump has called the bill approved by congress on monday "he does grace filled with wasteful item -- a disgrace filled with wasteful items." he said if congress does not return a suitable bill, the next administration will have to get it done. reporter: since last night, lawmakers have been celebrating. as they passed with a wide

bipartisan margin a spending bill with much-needed coronavirus relief checks. then donald trump sent out a prerecorded video tweets throwing the stimulus package into turmoil. >> i am asking congress to amend this bill and increase the ridiculously low $600 to $2000 or $4000 for a couple. reporter: true to form, his tweets came as a bombshell. democrats have been eager to include a higher payment but it was republicans who denied the idea. nancy pelosi replied on social media to the president, saying she was all for increasing the relief payments. republicans repeated refused to say what amount the president wanted for directx. at last, the president has agreed to $2000. democrats are ready to bring this to the floor this week by unanimous consent. let's do it. trump's criticism sends a curveball to his own party. over the $900 billion relief

bill, part of a larger 5600 page $2.3 trillion government spending package. while trump has not said he will veto the bill, for him to do so, congress has the votes to override. leaving many to speculate over the president's political brinkmanship. a gesture to please his base? in most to remain the focus of the narrative? trump has managed to quickly silence any holiday congratulations coming from the capital. >> continuing our coverage of the story earlier on we had the pleasure of talking to a professor of empire state college in new york. he told us it was unlikely president joe biden will have to step in to correct this mistake, but did say we could head into political complications. >> while no package is secured, that means the government is shut down in three days. that is not going to happen. the question becomes, how does donald trump deal with that?

if the government were to shut down between now and the time biden took office, you would have chaos. you would have chaos in the streets. beuse he would have millions of people without paychecks. at the end of the day, what would happen would be congress will override the veto. i don't see any way around it. if i'm wrong and republicans come together to sustain that veto, then i honestly have absolutely no idea how this could play out. it would be completely unprecedented. trump and his representative, secretary mnuchin were involved in the negotiations for months, and to back out of the last second shows what he is, he is a chaos agents, a disruptor, not a leader. >> president donald trump is also vetoed a bipartisan defense bill allowing for increased pay for soldiers and military spending that could lead to the first congress override of his presidency.

elsewhere, erdogan has accused the human court of human rights of defending terrorists's after they ruled turkey must immediately release a prominent kurdish politician. he was arrested in november 2016 on terrorism charges and face 142 years in prison. accused of being behind dozens of fast in 2016 -- thefts in 2016 and kurdish insurgents -- insurgence. >> [speaking native language] [speaking native language]

>> france is morning after the murder of three police officers killed as they answered a domestic violence call. the police forces, undergoing a tragedy under accusations of police brutality. macron, calling the slain officer's are heroes. -- officers our heroes. reporter: residents are in shock after three local police officers were killed while trying to save a woman from a suspected wife beater. >> [speaking french]

>> [speaking french] reporter: the gruesome event took place in a remote village in the heart of the volcanic region. police responded to a domestic violence call and found a woman on the roof of a burning house. in an ensuing standoff, her partner opened fire, killing the three officers and injuring a fourth. he was armed with an assault rifle and two handguns. other security forces arrived at the scene and rescued the woman and her child. france's interior minister offered his condolences and praised the efforts made by the police force. >> [speaking french]

reporter: president macron on twitter expressed solidarity with france's security forces, calling the slain officer's our heroes -- officers our heroes. >> hundreds of people have died in ethiopia. the reports come from the human rights commission, who specified the victims were ambushed in the early hours of the morning. survivors have said to have graphical evidence of the attack. -- graphic evidence of the attack. the multiple conflicts in the region have raised concern of a security vacuum in ethiopia. despite the deck light the popular antigovernment movements in iraq, activists who participated in a continue -- participated continue to be targeted. in a wave of kidnappings and torture in recent months.

many iraqis are calling for officials to shed light on the perpetrators behind these organized purges. france 24's correspondent brings us this report. reporter: after one of the members were shot dead on december 15th, this tribe is gathered in a region east of the iraqi capital, baghdad. this was a prominent activist within the popular democracy vement. his plan has given the government three days to reveal the identity of his killer. his family said he had long been receiving threats because of his participation in the movement. >> speaking native language[] -- >> [speaking native-language] reporter: the mass protests erupted in october of 2019 against the government corruption and high unemployment.

thousands of mainly young activists protested in baghdad's square. many consider his murder part of an organized edition -- part of an organization, of a cult. >> [speaking native-language] reporter: the iraqi human rights commission believes at least in 19 activists have been killed since august. it is recorded -- it has recorded more than 30 attempted despite the movement's general decline. it comes as the security situation in iraq is worsening due to a high level of organized crime. >> that is the end of this edition. thank you very much for watching. do stay tuned into the channel. bye, bye. ♪

>> hello. welcome to this addition of the interview today. our guest is this french astronaut, a celebrity here in france. he spent six months in space already. 197 days, to be exact. he is going back. welcome to our program. >> thank you, very happy to be here. >> you are expected to fly back to the iss in the spring. indeed, we have a historic lunch. -- launch. this is the embodiment of this commercial crew program by nasa and spacex. >> absolutely. this is a mestone in the way we are exploring iss. we have been doing it for 20 years.

it is a new page we are turning. the partnership between the private sector and the public sector. it is still funded by nasa, made on the public budget. but now we have more autony to design and build the hardware we will be using on flights to the iss. in the near future, two or more distant destinations in space -- to our more distant destinations in space. >> you are in houston, texas, getting ready for the spring, getting ready to fly on crew dragon, this new spacecraft. how exciting is that for starters? this is a new spacecraft. this does not happen to all astronauts, right? >> no, idoes not happen very often. i'm very lucky to have a chance to have flown on the reliable workhorse that enabled us to simply keep the iss program goinfor the last 10 years, the

10, 20 years after the retirement of the space shuttle. a very reliable technology mostly from the 70's. now today, a state-of-the-art, very modern thnology, huge flat screens, lots of automation. for a pilot, pretty comparable to flyingn an old glen, then you fly on the most modern, recent plane technology has to offer. it is very exciting. i'm very much looking forward to menik's mission. >> how different is it? it was designed in the 1970's. must be quite an analog spacecraft. does the crew dragon fly itself, or do you still have to work? how does it work? >> [laughter] it is ve automated. i think the first major difference is that information is regrouped and analyzed and digitized for the group to look at.

-- the crew to look at. you only have a few displays as opposed to hundreds of pages you have to interpret by yourself. there's already a layer of interpretation on the information. the spacecraft tells you, this has failed, and this is what it looks look. compar to you having to look at the pressure, you having to look at a voltage and conclude for yourself with the cases. -- what the case is. now, there's a lot of automation. the spacecraft basically does fly itself. you can still fly it manually. the dragon. but it's only in a vy degraded case. even if you do fly manually, you fly manually through the touchscreen. so it is actually a little bit of a difference and a jump to make for a pilot. you only have a fly screen -- a flatscreen. it takes some getting

used to. >> we were lucky enough we could follow you in your adventure last time. to see her you get prepared for the flight. is it different this time -- to see you get prepared for the flight. is it different this time? is it as much work as it was the first time? >> no, itsn't. and i'm glad. th ti, i only have one year. the first time, it took me seven years to get ready for the mission. luckily, i don't have to lear russian from the start. i already know the spacesuit for going on a spacewalk. really mostly, it is refreshers. the station has not changed. it's had some updates. this time around, i'm focusing

on the crew dragon, like you said, on the science experiments, on getting ready physically, then maintaining my knowledge and refreshing my knowledge from last time. it is a little bit more relaxed, but more complex in time -- compressed in time. >> a packed schedule, you were saying. what exactly are you going to be doing out there? you know what kind of research you will be conducting on the iss this time? >> generally speaking, i don't have the detail of the 100 or so or more experiments i will be doing, because this is all being prepared by the different agencies, nasa, the ternational ptners, etc. i know there's a lot of focus now on medical science. we are looking at how the viruses and microbes behave in microgravity.

it helps us targeted candidates for vaccines sometimes. we look at drugs that could help cure cancer. specific cancers. we look at muscle loss and bone loss this is a staple of iss research. we look at material science, as well. metal alloys are a bigopic right now aboard the iss. emotions are very popular. there's going to be a mix of all those topics. it's also what makes iss research so exciting. you do a little bit of everything. >> how about returning? we are at a time interesting in society. with confinements, people being stuck at home. you are going to go voluntarily and be stuck in the iss for six months. how do you feel about that? are you happy to go back? can you tell us why? >> [laughter] why?

because, first of all, it is a little bit different. the first time, it was my childhood dream. i worked a lot for it. but i didn't really know what i signed myself up for. i was excited but had no idea. this time, i know it is not always easy to up there by yourself or with your group. i know it is long to be six months away from your loved ones. i know what i have to prepare for. and that makes it different. but also, i think i am still very much willing to go, because of the sense of purpose that you get when you are on board the iss. because everybody, every morning when everybody wakes up, you know what you are here for. you know you are taking part in something that is bigger than you. you know you're working as part of a team and the team is working for you. it is very exciting. it's really nice to have that sense of purpose, that sense of teamwork, that sense of being in

an expedition. i'm looking forward to feeling that again. >> you spend a lot of time making sure the people on earth could actually follow what you were doing. you were very presence on social media -- present on social media. are you doing the same thing this time? for example, kids who dream of space, are you going to let them live this adventure with you again? >> i'm going to try as best as i ca it was not easy the first time. it took me a lot of time, on top of what i was already doing aboard the space station. because obviously, you don't get two hours a day to take pictures and tweet. it is on your sleep time, your sunday time, but it was a pleasure to do it for me. i'm going to do it as much as i can. i would like to find something new. i don't want to redo the same thing. people are going to be bored.

we have seen the pictures of the earth before. people get used to things really quickly. i'm currently trying to find maybe something new. i have no great ideas. if you have some, if viewers have some, i would happily hear them. >> another question here in houston right now, nasa's been rather ambitious these past few months, with announcements about project artemis, the gateway projects to go back to the moon. obviously there's been the coronavirus and a change in american politics, there's a new president moving into the white house. do you think these projects are going to go on? we going to be on the moon by 2024 -- are we going to be on the moon by 2024? >> [laughter] regardless of the administration, it is a very ambitious program. technically, it is but can go south on you very fast. -- technically, it is a's, i can go south on you very fast.

now with the change of administration, is difcult for us to know what's going to happen. as a european employee, we know we have agreements with nasa. we know nasa's been enjoying bipartisan support. the future.see what happens in i think we have secured some good cooperation andgreement we have committed on the european side. our american friends have committed. i'm hoping things will continue moving in the right direction. >> thank you very much for speaking to us. of course, we will be following your mission in detail and will be happy to see whatever you have to send us. we will have to think about new ways of telling that story. thanks again, and good luck with your training in houston. i can imagine you have a lot of work. thanyou viewers for watching this program. you can see it again on france 24.com. ♪

12/23/20 12/23/20 [captioning made possible by democracy now!] amy: from new york, this is democracy now! >> i feel extreme confidence in the safety and efficacy of this vaccine and i want to encourage everyone who has the opportunity to get vaccinated so that we can have a veil of protection over this country that would end this pandemic. amy: as the nation's top infectious disease expert dr. anthony fauci gets the coronavirus vaccine, we speak to