paris it is at 10:00 p.m. in the french capital. here are the headlines. the french president isn't mulled where he had at the press conference with the president he has given his backing to the country's bed to join the eu -- bid to join the eu. parts of north africa are dealing with an early seasonal heat wave. we will get to analysis on that from the director of the atmosphere monitoring service. we will be talking to him in a while. with inflation showing no signs of stabilization and consumer isis is soaring in four decades,

the u.s. federal reserve has hiked interest rates are three quarters of a percent. our business editor will bring us all of the latest on that. ♪ thanks for watching. we start with that news of the french president continuing a tour of countries bordering at ukraine after romania he is now in moldova where he has met with president -- the president. moldova is located between ukraine and you radio -- romania, it is three soviet states that submitted applications to the european union within days of russia's invasion of ukraine. it has pressed on with this application amid concerns that it could be drawn into the war.

macron spoke in favor of moldova's application during today's visit, let's take a listen. >> the question will be asked and then eu member states will decide. i do not want to make the decision, my role as head of that use rotating presidency is to build a consensus. my wish is to send a clear and positive message to this request. james: he is in the moldovan capital, he had this to say about the french president's trip. let's take a listen. >> macron arrived here straight from romania. he met and had lunch with the moldovan the president then they held a joint conference.

one of the main topics was the crisis, the other side of the border, a few miles away in the ukraine. moldova has taken in a lot of refugees and is on the front line when it comes to this crisis. the objective is to try to get as much backing as you can from the european union. in order to do so, she has launched a bid to be granted the status of candidate to the european union integration. emmanuel macron said that france would back moldova. what he wants is a strong message from the european union. he also said that integration was a very long process that would require many efforts on the behalf of moldova and put on the table, his proposition, for a political european community.

this is the idea to create a new group of states that share the same values and the same geographical zone, that is -- the moldovan president said she is in favor of the creation of this organ. the point is to create more security and military cooperation at a time where war is raging. just the other side of the border. james: russia's defense ministry calls on ukrainian fighters honing out of the chemical plant in the eastern city, to surrender, evacuations are set to take leisa for hundreds of civilians outside of the plant. the russian army overseeing that, with the evacuees being said to take apart of the region held by pro-moscow separatists. russian forces destroyed the last bridge linking it to the neighboring city. this is in a bid to completely encircle it.

volodymyr zelenskyy has pleaded for acceleration and delivery of western arms to the besieged region. we have more. reporter: as the fighting rages on, russia on wednesday continued its advances. now the key battle grain in the war. >> it is vital we hold the line there in donbass. the more last -- losses the enemy suffers, the less power they will have to continue the aggression. that is why the donbass region is key as to who will come to dominate in the weeks ahead. reporter: in a similar scenario to mariupol, civilians and fighters remain trapped. russian-backed separatists have accused ukraine's forces of sabotaging a civilian core door -- corridor. evacuations were only designed to take civilians to areas controlled by russians, regional officials say the cities outlook is looking worse with the

russian army surrounded ukrainian soldiers on three sides. despite the pressure building, they ignored an ultimatum to surrender the eastern city. ukraine says russia plans to attack it from the north and along the front to the south. it comes as nato defense and esters convened in a brussels to discuss additional military support for kyiv, heeding the call of a zelenskyy to speed up arms deliveries to these two front lines. >> everyone here is acutely aware of the dangers that ukraine faces as russia renews its reckless assault on the donbass. it is never enough. we are going to continue to work hard to move as much capability as we can, as fast as we can. i -- to ensure ukraine will be safe on the battlefield. reporter: u.s. prident joe biden announced a new $1 billion

weapons injection on wednesday, including antiship rocket systems, artillery rockets. james: alexei navalny sounded the alarm when they discover he was no longer in the prison where he was serving time. there was no word about his whereabouts. it appears he has been moved to a strict regime penal colony. his allies have expressed concerns about his safety. we have more details. reporter: a big scare for relatives of alexei, his lawyer paid his -- m a visit in the penal town. he has been there since february 2021 after he returned to russia. has press officer describes what happened next. navalny's lawyer was kept there until 2:00 p.m. and was told there was no convict name nal -- navalny. vladimir putin's most dangerous

put a goal for was moved to the east. there was no official statement from a russian authorities, but halfway across the planet, there was concern in washington, especially after reports surfaced that he was suffering from several health issues. >> we all on russian authorities to allow him access to his lawyers, to his legal representation, as well as to receive medical care. they will be held accountable by the international community, were anything to before mr. navalny while he is in their custody. h --reporter: navalny return to russia last year, recovering from a nerve injury that he blames on the kremlin. in march of this year, he was sentenced to nine years in prison on charges of fraud and contempt of court. the judge ordered him to serve the sentence in a maximum

security is an. it appears that is what led to tuesday's secretive transfer. james: parts of europe and north africa are dealing with an unprecedented early season heatwave. temperatures have exceeded 40 degrees celsius for several days. an intense heat is in the forecast for france, germany, switzerland, italy in the next few days. this comes on the back of a very dry spring, leading to extreme fire danger. we have a story. reporter: the calendar may say it is still spring but it does not feel like it for millions of people in europe and north africa. morocco, spain, parts of sprint -- france, all dealing with a record-breaking early season heatwave. >> it is horrible. i've been living here for 22 years and it is horrible. >> we are realizing global warming is becoming more noticeable. reporter: temperatures above 35 or even 40 degrees celsius are

impacting millions, and for much of western europe it is only the beginning. all-time record highs could be broken. >> the temperatures we are forecasting are very, very high for the middle of june. there is an air mass packed with sweltering heat over north africa and that explains why we are expecting temperatures that made reg records in the next few days. -- break records in the next few days. reporter: there is a silver lining, this will not be a heat dome, like the ones released over in india this year and canada last summer. instead, meteorologists are calling it a heat loom, a swath -- plume, hot air moving over the north that will not sit in areas for days and days. in a not so distant past, these levels were only seen in july and august. scientists say this is another sign of our changing climate. >> in spain, our traditionally

hot summers are getting hotter and longer. the summer season lasts more than a month longer than in the 1980's. reporter: the heatwave also comes on the back of a very dry spri. firefighters on high alert and warning that wildfires can start and quickly spread. james: for more on that, we can talk to the director of the monitoring service. thank you for talking to us. at the risk of sounding a bit facetious, are we going to have to start migrating to the arctic circle and wearing some arose, living in different --sombreros, living a different conditions? how difficult is this going to get? this is the burning question at the direction of these extreme weather events, how do you see this playing out? >> the report, it's a very high

projections that are made. that materialized. the best thing to do is to move to the arctic circle, no. the best thing to do is to address the problem of greenhouse gases. that is the only way to stop the trend we are observing and the increase and iteration of these heat waves. james: i know you're in france, the measures are being taken that go in the direction of fighting back against the trance, five under million years on planting more trees. these are not going to change the overall trends now. there is a necessity to adapt to new realities in terms of lifestyle. i suppose, that is not your specific area of expertise but what would you say to that? we have to adapt to a new normal? >> yes.

one, perspective is adaptation. whether we want it or not, because of the ongoing climate change, and the emissions and greenhouse gases that are in the atmosphere. we know the frequency for heatwave will increase. we still expect, by the end of the century, to see two times more heat waves by then. if don't do anything, or our mission stay at a high level, -- emissions, stand a high level, we could get to 10. it's important to adapt because, it will affect what we do, but also, to mitigate, to the factor of 10, in terms of these heat waves. james: we have been hearing about these particular plumes of heat.

can you -- we heard about something in this in the report, what way is it different to a normal heatwave? >> the typical heatwave, which is -- which was the one in 2003, the biggest we have experienced in france, where it is a period of stagnant whether, lasting for many days, weeks. with air that is coming from -- being brought to the surface, compressed and raising heat. that is a typical heatwave. the situation we are in is different. it is a flow of air which is coming from north africa, it is trained on the edge of the cycle. it is -- the hot air is being brought from north africa, spain, southwest france, pushing all the way to germany over the next days.

there is a factor to this, the increase of temperature, which is the dryness of soil. over the last three months, the weather is dry. when the soil is dry, the soil cannot hold water. there another factor due to this dry spring. this could cause record-breaking temperature in the next two days. james: let's hope we don't see the devastating fires we have seen in the last year or two in southern france. thanks for those insights. it is time now for business. kate has joined us in the studio. some pretty radical announcements coming out of the fed today. biggest hike in interest rates since 1994, .3%. tell us about that. >> it has already moved by a

quarter and half a percentage point in march and may. the federal reserve moving that key interest rate by 75 basis points. it brings the federal funds rate to between 1.5% to 1.7%. the central bank is want to continue raising rates through the year though not at that same exact pace, hoping to bring that key rate to at least 3% by the end of 2022. higher inflation rates tend to encourage consumers to save rather than spend, that helps keep inflation in check. consumer prices were 8.6 higher than they were in may. jerome powell said the bank is committed to bringing inflation back to us 2% target. -- two it's 2% target. >> we understand the hardship that high inflation is causing. we are strongly committed to bringing inflation back down. we are moving expeditiously to do so.

we have both the tools we need on the resolve it will take to restore stability on behalf of american families and businesses. my colleagues and i are are acutely aware that high inflation imposes significant hardship, especially on those least able to meet the higher cost of essentials, like food, housing and transportation. >> i spoke to christian lawrence from n york. he said today's move represented a shift from the fed's comments about a month ago. take a listen. >> this really highlights the difficult situation the fed is in at the moment, given they are facing the worst possible scenario for a central-bank supply-side driven inflation and slowing consumer. it is going to be a very difficult road ahead for sure. >> do you think the fed waited too long to act on interest rates? >> i think it is easy to say, in hindsight. the issue is the primary driver of inflation, as we just heard from the jerome powell himself,

his food, energy and housing. when we look at the food and energy components, those are completely outside of the fed's control. so, the fed did not really want to raise rates to trident tackle -- try to tackle inflation but it does not have the tools to tackle properly. they wanted to wait to see how the consumer was looking at the russia/ukraine situation through a big spanner in the works and we saw another surge in food and energy prices to the point where the fed can no longer wait to see what happens and how to act. >> a lot of factors in play. remind us how this move on interest rates will affect american consumers. >> primarily, it is not going to help when it comes to this food and energy situation. that is something that t world is facing and it is outside of the u.s. it's completely out of the fence control. there is some hope that it will help cool the housing market. we are seeing the fed raised

rates and hiking the u.s. into a recession, because households will still have to purchase energy, it was so have to use transportation, they will still have to purchase food. what this means is consumers will have less money to spend on other goods. it is a bad situation to be in. >> wall street did close higher because those fed announcements, while drastic, were already priced into trade. the doubt jones -- the dow jones snapping. boeing. the s&p 500 up 1.5%. earlier we saw the major european embassies closing higher. gains of between 1.2% and 1.3% for each london, paris and frankfurt. the european central bank held an emergency meeting on wednesday. it is expected to follow suit from the federal reserve and raise its own interest rates in the next month or so, this

gathering was focused on recent volatility in the sovereign debt market. it was described as a new anti-fragment institute to address the widening difference in borrowing cost for more stable economies like germany and more vulnerable you member states like italy. few concrete details were available. the ecb sing it will use its flexibility and tools -- singing use its flexibly and tools. the european union has been looking to reduce its independence on russian oil and gas. they signed a deal to boost exports of liquefied natural gas from israel through egypt. the agreement, while symbolic, will take years and major investment to bear fruit. >> it is known that russia's war against ukraine has exposed our european a dependency on russian fossil fuels. and we want to get rid of this

dependcy. we want to diversify to trustworthy suppliers. egypt is a trustworthy partner. >> separately, she pledged about 100 million euro's worth of food aid. moscow appears to be further cutting natural gas supplies to europe, for a second day in a row and to its two biggest european buyers. after reducing flows by 40% on tuesday, it was further scaling back on the deliveries to germany, leaving nord stream pipeline operating at 40% of its usual capacity. supplies italy, through different pipeline have been cut by around 15%. it has blamed the problems on equipment problems. german officials say it is an excuse to exert pressure over europe. despite those cutbacks, germany's economy minister says he's confident the country has enough gas reserves for the coming months. energy firms are scrambling to

develop their storage reserves, as joseph keane reports. reporter: in the foothills of the alps, germany is stockpiling the need -- s it needs to cope with the winter. the government passed legislation in martial wiring operators to fill their facilities to capacity by november. >> i don't have a crystal ball, i cannot forecast the future but i think with the measures that the government is putting in place we are aed a good weight -- we are on a good way to deliver those. reporter: the european government is a scrambling to store supplies in case moscow decides to further reduce or cut slows. -- gas flows. berlin says setbacks -- suspects gazprom cap this supplies deliberately low. one site was less than 1% full in may. the industry average is already 6%. but to store gas for later, and needs to be more than enough gas

for now. >> it is essential that gas is available on the market for storage. it is fundamental, especially for the coming winter, that gas deliveries from russia proceed as normal. if they are -- there are interruptions, it will be difficult to meet the filling targets. reporter: berlin has pledged it will move away from russian gas without sacrificing its commitment to reducing carbon emissions, before the ukraine war, germany got half of its gas from russia. >> very high-stakes there. james: we will be hearing more about it in the days ahead. thank you. now it is time for sports. a big decision from the organizers of the u.s. open. >> let me tell you. the u.s. open, we have seen wimbledon ban pollution and russian players -- ella rouge

and and russian players. they will be able to tape -- take part on their grounds. a big decision because we did not know what was happening. we had that decision coming through from the board is saying it comes from a concern about holding individual athletes accountable for the actions and decisions of their government. very different points of view than mention from the wilmot and organizers. they have banned them altogether from the all england club. this comes as welcome news from worlds, who was russian. >> it is great. i heard this news yesterday, like everybody. i always say i have to follow the rules. where i can play, i am going to play and i'm going to try to play my best. i am happy i will be able to defend my title. it will be disappointing if i would not be able to defend my title at the open. there are always great members in the u.s. open. it's an amazing tournament.

the most special one for me. yeah, i have not much more to add. >> the final fixture we saw last year, it could be repeated with him still unsure whether he will be allowed on american territory. the regulations around covid-19 vaccines. the season continues in tennis, as they prepare for wimbledon, for those available to attend. he has made his way into the finals after beating his opponent in three sets. seven, five, and what a point, as he came back. the spaniards from being a one sat down, a backhand then. for the australian to hand him the game. meanwhile, knocked out in -- the greek took hold of the first

set. but he ran back to beat him in three. four from the australian world cup -- wildcard, beating him as the world's number six. a word onto football. swiss has demanded a 20 month suspended jail sentence for thewe -- for those who have been tried for fraudulent payments. they continue to deny these charges, saying it was linked to a back payment for work carried out. 2 million swiss francs estimated in possible payments. alleged fraud payments. the 22nd african championship in athletics came to an end. it was marked by the run in the 100 meter sprint. he has now extended his own record as the fastest manned -- man on the african continent 9.93 seconds.

his team went on. >> here is the world's fastest man. ferdinand holds the seasons record for 100 meters, 9.77 seconds. now the canyon has won his first major title -- kenyan has won his first major title. up next, the world championships in oregon. >> i ain good shape. we have a month before we go to the world championship. we are going to beat the americans in their own home. reporter: he started his sports career in rugby, for five years he muscled up, becoming a successful sprinter. now, aged 26, he believes he will cement a spot among the world's best. he is the eighth fastest runner in history. and the first african to make it into the top 10 sprinters group.

>> by americans and jamaicans, you start forgetting that because now the africans are coming. i'm not doing anything less than i was a moment ago, i'm going to make kenya africa proud. reporter: conditions were far from ideal, yet ferdinand and t south african athletes ran under 10 seconds. the head of world athletics was impressed. >> i'm watching world-class dimes. the man's 100 meter finals, three athletes under 10 seconds, african sprinting is coming-of-age. those competitors will be very competitive in the world chamonships in just a few weeks time in oregon. reporter: ferdinand houde 14 -- had a 14 month suspension for using illegal substances, which he has denied. now back on track, he wants to clinch historic victory for the whole continent.

>> africans are coming on the scene. it has been dominated by jamaicans and americans. james: thanks for the business. we will be back with more news after that.

06/15/22 06/15/22 [captioning made possible by democracy now!] amy: from new york, this is democracy now! >> jobs are back. prices are still too high. unemployment is down but gas prices are up. our work is not done. amy: president biden blends republicans in a major address deliberates at the afl-cio convention in philadelphia. we will get in