welcome to "newsline." i'm catherine kobayashi in tokyo. first a look at the headlines. people in the gaza strip are returning to their routines as they wait to see whether a cease-fire will be extended. global health experts have gathered together to discuss the latest outbreak of ebola and to decide whether to declare an international health emergency. and the people in charge of fukushima daiichi are asking fishermen for approval to decontaminate ground weather and release it into the ocean. palestinians living in the gaza strip have woken up over the past month to the sounds of shelling. they have seen a temporary

cease-fire take hold. but it's scheduled to end on friday. leaders of israel and hamas are talking about whether to extend it. the two sides are negotiating in the egyptian capital, cairo, but not face to face. egyptian mediators are serving as a go-between. they expect the two sides won't reach a deal before friday. sources close to hamas say the egyptians proposed the truce be extended for 48 hours. they say the hamas negotiators agreed to the proposal and are waiting for the israelis to respond. residents of gaza are starting to see some things return to the way they used to be. shops are open for first time in weeks. people are driving again and children are playing in the parks. people are visiting what's left of their homes. this man lost a cousin, his factory, and his home. >> translator: everything precious to me is gone.

>> more than 1,800 palestinians have been killed. in a month of fighting. 9,000 others have been wounded. international health experts have gathered for an emergency meeting to try to stop the spread of ebola. specialists with the world health organization are in geneva discussing the outbreak in west africa. they are deciding whether the virus poses a global threat. health officials announced 45 new deaths in guinea, sierra leone, liberia and nigeria. in all, 932 people have died. some w.h.o. officials fear the virus will spread beyond west africa and they're trying to figure out how to stop it. they will decide whether it should be classified as a public health emergency of international concern. they have only declared an emergency twice in recent years for a swine flu pandemic in 2009

and for a polio outbreak earlier this year. public health officials worry that travellers will spread the virus farther. saudi arabia says a man possibly died from the disease after returning from sierra leone. he developed symptoms of viral hemorrhagic fever. if confirmed it would be the first ebola related death outside africa. international investigators looking into the downing of a malaysian airliner have stopped their search for remains of the victims. they've halted their work at the crash site in eastern ukraine over fears for their safety. the plane was shot down last month with 298 people on board. most of victims were from the netherlands. and dutch authorities are leading the investigation. government forces and pro-russian separatists have been fighting in the area. dutch leader mark rutte says it's too dangerous to continue. >> this evening the prime minister of the netherlands announced mh-17 recovery mission cannot continue at present time.

this means that tomorrow our police personnel and experts will not be searching the area. >> 100 investigators have been working at the site. some of them will remain in the region. they will resume their work if the situation improves. in the meantime they'll ask people who live in the area to hand over items they may have taken from the site. russian president vladimir putin has hit back on those who imposed sanctions on his country. his government decided to ban or curb imports of food products from the u.s. and european union. putin signed an executive order to enforce the embargo. the decree says the measures are needed to protect national interests. russia will ban all imports of agricultural products from the u.s. as well as fruit and vegetables from europe for a year. japanese officials brought in

their own sanctions against russia and it could affect japanese fruit. last month u.s. and european leaders brought in additional sanctions against russia and criticized leaders in moscow for their annexation of crimea and for their interference in eastern ukraine. the people in charge of fukushima daiichi are looking for approval from local fishermen. they want to discharge decontaminated groundwater into the ocean. experts estimate about 200 tons of contaminated water leaks into the ocean every day. engineers with tech owe electric power company are building an iron barrier along an embankment to contain the problem. they plan to pump the water out

and use a decontamination system they're building to remove radioactive substances. they say the barrier and new system will be completed by next month but it's they have limited capacity in storage tanks. so they want to release some of the water into the ocean. they want to decontaminate and release groundwater that is collecting in wells near reactor buildings. they explained the plan to the fukushima fisheries association and they will try to get approval from the fisheries cooperative. they say they won't go ahead without the fishermen's consent. a japanese publisher has tailored a classic children's story for a new audience. the words are in braille and the pictures come alive by touch. a visually impaired mother who wanted to share the joy of reading with her kids inspired the project. >> reporter: guri and guda are

two mouse brothers who love eating. since it was first published 50 years ago, the book has sold six million copies in japan. the picture book is considered a beloved masterpiece. cherished by children from one generation to the next. for ages, mitsuko iwata has dreamed of reading a braille edition of guri and guda. for the past 30 years she and volunteers loans picture books to blind parents and children. iwata and her team have converted picture books into braille editions. they also create a relief effect by using cutouts. what started iwata on this road was her inability to read picture books to her two sons. >> translator: when my boy was hospitalized i heard a woman reading books to her son.

i could just picture the boy looking at the book intently. i became envious and thought if only i could see. >> reporter: once iwata and her team tried to convert guri and guda into braille but it took months to complete a single book. so iwata approached a publisher to make guri and guda especially for blind parents. she succeeded. the company decided to make a braille edition on the 50th anniversary of the book's first bl publication. long story books like guri and guda are often bound with rings to avoid pressing the pages. >> translator: on a page like this, the ring would go through the picture of the egg. this ruins the composition of the picture. >> reporter: the book binding company came up with a solution.

they added a rim so no pressure would be applied to the page itself. so the braille dots and raised pictures are not flattened. at last, 5,000 braille editions of guri and guda were printed. the clothes worn by guri and guda each have different patterns so they can be recognized by touch. this two-page spread features many animals. each is overlaid with a larger version to enable readers to see the details. iwata's long-held dream has finally come true. >> translator: i can identify goour goour and -- guri and

gooud gooud immediately when i touch the pages. i feel so happy that it's finally been done. >> reporter: this family gets a lot of enjoyment out of the special book. -- has been blind since birth. she has two sons. she had always wanted to read to her children. now at last, she can. >> translator: which one is guri? does he feel rougher? >> translator: this one is guri. >> translator: i love sharing the experience with my children of touching the picture and recognizing the characters as we read along. >> reporter: the braille edition of guri and guda is a monument to the wishes of blind parents.

two japanese cities, two atomic bombings that changed history. tens of thousands of people died in an instant in august 1945. survivors were left suffering in the ruins. "newsline" will show you how they've been passing down their experiences and sharing messages about world peace. join us for our special coverage, "remembering hiroshima and nagasaki" through saturday, august 9th. cambodians who lived through a reign of terror have waited decades for justice. their hour has come. now a u.n.-backed tribunal is set to deliver its first verdict in a case against two former leaders of the khmer rouge. nuon chea was the right hand man of pol pot. khieu samphan was the regime's head of state. they have been charged with crimes against humanity, genocide, religious persecution, homicide and torture. the defendants have denied the charges.

the prosecutors are demanding the heaviest penalty possible, for the tribunal, life in prison. they argue the men cannot avoid responsibility for actions taken by those at the heart of the regime. pol pot oversaw the exodus of millions of people from cambodian towns and city. more than 1.7 million are believed to have been killed through forced labor, execution and starvation. a campaign in india that's aimed at improving public health and hygiene is underscoring the low number of household toilets. that's posing a serious public health problem. nhk world's neha gupta reports. >> reporter: an animation video made by unicef encourages indians to use toilets instead of going outdoors which worsens public sanitation.

problems caused by the absence of toilets are more serious in poor rural areas. household toilets are rare in villages with no sewage systems. unicef estimates that 600,000 children in india die from diarrhea or infectious diseases each year. >> i'm worried because he often gets sick like this. >> reporter: a woman living in a northern indian village has been trying to change the situation. priyanka bharti who is 21, grew up in a house th a toilet, which was uncommon. when she married two years ago, she moved to the house of her husband's family, but it had no toilet.

she urged the family to get one. but they refused. so she left the house in protest and returned to her own parents' home. her defiant stunt was almost unthinkable for women in the region. a local newspaper told priyanka's story, and it praised her as a courageous woman who raised her voice. she is also appeared alongside a movie actress in a government commercial to promote household toilets. [ speaking foreign language ]. >> reporter: priyanka's activities caught the attention of an ngo which installed a toilet in her husband's house free of charge.

priyanka and her husband have joined the ngo, engaging in educational activities to promote the use of household toilets among local people. >> translator: i'm glad my reaction has drawn attention to the toilet problem. >> reporter: priyanka has high hopes for narendra modi, who took office in may. >> translator: i will see that toilets and other items that have indispensable for people's lives are installed in all households. >> reporter: when he served as the chief minister for guj rat state, modi improved local infrastructure. now as prime minister he has designated the spread of private toilets as priority item. >> translator: now that prime minister modi made a promise to the people i hope he will live up to his words.

i will continue my activities until all the people get toilets in their homes. >> reporter: the insufficient number of toilets is even blamed for dragging down india's economic growth. now the question is whether the new administration can ease a serious and widespread public health problem. neha gupta, nhk world, new delhi. u.s. mobile phone carrier sprint will have a new top executive. efficients at sprint say he'll come from a group company of its japanese parent company, softbank. the third largest u.s. largest mobile telecom operator announced the appointment of -- he is the top executive of

miami-based cell phone wholesaler, bright star. softbank bought out bright star last year. it decided to drop a bid for t-mobile as it would face strong opposition from u.s. regulators. softbank's top executive -- said in a statement that he believes that it would benefit customers. he added softbank needs to focus on making sprint a successful carrier. japan based free social messaging service, line, will set up a development fund to help game and content makers expand overseas. line executives announced it will set up the $100 million fund as early as september.

line plans to provide funds to game and content developers. they will offer the games on its platform. line executives say they'll also hope the prungt will inease the number of overseas subscribers. line's senior executive officer says that game development costs are rising rapidly. he says he hopes line will grow together as a partner with game and content developers in the global market. the syrian capital of damascus was once considered a cultural hub. but many people have been forced to flee the city because of an ongoing civil war. some dedicated syrian artists in other parts of the world are keeping their traditions alive. nhk world's -- repts. >> reporter: im gallery in dubai displayed outstanding works from

artists throughout the middle east. the work of syrian artists has been attracting a lot of attention here. this piece is called "hope." it features multicolored objects that look like rows of fingers. the objects resemble the flags of many countries. they bring to mind a world in which people live together in harmony. some works offer deep reflections on the effects of the civil war. here an image of a building that was destroyed by war is combined digitally with --'s masterpiece, "the kiss." . mohannad orabi is a young syrian artist who fled to dubai. in april 2014. orabi's portraits express a variety of human emotion. before the war, their most

distinctive feature were large eyes covered over with paint. but the changes in syria transformed orabi's style. he began to paint the eyes in detail. >> now all the eyes have become more open and detailed and these eyes can tell more story. sadness but i believe in hope. in my mentality, the light is a hope. so this spark in the eyes these eyes is like a light in front of us. we believe in hope. >> reporter: this gallery has become a safe haven for syrian artists in exile. hishama samawi is syrian. he and his cousin own the gallery. he used to promote young and unknown artists in his gallery in damascus.

but the civil war forced him to move the main gallery to dubai. >> we had to make a tough decision that if it got ugly we would not be able to protect the works there. >> reporter: ammar al beik is one of syria's most prominent film makers. his short film "the son's incubator" depicts the life of a family with a newborn baby. it's a commentary on the so-called arab spring. audiences praised it at the venice film festival and elsewhere. in 2011 al beik found out that the syrian government d arrested many of his film maker colleagues. he thought he would be arrested if he remained. he asked samawi for help and fled to dubai.

>> sometimes i feel guilty because i -- there is a lot of friends, they the not go outside syria. this is what i -- why i feel guilty. >> reporter: al beik is working on a feature film. it tells the life of a syrian painter over the past three years. al beik feels it's his responsibility to tell the world about the situation in syria. >> i think my art and my films, it's the key to open a new window, a new door, a new future. this is why i'm working. >> reporter: even in exile, these artists keep their homeland in their hearts. as they continue their quiet fight to keep syrian art alive. akira saheki, nhk world, dubai.

it's time for a check of the weather. mai shoji joins us with the latest. >> it is the typhoon season and we have one typhoon coming our way directly heading toward okinawa. it is 120 kilometers of the island but it is already affecting the locations. it's out southwest of oak that showing the start of typhoon halong. winds have reported gusting up to 121 kilometers per hour already. and the waves will be as much as it is nearing the islands of ay. okinawa and possibly making landfall in southern kyushu as we progress through the next few days and probably making it toward tohoku but it is gusting

at 200 kilometers per hour. we are likely to see the gusts of 200 kilometers per hour and the rainfall accumulations will be staggering amounts. this is not a fast-moving system. it will just be climbing the digits. looks like it is going to be bringing a lot of rainfall to shikoku again which is bad news because the flooding has not alleviated at all. that is due to the moisture from the stalled front in northern japan. it is also surging all the way to tohoku where we have reports of 200 millimeters in the past couple days. and so additional amounts of 100 millimeters are not welcome there. and the land is very prone to flooding and landslides especially. there are a lot of mountains so dangerous and serious conditions here. it's surging a lot of the heat

and rising the temperatures up to 35 degrees or more in some pacific locations. and because of that heat develop, combined with upper cold air we are likely to see unstable conditions. we're likely to also see the southwestern monsoonal flow being active. scattered thunderstorms and heavy patches of rain are likely. about 140 millimeters have fallen across some of these locations. but heat warnings in the southern half of china. with 40 degrees in chongchin. a couple of storms heading to hawaii which is iselle. iselle is a category 1. it was a category 4. it did downgrade a little bit. but it is not going to become a tropical storm system before it hits the big island. you do have a hurricane warning in place across the coastal locations. a lot of people are preparing by

stocking up with bottled water but it's before it reaches near oahu it will be a tropical storm status. stormy conditions continue throughout your weekend and another hurricane moving in, julio. we'll keep you updated with this system. across the bigger picture, thunderstorms are likely across the northeast but not getting a lot of precipitation towards the west. critical fire weather will be continuing there with chances of thunderstorms in reno. 32 degrees. i'll leave you now for your extended forecast.

that's all for this edition of "newsline." i'm catherine kobayashi in tokyo. thanks for watching.

good evening from los angeles. i'm tavis smiley. an evening with angelique kidjo, has both a new cd out called "eve," inspired by humanitarian work in kenya as well as an auto biography entitled "spiert rising." we are glad you joined us. conversation with angelique kidjo coming up right now.