e.u. financial watchdogs in greece as well as the amount of debt relief the eurozone finance ministers will hopefully have some answers at their next meeting in june. and there's something different about the atmosphere at the talks this time around our correspondent at the meeting in sofia is barbara. we've seen something quite unusual here of when european finance ministers the euro group finance ministers are talking about greece there was a lot of you know man unanimity usually there was a lot of fighting and struggling but now they really say we're sort of ninety percent of the way in now we want to see this through basically we could say that the euro group finance was one the greek problem off the table for more than eight years they've seen crises and dramas and shouting behind closed doors and now all this is supposed to end on august twenty years and they want to smooth the way so they really seem to be of one mind to say oh we want to sort of make them go out we want to make them leave in an orderly manner they will be free however of course there will be conditions for the time

country's debt comes from assets adik quired when it bailed out institutions during the financial crisis but the e.u.'s largest economy still has a while to go to meet rules dictating that members of the eurozone keep their debts rate at sixty percent or lower. private space transportation company space. launched a rocket carrying ten years satellites into orbit from california it is part of a three billion dollar project that will replace the world's largest commercial satellite network. it's one of eight missions to place seventy five satellites into orbit in the coming months. it's been hard to come by any positive news about german russian trade relations these days that's because of the reciprocal sanctions in effect. germany's recent decision to go ahead with building north stream to a gas pipeline that will transport natural gas to the e.u. one day is welcome news. the other good news is that trade between germany and russia picked up last year. it declined significantly in twenty fifteen falling almost twenty four percent following russia's annexation of crimea the year before bilateral trad

e.u. political and financial elite with the scientific justification it needed to impose us directly policies on the whole continent. that were. less. impressed by its widespread acceptance thomas hadn't been a ph d. candidate in economics at the university of massachusetts prepares a thesis based on the rogue often reinhart paper. throughout the semester i was trying to kind of rebuild their analysis basically from scratch and just based on the publicly available records and the part of the data that they had posted on the web site i was unable to at the beginning you know everyone including myself thought that i was just making an error somewhere after the semester was over and we were pretty certain that i had made a mistake we you know i started i reached out festers right here and wrote off in through e-mail and you know just politely asking them for their data so i could take a look at it. and i know it was kind enough to send headed in the research data on a spreadsheet. that proved to be a problem. five countries didn't you know they didn't make it into the calculations and that was r

even some sort of a financial minister for the e.u. something we haven't seen yet and these are the things that germany is very opposed to remember there's very critical against because it looks a little bit like like taking over debt from other countries this is something especially the c.d.u. of uncle americal and her sister party these you don't want to provide a vault and berlin thank you and welcome. and for more let's bring in max hoffmann now our correspondent who is standing by with the latest from the french capital and paris a beautiful sunny day there as we can see max so tell us you know is it also likely to be a sunny day though for. in berlin how important is this visit when it comes to achieving his reform plans. well the political weather report in isn't as favorable as the weather we have here in paris to tell you the truth in my remark all is fighting for the survival of his political ideas for the european union some already say they're dead in the water were some of his proposals for rupert for example having a euro

e.u. exports to the united states time to rope in our financial markets reporter only by standing by in frankfurt ali just tell me is there any other way of fighting such a big trade deficit than imposing tariffs. well you can devalue your currency what does that mean that means you make the dollar less valuable and thus everything you export becomes more attractive to people let's say in china or in europe because they can buy a cheaper the u.s. currency is cheaper for them so they buy more and. you can save jobs at home the chinese have been doing that for many years for many years now although it's slowly eased the control over their currency so the currency has revalued a bit it's gone up a bit but that has helped them tremendously the u.s. can't really do that anymore considering how they important they are internationally and because interest rates are going up in the united states any attention would put fizzle out anyways now as far as this potential trade war goes i mentioned the signals of wiggle room coming from the u.s. administration but who would have to be the first to back down to

spike and financial markets don't like that investors rush for safe havens while the double whammy of sanctions and syria hit the russian ruble hot. the slippery business of crude oil the e.u. tries tapping resources from authoritarian rule doesn't buy john to make it less dependent on russia and promises promises china vows to open its financial sector to foreign investors will it actually happen. also coming up a great case of eating humble pie but wouldn't you do it if it made you three billion dollars richer. yep i'm talking about mock sack of his congressional grilling. i'm bad for us all and let's do business russia's ruble is falling fast against the u.s. dollar as tensions mount between the two countries washington's new sanctions against russian businessmen and their companies along with the shop the escalating diplomatic crisis in syria have seen the ruble plunged to just over fifteen u.s. cents a level last seen about a year and a half ago well the news of the sanctions last friday have hit and russia's currency is now plunged by about twelve percent. the sanctions washington announced on friday against russia are already beginning to be felt on the streets of m

on the bombardment there and also make it financially more stable particularly after the financial crisis so the e.u. to the core and there the question is of course how much headway will want to make be able to make on the reform of the eurozone particularly with her own voters and her own in p.s. actually in view who are so afraid of german taxpayers money simply being distributed across europe and their banking union i mean as you're alluding to there it's a really sticky subject for her domestically a lot of pushback that she is also getting from the population within germany but in the meantime in the pressure is also on to find some common solutions because we have this e.u. summit that's coming up in june how likely do you think it is that we could see a breakthrough in talks today. but one thing can be said the e.u. is on its way to a banking union that has been decided but there still are divisions over what actually means a high risk loan and these details still need to be worked out there's resistance from the german parliament which secured in its coalition deal here in germany the right

e.u. summit was devoted not the brics it durham's not the financial compensation on the british. we. love russia of chemical effect the civilized world of the west so. i think for any neutral observer it should be. do you think that's actually now because i'm obviously not a military person but from what i understand the claims of tourists amaze government actually saying that russia attacked them by the use of military means and when you are attacked by the use of military means i suppose you would respond militarily do you expect that to come well i don't inspect the u.k. to counter russia militarily because well with all respect to the british military with all respect the united kingdom it's not the it's not the nation to confront pressure militarily at present but i think it's not it's not the probably cation organized only by great britain the u.k. well in this case it was used as a tool i think that it was at least carbonated because washington and the follow up reaction by watching the show that they the most interested part that they expelled not just symbolically just to sh

still room for improvement to weather any new financial storm is a would give up with it would fall but i do however scholtz opposes the swift introduction of an e.u. wide bank deposit guarantee scheme after all that could cost german savers a lot of money if a foreign lender goes bankrupt. and a brief while ago i spoke to a washington correspondent costs and fun nominee outside the i.m.f. where the spring meetings and taking place and i asked him how close the e.u. is to being granted that permanent tariff exemption. we're hearing it's still difficult. shoals the german finance minister and vice chancellor said he was optimistic that a solution could be found that would be up. permanent exemption for the europeans from those tariffs today he sounded a bit more cautious again saying he didn't know if that would happen by the time the temporary exceptions run out at the end of april so we don't know simply what's going on talks on the way you mentioned the chance of the she would come to washington next week also french president mccrum will be here next week and what the europeans tried to point out all the time is this is an issue where europe is

e.u. tries tapping results from authoritarian rule to azerbaijan to make it less dependent on unruly russia. and promises promises china val's to open its financial sector as a foreign investors will it actually happened. i made his will in place of business round one in the facebook face off between congress and c.e.o. mark zuckerberg it got personal at times as we'll hear in a moment that the markets leapt up facebook shares let's more than four percent to one hundred sixty five dollars during testimony on tuesday that's the biggest hike in almost two years all the same they're worth eleven percent less than before news broke last month that consulting firm cambridge analytical misuse the daughter of millions of facebook users for election targeting purposes in the u.s. zuckerberg is facing a backlash for not doing enough to protect account information shareholders tighter regulations i'll talk to our correspondent about that in a moment first let's listen in to my favorite part of the testimony which really sums up the whole point of these hearings mr circle burt would you be comfortable sharing with us the name of the hotel you stayed in last

e.u. exports to the united states time to rope in our financial markets reporter only by standing by in frankfurt ali just tell me is there any other way of fighting such a big trade deficit than imposing tariffs. well you can devalue your currency what does that mean that means you make the dollar less valuable and thus everything you export becomes more attractive to people let's say in china or in europe because they can buy a cheaper the u.s. currency is cheaper for them so they buy more and. you save jobs at home the chinese have been doing that for many years for many years now although it's slowly eased the control over their currency so the currency has revalued a bit it's gone up a bit but that has helped them tremendously the u.s. can't really do that anymore considering how they important they are internationally and because interest rates are going up in the united states any attention would put fizzle out anyways now as far as this potential trade wall goes i mentioned the signals of wiggle room coming from the u.s. administration but who would have to be the first to back down to de

financial storm is a would give up that it would for. however scholtz opposes the swift introduction of an e.u. wide bank deposit guarantee scheme after all that could cost german savers a lot of money if a foreign lender goes bankrupt. and every four ago i spoke to our washington correspondent constant fun naaman outside the i.m.f. where the spring meetings with the world bank been taking place and i asked him how close the e.u. is to be granted the permanent tariff exemption. well we're hearing that it's still difficult yes they all off shoulders the german finance minister and vice chancellor said he was optimistic that a solution could be found that there would be a permanent exemption for the europeans from those tariffs today he sounded a bit more cautious again saying he didn't know if that would happen by the time the temporary exceptions run olive at the end of april so we don't know simply what's going on talks on the way you mentioned the chance of the she would come to washington next week also french president mccrone will be here next week and what the europeans tried to point out

e.u. said it will apply counter measures if the u.s. threatens its mettle industries for more on that i would like to chat now with our financial correspondent who is standing by for us in frankfurt comma considering that angela merkel is on her way to washington why is the government coming out with this now. well it certainly looks like the government wants to prevent big disappointments because it's pretty clear that a solution for this. conflict with the americans about terrorists will not be found on the national level it's not the berlin government that will negotiate this with washington it's the european level the european union which will have to find a solution together with the americans but for sure until america will mention the topic when she. is going to meet donald trump in washington she will repeat the position of the government that the government things those terrorists are wrong which means that this statement now can also be seen as a reminder to everyone that the government thinks there's you know pressure in the capital that this is an important topic where such a solution has to be found not if i was a member of the

financial support from the government the mayor says that last year that support amounted to a whopping four europe's. still that hasn't stopped molnar from criticizing the country's far right populist government e.u. flags fly prominently in the village as a sign of protest. still going on with his arrow question i think it's essential for him great to be part of europe and you shouldn't play one side against the other i think it's disgraceful that people are creating negative stereotypes and trying to turn that into political capital or you were lucky allan the. moment our is referring to a fellow mayor thirty kilometers up the road in the town of moore raw alone. there are a number of newly renovated monuments here and lots of new construction including the city hall building but we don't see any new flags here. mayor zoltan no grotty is a member of prime minister viktor orban fetus party no ground he supports the government and he and his town have certainly done well because of it. has got all communities that don't get government support should take a long hard look at their selves it's all about reciprocity that if a mayor gives the government a hard time the government will do the same to

financial support from the government the mayor says that last year that support amounted to a whopping four europe's. still that hasn't stopped molnar from criticizing the country's far right populist government e.u flags fly prominently in the village as a sign of protest. still going on with that operation i think it's essential for him great to be part of europe when you shouldn't play one side against the other i think it's disgraceful that people are creating negative stereotypes and trying to turn that into political capital or you were lucky allan a. mall nar is referring to a fellow mayor thirty kilometers up the road in the town of morata lawn. there are a number of newly renovated monuments here and lots of new construction including the city hall building but we don't see any edu flags here. mayor zoltan no grotty is a member of prime minister viktor orban feeder's party no ground he supports the government and he and his town have certainly done well because of it. you know the little communities that don't get government support should take a long hard look at ourselves it's all about reciprocity if a mayor gives the government a hard time for the government will do the same to him.

and most importantly that it's creating financial dependencies in countries that might lead to one realty as in smaller countries we've already seen that in the e.u.'s neighborhood and also india's neighborhood so they're very clear that it's good an economic concerns that germany and india both would like to address the e.u. wants a free trade agreement with india britain is now leaving the e.u. does that make this free trade agreement more likely the free trade agreement negotiated is have been going on for a decade and they've been stalled for a better part of the decade because of demands from both sides that have not been met but i think with bracks it is an opportunity to kick start these negotiations and keep in mind india had was free movement or better movement professionals within the european union now because of stringent visa regulations the u.k. was opposing that backs of the e.u. has possibility to offer more concessions to india and germany in fact is taking the lead in pushing forward their feet agreement negotiations because with the u.k. leaving germany stands to meet with the free trade agreement with india i have to also ask

e.u. facebook for example has been rolling out stronger privacy protections and making it easier for users to find their privacy settings the financial impact will be big as well so according to goldman sachs they estimated that this new regulation could reduce facebook's revenue by up to seven percent that's two point eight billion dollars per year the interesting thing though is that the law could also have an impact on people outside the e.u. so nearly all the users around the world now facebook says it will apply this new law to them as well so essentially e.u. regulations protecting global users of facebook very interesting there in fact the e.u. justice commissioner has already taken note of this and take a look at what she tweeted here she writes glad to hear that facebook wants to use e.u. privacy standards as their global model we will observe the great interest how the letter and the spirit of the law are applied so well to wait and see what happens in practice but the signs are there that this new e.u. regulation could in fact be a new global standard for data privacy and a blueprint for the u.s. as well perhaps right karl