the talks as angela merkel and emanuel macron under heavy pressure to contain growing outbreaks at homey is steadily approaching 3 million confirmed cases of the virus and france is treating more than 5,000 covid patients in icus, the highest number in nearly a year. president macron is set to address his nation today about the crisis. >>> so let's cross to cnn's melissa bell, she joins us live from paris. good to see you, melissa. so surging cases in france and germany with both nations turning to russia for help with the vaccine. what is the latest on all of this? >> reporter: that's right, rosemary. that is an important shift since what we had seen so far is that the sputnik investigation under investigation since march 4th by the european's medicines agency that process will take several months. if you look at what's happened with previous vaccines until now it was really only countries breaking ranks with the rest of europe who turned to it, hungry, austria which is extremely upset about the way that vaccines are distributed among european countries now in negotiations with russia

weeks later, those doubts grew after the french president emanuel macron intervened saying: well, mrn was wrong on that. there was a shortage of data for the over 65s but everything suggested the vaccine would be effective. despite that, some countries restricted astrazeneca for older people, then later those restrictions were lifted. and by this point, a perception was developing. here is the bbc�*s europe correspondentjean mackenzie reporting that "belgium's medical adviser has told me that people who have nicknamed it the aldi vaccine — after the supermarket — because they see it as the budget option." and here is one woman at a vaccination centre in berlin this week. translation: it doesn't exactly | inspire a lot of confidence, you | know, because there is also a lot of discussion already at work, do i get vaccinated or not? and this evidence isn't just anecdotal. this french survey was conducted as the suspensions were announced. only 20% of people said they had confidence in astrazeneca. for the pfizer vaccine it's 52%. and let's remember the context here. while confidence in

military bases around the south china sea so now the french are getting involved emanuel macron is seeking to position france as an alternative power to both china and the us in the south china sea as the unprecedented military buildup in the region. got to love him also last month he declared a hunter killer submarine into the south china sea. britain of course is reliving former glories britain's newest aircraft carrier h.m.s. queen elizabeth would be deployed to the south china sea in the coming months when you spend all that money on a ship about $3000000000.00 quid it's important show that wasn't a complete waste of cash to do something with it but get the violin will dispatch a warship to asia on its return journey it will sail through the south china sea yes even junius ending if we get this german even have a navy and if so germany have a navy we've been here before people and you got to love this question stroke headline from c.n.n. from last week china has built the world's largest navy now what's beijing going to do with it i don't know. protect itself from all the other navies

say it would allow more countries and manufacturers to mass produce the jobs french president emanuel macron says his government will speed up the declassification of secret documents from its colonial era that decision will make it easier to access information relating to the algerian war of independence the dismissal of armenia's army chief has come into force 2 weeks after the prime minister fired him nickel passingly on accuse the military of attempting a coup last month demanded that he resign army leaders have reiterated their claims for passion to step down 3 jurors have so far been selected in the trial of a white police officer accused of killing george floyd former minneapolis officer derrick chauvin is facing charges of 2nd degree murder and manslaughter john hendren has more now from minneapolis. race is particularly important in this case of a white police officer accused of killing a black man in a racially charged incident that was videotaped by bystanders and went viral that video sent protesters into the streets across the united states and set off riots here in minneapolis

there will be no weekends or days off the government's been criticized for its slow roll outs but emanuel macron promise all people over $75.00 would get a vaccine appointment in the coming weeks and he said the vaccine center staffing would be boosted by firefighters retired doctors and medical students no look at that the heart of the battle in the coming weeks and months will leave it as a nation morning noon and night i will be mobilized the government will be mobilized and i know that all the medical staff across france will be mobilized in this fight. ethiopia's prime minister has confirmed for the 1st time that eritrean troops entered the northern territory region during the recent conflict and said the soldiers entered out of fear they would be attacked by to ground forces he added eritrea had promised to leave the area when the ethiopian forces were able to control the border soldiers though been accused of atrocities by rights groups we started to get preliminary results for the republic of congo's presidential election a vote that was marred by concerns over transparency denis is wide

given the sort of night and day scenario you can understand why french president emanuel macron is sortive of this idea of limiting or restricting vaccine exports out of the eu to places like the uk where obviously the situation is much, much better. kim? >> absolutely. all right. thanks so much, scott mclean in london. appreciate it. >>> the suspect in the boulder supermarket shooting has been moved from the county jail. officials tell cnn that other inmates were asking about him and making threats. in court thursday his attorney asked that the next hearing be delayed so that the defense can assess what she called her client's mental illness. kyung lah has details. >> reporter: handcuffed and in a wheelchair from a gunshot wunt to his right thigh ahmad alissa appeared for the first time as defendant. the 21-year-old sat alert as the judge read his rights in the courtroom. >> sir, do you understand those rights as i've explained them to you this morning? i need you to answer out loud, please. >> yes. >> that was the only time he spoke in his ten-minute hearing. he is charged with ten

. >> and in france president emanuel macron is making it his priority to speed up vaccinations as theountry face has third covid wave. for more on the situation in europe let's bring in cnn's melissa bell in paris. so, melissa, the french president saying he will accelerate vaccinations, making it a national priority. how will they do that exactly and talk to us, too, about germany's situation. >> reporter: well, essentially, right, keeping vaccination centers over the weekend, rosemary and denouncing that people who are over 70 until now had been people over 75 with no underlying conditions can go ahead and get themselves vaccinated. so lowering that age range of people who can go to those vaccinations and -- centers and begin to get a vaccine, but it is a reminder really of how far behind where it should be france is. less than 4% of its population has been fully vaccinated and once again, eu countries want to get 70% of their population vaccinated by the end of the summer. so it's going to be a hard slog. this of course as you mentioned each as in germany, in holland, in norway, in

european politicians, particularly emanuel macron poured cold water on the ethics of the astrazenecathat even as europe, as you say, is way behind others, they are not using doses of the astrazeneca vaccine they have. so add all of that together, it means they are incredibly slow. there is a lot of anger in europe, but it is really incompetence and inexperience. >> so that leaves them in this extraordinary position where they are putting embargoes on the vaccines. how is that going to play internationally, do you think? how is that playing in europe? >> i think it will play extremely badly internationally. its practical consequences in the short term are relatively modest. as you say, the italian government's decision won't have an a huge impact in australia because they have few cases. but the signal it sends out the reputation of the european union which always prides itself on being the bastian of the international system looking like internationalist in extreme. it is very global, everything from viles is produced in lots of different countries. we would have terrible trouble vac

supply to stave off a third wave of the virus and so you can understand then why french president emanuel macronve of vaccine export restrictions from the eu. the only option france has right now is to, well, put in new restrictions. so more regions are going into lockdown and across the country social gatherings are being restricted to six people. on the other side of the english channel the uk on monday is going to loosen the restrictions on social gatherings and next month pub patios will be reopening. so british prime minister boris johnson says that he is thinking deeply about this issue of vaccine passports each for the pub which would potentially require people to show proof of either antibodies from a previous infection and negative test or of course a vaccination which more than half of the adult population has right now. this plan, though, has been getting a lot of push back from pub owners who are expecting all covid restrictions to be fully lifted by the end of june. the prime minister also acknowledged that there are serious moral and ethical issues with any kind of a plan like this

emanuel macron yesterday of france saying, yes, the way they went to get hold of vaccines was the rightas shown is going to be a thing of the past, which may be seen once again as someone who is talking the toughest language probably of all of the eu leaders, saying if they want then they still have on the table then they still have on the table the option of any sort of export ban. . ~ the option of any sort of export ban. ., ~ , ., the option of any sort of export ban. ., ~' , ., , the option of any sort of export ban. ., ~ , . the option of any sort of export ban. ., ~' i., , . .~' the headlines on bbc news... china has imposed sanctions on nine british citizens — including five mps — after the uk took action over human rights abuses. "stay local" rules will lift in wales from tomorrow and staycations are back on — but only for people living within its borders. the president of the european commission, ursula von de leyen, says astrazeneca producers must "catch up" on its promised deliveries to the eu before exporting doses elsewhere. shipping traffic through one of the world's busie