this would marry armenians of every walk of life gathering in different parts of the city and connecting and then forming a you know again once again a substantial crowd that they will have been avoided by this means that things are taking. things are happening quickly let's put it that way and you have a hard minister to be elected next week well who is that going to be i think about everybody as one man who lives there these crowds that will be told i'm sure. the french president has used a speech to the u.s. congress to urge washington to reject nationalism isolationism and to preserve the iran nuclear deal but just hours later emanuel macro said he's not confident president trump will stay within the agreement. palestinian journalist ahmed abu hussein will be laid to rest in gaza he died on wednesday from injuries sustained while covering the protests and gaza's border with israel two weeks ago abu hussein was shot when israeli forces used live fire against unarmed palestinians. today is

day one of the philippines president rod rico to his order to close a popular holiday destination for six months he says tourists have turned the bar a kite beach into a cesspool now the beach does attract about two million tourists every year that's worth a billion dollars in revenue it's now declared off limits for tourists while the government looks at sewage related problems you are right up to date with all the top stories up next jayne's here with inside story i will see you very soon. the scramble to salvage the iran nuclear deal french president emanuel might call

is in washington for a state visit as iran insists the west has no right to make any changes to the agreement so can the core convince trump to stick with the deal this is inside story. i welcome to the program i'm jane docked in france in the united states have a long history that goes back centuries from the american revolutionary war to the statue of liberty the two countries have had strong ties french presidents emanuel mccaw is hoping to build on that special bond joining his three day state visit to washington d.c. and donald trump has rolled out the red carpet but beyond the handshakes smiles and lavish ceremonies there are serious policy disagreements including the twenty

fifteen iran nuclear deal which could threaten to put a strain on the special relationship trump says he wants to withdraw from the agreement while france and other european nations are urging him to stick with a deal iran for its part says if the u.s. withdraws it too will likely abandon the agreement gets i guess in a moment but first al-jazeera is kimberly elke its reports from washington d.c. . u.s. president donald trump welcomed french president emmanuel macron to the white house with a state dinner to celebrate the bond between the two nations. what appears to be a warm friendship was on full display earlier in the day trump even somewhat oddly decided to white dandruff off mccrone shoulders we have to make a burger he is perfect but as the parent barked on the substance of their bilateral meeting from had

a stern warning for iran they restart their nuclear program they will have bigger problems than they have ever had before his statement underscores the leader's key foreign policy differences truck favors was drawing from the iran nuclear deal as one of the signatories to it mccraw and was to preserve the twenty fifteen agreement to limit tehran's nuclear powers before may deadline on whether to pull the u.s. out or not trump wants his concerns addressed those include a plan to stop iran's ballistic missile testing and limit iran's influence in iraq yemen levet on and syria a chronic greed they may need to address those issues to keep the deal alive. who's on iran we disagree on the j.c. but i believe we can come up with something that can deal with the fundamental issue of the j.c. a which is the nuclear issue but also deal with these other three issues that are included. trump again suggested gulf nations need to make

a larger financial investment in syria's future stability as security following the defeat of eisel the countries that. are there that you all know very well are immensely wealthy they're going to have to pay for this but the meeting appeared to do little to ease fears of a looming trade war with no sign trump had agreed to exempt the european union from tariffs on steel and aluminum imports set to take effect on may first we have a very first issue on trade which is overcapacity is still in a limb in him it doesn't come from europe and not even from friends can really help it al jazeera at the white house with the u.s. and france trying to resolve their differences there is no disagreement over iran's next news as we mentioned earlier its foreign minister says his country will likely abandon the deal if the u.s. pulls out and he had some sharp words for donald trump we have said that the united

states has not lived up to its to its side of the bargain that is to its commitment to lift certain sanctions not to impede. economic relations between iran and its economic partners it has done all of that it has prevented. basically dissuade threatened companies from engaging with iran so the economic benefits of the of the nuclear have not been at the level that had been promised it's bring in our guests in teheran how mad most obvious system professor of political science at the teheran university in washington d.c. hillary mann leverett a former state department diplomat who negotiated with iran and the book texas joining us on skype all of us mcgee is an author and does public policy advocacy in support of the trump administration a very warm welcome to all of you have an was sorry i'm just wondering how iran is

viewing this vacillating over its future and the future of the deal what are they going to say about it well i think. yes i think a lot of uranium is are very disappointed in micro because previous to his visit to washington the position of the european union especially france and germany was that the nuclear deal has to stay in place nevertheless what we have heard during this with visit to washington is perhaps a very close inning a convergence if you like of positions regarding the nuclear deal with not saying that we need a new nuclear deal the problem with that is we already have a nuclear deal that actually took over two years of diplomacy and if the united states is not fulfilling its obligations in the current deal what why should iran trust the united states in making a new deal so i think a lot of skepticism and most of not a lot of disappointment regarding friends in iran right now ultimately that's

a good point isn't it i mean why should iran now trust the u.s. with anything as far as a state is concerned well what we see right now is the trumpet ministration as adopting what the reagan administration did on nuclear containment and that is trust but verify so i think the sticking point that is right now is how can the united states verify that it's the chibi in its interest inside the deal and more importantly how can it verify that all the pieces of the puzzle are being a here to so right i don't care what those interests all what the u.s. interests are at the moment was us do is concerned. you know those interests really are about america first it's about trying to make sure that they can control nuclear proliferation not only in the middle east but also in the asian bloc as well and that's what you see right now in. talks with north korea and those are

going very parallel to restarting the iran deal you might think that the trumpet ministrations trying to unite the interest that has received and then heritage from the obama administration to be more consistent with the america first national security strategy that trump has articulated already and then get that to match what they're trying to achieve in the north korea. piece as well you already see the north korean leader conceding to the interest of the west and all now what you're seeing this week is the french are already there and the germans intervene or possibly have to get stronger on the table because we jumping india hillary mann leverett i mean because of that we jumping ahead but now with q. is probably looking at this with glee and thinking why should i stick to any deal if the u.s. is going to change its mind it's a time. well very interesting lee within the white house there is

a certain consensus that pulling out of the iran nuclear deal will help them in negotiations with north korea because their goal they say is complete denuclearization of the korean peninsula which would mean taking apart every single piece of it north korea's nuclear program and what stands in their way in terms of achieving that with north korea in their view is this nuclear deal that the obama administration negotiated with iran that leaves iran with a nuclear program where iran is perfectly entitled and continues to enrich uranium on iranian soil so that's. a baseball is that the fundamental behind what donald trump is about it so much i mean first and foremost because it's going to bomb his name i suspect but. it is that that's the first that is absolutely the first issue i mean the first the first issue and this is critically important because it's really all about domestic politics and president trump himself coming

into midterm elections here in november twenty eighth and then for his reelection in two thousand and twenty so it's very much rooted in domestic politics and the key filler for trump in his domestic politics is to distinguish himself from president obama and this is president obama's signature foreign policy achievement so first and foremost trying must do in terms of how i think the white house views this must do whatever he can to tear down and minimize and be little what obama achieved however that does leave some room and there is some there is some optimism here in washington this morning that that does leave some room for a follow on agreement to the g c p a way to the iran nuclear deal something that makes it much bigger in president trumps words that would give him a victory out of the jaws of obama's defeat ok all of a what is this possible new deal going to be and do you agree with hillary that

they could be a deal on the side that is not going to scope open out of this agreement. i think that trump is saying very consistent to what he's been saying on this issue for quite a long time that it's time for america to get tough. we've already shown that we're getting very tough with north korea and they're coming to the table and now he's saying at the same time going into office that this moran this iran deal stunk up high heaven he did not like it he's really saying that they will announce that iran had in their view already come to the table. well the thing is is that what he's saying is he needs to change the economic interests of the united states associate with the iran deal and that's what he's also achieving in the north korean negotiation as well because these the we can have your rainy i'm going beyond three to four percent in the nuclear in nuclear realm up where we are in n.

korea and also in iran we do not want them to get your rating and values up to ninety percent where they can have a bomb that's proliferation that is against the economic interests of the united states and what you see going on in the white house is a much stronger hawkish stance in bolton and combined with larry kudlow where you have ninety national security strategy with economic security strategy and this is the america first ratatouille i don't see donald trump moving very far away from that on this he's going to be tough tough hard to go she hits with iran tough hard negotiations with north korea and then he's also working very carefully to keep the relationships with the french and then later in the year in november he's planning to go over to make good relationships with our own longstanding partner to u.k. and he's going to bring the germans on board i got you want to have all that us so how hard for president rouhani has already said today that he won't accept any

changes to the deal do you think you'll stick with that line because we've had on the same days a rift saying that iran is always open to diplomacy said two different messages. right so before i answer your question regarding verification of the dio the j c p o a is very clear in that the only party authorized to actually inspect and decide whether is whether iran is abiding by the deal is is the i.a.e.a. and the i.a.e.a. has consistently reported that iran has fully obliged by the deal so there is no talk whatsoever of cheating even in the united states i don't think they believe that iran is enriching over four percent i mean just a few weeks ago might compel the head of the cia who's trying to become the new secretary of state told the senate foreign relations committee that he doesn't believe you ron is after the bomb even before the deal let alone after the deal so

regarding the issue of verification i don't think there is any problem whatsoever there nevertheless what the united states is asking right now has nothing to do with verification the united states is talking about iran's ballistic missile program about iran's regional policies while the problem is that these issues have no place in the current deal there's not a single word about iran's missile program in the deal now regarding what iran will do i do not think that as a final decision has been made i think iran is still waiting to actually see what own trump will do and then after that i think there are probably three likely scenarios from the iranian perspective either that iran continues with the d.o. although it might decide to you know not implement some aspects of the deal so maybe somewhere in between the second scenario would be to withdraw from the deal

because the united states has withdrawn and right now actually there is this talk of maybe even withdrawing from the n.p.t. so one of those three scenarios but i think iran has essentially no choice but to respond in a way if donald trump decides to withdraw from the deal ok hillary if iran does decide to withdraw from the deal. what are we looking at. well president trump you know gave his hind rhetoric yesterday here in washington that if iran does withdraw from the deal and. restart in his terms restart this nuclear program they will be facing dire consequences from the united states but i think my two colleagues hit two critically important points first my colleague in teheran very rightly very astutely pointed out that secretary of state doesn't it pompei out testified before congress here and here in washington last week that the united states never believed that iran was racing toward

a bomb before the nuclear deal in twenty fifteen and still doesn't believe that iran would race toward the bomb that's one piece the other piece is my colleague in texas pointed out with the lack of any economic payoff for the united states from this deal those are two critical aspects because from the trip but from the perspective of people i speak to in the white house on one hand the united states got nothing from imposing this new nuclear restrictions on iran since iran wasn't pursuing a bomb anyway and it got nothing economically the european companies are the ones that benefit it not american companies so there is really no interest within the current white house to stick to a deal that in their view essentially only pops up the former president obama but gives the united states the thing in return that said the key point that trump has put out there as american concerns and who knows whether these are real since the the nuclear issue also now seems have not been so dramatic in terms of pompei us

testimony but those issues as my colleague in teheran pointed out the blisses ballistic missile program the iran is not pursuing a nuclear weapon ever and iran's regional stance its stance its influence in the region there is real there is real room to pursue and proceed on those paths and it's not that hard and this is where i think members of the french delegation here in washington. see some optimism on the ballistic missile program it's not that hard for iran and others in the region to agree on a limit for the range of missiles iran doesn't need and has said it has no interest in intercontinental ballistic missiles long range missiles it doesn't produce them it can agree not to not having nuclear weapons forever iran is a signatory to the n.p.t. it can literally just recopy that language into a new agreement the sticking point which people are really minimizing in some ways is how to deal with iran's role in the region here in washington there's really no sense of how to deal with iran's continue rising influence it seems no matter what

the united states does in syria in iraq in yemen iran is the one that benefits and so there's real puzzlement i think a especially in the white house how to deal with iran's influence and here my colleague in tehran perhaps could point to this more their foreign foreign minister mohammad java three if has an idea he has an idea for a regional security mechanism to have a dialogue on all of these issues i'm not sure that will work in washington people here aren't that big on dialogue but to me that's the real sticking point and that's where i think president mccraw on has focused his has his plan going forward ok how much do you think that's what this is all about at the moment what is happening in syria in particular the fact that iran has got such a strong foothold here the close relationship between saudi arabia and the u.s. administration. well the issue here is that first of all if there is to be

negotiations with iran the united states has to talk to iran directly right now the united states is talking about a new deal unilaterally there's been no negotiations whatsoever with the iranians on any of these issues even if there is negotiation the only way to success as professor leverage just pointed out is to have a mechanism where other parties are also involved for example you cannot have israel having over two hundred nuclear weapons in the new in the region in fact the only nuclear power in the region and at the same time as iran not to even have conventional missiles how is iran supposed to defend itself so if there is to be dialogue it has to be on a regional level and also other parties searches russia turkey even china should be involved right now there is absolutely no dialogue except for trump making decisions on his own ok oliver is the paranoia of what's happening in the middle

east iran's growing strength there israel's growing concerns about iran coming ever closer to its border is that what's driving donald trump now and his policy what is . absolutely jane this is the art of the crust of what the matter is. there has been economic interests associate with the original deal called a one hundred fifty billion dollar boeing contract to bill hemmer and airlines so we're talking about big airplanes big airline industries that's an economic interest but the biggest economic interest that donald trump's been talking about for years is get the oil drop the price down on that oil and keep it down there looking at how merican interests can get a hold of those reserves and start building up reserves of oil there we have lots of reserves of oil here in the united states but the middle east is also

a very strong economic interest for the united states in that oil when you have good oil then you have good four percent below unemployment four percent unemployment and then you're trying to drive an economy from three and a half percent to four percent and that's that's the economic security enters that larry kudlow is that hearing that the president and they needed to have or a strong national security strategy which they happen place and also a hawk in their like in john bolton to be able to unite national security with economic security because when you look at donald trump it's about integrating immigration and integrating economic tax reform economic interests and growth growth growth growth jobs jobs jobs and it's also about integrating america's infrastructure hillary considering the negative impact on will trump's raid has had on iran and its european business partners do you think the e three britain france

and germany from a financial point of view could go to lead i think chancellor merkel in germany put that out on the table a soon after president trumps and i gratian her visit here to washington her last visit here to washington. was was terrible presidential trump would not even shake her hand and i think she went back to the european union and tried to make the case how the european union could go it alone if they could be a single power on the world stage to compete with the united states they didn't have to go along with the united states but i think her dismay in some ways her colleagues in europe especially in france with the election of president mccrone he said well you know i'm not so interested for france to go along with the european union france may get a better job going it alone with the united states and so we've seen the french really out in front working hand in hand with the united states they were the first to come to the president from side to retaliate in syria after the chemical weapons

attack there a couple of weeks ago president mccrone has had weekly conversations with trump not just these these visits for all their pomp and circumstance but weekly conversations with president trump so i think what trumps interest is when he looks at the european union and he is he has said this quite frankly he doesn't want to deal with the european union he doesn't want to deal with a strong multilateral framework on the other side of his negotiating table he wants a one on one scenario where he's dealing with countries whether it's north korea whether it's japan or china or france he wants to deal with them one on one because he thinks then the united states has the clear advantage as the world's biggest economy maybe side by side with china but he sees the united states having its economic and strategic advantage if it is sitting across the table from a single country so for trump not just on the iran deal but on all sorts of economic issues on tariffs on trade it's critically important for trying to have this relationship with france to break france away from germany and the rest of the

economic rest of the european union and i think in part of the reason of it if i'm trying to shore what about iran and its relationship with the e.u. you have from the business point of view on how much iran needs the e.u. and this little bit more about what zarif straitened when he said that there would be consequences and how will this play out on the ground if this deal is broken and you weigh. yes well first of all when we talk about the economic interests of the united states in the region i think it's actually very debatable if the united states wants to solve the conflicts in the middle east because the tensions of the past few years back surely hoped the united still states sell billions of dollars in fact over three hundred billion dollars of arms to saudi arabia and now there is something a lot of arms both to the m.r.i. to use as well as the batteries so i think it's very debatable if they want to actually reduce the tensions in the region i'm regarding the issue of europe in

iran i think if the united states decides to withdraw from the deal on may twelfth we'll have to see if they decide to exempt some european countries from sanctions or not if however they decide that they want to implement secondary sanctions secondary sanctions being sanctions that also punish not only u.s. companies but actually companies all over the world so even if a chinese company does business with iran according to secondary sanctions they could get punished by the united states and if one made twelve the trumpet ministration decides to go down that path then the problem is that you're on cannot even continue with the deal with the europeans even if it wants to because even if leave it there today a lot of your how much most of it thank you very much for that those final words they hillary mann leverett and all of a wiki thank you for watching you can see the program again any time by visiting a website al jazeera dot com for further discussion go to our facebook page at

facebook dot com ford slash agents that story can also join the conversation on twitter handle is at agents that story line is at. by thanks for watching. my. the scene for us where on line what is american sign in yemen that peace is always possible but it never happens not because the situation is complicated but because no one cares or if you join us on sat there are people that that are choosing

between buying medication and eating base is a dialogue i want to get in one more comment because this is someone who is an activist and has posted a story join the global conversation at this time on al-jazeera. her. life. everything you do is being analyzed it's being weighed and it's being measured it was cool this month. and it's not just i phones that i lost my phones i mean most small phones of all these days at the moment we are in a state of the universal it started something that was. i would rather take the risks of democracy to the risks of dictatorship digital dissidents at this time on al-jazeera.

hello i'm daryn jordan in doha the correct amount of the top stories here al jazeera security is being tightened at the border between north and south korea a day before their leaders hold their first direct talks and more than a decade helicopters and police dogs are being used to secure the area where north korean leader kim jong un and south korea's president moon j.n. will sit down at the board of truce village of pan man jom a wide range of issues are expected to be discussed including pyongyang's nuclear weapons program democratic editor james bays reports from pyongyang i was led to this historic meeting. when you walk around pyongyang everywhere you seem to go you hear military music blaring from shops and loudspeakers some of the drums beating particularly heavily it was arguably the tense is time on the korean peninsula and .