now western leaders to spend the day condemning the use of chemical weapons in syria and talking about the need to send a message to the asad regime most what that message delivered by guided missile accept democracy is a tricky thing and their leaders might be hawkish can they convince their legislators and their voters to get involved in someone else's messy war on the other side of the world i'm phil gale in berlin this is the day. you're. here got to do want on this you know we have proved last week nearly ten days ago now chemical weapons were used in at least chlorine and that they've been used by the regime of bashar assad in the better of you know we would have been very very seriously very close to the whole situation. to see what happens folks you see what

happens to bread. in the world groups of those in the position working. with germany with a notice of making an item off of all military action but i want to stress again that no decision has been made on this that we acknowledge and support that everything has to be done to signal that this use of chemical weapons is unacceptable and it is for some time nick no one authorized western leaders to take the role of the world's police and at the same time investigators prosecutors judges and execution is already here. so we begin the day with a crisis over syria u.s. president donald trump or so far held off on his threat to bomb the assad regime after last weekend's suspected poison gas attack but his allies do seem to be rallying round after an emergency cabinet meeting britain's prime minister theresa may said her government agreed on the need to take action to deter the further use

of chemical weapons by assad's regime president of france said he's spoken with donald trump several times this week and now says he has proof that the syrian regime did use poison gas meanwhile forces on both sides are getting ready. the destroyers the u.s.s. donald cook and the u.s.s. porter have been positioned off the syrian coast but if and when they'll get the order to strike is not yet clear. after this bellicose tweet us president donald trump is holding back for the time being we're looking very very seriously very closely at that whole situation and. we'll see what happens folks we'll see what happens it's too bad that the world puts us in a position like that but you know as i said this morning we've done a great job with isis we have just absolutely decimated isis but now we have to make some further decisions so they'll be made fairly soon thank you all very much

. france's president emanuel said in a t.v. interview he had proved odds ally russia at a reception of international diplomats president vladimir putin called for common sense russian warships have left their base in the syrian port of tartus but officials say the move was only for the ship's own safety. so what happens next well let's discuss that with the director of the margaret thatcher center for freedom at the heritage foundation in washington and nile gardiner correspondent. been monitoring the situation on the ground from syria's neighbor beirut brussels bureau chief he's here to give us the the multiple european perspective so welcome to you all let's start with you in washington should america's next move be military and if so what. i think it's highly

likely that the united states is going to launch strikes against the assad regime the president has clearly signal that the united states is prepared to take military action there have been a whole series of discussions within the u.s. administration of the past few days over the course of u.s. military action i would say it's very highly likely at this at this stage and certainly washington will be looking for its allies in europe especially of course great britain of france to take part in any military action and also looking for support a more widely across europe and also in the middle east as well but without a doubt i think we are certainly looking ahead to. what will be i think a very significant and robust u.s. military response to the barbaric use of chemical weapons by the assad regime so a very clear statement of intent i think will be sent by the united states a tool regime but also of course to the russians and the iranians who have been

propping up our saddam in damascus and so what would be the purpose what would be achieved by bombing assad in this way. i think a number of things going firstly the united states wants to send a very clear message not only to our side but also to other rogue regimes that the use of chemical weapons against civilians is completely unacceptable the actions of the regime have been absolutely brutal and barbaric the united states as the leader of the free world must stand up to this kind of barbarism and savitri so i think that's the first thing but secondly this is also i think a warning to the russians and iranians that their support for the assad regime is also unacceptable and i do believe the president trump will be sending a clear message to both moscow and to raam. it's it's all about us and his

murderous regime is unacceptable it's all about the message i wonder. in beirut obsessive going to preventing another attack ok oh. the west has proved to be quite an unreliable ally to the syrian people i would i wonder would syrians necessarily welcome this sort of military intervention. well you know syrian people are quite divided have been there last year and met many on the ground and of course a lot of syrians who live here in lebanon than what they feel about the assad regime is quite mixed i haven't met people who like the assad regime but i certainly have met many think that perhaps he is the lesson of the two evils there is also a certain amount of war fatigue which has set in and assad in many ways is managed to convince people that it's either him or the extremists partly because there have been extremists fighting against assad also because assad's narrative in many ways is one so those people will not be happy in fact today we've seen some sort of

protests happen within the regime kanjorski the anti american protest but those who supported the rebels and who wanted a change in the sit in political system would welcome such a move provided it is based on a broader strategy and does bring a broader change to the things and the situation in syria and it's not just of be sitting exercised by the united states of america and its western allies of these people would want assad to leave or to have some sort of a political say or to have some of these areas under their control so the political situation move forward in a way that they would like i say you have much hofman in brussels that we see we saw in the report that the united states and france and britain seem to be gearing up to follow the united states in whatever it is doing germany though saying no we will not do that they are both bag with merkel we heard saying the country will not participate but support sending

a message that the use of chemical weapons is unacceptable so to us suppose that two questions why is germany unwilling to commit militarily and how does germany send a credible message to syria without force. all right where do i start let me start by germany having a very passive his streak ever since world war two a very strong side lacked that shying away from military conflict ever since that had to change a little bit in the last decades still they also feel that they were right with many decisions they took to take for example the invasion of iraq where then chance or germany categorically refused to take part of this and afterwards germans felt that this was the right decision but we also have something in two thousand and eleven when there were strikes by western allies in libya again the germans refused to participate back then that was a huge problem for them diplomatically but now again it seems like they have been well read indicated that actually this was again the right decision so this is

a german tradition fortified by these decisions and so secondly what can they do to send a credible message you probably could extend that question to any country that is operating outside or inside of syria at least i have not met one expert in the last year or so who said we really have a credible way out of this mess there would have been solutions earlier that's what they all say for example in no fly zone or a humanitarian corridor it seems that this ship has sailed because of the consolation that we have with the russians on the ground with the proxy wars that are going on there and like i said no expert really could give you a credible way out of there and of course if you don't if you're not willing to use military power like germany is then the credibility or the threats you can put on the table decrease. godrej in washington though those missing weapons of mass destruction in iraq and the repercussions from that do cast the long shadow in this

conflict it's going to be a big sound certainly for britain to get involved in any conflict in syria in this way as well as perhaps france how does how do they go about solving that. i think this is in many ways different to the iraq war the iraq war is actually a sort of distant memory i think for policymakers in washington right now and it's already very clear i think from both london and paris the french and the germans. already on board i think with participation in u.s. military action a very significant cabinet meeting in london today with overwhelming cabinet support for a british role in this military intervention so i don't expect that iraq is going to weigh heavily in terms of political decision making no i mean i'm just i mean i think if you're interrupting you there but i think. it is quite an important point

to make the british cabinet decision was that event should be a response there was no mention of a military response. you know i think that you know when we're talking about a response to syria's action were overwhelmingly talking about a military response i think that's very very clear there isn't any other response i think there can be effective against the likes of anything else would be seen as absolute weakness which is why i think the position taken by the german government a very isolationist position i have to say on this matter is very disappointing. i think that if you know prepared to act militarily against brutal tyrants using chemical weapons murdering children you know we are absolutely without moral clarity if we cannot take action against these kinds of barbaric acts

so the free world must act and that action must be in the form of military action i think there's a very clear understanding the british cabinet what is at stake here and what needs to be done and in beirut west of indecision and in the posturing about red lines and possible military responses seems to be playing into president assad's hand sort of warning him and giving him and the russians time to prepare. well absolutely if you remember two thousand and thirteen president obama had done the same thing but then he could sort of return to his people and say look i've got a deal and the russians are going to ensure that assad is going to get rid of all of those chemical weapons stockpiles but it attacks a continued and believe mongst intelligence officials in western countries at least is that he either hid some of the stockpiles or has made fresh ones with the help of local scientists now that happened then now again it sort of occurs that donald trump is sort of following the same lead line by president obama and this certainly

has given us our time or the last few days we've seen a lot of activity in syria through our heart actually hearing reports how all the air bases have been emptied our forces have been scattered and as others moved all of them closer to the russian bases and of course he would do that to ensure that if there is an american strike then they would want to not to hit any russians and he's moving closer to them to sort of see a save his country or say it is regime actually from a from the american strike so it has given assad's regime a lot of time the generosity an army general summer for we have managed to speak say and they also are very well aware of where the american coalition forces are and they would be prepared to strike them if the american deuced like incident was in essence mataafa russia's line through all of this has been there is no evidence that there was a chemical weapons attack in duma and they are saying that everybody should just

calm down today the french president says he has proof what did he say about proof. he did say that there at least was chlorine used and that it was used by the regime of bashar al assad he refused to disclose what his sources were what the kind of proof was that he has but we've heard from u.s. sources that they tested urine and blood from victims of that attack and they tested positive on chlorine and that would be the usual way to verify something like that as for who did it that's a little different here we would have to know what kind of intelligence he has but of course syria at the moment is heavily surveilled by nato awacs that is rater surveillance with big planes so that would be a source for example for identifying aerial movement by the regime of bashar. al

assad but we don't have proof of that that's probably what mcchrystal has in mind but we haven't seen it but hoffman in brussels thank you so much. in washington and child in the beirut thank you. human rights group amnesty international says the number of reported judicial executions around the world fell during twenty seventeen the group is warning that the true number of people put to death is unknown since some countries like china treat execution of this as a state secret and many of us carry out executions in full view of the public. in iran responsible for carrying out small then huff of the well it's known executions last year that's according to amnesty international's latest figures in dozens of those cases that meant public execution in iran drug trafficking and blasphemy are among those crimes punishable by death. at least five people were executed in iran

for acts committed when they were still under eighteen. but. just four countries were responsible for eighty four percent of all recorded executions last year iran saudi arabia iraq and pakistan but the country suspected of being the world's leading executioner is china. it's thought to have put thousands to death last year more than the rest of the world put together the because data on the death penalty there is a state secrets exactly how many is a matter of speculation. but not counting china twenty seven thousand so the total number of executions worldwide fall by four percent from the previous year. m misty international says that reaffirms the global trend towards abolition of the death penalty last year a further two countries guinea and mongolia joined the one hundred four who have

now abolished capital punishment for a second year in a row the us did not feature among the top five global execution is slipping from position seven to eight this is due in part to ongoing legal challenges of the use of lethal injection. but as litigation in several states progresses that because the executions resume. charis on georgia campaigns and advises amnesty on the death penalty and specializes in the americas she joins us from london welcome to day to the now as well as laying out the situation around the world the amnesty report makes it clear that the group views the death penalty as a bad thing why. there is a thank you for having me first of all and i'll report shows create. the festing is that there was there in the auction in the use of that yes yes we have seen the

executions job being and that the sentence is always a four lane compared to the high peaks that we're going to need because yes we also recorded our basic practice is being deployed in consciousness. and that what i report makes really here is that we still need support to lead the court to the research on the. reasons why is my question which is why is amnesty against the death penalty why not execute people like terrorists whose atrocities kill tens hundreds of people for the sake of whatever combs. thank you i was going to the point we believe was in that penalty unconditionally we believe it is a human rights violation and the practice is i just mentioned showed that it is untenable at this time in eight to want to let me give you an example as we are watching television as we all do when you've been in if i mean was. that their

relative was and that's your author known for its eye on a nickel or not. it was based on a forced confession that he didn't make that was executed and this i mean learn about the thought on it by what it isn't even no matter what we think about that that i'm sure we're all feeling horrified about the fact that the family it was the night the last goodbye there at that if if not you're example just not actually address it for your example tells us that a system was executed values that were. barbarously it doesn't explain why killing people by the states whom the state views to be the most heinous of its miscreants is a bad thing. my assumption in my view really makes a point because it shows that whenever that is you who is it is you who is that

everybody crazy and if you really are believing in the sense of your life and not their rights of oil we can all relate to larry that if there isn't i have that at that. time as a unique fact compared to a different function and we have seen that brings us in iraq must executions been carried out in one day just as a. measure against. terrorists this is not stopped for that reason from happening and we see that in iraq by many other countries around the word that is not the solution to crime and that is a moral choice that we need to make if you want to protect human rights and that anti should go. america in one of the reasons that the cover of the americas that the united states is the biggest executioner there but you say in

your report that the move towards abolition is gathering pace why do you think that is. this is nastier in the united states recorded again historical law is what for excuses and the sentences and we feel that the sentence is in particular is if you know that we want to highlight because it shows a country that has no you must. be not convenience but if i think that that is the response of a system a country that is absorbing all the fear yes and not only their claims of racial discrimination or of economic discrimination that has done. the use of that today and we strongly believe that the fact that the sentences have been decrease in. show is that even the united states are moving away from that we had a terrific stories from last year just to give you one example we had one man i

mean really it was execution just hours away and not it was really well commended. that were important that sentence he wanted for the sentences for him because he believed that as a black person that he didn't have a soul and he deserved to die despite the courts finding out about these claims and . they could not address these really deeply concerning features because of procedural issues and it's. really enclosed with his life. i will leave it there charles some georgia from amnesty international thank you. tyrant ra friday is not only the start of the new year but also national elderly day as in many parts of the world older people are a great proportion of the population so a. national education is going to help them lead happier and healthier lives.

thailand has embarked on something of a new education drive that these new pupils are hardly school age because of the country's rapidly aging population or thora these are trying out a new initiative which is less about schooling the young and more about educating the old with projects to keep the elderly from being bedridden and combating loneliness opposite. the mayor of a thailand subdistrict explains the scale of the problem he says that in his district almost ten percent of his nine thousand residents are registered for elderly welfare a high figure which is set to rise. so it's back to school for these pensioners where they learn simple english language phrases and body movement exercises. the sixty three year old chucho supercat the classes and uniforms provide

a kind of therapy. that coming back to wearing the school uniform makes me think about the good old days. and it feels very comforting meeting a lot of friends here. i got to learn and think about things from a depressed. graduating with a class of twenty eighteen was he says one of the most important days of his life but after that the reality of every day life bites. we were in stressful just living day day by. i don't have any income who my children would sometimes bring me food and stuff so i receive the disabled welfare of about twenty five u.s. dollars a month and my children also have to raise their own children. as thailand marks national elderly day on april the thirteenth the country will have to address the concerns of people like shot by twenty thirty twenty five percent of its population

will be senior citizens so it will have to learn how best to katha them. that's the day to day have a good time. the . flowers are everything to him. last has dedicated his life to. this is my love. he creates huge stunning floral

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a king to luxury chocolate treats we have lots of fun topics on the show today here's a look at what's coming up. singing stars music maker round plus designs and prison usual instruments. aren't sissoko arrangements.