Of a spike in infections in georgia after all the docs christians gather in defiance of bands to celebrate easter. Welcome to the program british leaders are defending themselves against damning criticism that theyve mishandled the coronavirus pandemic the sunday Times Newspaper points the finger directly at Prime MinisterBoris Johnson it accuses him of wasting precious time in stopping the spread now the paper it usually supports Johnsons Conservative Party but it says he ignored scientists warnings fail to replenish stocks of protective medical equipment and didnt attend 5 initial emergency meetings about the outbreak well since then more than 15000. 00 britons have died in hospitals around the country and thats the worlds 5th highest now. Tional death toll and the true picture may be much higher official statistics dont include the deaths of people in care homes for the elderly that totals estimated to be around 7 and a half 1000 well paul brennan has more from london it is critical the times the sunday times apologies has basically gone back to early january and kind of looked at the governments response in those early weeks particularly the 5 weeks from the end of january to the very start of march where there were 5 cobra meetings this is the National Crisis committee of the government where Security Advisors scientific advisors and political bodies political people get together and work out what the Government Strategy should be the cobra it was the acronym then what we have is the Prime Minister not attending the 1st 5 of those and the sunday times is gone and spoken to senior downing Street Advisors people from within the areas Government Departments and the quotes that they put forward in todays report spread over 4 pages as you say pretty damning you know one quote is from a department of Health Person the pandemic was always top of the National Risk register always but when it came to it we just slowly watched the government there was putting up a defense of it saying Boris Johnson doesnt actually have to attend those cobra briefings those cobra meetings not until it really gets critical u. K. Education secretary given williams and dismissed allegations that the Prime Ministers absence from cobra meetings was unusual. For Prime Minister from the moment that it became clear that there were challenges in terms of coronavirus developing in in china has absolutely been leading our nations effort to combat the coronavirus making sure that resources and money is not an issue or concern for any department especially Health Service in terms of dealing with this and as you will well know and i know as an experienced journalist youre very aware of this many cobra meetings take place and i spent many hours attending cobra meetings where its actually led by the departmental minister but the focus that the Prime Minister was putting on this and can to continue to put on this has meant that this is the whole government effort also under increasing scrutiny for its handling of the pandemic has the United States now the question of when to ease lock down restrictions is dividing the country President Donald Trump keeps pushing a positive message he says there are signs that covert 19 has passed its peak but experts warn moving too fast could be disastrous as Andy Gallaher reports now from the state of florida. After weeks of stay at home otis hundreds flock to the reopened beaches in Jacksonville Florida the medical of this controversial move as essential activity even as a state hit more than 27000 coronavirus cases its what authorities call a pathway back to normal life. But in other parts of the u. S. The scenes a very different across the country a small but growing protest movement is calling for restrictions to be eased from utah to wisconsin in both republican and democratic led states people are taking to the streets urging a return to normal life we are still a free country at least for now and people have to make a decision and thats their personal decision if they dont want to be 6 feet apart or 7 peter peter parker i cant i cant dictate to that to them despite declaring that individual governess are in charge President Donald Trump seemed to encourage the protests in a series of tweets on friday all 3 states have democratic governor has his tacit support is seen as deeply political in a time of crisis i know it is there are a lot of protests out there and i just think that some of the governors have gotten carried away you know we have a lot of people that dont have to be told to do what theyre doing theyve been really. Doing everything we best and in new york the epicenter of the pandemic measures to ease restrictions still far off the states governor says this is no time to play politics how does the situation get worse and get worse quickly if you politicize all that emotion. We can not go there thats where i work so hard when anyone raises any political agenda to me i work so hard to distance myself from it. Some states are beginning to ease restrictions many are still battling the coronavirus and testing is in short supply the desire to get back to some kind of normal is clear the careful approach to doing so vital thank you very much a nation divided it was perhaps inevitable the politics would play a part no matter what challenges lie ahead throughout this crisis the mantra has been were in it together but any sense of unity now seems to be falling apart conservatives believe the cure is worse than the disease others and used to be a more science based approach the fact remains many states a yet to peak in their coronavirus cases the decisions governors make now will be crucial but that hasnt stopped some trying to score political points gallacher aljazeera Miami Florida not all trump is accused of stoking islamophobia as well after raising questions about social distancing in mosques during the holy month of ramadan White House Correspondent kimberly how get us more there are increasing questions about a retreat by u. S. President trump on saturday accusations he may be stoking islamophobia in the United States the reach we read lets see if authorities enforce the social distancing orders for mosques during ramadan like they did churches during easter i asked the president about this retreat heres what he had to say i didnt put it back go ahead please just think that the monster to follow so i think i just had a call with the moms i just had a call with ministers rabbis we had a tremendous go with the faith leaders no i dont think that at all i am somebody that believes in faith. And it matters not what your faith is but our politicians seem to treat different faiths very differently and they seem to think and i dont know what happened with their country but. The Christian Faith is treated much differently than it was and i think its treated very unfairly now when it comes to enforcing social distancing the department of justice did take on the case of at least one church in mississippi where worshipers attended in their automobiles with the car windows rolled up the department of justice said that these worshippers were simply exercising their right under the 1st amendment of the u. S. Constitution now many in the United States watching very carefully to see if this same effort will be applied when it comes to those who may want to celebrate during ramadan which begins in the u. S. On thursday turkey has overtaken iran as the country with the highest recorded number of covert 1000 cases in the middle east the latest figures put it up to 8 highest in the world just after china a crowd of ours in turkey has also killed nearly 1900 people with more than 82000 infections that have been confirmed and nearly 3800 of those cases were diagnosed in the past 24 hours a lockdown has been extended for a further 15 days prohibiting travel between 30 of turkeys largest cities kids the managing editor of the daily subba a progovernment english language newspaper in turkey he says residents are complying with the lockdown measures that are happy with the governments handling of the crisis. Majority of the people regardless of what d car or party they come from even if they do have some sort of criticism they support the way that the way the government has handled this issue in fact the trust for it for the for the Health Minister for example has been like skyrocketing like no other ministers before how he has handled the information sharing the transparency with regards to that has been largely supported by the public and in fact the reason why. You know of course the numbers are rising in turkey but and this has a lot to do of course with our population with the numbers of testing and you know it has passed in iran our neighbor but if you look at the testing numbers we have done turkey has done double the tests in iran so far and to the measures prior to the 1st case in turkey are significant post 1st case and treat when it comes to treatment for example d the situation of the health care d system in turkey is not comparable to its neighbors. You know in the neighboring region so yes there is of course there d is there will be some criticism regardless of how the government is acting and there may be some room for opportunity but i think overall if you look at the big picture turkey has handled this coronavirus in a successful way but the number of confirmed cases in japan has doubled in just 10 days 568 new cases were reported on sunday raising hurdle to more than 11000. 00 for the rises are expected a small testing is done the safe for emergency in tokyo and 6 of the areas has been expanded nationwide. Well its a different story in south korea where the daily tally of new infections has fallen to Single Digits for the 1st time in 2 months just 8 new cases were confirmed and the governments been praised for its widespread Testing Program despite the downward trend officials are warning of a possible renewed spread as people ease up on social distancing. Well still ahead here on aljazeera how far largest refugee camp in greece is being linked to virus Safety Measures and delivering a lifeline venezuela migrants are being seen as essential in colombias capital but at what cost to themselves. And yet will rain in the fall calls across much of japan weve just seen system after system of the last several days say this bank of cloud or his face at least was away from the Korean Peninsula so for much of monday it should be a dry a day here but there is some rain just a pulling in to Northern Areas that there is that rain working its way through home shoe and eventually later in the day pushing up into guide and still very heavy amounts of rain into all central and southern areas of china this will stay in the full cost for the next couple of days it could be very heavy we could have some isolated flooding united to the north coming into beijing weve got to quite a cooler fields of things that a very strong wind cycle from this system up in the far north and then down into indonesia some lighter rains here for the next couple of days you will see some dry conditions through much of thailand cambodia vietnam maybe just the oldest scattered showers but really nothing more than that and the rain notice as heavy as it has been across to march and java still nolan i was born and seeing some heavier downpours similar story on choose davis still staying fine and dry to the north 37 in bangkok and we just got a scattering of showers really throughout much of the philippines more than a few showers there into the fall northeast of india as we go through monday the rains developing again into bangladesh up into assad and also along the east coast pushing across into west bengal as we had to choose day. Man ma is on trial from rain to genocide the government stands accused of committing atrocities against their own henge of people one i want to investigate on aljazeera. Al jazeera. Heard. Welcome back youre watching aljazeera me so home run the reminder of our top news stories a British Government minister has described reports that Prime MinisterBoris Johnson skipped critical coronavirus meetings early in the outbreak as grotesque the sunday Times Newspaper alleges that the British Government was too slow to respond to the threat from the pandemic. Pressure is mounting on the u. S. Governors to ease coronavirus lockdown rules protests encouraged by donald trump have been held in several states for the 3rd day in a row the president says some states will begin easing restrictions as early as monday and turkey has replaced iran as the middle eastern country with the highest number of reported infections close to 3800. 00 were diagnosed in the last 24 hours raising the total to more than 82 sounds and. Trafficking are voters in mali hard casting their ballots in the 2nd round of legislative elections despite threats of violence and the pandemic hand washing facilities have been set up outside polling booths and guards are warning people about social distancing in the capital bamako the government went ahead with the vote despite the kidnapping of an Opposition Leader and threats from fighters like al qaida but there are 147. 00 seats up for grabs in the National Assembly nicholas haq is following developments from neighboring dhaka. The Prime Minister has come out and said that he was happy that the mountains took part in this election and yet theres only been 8 percent of the electorate according to the Election Commission that has come out to vote even worse than the 1st round of this election where there is a historical of 10 percent of the voters that came out clearly people are scared of 2 things the Global Pandemic the coronavirus thats also affecting mali but also the threat of armed groups such as the al qaeda affiliates Jemaah Islamiya loosely mean and the state in the greater so hard to groups that have called on this election to be boycotted and so what weve seen is that a few people came out to vote and that has gone in the hands of the ruling party who has claimed victory in key areas including the north of the country were armed groups are active at the heart of this is the reason why this parliamentary election is taking place in the 1st part of this was part of the Peace Agreement signed in 2015 between armed groups and the government and the idea here is to change the constitution and give greater power to local officials libyas youd recognize Government Forces say theyve resumed their military operation toward the who didnt have to successfully completing stage one they are battling to recapture the stronghold of walled clique for the western city of the who is where many of his men come from Government Forces say they killed 10 didnt have to fighters and captured dozens ball in retaliation forces intensified shelling on residential areas in tripoli heavy floods in kenya have killed 3 people and left 20 missing including Police Officers who were on a rescue mission in west the current has been Strong Enough to uproot trees this week to belong in a fast moving toy to schools homes and market. And in chad 5 civilians died when the war plane on the ground accidentally fired a missile the rocket shot through a fuel truck an hour early missed another fighter jet and hit a house next to the airbase children are amongst the dead in the capital in germany now iran has warned that the us of a decisive response to what it calls any dangerous actions by American Forces in the gulf that follows an incident on wednesday when the u. S. Military says 11 vessels from irans elite revolutionary guard came close to its ships in the gulf the u. S. Called the move provocative in response iran has stepped up the guards patrols in the region. A growing number of private clinics and laboratories in france offering coronavirus tests but Public Hospitals are a long way from offering widespread screening that could delay government plans to loosen the lockdown in the middle of next month the battle has more. In the northern french city of this private part 3 tests for corona virus using blood samples the equivalent of 30. 00 people without a prescription can find out within a week if they are or have been infected the test measures antibodies that a created to help the immune system fight infection or be detected the body is in a phase of active infection which means the virus is present and antibodies are developing if the test is negative the person is either not infected or theyre in the incubation period so its too early to see the antibodies the test can also show if you came into contact with the virus a few weeks ago because the body has developed specific antibodies some Health Experts say the blood tests can help track cases but a less reliable than the nose and throat swab tests favored by the government and while private testing is growing in france its not enough to fill the shortfall in the Public Health system the french Health Minister says france tests are 150000 people a week half the number in neighboring germany since the beginning of the Health Care Crisis in france there havent been enough testing kids in the countries that means that only people in hospitals like this one or in care homes for the elderly are being tested for coronavirus presence Emanuel Macra admitted france wasnt prepared for the crisis that said the country will be in a position to test widely in a month when the government plans to loosen its lockdown. Me. At the city did this by mail event we will be able to test everyone who shows symptoms were not going to test everyone in france that would make no sense but everyone with the symptoms needs to be able to be tested that way people with the virus can be quarantined looked after and monitored by a doctor one of us this doctor says the testing is key but so is more research into understanding the coronavirus. What were missing is research on infected people how people infected the virus in different regions and how widely the virus is circulating in the population the studies havent been done. The french government has ordered millions of tests from companies in europe and asia and boosted Domestic Production but unless it has the capacity to carry out widespread testing in may to track and isolate coronavirus patients easing the lockdown could put people at risk of a 2nd wave of infections and its actually a partner aljazeera france not far as damage to one of the largest migrant come sing greece on the island of chills. Athens he says a 47 year old iraqi Asylum Seeker died in the overcrowded camp which sparked hours of protests. It seems that a lot of the people staying in the camp were worried the woman who died had died of corona virus she had been to hospital a week earlier with a high fever she had been diagnosed negative for coronavirus evidently Something Else was the matter because she died days later in the camp but these facts were not known to the people who started this protest and it seems the court house of hand part of the administrative facility has been burned down mainly offices belonging to the european and the Greek Asylum Services which have been suspended since late march because of corona virus so there was no activity there and no one in the camp was hurt thankfully the camp is also under strain because apart from the general anxiety refugees have about catching coronavirus in overcrowded conditions there are also restrictions on movement to the government weeks ago decided to allow people in and out of these open reception senses on the 5 eastern a. G. N. Islands under certain conditions for shopping or for medicine but not to come and go as they wish and that creates an extra strain there also tents for people to be tested outside the camps in time the government wants to turn those into field hospitals for kit for positive cases because it wants to keep the refugee cases separate from any cases from the greek population which will go to the general hospitals regionally. Of the few job lot of acted by the pandemic lock down in latin america its korea work in colombia its become particularly popular amongst venezuelan migrants who are desperate to make a living even if it means putting their health at risk and i sounded on t. N. T. Reports from bogota. On the deserted streets of bogota theyve become familiar figures backpack wielding couriers on bicycles delivering food and medicine to lock down colombians most of them here are venezuelan migrants who say they have no alternative but risking exposure to the coronavirus. During my gone with the mother of 4 says contagion is always on our mind but since her husband lost his job saying at home was not an option it on my face. Its not easy to go out and expose yourself to the virus especially when you have kids waiting for you when i get home i need to take full precautions wash change clothes before touching anybody. Trying to be safe means context with customers have been reduced to a minimum. Yet there may be a bright side people who look down on them as own skilled migrants now say theyre essential in the fight to control the virus. Because you know i receive messages on the up saying that we are heroes like the doctors or the policeman i was a nurse back home when youre sharp to becoming a doctor so i feel what i am doing is not all that different from my passion helping others. Delivery services had already become a lifeline for venezuelan refugees across the continent but as latin america hunkered down thousands of lost their jobs with delivery orders spiking so has the number of recently unemployed migraine smooth lighting this careers there are now 25000 people working as delivery men here and the company says they have a waiting list of another 45000 people none of them receive Health Insurance for their work in exposing themselves and very few seem to have it now. Nor the companies dont offer insurance im here with gods blessing. Any man this says that at times he receives masks in hand sanitizers but that he has to buy most elements on his own. Reports that in the United States more than 40 grocery workers have died after catching the virus worry him but he says the issue is one of survival one way or the other. Its a blessing to simply be able to go out and make some money that we all live with what we are in on a daily basis you know work means no food. Even when working means putting yourself at risk with little or no protection and listen to them. Russian president Vladimir Putin says the countrys coronavirus situation is under complete control he made his comments as christians were to stay at home during all the dogs easter weekend on sunday russia reported the record daily rise of 6000 new infections but putin says the Health Care System and the economy can cope. When you my dinner and. We are carefully analyzing the experience of other countries and actively cooperating with our foreign friends and colleagues we understand whats happening and see the risks know what to do no matter how the situation develops and doing whats necessary when youve left all levels of government are working with thought it clee smoothly and responsibly the situation is under complete control. And then Georgia Health officials fear a spike in infections after the Easter Holiday despite fines for gatherings of more than 3 people churches have stayed open critics have accused the government of failing to hold the leaders of the Eastern Orthodox Church to account from tbilisi robin for a walk or reports. The. Most potent date in the orthodox calendar is also a critical moment for the spread of coronavirus the at tbilisi some may be a cathedral the Orthodox Church opened its doors to the faithful leave. You the odds of the. Worshippers who have chosen to participate in the traditional midnight eastern mass how to get here early to avoid breaking a nightly curfew and its been decided between the church in your fortys that they can stay here overnight all together under one roof until the curfew is lifted in the morning. Restrictions including a ban on gatherings of more than 3 people have been in place for weeks but for the head of the church and his followers those rules do not apply. This satirical video illustrates what critics say a double standards. With the state refusing to intervene in matters of faith this case you subservient to the church because of that sure ratings of the church and because of. This year so the government doesnt appear to directly or host a church which is encouraging each parish in years to extend their Easter Service as georges Prime Minister has said a balance must be found between staying safe and practicing faith. I want to assure you that both the state and the church fully understand their responsibilities towards human health opposing executions and the law and the functioning of the church been challenged. Its finally called insanity which georgia has enjoyed a gentle infection curve until now with social distancing largely observed but eastern celebrations have the scientists worried this is the now the problem for us this 4 or 5 days if this social distancing will be less of a chance of the spread of teen fiction and increasing the rate of the new infection will be much more all the. Many georgians have chosen to stay home this easter pray with their families and prayed for the safety of their nation robin 1st you walk out tbilisi. Georgia al jazeera with me cell rama reminder of our top news stories now the British Government has described reports that Prime MinisterBoris Johnson skipped a critical coronavirus meetings early in the outbreak as grotesque the sunday Times Newspaper alleges that the British Government was too slow to respond to the threat from the pandemic. The Prime Minister from the moment it became clear that there were challenges in terms of coronavirus developing in in china has absolutely been leading our nations effort to combat the coronavirus making sure that resources and money is not an issue or a concern for any department especially Health Service in terms of dealing with this and as you will well know and i know as an experienced journalist youre very aware of this many copra meetings take place and i spent many hours attending cobra meetings where its actually led by the departmental minister but the focus that the Prime Minister was putting on this and can to continue to put on this has meant that this is the whole government effort pressure is mounting on us governors to ease coronavirus lockdown rules protests encouraged by donald trump have been held in several states for the 3rd day in a row the president says some states will begin easing restrictions as early as monday turkey has replaced iran as the middle eastern country with the highest number of reported infections close to 3800. 00 were diagnosed in the last 24 hours raising the total to more than 82000 irans warned of the us of a decisive response in what it calls to any dangerous actions by American Forces in the gulf it follows an incident on wednesday when the us military says 11 vessels from irans elite revolutionary guard came close to its ships in the gulf the u. S. Called the move provocative voters in mali are casting their ballots in the 2nd round of legislative elections despite threats of violence and the pandemic the government went ahead with the vote despite the kidnapping of an Opposition Leader and threats from fighters linked to al qaida. Libyas even recognized Government Forces say theyve resumed military operation towards to huna after successfully completing stage one battling to recapture the stronghold of warlord Khalifa Haftar those are the headlines and back with more news in half an hour here on aljazeera next its what i want east on trial to stay with us. Villages back to the ground. Hundreds of thousands displaced. Mass murder there is compelling evidence of genocide and genocide against. The gambia has taken me in math to the International Court of justice accusing its government of orchestrating a campaign of destruction against the rocking of people there will be no tolerance