I love im Julie Macdonald this is the news hour live from london coming up Spanish Police are accused of brutality as they move in to prevent an authorized secession vote in catalonia the government blames poor independence leaders for what they say are senseless events. U. S. President donald trump resumes his war of words with north korea undermining his top diplomat. The head of the World Food Program visits refugee camps in bangladesh as aid agencies struggle to help the more than half a million were hinges who fled humas Rakhine State. Im joined her oscar in doha with all your sports news catalonia is the biggest sports team plays behind closed doors fans a shutout of barcelona football match after clashes over the referendum. Is very warm welcome to the news hour we begin in space where police have been accused of using on justifiable brutality to shop down on authorized the session vote in catalonia in the regional capital barcelona offices used best songs and fired rubber bullets during progress random protests these four hundred and sixty people have been heart according to the citys mayor the National Government claims for independence leaders for what it calls senseless events polls are due to close about now but its not clear when the result will be known but weve got reporters across the country covering the story tony burke he is at the rally in madrid karl penhall is in the main square in barcelona and john hendren is at a calling station in the same city well hear from all of them shortly but first john reports on the days events so far. Catalans lined up by the thousands devote many paying a high price for. Spanish National Police in riot gear battered their way to one Voting Center after another was tossing voters downstairs striking them with the tonton as promised confiscating ballot boxes. They did not discriminate by gender or age advancing on those peacefully protecting the polls sometimes retreating and sometimes clashing verbal ewood patton is local most of the elite apparently over the use of force what they chose that is a tried. They stole materials they violate that human rights they were you know they injure people that east a crime still voters lined outside by the thousands here at the polls election organizers used a special tactic they gave the entire voter registry to pulling place so that it police shut down one place voters simply went to another this ninety two year old voter remembers when the catalan language was outlawed until the one nine hundred seventy now she comes to vote only to be turned away by a system shutdown. I believe we will gain independence because we are sick of the current government that we have. This hundred two year old waited out several outages to cast her ballot. Just outside the center of barcelona where residents proudly fly the spanish banner some catalans quietly oppose independence since. I lived here for sixty years of course i love catalonia its where my children are where my family leafs but there is no reason why we have problems with this obsession ists. If i am catalunya and i dont think like the secessionist do then im from the outside but then when i go to my family home then im also from the outside so where am i from and what identity do i have yet the n. T. Secessionist seem largely to have boycotted the referendum which the Spanish Government again declared illegitimate under spanish along. Not me no but if it and there hasnt been a referendum or the resemblance of one i ask the Catalan Government and the parties that supported to cease this irresponsibility to assume from this moment that what had never been legal is clearly unfeasible it makes no sense to continue this that leads nowhere. This International Observer says the vote passed global voting stand she if you look at whats happening yes among the rocks. Here with their official i didnt see the register them as well and they just. Keep right on the phone. As catalan celebrate the way the outcome and perhaps the declaration of independence. Well john joins us now live from a polling station john those polls are jude sickles whats happening where you are. Route right now the polls have just closed and you can hear this crowd celebrating behind me those are the doors to the polls right there i dont know if you can see it but if you can see some helmets in there those are firefighters from catalonia theyre here to protect the doorway and look in front of them that is what all of those people are doing here and many of them have spent a good amount of time here im about to introduce one of them this is tara and let me ask when did you come here i came to seven oclock and they stayed until one oclock no goal was just to preserve and not allow the belief bunnies belief to come in because the idea was that as long as there is a belief two hundred people you can upload it to how many people do you think are here now thousands i dont know because of when we see only one part of the full street clothes full of people as well are you going to stay here until the ballot boxes are carried out yet until we have them the final outcome theyre going to thank you very much. So i dont know how well were going to do that because it places very crowded but there are thousands of people all gathered in this square where we are right now. And this place is ringed by fences outside of those fences are thousands more people blocking the street so theyre going to stay here until the ballot boxes are carried out in this is just one of several locations in barcelona and throughout catalonia where people are protecting the posner protecting them from the spanish National Police and the Civil Defense forces who have been bursting as you saw in that story theyve been bursting into the polling places their goal is to capture those ballots. There was a gentleman who was here earlier today when the police came to this very spot i can find him im going to introduce him to you this is david dreier hes an american who lives in barcelona right now so just tell me what happened here earlier today somewhere around ten thirty or eleven after the polls had been open for a bit the Police Arrived out front from. And where theres one gate its basically the only main entrance in and as they came close people called to everyone who was out on the street to come inside the gates and the gates were closed with the police on the outside. I dont know how much they pushed in after that but at that point we felt secure and that was resolved that was resolved however you should have barricades the police did not make it into state the bell actually there was even a barricade if the gate itself theres theres a good theres a gate in the wall and theres spikes on top of the fence so climbing wouldve been hard for them not impossible im sure but with with fifteen hundred people standing in front of it it was pretty much box from there thank you david i bet im going to have to end it there but i really appreciate it and its amazing story so here we are the polls are closed but the people have not gone away many of them as youve seen youve been waiting here for hours the firefighters blocking the door and theyre going to stay here until all of the ballot boxes are carried away or until the police force them out and that has happened in a number of places although we are told by the catalonian government ninety five percent of the polling sites were open at the end of the day but the manager now live from boston on its own son to call pinhole joins us now live full so and boss alona at cult tell me more about what hes been witnessing today how would you sum it up. Well julie its interesting to hear what john is saying there because the day is ending very much as it began and that is the involvement of citizens potential doubt. His pro secessionist supporters mobilizing in what they call defense committees to defend their right to vote effectively what they have been doing since before dawn since hours before voting actually got underway is putting up human cordons to stop the threat of the spanish National Police and civil guard coming in and trying to shut down those polling stations the Spanish Government had given them that order to stop the referendum happening now throughout the course of the the morning at least we saw a lot of scuffles as riot police tried to clear entrances to polling stations from its high of humanity as those scuffles broke out the the citizens were under orders under a new organization alluded to only showed peaceful resistance they put up their hands and at that point the police would drag them away by their arms by their legs sometimes by the hand and there were injuries over four hundred sixty people were told were injured in the course of the day we saw an elderly lady bleeding profusely from the base another man stretchered away in another clips a video weve seen people kicked and beaten but then fast forward to now and were in the Downtown Boston logan middle class at Catalunya Square and you can see the scene thats shaping up behind me hundreds lets say perhaps thousands of people expected to flock here ask the results come out now we dont know when those results will come in what we do understand is that first of all level be some kind of announcement about voter turnout because that is key in order for cats alone here to show that this was a fair and square referendum they need to show that there was a sufficient number of people voting today of course the government did their best to try and stop that so we are here now waiting for the some of the initial results to be announced on big screen t. V. And karl lots of people commenting online and other wise that the crack in time from the government has actually encouraged people to turn their backs on the government in madrid. This certainly has been an outcry even people who are perhaps against catalonia as bait for secession are also against the way that the Spanish Government has reacted lets hear what the catalonian spokesman jordi total had to say about the way the day i am told that. What theyre doing is scandalous an International Scandal its disgusting the Spanish Government should be ashamed of itself it is placing spain in a very delicate situation because it is violating human rights. So carla guess the question on everybodys lips is what happens now. What happens now over the next few hours is key first of all as john was describing in his report there citizens have to defend the ballot boxes they cannot lose those ballot boxes to National Police right at this stage because simply there would be no vote to count the next day were all waiting to see what the turnout was after that we dont know to hear what the actual results were but then forty eight hours from now if there was a yes vote in favor of secession the cattle and government said it will declare independence from the rest of spying and that is only going to stop this political crisis one of spains worst political crises since the end of general francos dictatorship in ninety seven by julie karl penhall there live from central barcelona karl thank you. Well lets go has its horn in berkeley in the spanish capital madrid hi there tony a day that may well have lasting effects on the spanish psyche. Yes i mean a lot of people here expressing dismay about what is to happen the fact the police have use such force this is a rally by the socialists they say just to show support for the. Rights of catalonia for selfdetermination of come out in numbers we see barcelona flags catalonian flags past flags communist flags over here there have been some small clashes earlier on which were put down quite quickly it was a clash between program friend of people and anti referendum people the police now have gone they were in numbers but it is shows you know the depth of feeling in this one person said to me today that this feels like a divorce they dont know how catalonia im straight can live together after this so much has happened they feel very sad about what happened they cant believe what happened the still in shock until we are we likely to get some sort of reaction from the government this evening obviously pools have closed and i wonder if they will reflect its all on that sense of you say of of almost disappointment and worry frankly anxiety about whats going to come next. Here a lot of people are disappointed they are embarrassed weve only had one official statement from the deputy Prime Minister not the Prime Minister mr henri expecting something for him later but its noticeable that he has not been to the forefront of whats been happening today and you would expect that for him for the leader of the country people here talking about the old days away franco was here the return of the authoritarian regime we shall see behind me. Democracy is dying and here is the graveyard of fascism also theyre talking about fighting with us the only way to do it and they say they want to fight where this leads i dont know but its not very good people are very concerned about the next few days what will. Good. Morning there joining me live from madrid tony thank you so still to come on the aljazeera news hour where two of the can find sing for survival ten days after the devastation of hurricane maria. Demonstrators in hong kong march against what they say is political persecution by china. And ferrari screech through the weekend at the malaysian grand prix joe will have the details in support. U. S. President donald trump has resumed his war of words with north korea over its Nuclear Weapon and Missile Program on sunday he tweeted i told Rex Tillerson our wonderful secretary of state that hes wasting his time trying to negotiate with little rock man thats a reference to leader kim jong il and he also said well do what has to be done well for more on this lets speak to mike hanna who is live for us in washington d. C. Hi there mike so just yesterday we spoke about the u. S. Actively using these back Channel Communications to negotiate with north korea and now this tweet. Well its an astonishing act by the president of the United States changing Foreign Policy with a few some strokes in the public tweet to the course of the morning and repudiating contradicting his secretary of state who as you said has been holding two days of talks with senior chinese leaders ricks to listen said yesterday that the u. S. Was exploring back channels of communication with the pure nyang administration saying that these were unilateral forms of communication not going through the chinese this was an important step forward the first public confirmation that back channels with north korea did exist however that has now been contradicted by donald trump who says that negotiation is worthwhile is worthless apparently taking the whole concept of dialogue off the table the very concept that his secretary of state assured he was pursuing with the chinese leaders just a few hours before and mike what does this tweet tell us about the negotiations themselves that are ongoing and how they might continue to unfold. Well the negotiations themselves did not appear to be gaining any traction we did hear from the state department in the last twenty four hours that north korea was showing no inclination of being willing to discuss the question of denuclearization however the important point is is that the possibility of discussion of negotiation of dialogue was being kept alive by the secretary of state while the sanctions which have been imposed by the us and by the u. N. Security council took their course in terms of having some effect on the north koreans and on the economy in particular this was a Long Term Strategy that the secretary of state had outlined in alliance with china pressure be brought to bear on north korea may take a bit of time but sooner or later that a stop in currency flowing into north korea would have an impact on its Weapons Program and may take it to the negotiating table that is now completely off the books and donald trump in the course of the morning has totally restated u. S. Policy on north korea making clear that dialogue is not an option of basically saying that his secretary of state is incorrect in pursuing this option and opening up the possibility that only one option is left on the table and that is military action michaela there live from washington d. C. Mike thank. The u. S. Says it sent more than two thousand more personnel to storm ravaged four to recall for the weekend most of the u. S. Territory has been without power jenkin water since it was devastated by hurricane moneer maria nearly two weeks ago the government continues to face criticism for its slow response eighty eight hundred people remain in shelters to ease of over four its not from some. The generator went down in this hospital in some one who more than one hundred patients had to be urgently transferred to other locations a lot of his mother is still inside hes worried about where theyre going to take her. Just several complications in the oxygen she is old and im not sure where we will go but she is not alone on site there are others who are recovering from surgery among other things who were not allowed inside but we were told that most of the patients were transferred on time. For the recall is pending and on a general way fifteen hours which was completely destroyed during the hurricane just an example of how the situation for the police really deteriorate if immediate action is not taken this forward is playing a crucial role this days as it is where much needed aid has arrived. Says there are more than ten thousand containers here with goods even though the products were long to private companies they could easily help to restore the supply chain here right now in in all of our terminals there are merge and see supplies they are emergency good medicine water food Construction Materials commercial materials so the terminal is full of g