Hello and welcome im peter w. Watching the news hour live from my headquarters here in doha sixty minutes of news and comment today the Free Syrian Army launches a major operation against Al Qaeda Linked fighters they do it with backing from turkey and russia. Is a live pictures coming to us out of madrid as thousands take to the streets in spain and protest against the plans a session of catalonia. The sixty fifth birthday of president that he may have putin is met with a call for nationwide demonstrations over the arrest of one of his toughest critics plus. The city remains under a state of emergency as we prepared and i assure you in the public that we have very well prepared new orleans gets ready for what is now a Hurricane Nates a storm thats already left parts of Central America with mudslides and flash flooding that killed twenty four. Now from how much with over the new spain are officially off to next is the four world cup and the United States have taken a huge step towards joining them in russia final results from across the globe coming up. Techies president. Says a Major Military operation is now underway in syrias province he says the Free Syrian Army is carrying out the operation against former Al Qaeda Linked fighters with the supports of russian airstrikes he says turkish soldiers are backing the offensive but they have not entered the area yet techies military is building up at the border with it the region was labeled a socalled deescalation zone last month after an agreement between Turkey Russia and the. Iran but the fighting has continued there the deal is not recognized by a coalition of armed groups who control large parts of it the province is one of the few crossing areas that does remain open on the turkish Syrian Border which is a security concern for ankara bordering to the north is an area controlled by kurdish y p g forces turkey considers the y. P. G. D. An extension of the Kurdistan Workers Party or p k k which it deems to be a terrorist organization tell a cozy is a professor of Political Science at the see here university in istanbul he specializes in Turkish Foreign policy and Defense Strategy joining us on skype from yellow over welcome to the news. What are they trying to achieve here i think this is this operation as part of a green month thats reach out its so the main the main concern is to stabilize the area to create the contradictions song and deal with. Rebels who are against the consequences thoughts reached us then also a turkey is taking responsibility inside the area the police. Creating this they will duty and response to that. In something else. And. How long do you think until the turkish authorities are prepared to actually cross the border. I think turkey should tertius. Will try to support their local actors including to Free Syrian Army and the Turkish Military will be coordinating to their efforts in the first place in the second phase of operation so if they are faced with some resistance if some of the rebel groups are trying to take down they will get more involved but this will the other thing is that there may be some tensions in the areas that are. Controlled in the afan area so if there are some tensions in that area as well if the rebels are. Escaping to other places i think Turkish Military will be in want but i think in the earlier period the Turkish Military will try to stay less you more. In the right direction Turkish Forces crossing the border has been pretty much a negative some people would say a disaster for ankara in the past how do they make sure that doesnt happen again. Of course this operation has lots of risks especially now that. Some liberals are against it what you see more also in the often area controlled regions there are some patients but this operation needs to be. Conducted in order to stabilize that area so we know that our response if the local actors including the Free Syrian Army and we can also include some other factions that are more involved in the process of securing the area so that you will be in walt less but if there are you know. We know that there may be some strong tensions in some areas and i think the african area will stay on the outside of this operation and in the first. Period so. Trunk you will try to increase its coordination with the local actors and if there is a direct attack two hours. Literally i think the small lot of expansion after operation and so we dont exactly know at this moment but turkish authorities are everywhere up to risks of this operation. Many thanks to Spain Catalonia as regional president has met Community Leaders in barcelona to discuss what to do after sundays session referendum now the Group Includes lawyers academics and members of the Barcelona Football Club catalan separatist leaders say theyre planning to go ahead with secession despite that ban from the spanish Central Government the Prime MinisterMariano Rajoy has rejected any talks on the issue lets give you the latest live pictures coming to us out of. Madrid you can see there the protests big numbers of people on the streets there lets take you live to barcelona and my colleague jonah how jonah over to you. Thank you were here in barcelona it sort of feels a bit like the city is trying to catch its breath perhaps the whole of catalonia is doing the same thing after the events of last week and a lot of people wondering with some trepidation what next week may bring possibly a meeting of the cattle and parliament in contravention of a banned by the Constitutional Court a speech on tuesday by the regional president carlos squeege demand in which he may unilaterally declare independence for catalonia from the rest of spain which may in turn lead to madrid revoking Catalonia Autonomy under a never before used clause of the constitution and invoking direct rule that would provoke a constitutional crisis and a potentially very dangerous situation here well one man with an almost unique insight into at least one of those questions joins me now roll over hes the head of the regional head of Foreign Affairs effectively the foreign minister here you can tell us i think whether there is going to be a unilateral declaration of independence next week or what we have to happen next week is very clear the parliament will meet. Out of understanding of anyone that the parliament cannot meet that would do in democracy so the parliament will mean it. Shout respect what the people said on sunday the people was very clear the people demanded despite all the attempts for not being allowed to vote the people voted the responded peacefully to the repression we star and we are from the police and the message was clear so the parliament has to listen and to acknowledge that decision but there is a key question over that mandate i mean its not entirely clear is it because whether under fifty percent of those registered to vote voted its not a clear mandate for independence is it i think it was clear he was not you would agree to nowhere that the minimal she. Fifty percent as a matter of fact i shall remind that there were a lot of a lot thousands of people that were not allowed to vote for their oppression of the police and for the person of the of the state forces so from that perspective even in that circumstances that everybody could see. The people went to vote and were more than two Million People voting i shall remind as well that when the cost of the libyan constitution was about it at the time well they had the sam torn out that it happened on sunday so its not the problem of china other words in other words mr over if the will of the people will be carried there will the next week be a declaration of independence the people of the will of the people needs to be respected for a single reason there is no alternative to this we tried for years to enter into negotiations with the state no once youre in the positive manner repression was the only answer and despite this the people went to vote freely the market and peacefully and that is what the parliament of catalonia needs to acknowledge we have two projects here one is democracy the other one is repression of violence which one the people is charging i want i want to ask you one final question theres going to be a big rally here on sunday of people opposed to secession opposed to independence its expected that there will be thousands of people in there may well be a majority of catalans opposed to independence you dont actually know that whats your message to them simply everybody should have the right to express themselves with no provocations with no reparation thats what were demanding for years eighty percent of the catalan population demands to be listen some because they want to hold us down because they want to vote no no problem with the people with ever they think they can money so they can demonstrate that i think that that should be the normal situation everywhere in the world and definitely that would we expect this to happen here what were saying however is that there are Great Depression and sky. Again and again and again to what are those who defend one specific project what im saying to those people no fears no threats no arresting people lets respect democracy lets listen everybody and lead to respect the result of the bad work in democracy he should be going ok over were going to have to leave it there thank the catalan foreign minister certainly will be if there is to be an independent catalonia peter back to you jonah thanks very much opponents of russias president Vladimir Putin are planning to hold antigovernment protests to mark his birthday the Opposition Leader was jailed last week organizing banned Public Meetings putin is serving his third term as president hes made russia a key player in World Politics particularly of course in the war in syria his party promotes him as a tough no nonsense leader who is physically active despite turning sixty five on saturday lets get you more on that live now to moscow and our correspondent rory chalons i guess the key question rory how big do we think these anti putin protests are going to be. I think is going to be very interesting to see how today. As you can see theres not very much going on behind me at the moment very few protest is barely even a police presence. The rally isnt actually due to start for another hour yet so perhaps well get more people coming down over the next few minutes the next until the rallies to to start but this demonstrations today in moscow in. Other cities across the country theyre much more about. The man than previous demonstrations have been wichard which have had a message of fighting against corruption this time the call. Was to come down to protest against his detention or allow him to run a normal campaign and to allow him to stand in next years president ial elections now today is also as he said to me of putins birthday so that gives todays protests a bit of a kind of grudge match feeling and i think it will be interesting to see whether the valley even though hes currently in detention of the moment can pull the numbers of people out on the streets in various russian cities as he has done on previous occasions with a more personalized message one thats less about fighting general corruption. And laurie mr putin not exactly a young man sixty five but he does like to push himself put himself across rather as being an action man everything from you know horse riding topless to killing tigers. Yeah thats the density that hes carved out in many years of adventurous press opportunities to go and as you say film him fishing in the wilds or a. Hang gliding with cranes in the sky that sort of thing. Of carefully cultivated image and its one that does play pretty well after say here in russia. But he still seems fairly fit there are always rumors about his health and whether perhaps he might be fading but the man seems to march on certainly when you compare him to all the World Leaders on the stage hes been around the longest pretty much shes been around since one thousand nine hundred ninety nine days a very experienced politician hes knows what hes doing and he still seems to have a fairly tight grip on the politics of this country alexina valley has been a busy man over the past few months hes been campaigning around setting up. All sorts of russian cities outside the main senses of moscow and St Petersburg he is trying to get a Regional Power base in areas where ive read a lot to me a putin is traditionally very very popular. People in moscow and St Petersburg how popular is well you know you are likely to fight as many people against him as they are for him but out in the regions thats where persons popularity is strongest and thats what me is trying to counter i guess at the moment by promoting his message around the country in advance of next years elections but of course. Most people think that the valley will be allowed to stand in those elections and most people think that it will i will win fairly easily thanks for it. Is a former spokesman for mr putin hes now the director of the institute for Political Studies in moscow. If these demonstrations against mr putin are big or if they are allowed to just mr putin have a big problem. I dont see him as a size you must question or create big problem will you meet up with him. Or less from the pools sure where you must. Or in the National Society something about eighty percent among to enter perception or doesnt support what you mean or what you know. Additionally eighty percent more are russian nationalist as they could just sizing up. Because he wants to all march to make that deal with United States and European Union ok mr putin let me just interrupt you for a second deck so i do want to get to one key point here if mr putin doesnt have a problem why is he refusing to announce the election date because he does have his critics who say he is not announcing that date because he doesnt want to miss them the valve need to carry on building on his undoubted political power base. Let you in a platoon has no problem with alex in the wire in a because now why not use supported by United States and European Union and most of that ash and create source but if you should always support them by i made it and its absolutely clear. Well announces that he is going to lecture according to buys a schedule because i do chanel the russian. People want everything to be on plane as its caribbean schedule russian doesnt like resorts but if your songs were clear theyre willing to take part in elections there are many many amounts as. Does mr putin have another big issue that hes got to deal with and its the age old issue the president s and Prime Ministers have to deal with russia as of the past couple of years has a very complex International Relationship with many other countries and on top of that year on year on year real incomes have really gone down for your average russian. Of course our National Side doesnt imply such a. Declining standard of living about the same time russia russians believe that its not because like you made a fortune but its because the United States and European Union attacked a russian now russia consideration which war and the russians wants as a russian president to be strong a good source who are attacking russia that was a supporter of him i would say more americans and europeans criticize well you made a fortune means more russians supported. So your mark of were out of time many thanks for. And still cover for you here on the news hour including these stories this is a president who supports the First Amendment supports the freedom of religion i dont understand why that should be an issue. Anger in the u. S. Over Donald Trumps executive order allowing Insurance Companies to refuse paying for Birth Control. And bringing power to the people we look at the legacy of liberias president as she steps down from office. 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