might pompei only meets one quite a. and protecting the world's most famous ship wreck the treaty between the u.s. and the u.k. to preserve the titanic's remain. so the u.s. senate republican leader mitch mcconnell has announced the rules that will govern president donald trump's impeachment trial and they're designed to end the proceedings as quickly as possible trump's lawyers have filed papers calling the case against him flimsy at the 2 articles of impeachment accuse the president of abusing his power and obstruction of congress the trial is scheduled to start on tuesday let's go live straightaway to she returns a who's standing by for us in washington d.c. and she had these rules will shape the way things are going to run over the next few days tell us more about the rights of the trial begins on tuesday as you say with a discussion of this of this proposal from from mitch mcconnell and maybe this is just an opening proposal and he's prepared to compromise or something is very very speedy or as has been reported he does actually have the votes for it to pass this as it is but. the contentious spot to begin with is that each side has 24 hours to make their case the house it beats what manages the democrats and the white house lawyers they each have 24 hours to make their arguments but over the course of 2 days beginning wednesday so that mean the democrats make their case wednesday thursday using up 24 hour 24 hours and then the republicans make their case friday saturday if they wanted using 24 hours that's got the democrats rather upset barack using husing mitch mcconnell of trying to try the president in the middle of the night because each day proceedings begin at 1 o'clock in the afternoon if you want to use 24 hours you say if they have 12 hours a day that means and with breaks and all sorts of other things to go on with the trial could go on until the wee hours of the morning so the democrats aren't terribly happy about it so others are saying well you know what maybe this isn't such a bad idea given this is mainly about public opinions and all trump is almost certainly going to be acquitted by the republicans if the democrats fashion that message for prime time between 8 and 8 in 10 to 811 or whatever and they have a sort of small succinct message maybe it's better because it was so in the house they felt a sense u.s. public opinion and light with their arguments maybe of a more focused succinct are going to it may not be so but let's go on with the timetable so then so each side has 24 hours to make that case over 2 days of a crab's wednesday thursday republicans friday saturday if they need it then we have debate cross-examination rather 16 hours of cross-examination by the sentences . to the to the house managers and the white house lawyers this isn't done bubbly though this is done through written questions given to the chief justice john roberts is providing over over the trial and then he asks the questions following that there's a debate of 4 hours on whether witnesses and documents should should be should should be entered into this trial this is a very contentious issues the democrats save more witnesses where this is need to be introduced partly because going to. mation has come to light also because they weren't able to speak to key figures like former national security advisor john bolton during the house the house inquiry a republican say look you have now said already that you have the case for impeachment why do you need any more evidence if you need a witnesses and maybe your case isn't terribly strong or is it the debate of a 44 hours on babs on whether to bring more witnesses documents if it is decided and some republicans have said they're interested in hearing from witnesses perhaps just because they want to show that they are taking this all very seriously that they will be they will be votes on each witness and each witness will be deposed and then they'll be a further vote on whether that witness will then appear at the trial so there's a long process to get witnesses on to the on to the senate floor if however if however that is decided to pounce off votes in order to bring witnesses and further documents this could all be over by the end of next week conceivably with a vote on whether to dismiss or. to dismiss but also it could be that's not final vote on whether to impeach the president this could all be over by the end of next week conceivably if there are no votes if the votes aren't there to bring witnesses and documents and that does fit in with the schedule we've long heard which is which this is the white house which mcconnell for that matter one all of this to be done by february the 4th and the state of the union address in a few tuesdays time she had thanks very much for the member let's bring in bill schneider who's a public policy professor at george mason university joins us now from washington d.c. . bill schneider pretty much as predicted these rules aren't they and the democrats are never going to like them or they. know they're not they want to hear more witnesses they want to see more evidence it's possible that could happen but under these rules the senate has to vote on allowing each new witness and there's a majority of republicans in the senate and they have to vote on whether to allow any new evidence to come in that is very unlikely unlikely and also says that they can vote on a president what the president is proposing. which is just to throw the case out i don't think they would ever do that because that would look very peremptory and unfair but they are allowed to do that under these rules and as far as witnesses is concerned we're looking in from the outside it's a complex process is that the impeachment process looking from the outside you would think that says without reason that you should have witnesses that any kind of trial and. while there are some witnesses who would like to who have said they would testify by john bolton the former national security advisor no one knows exactly what he'll say but he's very much involved in white house operations there is this other fellow mr parness who is working closely with rudy giuliani we're peers to have a lot to say although he faces charges himself and may have all teary or motives so there are some people who have not yet been heard from and their hearts want them to be heard from the republicans want to get this over as quickly as possible but you know what's important here is that the real jury isn't the 100 members of the senate although by the constitution they're the ones who vote to remove the president or not the real jury is the american people and that verdict will not come until november so really this is all a play for public opinion and for voters support yeah so you'd say it's pretty much an absolute foregone conclusion that president trouble be exonerated. well he will not be removed i exaggerated his strong work care a lot of americans would quarrel but let me remind you about something americans get trials they've been watching trials on television their entire lives for years one of the most popular programs on television remembered by older americans was the perry mason show every week i watched the new trial and then more recently there was the o.j. simpson trial which people were glued to day after day month after month americans understand trials and if anything in this procedure impresses americans as unfair or unreasonable the senators are going to hear from their constituents or i believe that the members will be talking again over the coming days bill schneider thanks a lot. a 4th person has died in china from a mystery virus that spreading across the country and it's also appeared in other parts of asia the world health organization has called an emergency meeting in geneva on wednesday of the latest victim died in the chinese city of han where the risk for a tree illness was 1st detected more than $200.00 cases have now been confirmed and officials say they have evidence of human to human transmission so after is sent of for disease control and prevention has also reported its 1st case a chinese woman who flew into inch in city from 100 on sunday has been quarantined . one case being confirmed in japan early in january into in thailand 6 days ago for more on that let's cross live to katrina use study by for us in beijing a train of this is getting more serious. that's right and i think there are concerns of a half ass as a spreading in china as allies you mentioned more than 200 cases about 219 and we've got cases that were confirmed outside of the 1st time yesterday in beijing and in guangdong and now today we've got more potential cases in other provinces so we've got special cases in sichuan in you 9 guangxi and chandon which are in different areas of the country so i think the concern is how fast this is spreading so we've heard from john schon who is china's key expert on this and he admitted that that there has been human to human transmission and that in fact about a dozen medical staff who are treating patients have been infected and it's thought . it's potentially that they were infected by one person and he was mentioning that the priority now is to stop what he called super spread is one person who might be affected by the virus was potentially able to infect a number of people he's also recommended that anybody in watch who has symptoms be restricted from leaving. i think one of the things that is a comfort at the moment if there is any of that in this story is that all the people who have who are suspected have the virus or who have confirmed to have had the virus do have come from so we haven't had any cases so far people who've just been in contact with people in hunter have all come from themselves and we've also had she didn't say yesterday that this is a top priority for the government to ensure the safety of the people here in china so it's very much being taken more and more seriously as we see these numbers quickly rise road these developments especially coming to focus as millions of boarding trains and planes for the leaving new year. that's right so if this perhaps couldn't have come at a worse time this is the peak travel season in china the government has always boasts of the during chinese new year you see between 2 to 3000000000 trips of people made across the country and $100.00 as a city is not a small city it's about 11 as in a population of that $11000000.00 people who are traveling it out of the country not only within china but as we've seen already overseas as well it's a major transport hub and what we went around and we spoke to some people traveling yesterday in beijing a very busy train station a lot of people leaving the city to visit loved ones back home for the holidays some of them weren't really aware of the situation others were concerned or seem to think that the government had things in hand but more and more on social media were reading this morning people are concerned that just generally the public is not taking this seriously enough they're not taking these warnings to to cover your mouth wash your hands seriously enough so it's starting to be more and more of a public concern here in china or could you leave the country to your reporting. more ahead on the news hour including. anti-government protests came a mentor across iraq with fatal consequences. why gun rights rally in the u.s. state of virginia prompted the governor to declare an emergency. and also head in sport which delights the crowds in melbourne peter has yet seen from the straight you know. so it makes going to thora teams have arrested dozens of central american migrants who forced their way across the border from guatemala immigration officials and national guard officers made the arrest after hundreds of migrants waited through a river at the border to get into mexico they had been stopped from crossing a border bridge connecting 2 countries and those who were arrested say mexico should be helping them not detaining them. but. we've all come peacefully we're not coming with bad intentions we're calling on the mexican president to help us with political asylum or permission to cross just like lots of knowledge it just across because they know we're not criminals if they were criminals they wouldn't have allowed us to we have come in legally but we're not criminals. john holdren is in ciudad algo on the guatemala mexico border and he says most people don't want to stay in central america. we spent much of the farm family of them on the mother and 2 young children as they tried to work out how they're going to get into mexico they actually wanted to get here for asylum she said that she can call the kids by going to guatemala city to some of the home during times when the story. would be trying to see all the see basically don't take the drugs i mean the food in the home not everyone is in the bridge to do that bridge between what the mama chapters to you by the down good south and south mexico 3. actually had to do in the petition to the mexican government. you allow them to get the government's about to be possible not everyone thank you reynolds it sounds and underneath it for the rich are the troops only about. what he did and then came up on the right side of the national guard. militarized police force a way to. european union foreign ministers have agreed to look at ways to support a long term ceasefire in libya but only if warring parties stick to the tentative truce they agreed this month it could include a monitoring mission and restart a naval operation to uphold the un arms and bog annex hebron as this report. the future of the shop is that a mark is in tripoli is being discussed thousands of kilometers away in europe the foreign ministers are trying to work out how to secure a shaky truce that's been in place in libya since earlier this month i want to stress once again the fact that we are not the state in a cease fire. we are no troops. which is stable and you know true scum be several times a day on sunday in berlin world leaders committed to stop interfering in libya's civil war and to uphold a weapons that's been in place since 2011 but the talks failed to deliver that serious dialogue between the warring parties warlord khalifa haftar and the un recognized administration in tripoli. and now all have come to realize that there is no military solution to the crisis in libya despite the fact that haftar and his forces do not believe in diplomacy nor a political process we hope that after hours allies and supporters have also come to this conclusion and would recalculate their moves in order to revive this political process. half dozen battling to take over the capital since i froze and fighting have killed close to $300.00 civilians and displaced hundreds of thousands more but this civil war is also a proxy conflict each side has several powerful international backus analysts say europe is trying to prove it's still relevant and united european ambassadors have been given 4 weeks to present concrete proposals on how to implement the un arms embargo which has been repeatedly violated by both sides. in a way libya is a kind of cancer a kind of tumor which is growing throughout the region it's spreading. despite the diplomatic efforts have to as forces continue to blockade oil ports in the aist causing output to almost 00 oil is central to libya's economy its largest export and a financial lifeline for the government in tripoli oil itself is. it vital in terms of supplies the power stations all spittal and other key facilities libyan citizens use daily so i expect also deterioration in humanitarian terms in libya in addition to what we've seen throughout the. war the u.n. is inviting top generals from the 2 sides to geneva next week and yet another effort to end the armrest. al-jazeera. government protests have escalated again in baghdad and several other iraqi cities at least 5 demonstrators and 2 security officers have been killed in southern iraq hundreds brought to main road in main roads in a number of cities and many 500 people have died since protests began and imran khan reports now from baghdad. in one of the main squares in central baghdad police and protesters confront each other it began in the early hours of monday as protesters tried to block the road leading to the square they want a change of government and accuse the current one of corruption a call had gone out to protesters to block main roads in baghdad a major highways in the south access. police used live ammunition and fight a gas in attempt to disperse the crowds in the capital but a standoff a suit lost in several hours angry iraqis are determined to get their message across that. the idea isn't just blocking the roads all the people here often straighted so we make noise here to make sure that we are heard. for months no one has listened to our demands they're killing us it's just bloodshed. throughout the day took took 3 wheelers have been ferrying to guess victims to makeshift hospitals like this one tent. i went to tyrone square in baghdad and the people wanted me to help them i was also attacked by gas i felt down the security forces have been using tear gas and live ammunition. iraq's national security council has authorized the arrests of protesters but so far that's had little impact on the movement there wasn't the same level of violence elsewhere in the country as the wars in baghdad and the roadblocks in the south the protesters considered a success the real question for the protest movement is where do you go from here once you started blocking off roads in the south of the country effectively cutting off the south from the rest of the country where do you escalate your demands being listened to and that's really angering the protest movement now it really remains to be seen whether the blockade of the roads is going to work and whether the government will listen as a result of it imran khan al jazeera baghdad well 3 katyusha rockets have landed inside the iraqi capital is heavily fortified green zone to them fell near the u.s. embassy no casualties have been reported it's not known who fired the u.s. secretary of state might pumpin has promised more support for venezuelan opposition leader on going to the 2 men met in antiterrorism summit in colombia called on world leaders to help remove president nicolas maduro from power describing his rule as a terrorist as several countries including the united states recognize quite as venezuela's leader amazon to ramp yes he has more from the summit in bogota. the issue of venezuela was front and center in this regional conference against terrorism where the u.s. secretary of state mike compel accused venice well of being a failed state and a supporter of terrorism saying that the government of nicholas about bhutto is sheltering and assisting groups as the land the last active rebel group from colombia or dissidents of the former rebel group are far and also accusing my daughter of assisting cells of its ball or the iranian proxies operating he said in latin america tanks to nicolas maduro and that's why he praised the government such as colombia and another a number of governments in the caribbean and latin america that have decided to label a terrorist organization. the really regimes. and . this is an acceptable one of the surprises here was the arrival of a dog the leader of the venezuelan opposition who arrived here in colombia defying a travel ban imposed by the government of nicolas maduro he met with pompei on the sidelines of the conference and talking to journalists here announced that there will be new actions that will be taken by the united states to put more pressure on the government of nicolas maduro but no concrete new sanctions have been announced. we undertook this tour precisely t