uncertainty as madrid retaliates by dismissing the regional government and ordering snap elections in december. and welcome to al-jazeera live for my headquarters in doha me and as a purana i'm also ahead bridging the divide syria's three main rebel factions to unite against president bashar asad as government forces make gains and kenyans in some opposition strongholds were meant to watch on saturday but now the election commission suspended the polls and definitely. it is a night that will long be remembered in spain the country's prime minister is calling for calm after he ordered direct rule of a cotton or nya an hour after the regional parliament's declared independence well thousands gathered in barcelona chanted liberty and singing traditional castellan songs where regional politicians voted to split from spain it is a major development in the country's worst political crisis and decades on the first of october castellan leaders defied a spanish supreme court ruling by holding a referendum on secession madrid sent thousands of police to prevent the vote from happening sparking confrontation with caution lines attempting to cast their ballot and since then madrid has rejected calls for talks and has now with. regional autonomy a snap election to choose a new regional government will be held on the twenty first of december anderson let's has more from buffalo in. the moment catalonia declared secession from spain a wave of euphoria across barcelona a mix of intense emotion elation and danger because of the uncertainty of what comes next they cheered they hugged one another they cried and they toasted what they see as a new nation it all started unfolding hours earlier at the catalan parliament passionate sometimes angry debates a sense of anticipation on one side dread on the other dozens of mayors had been invited ceremonial sticks by their sides turns to. the story since. it wasn't long before his wish came true a secret ballot slowly but surely moving as parliament into the history books most opposition members walked out in disgust leaving the spanish national flag and the catalan flag draped over their benches then came the count again slow with reaction to every yes. seventy votes for ten against and two abstentions and the catalan national anthem this time striking a different goal. before long another vote in madrid this time the senate making a decision on article one five five direct rule moving to the spanish government a large majority. two hundred fourteen for forty seven against approval for prime minister mariano rajoy to sack the regional government and impose sweeping powers back in barcelona these politicians and supporters hardly look like people about to go into the background president colors push them all call for calm. citizens of catalonia in the coming hours we will have to maintain our country's polls a most of all to montane that peace public spirit and our dignity that's we have always done with no doubt it will continue to be that way this is an extraordinary moment but it's historic to find the right way across this eighteenth century building the mix mood was sure it was the right the sticks to say often the more it was across the way to express the. you. don't see the look of what a thought was one of the total. independence. independence is heartbreaking sad and distressing that is how all the cats who are not pro independence feel including very democratic and pro independence supporters that cannot shed this destructive operation based on lies fraud and impositions it is causing on the social fiber of catalonia looking to madrid for the next move catalans who are angered or saddened or also fearful of what will happen if mariano rajoy is already using his new powers dissolving parliament calling elections in december and listing those he's sacking. friday night in the center of barcelona a city known more for its football its beaches and sunshine than any resistance to state power and it's a policy time for a large number of people packed. into a square in front of the seat of government how long will the smiles last night so many questions remember the model so bring the story. goes between those who want to be inspiring but you don't hear it's never been big under simmons i would use to bosler. well let's get more on this now we're joined by federal federica big a senior fellow at the center for transatlantic relations at the school of international advanced international studies he's joining us live from washington d.c. very good to have you with us on al-jazeera just so many on loans at this point how do you expect spanish authorities to proceed with imposing direct will how quick or forceful do you think they'll be here. well. i am for surely expect them to be harsh in doing it and. they are question is whether they're going to prevent people from entering the spanish. parliament and the catalan government and whether they're going to arrest people i do hope these two things will not have been especially the last because that would spark emotion something that we don't want to really see and the other question is how the catalans would react if there is still gone being peaceful or not how much resistance do you expect leaders the separatist leaders to put up here. can you please repeat it how much resistance do you think that do you think the other soldiers a leader who got it. so it know they're going to put all the resistance we may expect i wonder there's been talk of the spanish. civil servant going on a strike so not not presenting the work of since they are supposed to report to the spanish and the series oh they're going to resist all the way the question is will the government arrest them for sedition and i hope not because that could lead to violence which we haven't seen so far and the bomb and the violence of stars you never know where it and we have already seen at least one arrest for sedition haven't we i mean the regional election has been announced for the twenty first of december can an election take place in these sorts of conditions do you think what the spanish government going in imposing direct role in the separatist leaders putting up resistance is that atmosphere conducive to elections. well certainly they want to be elections but i do think they will they will have they will go on the ground practically and in the end they will be afterwards spent at the people at this point to vote for parties that either one independents or don't want independence musta been the mist in the it's a quick to get your thoughts on the federica been there joining us live from washington d.c. thank you thank you very much for having me. right let's move on to other news now kenya's election commission is calling for calm as it counts votes cast in thursday's repayed presidential election low voter turnout has further divided the country with just one in three people casting their ballots the home of the reports from nairobi. kenya's second presidential elections in three months what designed to bring along a coup money as political season two and. then now doubts they may provide any closure off to them what we witnessed was a very low voter turnout into a climate of fear and intimidation and in that political environment is difficult for an election to be considered credible with nearly all photos of opposition leader raila odinga heeding his call for a boycott. victory is not in question but some are already questioning whether the lol tunnel to give president kenyatta a reasonable monday took up a major defeat. the total voter turnout is a little over thirty percent who can yet i may have won but there's no way you can see a leader of you and form a government for all people. voting on thursday was mobbed by skirmishes between police and stone throwing the position supporters police used teargas and fired live ammunition and blanks into the air to disperse them but the protesters were trying to this big grouping quickly how about the situation was calm elsewhere for voting in kimbo outside nairobi and other strongholds of president kenyatta. the election comes after weeks of political twists and tongues in the central business district of nairobi this through almost empty the kenyan economy slowed sharply the city as businesses have held back on investments until after the elections many kenyans say they want this crisis. some even say the continued uncertainty is threatening their livelihoods when is the we've been stuck at home since wednesday when the children went milk they want to eat and who else will provide for them yes we want a president if he wins and if you're sworn in it's fine as long as we can continue to work and our children can have food and an education. a fraud election numerous resulting in a controversial route which many stayed away from thought is the story of this presidential race these hope it will have a happy ending but confidence is not high mohammed at all jessica i don't because. his electoral commission has called off the presidential repaint election and for opposition strongholds violent confrontations between police and protesters have made it impossible for voting materials to get to a number of polling stations catherine so reports from the opposition stronghold of concern. at an informally set up road block in this man are using an electricity pole to make sure no vehicle carrying ballot boxes passes through. the hole all the while they're saying no election no who and calling themselves the national resistance movement the new wing of the opposition coalition led by. our father. so we don't know why people are bringing the. box in. voting has been called off in four counties here in western kenya threats and violence have made it difficult for electrical mission officials to get stuff ballot boxes and voting slips to polling stations about one point eight million registered voters are affected when it comes to. political and religious leaders say the saturday election should not have been called in the first place we the people. be respected. to get. on with election are called off many people are hoping tensions might so dozens of people who were injured in a confrontation between police and protesters on thursday were brought to this hospital several of them want to said and discharged us some are still at metered with gunshot wounds that man there was shot at an area not too far away from here. system millicent blames the police but she and many other supporters of. hope that while he may not have participated in the poll he may yet help to change the way elections are held in the future catherine soy al jazeera western kenya still ahead on the bulletin a a celebration in south africa after two white men a sentence for an attack that highlighted racial abuse and the son of africa's longest serving later a sentence for embezzling millions and public funds. from the points of asia. to the city that never sleeps. sky's a clerical secured parts of china and right now we've seen some very wet weather just pushing across the northwest pacific that's heading towards japan in the form of possibly a typhoon by the time it makes its way there through the weekend but it means elsewhere for much of china it's fine and dry twenty eight twenty nine celsius for hong kong over the next few days just not just down towards the southeast and cold system could produce a little more class but i think it will be generally settled for the most part with some decent spells of sunshine so meanwhile across southeast asia as per usual some heavy downpours there into malaysia pushing down into indonesia so pockets of heavy afternoon right a little bit of wet weather too just stretching its way into the fosse out of vietnam maybe into cambodia i'd also cross pos of thailand from time to time but for many i think it should be fine dry and sunny the amounts of dry and sunny weather to into central and northern parts of india. just around that southeastern corner of india down towards the fos out of the country to topple nadu and also into kara elsewhere the sun should continue as we go on through the next couple of days in a delhi pleasantly warm and around thirty degrees celsius. weather also stretching across a good part of pakistan. there with sponsored by the time. we wanted the good news that's. trying to get. on the right. get. the one today. this time out just zero. good to have you with us on our top stories and a historic move the spanish prime minister has stripped of its ptolemy and that regional elections came within an hour of the parliament issuing a declaration of independence. violence has broken out between supporters of kenyan president hu kenyatta and opposition protesters kenya's election commission is calling for calm as it counts votes from thursday's repeat presidential election and. the united kingdom says a military action should be considered against those who have carried out chemical attacks and syria it follows a u.n. investigation that blames the syrian government for the lethal attack in april more than eighty people were killed in the sound gas attack and khalid shaikh the syrian government rejects the un's report mike hanna reports from the united nations. the security council debate is about women peace and security but in coming days the chambers likely to become the scene of heated argument about the future of the joint investigative mechanism jim its annual mandate needs to be renewed before the seventeenth of next month the g.m. as it is quite frankly the best who we have it has been created by unanimous vote. it has demonstrated that it is highly professional. impartial. so we have. to let's let's use it frankly collectively but the key the key priority now is to recreate consensus. i consider that we have the moral and political responsibility to succeed here in its latest report jim found the syrian government accountable for a sarin gas attack and it looked province earlier this year more than eighty civilians died many of them children the report says evidence gathered from eyewitnesses satellite imagery and mobile phone footage indicate the attack was carried out by syrian government aircraft and that samples of chemical compounds used in explosives lifted from the scene are identical to those found during an inspection of syrian bomb stocks before the conflict began. earlier this week russia vetoed a security council resolution calling for jim's mandate to be renewed maintaining it first wanted to judge the objectivity of the latest report. and in a move likely to raise the level of argument the u.k. says the security council must pass a chapter seven resolution which would allow armed force to be used there must be a chapter seven security council resolution to do what we said we would do. we all agreed in advance that if we were in this scenario then they would be a chapter seven resolution to impose accountability on whoever used chemical weapons in syria the question now will russia hold to the supreme and will formally reject jim's findings and we'll that security council veto for the tenth time since the syrian conflict began mike hanna al-jazeera united nations the syrian opposition wants three main rebel factions in northern syria to unite as one on me but many say the move has come too late and the government forces are taking more territory while the rebels of attracting a lot of reports from turkey's border with syria. safe abubaker is the commander of an elite free syrian army unit the f.s.a. once the pride of the syrian opposition is backed by turkey the u.s. and many european and gulf countries it has paid crucial roles in recent military operations against i sit in northern syria. but it has been weakened by divisions and is outnumbered by rival groups syria's opposition is now turning to commanders like from the brigade to unite all the armed groups and build a new army. we will have a transitional authority a new army that will run the country went to show other side is a victor dog power but we need weapons and logistical support the syrian opposition is expected to appoint a minister of defense and chief. but rebel commanders are yet to overcome differences about the structure of the new army and the groups that will be allowed to join the f.s.a. has disintegrated into disparate factions mohamed commands a free syrian army unit in. an area in homs besieged by government forces. some factions have acted selfishly never cared about the others they still weapons but never share them with those constantly on the front lines this is created resentment among many factions. other commanders like ayman shah band blame the opposition's main regional backers for undermining the. it's no secret our backers are the ones who dictate when and where to start a fight they are manipulating the rebels had it not been for their interference we would have toppled as had a long time ago. powerful armed factions like and they. are a coalition led by a former al-qaeda affiliate well to be fond of the new army the to operate independently and reject handing over their territory to the f.s.a. the rebels may not be able to stand against the syrian army which has the support of russia and iran but there is still this feeling among opposition command that reversing athens where two gains is never too late they remain confident that the fight is far from over and that with international support they may be able to run syria in the future. iraq's prime minister had there and of his own wanted a twenty four suspension of military operations against kurdish forces in northern iraq both sides have agreed to halt the fighting which broke out on the sixteenth of october after iraqi forces seized the oil rich city of kirkuk a body says it will give time for the peaceful deployment of soldiers along could issue a rocky border crossings seventy deca has more from ed being in the north of iraq. so these twenty four hours are for a joint committee with both iraqis and the kurds to figure out the details of areas of redeployment in the words of the iraqi prime minister to save iraqi lives because we have seen violent minute you confrontations at some of these flashpoints now the intention here is for the iraqi federal forces to take back all of the disputed territories and also significantly to take control of the border crossings of the k r g still holds with syria out with turkey and with iran they've been holding those borders since two thousand and three so says this is certainly a huge reversal of fortune for the kurds i don't think anyone would have predicted that these were the consequences of that controversial referendum to want south african men have been jailed after they were found guilty of forcing a black man into a coffin and threatening to burn him alive they were sentenced to more than ten years in prison the case triggered widespread outrage in the country the talks are going to aim upholds. there were tears on both sides of the courtroom in the so-called coffin case it was a case that laid bare the ongoing racial divide in post apartheid south africa on friday a judge sentenced tayo jackson to fourteen years and villa. to eleven years in prison. and. was to. again. video shot by the men on a mobile phone led to nationwide condemnation and eventually their arrests victor millo she was says he was taking a short cut on the men's farm when they kidnapped him drove him to another location forced him into a coffin and threaten to kill him in their defense the farmer say was trespassing they caught him stealing copper cables and said he threatened to kill their families and burn their crops but the judge pointed out this was not the first time the men had force someone into a coffin and their behavior had quote fueled racial tensions in let's say this case spotlights the haves and the have nots in south africa which is largely split along racial lines heaven to come to terms with exactly who we are as a country where a country that is both on the racism and shipley on sex. in sentencing the two men the judge said they showed no remorse their prison sentences should send a message to others that this kind of behavior will be punished and punished severely. the son of equitorial going to as president has been found guilty of a bestselling money to buy property and luxury cars to adore and of young who is also the country's second vice president was found guilty in absentia by a french court but the equitorial going to ambassador says the charges are false david chase has more from paris. the vice president of equitorial guinea embezzled more than one hundred seventy five million dollars from his country's public funds to finance his playboy lifestyle in france the verdict on don't usually introduced legislation to deal with so-called ill gotten gains was hailed by his opponents and described by prosecuting lawyers as an historic decision. is an unprecedented and global message to court is sending to kleptocrats it is de beginning of the end for this rule of impunity and immunity is kleptocrats imagine it was a turn all in universal unity or bangs father has been president of equitorial guinea for nearly four decades a country made rich by its all reserves but where nearly two thirds of the population live in squalor and poverty is sons multi-million dollar mansion in an exclusive suburb of paris has now being confiscated as well as many of the luxuries artworks and antiques inside the former butler of the vice president allege that life behind his mansion walls with one full of alcohol and cocaine those days are definitely now over but at the paris courthouse a reminder of what life can be like for opponents who challenge the families grip on their country or to live nice through our stacia by the minister of the interior the minister himself was giving orders saying do it is do that it happened at the ministry building in equatorial guinea the minister touches me that means did or didn't endear the activists who launched the campaign want to return the embezzling money back to the people it was stolen from but no mechanism is yet in place to do that investigations have also been launched against the presence of good one and the republic of congo but it could be months before they reach the court david chaytor al-jazeera paris. the u.s. ambassador to the united nations has warned that the democratic republic of congo's presidential election must go ahead next year or it will lose international support like a highly met the congolese election over the long delayed vote to replace president joseph kabila earlier this month the commission said it's impossible to hold the election before april two thousand and nineteen the poll of originally scheduled for this year has been peaceably delayed fuelling political tensions. as a mayor has revealed that the us president has offered to hold a meeting at his retreat and camp david to put an end to the blockade on gaza shake the member and have a han he says donald trump plans to bring the gulf labors together in a bid to mediate in the crisis saudi arabia the u.a.e. egypt and bahrain qatar is with cup in june and opposed to land sea and air and. i'm fearful that if anything happens and a military act happens this region will be in chaos i met with with the president when i was in new york few weeks ago for the united nations the united nations and the president showed that he is committed to find an end to this crisis yes it is true here he suggested that we come and i told him straight away mr president we are very ready i've been asking for dialogue from day one and what did the other countries say it was supposed to be very soon this meeting but i don't have any response. united nations human rights investigators say they're deeply disturbed after hearing accounts of mass killings and rape by myanmar security forces against the one hundred minority the investigators say that the accounts are among the worst that they have ever heard in conflict zones around the world more than six hundred thousand one hundred have fled iraq and state from bangladesh since august . began on one of the problem in doha with the headlines on al jazeera and a historic move the spanish prime minister has stripped catalonia of its autonomy and has ordered snap regional elections that came within an hour of the catalan parliament assuring the declaration of independence. citizens of catalonia in the coming hours we have to montana our country's polls most of all to maintain the public spirit and our dignity as we have always done with no doubt it will continue to be that way violence has broken out in nairobi between supporters of kenya and president hu kenyatta and opposition protesters kenya's election commission is calling for calm as it counts votes from thursday's repeat presidential election low voter turnout has further divided the country with just one in three people casting their ballots the syrian government has rejected the findings of a un investigation that claims that for a lethal chemical attack in april more than eighty people were killed when the nerve agent sarin was dropped on the rebel held town of conch a crude. the son of equitorial going to president has been found guilty of a beslan money to buy property and luxury cars to your door and abi on who's also the country's second vice president was found guilty in absentia by a french court but the equitorial guinea embassador to france says the charges are false. the u.s. ambassador to the united nations has warned that the democratic republic of congo's presidential election must go ahead next year or it will face lose rather international support nikki haley met the congolese and actual board of the long delayed vote to replace president joseph kabila earlier this month the commission said it's impossible to hold the election before april two thousand and nineteen the poll for this year has been repeatedly denied political tensions. you know out of nations human rights investigators say they're deeply disturbed after hearing accounts of mass killings and rape by myanmar security forces against minority investigators say that the accounts are among the worst that they've ever heard from conflict zones around the world. those are the headlines on al-jazeera and sad story that's coming up next thank you for watching. emotions are high in barcelona. intense political drama. for independence but in the region afford to go it alone.