Tonight an in our week ahead segment, Senate Approved bill to keep the government running. Well examine how that will radically change the bank reform law in the walk of the financial crisis. We begin with our breaking news. The hostage situation started before 10 00 a. M. , 6 00 eastern. Hostages were taken in a lindt coffee shop. A black and whiel white flag wib writing is flying. To give you a better understanding, the Lindt Chocolate shop is located in the center of sydney in martin place. This is a very active place for business. During the height of the monday morning rush hour. Tony abbott said he didnt know if the incident was politically motivated but appeared to be. This is a very disturbing incident. I can understand the concerns and the anxieties of the australian people, but our thoughts must go out to the individuals who are caught up in this. I can think of almost nothing more distressing more terrifying than to be caught up in such a situation and our hearts go out to those people. Once again the Prime Minister urged people to go about their business despite the ongoing situation. He also encouraged anyone with information to contact a special hot line. Andrew thomas is in sydney and has been following this developing story. Thats right, they do, they say the incident is contained in martin place. Let me give you an idea of the geography here, this is mcquarry place, about a kilometer down there is sydneys famous opera house. But in between there, about lefthand side is the eastern part of martin place, the pedestrian square right in the heart of sydney cbd. This is a busy thoroughfare, there is a big hotel, lots of banks, officest, a buzzing heart of the city and this cafe is right on that square and itself not a particularly famous cafe but its location is very, very central. Its at 9 45 in the morning sydney time, right when the workers are grabbing their coffees and going into work, is when this happened. There is at least one armed man inside that cafe and an undisclosed number of hostages, speculation, that number was 13 but to be honest, those numbers have changed a little and i wouldnt want to peg my honest to the mast, about that number. Those being held hostage, there have been a number of socalled terror raids by the police on addresses in the western part of sydney, and speculation that some arrested were somehow plotting something in sydney center. No specific threats, no. And we dont know of course whether this has anything to do with the fact that australia has had to raise its terror alert, its socalled terror alert with the understanding that a terror attack on australian soil likely, whether this has anything to do with the situation in the middle east, communicated back with people in australia trying to encourage them to carry out attacks. We dont know if that has anything to do with that sort of chatter as yet. Our Anthony Lewis on scene in sydney. What do we know about this black flag with the white lettering . Not a lot. Originally it was said to be the Islamic State flag, that was quite quickly found to be wrong. Syria or iraq, in the last six to 12 months, we dont know more than that. The actual person in charge of the siege apparently has an arabic message. There is a lot of media around the actual site in martin place. There is not a great deal of accuracy about whats happening inside sadly. We are understanding that the a black flag is displayed in the cafe window. Can you explain the situation of muslims or nonmuslims in the area . Absolutely. Australia has a population of 23 million. They have been in the country for years. The relationship is generally pretty peaceful. Theres not a lot of actual riots or direct violence. But theres a lot of islam phobia, a lot of islamic phobia, increased a lot since 9 11 and particularly this year the Australian Government has joined the americans in the military fight against i. S. I. S. In syria and iraq. And i have a number of muslim friends. Im not muslim myself but i have a number of muslim friends who say the verbal attacks against muslims have undeniably increased in the last six months. The grand mufti has issued a statement condemning the attack. One of Rupert Murdochs biggest newspapers in, this, quote, cbd attack, i. S. Takes 13 in attack. That ifactually incorrect. Incredibly vague information. I know a lot of the information coming and a lot of this reporting is premature. I want to talk a little bit more about the situation you reported, anthony, is there distrust of the Muslim Community in the government there . Huge, massive mistrust. That didnt start this year, it was certainly around after 9 11, but its gotten worse. I think what youre saying though has been a little disconnect between the way in which the Muslim Community feels, and mind you reported incorrectly, when for example the last six months, there has been talks about i. S. I. S. And undeniably a group of young muslim men who are fighting in syria and iraq with i. S. I. S. The majority of journalists in australia are from white backgrounds including myself but has no understanding of the Muslim Community itself, even those though these issues have been around for years, particularly since 911 9 11. The current government but also frankly the governments before in the Muslim Community. Theres not a lot of open and frank dialogue. Having spent time in Muslim Community in my recording and with friends what you find i think is the frustration that so often when the Muslim Community is talked about in the press they are framed as terrorists or terrorists in waiting as opposed to like any community has extremists, if the person carrying out the sydney siege has extremist views apparently we have lost anthony lowen stein. Lowenstein. We are following the situation very closely, the hostage situation in the Central Business district of sydney. We want to take a look at other headlines at this moment. Former Vice President dick cheney is defend technical Bush Administration on what he calls the enhanced interrogation techniques. Our kristin saloomey has more. Bush era former officials are facing tough questions as more details come to light from that 500 plus page report detailing cia interrogation techniques in the wake of the 9 11 attacks. Cheney defended these attacks which included water boarding, hanging them from their coffin size boxes and rectal hydration. These techniques stopped short of torture according to cheney as was defined by the justice department. The report does detail steps taken by the cia to make sure their agents did not cross the line as was laid out by the justice department. Vice president cheney not only said he thought they were legally justified but morally justified as well. 19 rlg passengers with box cutters did on 9 11. A former prisoner of war himself, john mccain, takes a completely different view. This flies in the face of what americans stand for. You cant say that tying a person to the floor and having them freeze to death is not torture. There seems to be little appetite to prosecute anyone in connection with the cia tactics. On the International Level however, more outrage and more questions being asked, including the u. N. Special reporteur on terror. How the United States could be held accountable under that convention, raimtion to be seen. U. S. Secretary of state john kerry has a lot on his diplomatic agenda. Kerry met with Russian Foreign minister are sergeminister serg. Im grateful for foreign minister lavrov changing his schedule. More from claudio lavango. Met here on rome on sunday, at a time when u. S. And russia relations, after last thursday the u. S. Senate passed a ukraine freedom act bill in which it impose ed or proposed to impose new sanctions against moscow and releaves 300 million in hardware to to help ukraine to help turn back separatists in the crimea district. Calling that overtly confrontational message and saying that those are antirussian sanctions and saying that russia will not be intimidated in giving up its interest and tolerating interference in its internal affairs. Lavrov has a few aces up his sleeve, in particular, he may threaten to withdraw from a de deal, by the Iranian Nuclear program to convert into fuel rods so iran can only use that to produce energy. It may not be a coincidence that the next meeting to discuss that deal will take place in geneva next wednesday. Our claudio lavongo in rome. Opec says it will not try to drive up plunging oil prices. The price of crude dropped to below 62 a barrel, the lowest since 2009. Opec Officials Say they are trying to determine the reason for decrease. These could lead to the lack of oil projects both from the Member States or even countries outside opec. That will lead to reduces in the supply on the market and could involve increases. Falling gas prices have cut into government revenues. It is not just oil prices that are slipping. The National Average of a gallon of gas is now just 2. 55. Last year it was 3. 33. The cost of flying is still skyhigh, Chuck Schumer is calling for an investigation into those high prices. Oil prices have gone downing dramatically, from over 100 a barrel to 60 a barrel. Why are the ticket prices going up as well . That is unfair and wrong. The air transport association predicts that air profits will grow to 25 billion next year. A grim anniversary for residents of newtown, connecticut. Two years ago, adam lanza shot and killed inside sandy hook elementary school. Thno celebrations are going on, same as last year. Guard overpowered in chocktaw county. Boast both escapees were found in central opportunities to in alabama. One man remains at large. Still on hand, google is calling it quits in spain. Well explain why. Riders, one of them a provision rolling back the dodd frank financial reforms. Well explain that in the week ahead. Plus i said it was really neat you could respond to these letters and help the kids. A 102yearol02yearold trao lend a hand to those who need it most this Holiday Season. Welcome back. Still developing scene in side australia. This is the Prime Minister tony abbott speaking just a few minutes ago. A gunman took hostages inside a Lindt Chocolate shop. Nearby buildings have been evacuated as well as the u. S. Consulate as South Wales Police work to defuse this situation. The protests in hong kong are over at least for now. Police cleared out the final camps. Proampts said they would bprotee back. Voters in japan have given shinzo abe another term in office. Al jazeeras Harry Fawcett reports from tokyo. The voters gave their Prime Minister another term in office. There was a lack of zeal. The opposition is very weak so we really had no choice even though you wish others could challenge. And opponents were fatalistic. It is an election that was designed to be won so its very strategic. As a citizen it makes me wonder, why now . Confused by the need for this election just two years into this governments term in office. There is littl little enthusias. Even from those who said they voted for shinzo abe. Known as abenomics, abenomics has succeeded in third and most critical stage structural reform is still stuck in low gear. He was going to be facing a tough reelection in next fall for presidency of the party. That if he delivers 300 seats today in the election, hes going to be sitting pretty and will not be facing any leadership challenge for the foreseeable future. This election gives shinzo abe more time to make good on his economic policies. Restarting japans Nuclear Power industry. It was a big political opportunity and japans Prime Minister has grasped it with both hands. Harry fawcett, al jazeera, tokyo. Spanish law would require any news aggregator to pay. Jake ward explains. Google news was built on the idea that more visibility for any news report from any publication would somehow be a welcome thing. Utterly bewildered to pay a fee to Spanish Publishers for using their content. The Company Finds that unimaginable and is so bewildered it would seem that they are not going to attempt any fix or negotiations, theyre just going to shut the whole site down in spain. Europe has caused this kind of situation for google before. But whats new here is that the spanish law requires google to pay whether or not the publishers request it. They have to pay even if the publishers dont want to charge google. Google is a huge source of traffic for news outlets. Google is infact the single greatest traffic for outlets, dwarfing facebook which comes in a distant second. The company wrote in a blog post that it doesnt make any direct money from google news. But spains law seems to push back against that notion. And now, 47 million spaniards are about to go back to the days many publishers openly pine for when their stuff wasnt readily available and given away for free on google news. Jake ward. Sony warns about publishing data leaks. Released a letter to news organizations. In the letter this is a warning boyce says, downloading or making any use of the information. Now the hackers were able to obtain digital copies of thousands of documents detailing budgets and staff salaries. The Holiday Season is in full swing and many children are writing letters to santa. The u. S. Postal service has a tradition of selecting letters and letting employees answer them. Courtney keely reports. Christmas in manhattan. Only a few blocks from the elaborately decorated windows, new yorks central post office, zip code 10001 is also home to operation santa. Now in its second year nationwide with 20 cities currently participating. Volunteers sort through thousands of letters to santa, identifying those from poorest zip codes. Letters are available to anyone who wants to read them. Shop for presents and send them. Im a huge fan of christmas and i thought it was really neat that you could respond to these letters and help little kids. Many come back year after year. Sometimes youll hear about a parent who died, or you know someone just lost their job right before christmas and they cant provide for their kid which is really hard. I never had to deal with that when i had a kid. I always had a great christmas so you want to try to do what you can to help these kids have a great christmas. Here in the main post office, they receive between 300 to 500,000 a year. But only 10 get answered. Pete has been chief elf since 1995. While there are requests for x boxes and laptops, there are many that are asking santa for simply food, warm blankets or clothes. They even send us their bills now and ask us to pay them with their account information. He says he has seen a number of needy grow in recent years. Theres no doubt that the need has tremendously gone up. And it goes with the economy. You know you can pretty much see it from the way the tone of the letters is how the state of the economy is. Figures indicate that one in five American Children currently live in poverty. In some cities that rate is over 30 . Still considerably higher than it was before the recession started. Thats true with both urban Child Poverty and with national Child Poverty. The sting of going without can be particularly hard dural the holidays. It is what it is. And i think it is a source of disappointment for poor children. Despite the dire reality for many the lesser of christmas magic has not worn off. Do you still believe in santa claus . I do, it is a force. Courtney keely, al jazeera. Still more rain headed to california. Coming up well look at what that means for states drought. And after the 2008 financial crisis restrictions were put on banks to reduce the risk they could take. Thanks to a new spending bill thats going to change. Were going to explore in our week ahead segment straight ahead. And were watching the developing news story in sydney australia, a gunman took several hostages inside a Lindt Chocolate shove and cafe. Stay with us. A deal went against theyre own government egypt mismanaged its gas industry taking the country to the brink of economic ruin this is because of a corrupt deal to an assigned to basically support two dodgy businessmen an israeli one, and an egyptian one. Al jazeera exposes those who made a fortune betraying an entire nation you dont feel you owe an explanation to the egyptian people . No. No. Al jazeera investigates egypts lost power on Al Jazeera America welcome back. A fivehour scene still developing in sydney, australia, a gunman took several hostages inside a Lindt Chocolate shop and cafe inside the Central Business district. We still dont know how many hostages or who is behind this act. As new South Wales Police work to end the situation, mike baird the premier of the New South Wales spoke just a few minutes ago. We are being tested today in sydney. The police are being tested, the public is being tested. But whatever the test, we will face it headon. And we will remain a strong, democratic, civil society. Mike beard with New South Wales. Well keep you updated on this hostage situation throughout the program. It is sunday evening and time to our regular work week ahead. Buried deep inside, changes to dodd frank. The reform bill passed in the wake of a financial crisis, critics say it will be easier for ban