Secretary of state mike compare arrives in the u. K. I made tensions with china over hong kong and 5 g. Technology. And mollys opposition calls for a pause in protests calling on the president to step down while regional mediators try to end the crisis and people seemed with the sports Human Rights Watch school only unishe premier league to take saudi arabias human rights record into account when considering the countrys take over good from new calls the United States. Thank you for joining us our newly released Intelligence Report has found the British Government actively avoided looking into evidence of russian interference in the u. K. Politics it says the government failed to take action even after evidence emerged that moscow tried to influence. 2014 Scottish Independence referendum the report also indicates the kremlin meddled in the 2016 brecks it vote but its hard to prove while the u. K. Was slow to recognize this threat and the report warns russias cyber capability pauses what it calls any media threat to Britains National security now reacting to the report the u. K. Government insists its not being complacent when it comes to the flow of illegal russian money into the country what we do know about russian influence in the u. K. Is that is the new normal successive governments of welcome russian oligarchs and their money with open arms and there is a lot of russians with very close links to. Putin who are now very well integrated into but both u. K. Business political and social scene was referred to as lending london ground yet few if any questions of the National Guard the province of considerable wealth. This open door approach has provided an ideal mechanism by which illicit finance can be recycled through the london laundromat as for insomnia they go in london for a sony a weve been waiting for this report to be released for nearly a year now over a year actually it taken a long time tell us about what the findings are the details of what its about. Well indeed fallen and with. Relation to that delay all the excuses the d that the government was giving up the time of course happened before the 29 team december election general election they the i. C. s in fact pointed to there was absolutely no reason for that and it refuted all the excuses and explanations that the government had given to not its release and of course when you look at it now it is really quite damning and very critical over the lax and complex and the way that governments excessive governments going going back a few years now have dealt with this issue of russian influence through social means as well as economic means as well and the Cottage Industry of lawyers and Estate Agents and and accountants that welcomed high profile russians into the country and dedicated themselves to their services as was put there as a kind of functioning as a kind of laundromat as well and also theres a very serious question mark being put over certain members of the house of lords the upper house in the palace of westminster and in parliament there are ties to russian businesses and russian Financial Institutions as well that is being called into question too and that not enough has been done for there to be an open transparent way of looking at to see how if anyone from these institutions has also possibly been compromised as well the whole range of this whole our whole array of possibilities of influence their folly right in what have been the reactions then to this report and what is the British Government doing now to counter russian interference. Well you may remember that a few days ago or so a couple weeks ago the foreign secretary did lay out that britain was going to be enacting its own magnitsky act to try and stand down on this kind of laundromat process that has been going on in the country however youve got that in process and youve also got unexplained well thought is in play but so far they havent really been extremely effective at countering this kind of process of this kind of influence as well not least to say the doesnt really have an effect on the whole on the cyber crimes that have been taking place in the hacking that has been attempted to try and thwart british democracy as well now weve had reaction from the British Government as well while the intelligence and Security Committee said that they strongly recommend looking at how if there was any sort of influence looking into for example the bricks at referendum because of course they cant ascertain exactly how that was done through the social media platforms that were there the British Government has already said that that retrospective assessment of the of the vote was not necessary as there was no attempt of any successful interference well that we cannot know at all considering that there was all the microtargeting and the focus that was put on social media platforms to provide misinformation which is really a stall. Of of what a russian interference has been able to do so theres no no clarification the u. K. Government maintains that it is doing all it can but until it actually acts on what the i. C. s recommends it really is looking like as if its stalling and really stonewalling on any of those recommendations which actually puts a lot of doubt and question marks over how that affects the very heart of government ali thank you very much for that sonia live there in london and reacting to the report the kremlin is denying interfering in elections well have more on this for you later on in the news hour. In other news its being hailed as a Pivotal Moment for europe a rescue deal worth nearly 860000000000 dollars to help economies by the coronavirus the agreement between e. U. Leaders was reach after days of very tough negotiations step boston way for some amsterdam it was a test of an insurance for e. U. Leaders in their longest block summit in decades 4 days of tough negotiations with tempers often freight finally on the 5th a deal 8 159000000000. 00 in non repayable grants and loans to countries worst affected by the coronavirus condemning cuts. In we we spent 4 long days and nights of negotiation more than 90 hours but it was worth it this agreement is a signal that europe is able to act after all people often accused europe of being too little too late for us here were demonstrating that the opposite is the case dawned in masks it was the leaders 1st face to face meeting since government imposed lockdown restrictions in march lockdowns that also meant the biggest economic downturn since the great depression. German chancellor Angela Merkel was among leaders from france spain and italy who led the way in convincing the block to consider the amount evenly into loans and grants. Weve laid the financial foundations for the e. U. For the next 7 years and at the same time came up with a response to the biggest crisis in the history of the European Union with the recovery fund. The south proclaimed frugal for sweden denmark austria and the netherlands initially stood opposed to the deal. The group led by the dutch Prime Minister mark hurd worried about death but in the end they were also convinced. This is of course difficult in the decisions been very difficult to use for all your appearance a militant which ended in success for all 27 Member States with especially for the people this is a good deal this is to only you and most importantly this is the right deal for europe writes no its an unprecedented aid package an unprecedented times with so many European Countries suffering from the covert 1000. 00 crisis the European Union did not have much choice but to show solidarity and unity otherwise its relevance would have been seriously questioned now its up to the individual leaders to sell this expensive deal at home while the e. U. Bloc has been faced with rising unemployment as Large Industries including airlines and Car Manufacturers lay off workers inside these walls in brussels many are hailing this as a Historic Deal and a big step forward in soft pedaling the economic blow the liver by dependent make steps fast and aljazeera amsterdam our listener return to our top story this hour in the u. K. Intelligence report on russian interference joining us now is andrei fedoroff lizzie was the chairman of the fund for Political Research and consulting in russia and also a former Deputy Foreign minister has via skype from moscow thank you very much mr fedorov for speaking to us here on aljazeera its not the 1st time of course that weve had such accusations leveled against russia accusations of election interference the kremlin has always denied interfering in elections 1st of all i want to ask you what you make of this report and whether there is anything in it at all that you would tend to agree with. 1st of all i think its not one of the last report on such such current and. Of the problem is that its the 1st trip or of which is directly accusing. Russia from u. K. Side and its of course its create additional problems for the future now let our relations are on official level we will always denying any kind of interference on the state level on the state level you did die in difference but on officially is there interference. Ok it took days computerize wald with the sky crew with learn whats up with their face move there are of course offense from several groups who are in france to spread information that cetera et cetera. I would like to mention one point its a question of great sit in russian political circus couple of years ago there was a kind of feeling that brecht 1st braggs it. Because you can was the main trouble maker within European Union and many sanction initiatives came from u. K. And there was a point of view that if you can i will leave European Union it will be easy you know inside European Union to change the mood and to leave the ascensions which i exist in be against russia and to solve by let the reprograms on the separate bases so this is a kind of bed ground which might influence on the whole story thats interesting they say that so would you say then there was russian interference in the 2016 bratz it felt. Its course not due to fear it is but there are certain. 5 there was an opinion among many of our experts that brags it will be in favor of russia because it will ease our relations with European Union. And from this point of view although. They were saying that ok we should welcome brett arends and we should see it as a possible way out of the Current Crisis with the European Union and mr fedorov the report i mean doesnt just touch on election interference of course it also states that successive British Governments have welcomed russian oligarchs and their money with open arms providing them with a means of recycling illicit finance through the socalled london laundromat and you know today theres greater suspicion of russia and russian money does moscow not worry that reports such as this 1 may have some bearing on russias economy on its ability to raise money from Foreign Investors on russias standing on the world stage. Ok for the last that can longer was very very much a corrective to russian oligarchs. Person in america in 2006 in london Boris Berezovsky horse the may not want him to put him. Out i mean the main seeing now it is of that london at this moment is not so much a corrective. For russian. Businessman for russian oligarchs because. It is a big if you are that there is not more checking go. Of the property. Of. How do you use it at certain etc i mean anyway london is still very important from the financial point of view. Of course there is some money laundering. A while longer and stronger rational but its no child with the russian Economy Today well thank you so much for talking to us and taking the time to give us your views on this andrea fedorov is a former Deputy Foreign minister of russia joining us there from skype we apologize for the poor connection maritime sankey so much for your time now the Coronavirus Crisis send us President Donald Trump us we did a photo of himself in a mask calling it patriotic as far as months of mixed messages on whether he believed they were an essential tool to prevent the spread of call the 1900 as bring in kimberly hark at our White House Correspondent so kimberly a change in tone from the president perhaps offering his strongest endorsement yet for wearing masks. Many arguing though its coming much much too late as the number of corona virus cases in the United States continues to surge 140000 dead now in the United States more than 3800000 americans infected and were seeing a majority of us state showing record breaking surges in terms of the number of people that are being infected on a daily rate now the u. S. President as you point out has been criticized as the administration criticized for sending mixed messages for not showing more leadership on this particularly as weve seen both democrats and republicans now saying in many cases that the best thing to do to stop the transmission is to wear our mask but notable in all of this for months has been the absence of a mask by u. S. President donald trump even as his own c. D. C. Federal government body has recommended that this is something that should be done in the u. S. President changing all of that with that tweet making many yuri s. When he suggested that its now the most patriotic thing to do to wear a mask given the fact he was one of the last to do so so in the midst of all this another thing the u. S. President is doing is resuming those very controversial Coronavirus Task force refix they will be picking up again at 21. 00 g. M. T. And you can remember they have a stock after the president got himself into a bit of trouble for suggesting that might be good to inject yourself with disinfectant to potentially stop the spread of the virus or to get rid of it from your body and also pushing im proven drugs but in the absence of strong messaging from the president in the absence of being able to hold his rallies because of social distancing it appears the white house bring those back and we are told from the press secretary that he will be taking questions ok thank you very much well look forward to that press conference will become area here live on knowledge is your committee how can my forest at the white house. Plenty more ahead on this news hour including china warns the u. K. Over interference in hong kong as britain scraps an extradition treaty with its former colony. Boss donald trump again criticizes pay is during the National Anthem as baseball teams do exactly that in preparation of the east we start. To. Now within the next hour leaders from ethiopia sudan egypt will begin a Virtual Summit in yet another attempt to break the deadlock over africas largest hydroelectric dam the last round of talks on the grand renaissance dam ended a week ago with little progress made major sticking points think good how any future disputes will be resolved and how ethiopia will respond to droughts in the region sudan in egypt say the dam will impact their Water Supplies and dont want to start operating until a binding agreement is reached with ethiopia lets bring in Mohammed Vall has covered this story for a 6 sensitivity so a new round of talks but this time mohamed sof africa is stepping in as a mediator do you think they can succeed in helping make progress in these negotiations that have been so contentious over the. Yes fully this is a return to to africa its very significant egypt has been approaching the u. S. The u. N. And. Those partners have not done much egypt has now realized that to the United States would not put enough pressure on the each opens to stop feeling that. Anytime they want so thats clear now to the egyptians they return to the africans and south africa chair of the South African leader as the chair of the African Union has the backing of the African Union some 50 plus states they want to this problem to be resolved 10 countries are concerned. That the nile basin they know that any conflagration in the conflict between each o. P. s sudan and egypt will backfire and you know will spread across the region south africa itself is a very is removed from this spot but they know that it is in the interest of the continent to resolve this problem so egypt is going back to the africans even though africans have some criticism to words egyptian position for instance lets go back to a few years ago when its your peer began building constructing a dam on the or more river that according to the Human Rights OrganizationHuman Rights Watch and other sources created a lot of damage in lake turkana if. Some of the gulf is in that lake shrunk by 1. 7 kilometers and the water level dropped by 1. 5 kilometer affecting the livelihood of. Hundreds of thousands of people and that lake at the time the criticism leveled against egy