Its one of the lowest rates in the world. Reeling from the effects of the pandemic japans economy suffers the worst contraction on record. And a race to save the soul of beirut we visit the historic neighborhoods in the lebanese capital devastated by the port explosion. For the 1st time since a contested election by president Alexander Lukashenko has hinted that hes willing to share power it comes as hes under increased pressure from protesters workers from state owned factories and walked off the job other protesters are marching towards the compound where the president visited employees at the state owned Television Channel are also on strike broadcasting an empty studio during the news bulletins of correspondents step vasant is in minsk and she joins us from outside one of the factories where the workers are on strike and the president s that we turned up just a few just over an hour ago didnt he to talk to the strikers what did he have to say. Exactly im here at the large truck wheel and the trailer factory here a stained state owned company that was thousands of workers outside just 10 minutes ago they moved to another factory now its a snowballing strike i would say to go in from one factory to the other president look at shankar flew in with a helicopter he spoke to the workers inside there were actually workers are screaming at him leave leave so not even the workers inside could be controlled by the government he said that there would absolutely not be any new elections even if someone shoots me or theres not going to be any new elections but he did say that he is willing to share power that there needs to be a change in a constitution to achieve that but he wont do that under pressure this could mean 2 things one is that he is slowly realizing that the situation is getting out of control for him that he is losing power very rapidly and the 2nd sign is that this is could be that he is buying time to stay in power longer that hes leaning on while he sees that so many people are not supporting him anymore and the scientists that he might be willing to share power how is that being how is that likely to be received by the protesters. They want to leave this not for been any skin area where local shanker was going to be still in power they really want a new president they are they have floated in the majority for startline a guy who also spoke from her exile in lithuania saying shes ready to be the National Leader well theres going to be some kind of Transitional Government until new elections are going to be held free and Fair Elections thats this going to ariel that most people who have been protesting here on the street and there were more than 200000 people yesterday yesterday in the streets of minsk only and also in other places in belarus thats exactly what they have been asking for so this could mean only the president buying time right now in the meantime to expect the protesters to continue the daily appearance is on the streets of the capsule meant. Yes this is not going to stop its getting getting bigger as we speak the major factories the Major Industries in belarus are all on strike and of course this is a major headache for a look at shanghai because the economy is already in very bad shape and thats why hes very concerned about these striking workers hes been talking to them in the last couple of days urging them to go back to work hes downplaying the strike saying its only a small group so we can still continue to work but it has not been heard his words are now sounding hollow to lots of people here in belarus certainly events happening quickly in minsk thanks very much for keeping us up to date in batteries. Now the official number of corona virus deaths in india has a past 50000 india is the 1st worst affected country behind the u. S. And brazil with more than 2 and a half 1000000 reported infections the government says the situation is improving despite criticism of the low rates of testing more than 1300000000 people in the country and is the problem as more from new delhi india across the 50000 mark in deaths the recorded and confirmed number and remains the worst affected state 20. Media half of the deaths in the state of maharashtra bash the numbers both the cases and deaths are going down in the capital but they are growing in other parts of the state now when you look at the numbers though and you recorded one of on sunday it had nearly 58000 cases which is lower than the number of cases over the past week but if you look closer it also conducted about 100000 fewer tests than it has in the last week and theres also concern about the type of tests that are being conducted because up to 30 percent of the tests that are being done in the country are the less accurate rapid and teaching tests which are quicker to do but they report false negatives up to 50 percent of the time now if you take somewhere like delhi for example with the number of cases have been coming down over the past month where the Supreme Court asked the Delhi Government weeks ago to explain why it was conducting twice the number of the record and teaching tests as it was the more accurate test known as the. Theres been no real explanation and in that time the government has continued with what its been doing in the number of cases have been coming down and the concern is that there are people who have the infection and possibly it on to others because theyre not being tested all because the because the tests is giving a false negative about his record or his worst Economic Contraction in modern history mainly because of the current virus the worlds 3rd largest economy shrank by 7. 8 percent in the 2nd quarter from april to june robot bride reports from seoul. The scale of japans contraction is worse than even the most pessimistic for costs it would translate into an annualized decline of more than 27 percent for an economy that was already in recession it took a big hit in the last quarter of 2019 and then the coronavirus effect began to come in in 2020 so the japanese economy is in a world of hurt exports like costs have fallen by more than a quarter around a year ago while in band tourists have virtually disappeared its a personal setback for japans Prime Minister shinzo who has made the economy one of his priorities and who will be hoping the only way for the economy to go now is up. Which we will continue to make the optimists afford to put the economy on the growth path after it bottomed out in april and may has been widely criticized for his handling of the pandemic and abbate scale to provide any leadership he did not establish early on a control tower for policies dealing with contain it in 1000. 00 oaks rake in japan critics say he delayed an Effective Response to save the tokyo summer olympics which had to be postponed anyway at huge Economic Cost and businesses have not adapted well to changed working practices when people had to move to teleworking and people had to move to more Digital Solutions japan was pretty unprepared for that compared to other advanced economies japans experience is in stark contrast to neighboring south korea which of all the developed nations is predicted to come out best from the pandemic with an Economic Contraction of less than one percent this yeah seoul has been widely applauded for an effective early response to the outbreak without shutting down major parts of the economy its also credited with being nimbler and adapting its economy for a world altered forever by the pandemic brabant bride aljazeera soul. New zealands Prime Minister has postponed next months election for a month because of the struggle to contain a 2nd corona Virus Outbreak to sender and consulted rival Political Parties and the Electoral Commission before making her announcement is ilands largest city oakland is back in lockdown following a new outbreak of infections i have decided on balance to move the election by 4 weeks to the 17th of october at the end of last week i was advised that this date is achievable and presents no greater risk than head we retained the status quo ive also been advised that im moving to a 17 or election day the commission will be able to leverage and draw on much of the already undertaken to deliver the election. Government troops in mozambique are surrounding an important port captured last week by fighters linked to eisele air attack in a gas rich province in the north is expected to be discussed at a meeting of Southern African leaders how much more from neighboring zimbabwe. For 3 years People Living in parts of northern mozambique have lived with violence and destruction attacks in kabul delgado province have rapidly gathered pace this year with fighters seizing towns for brief periods and increasingly hitting military or other important targets the government says local fighters affiliated to eisele are responsible leaders from Southern Africa a meeting on monday to decide what the region can and should do to help those and examine. A lot of issues on the capabilities of the muslim we can military. From our from the strength and from the military intelligence and side of things. This story. Became military is not really been able to. What any insurgents from the. Mozambiques president felipe when you see visited the area and promised to do more to help people affected by the violence there is speculation some Southern African leaders could send in troops to help mozambiques army its happened before in the democratic republic of congo listened to and mozambique back when fighters from the group or normal were raiding towns and villages. It doesnt now thats from a militant and in any event it is coming from a process and produced it was already undergoing military civil war and again was International Assistance to come to a Peace Agreement with the former military movement as well as to try to integrate the armies within was a me so its a very fragile sort of from a good muslim because at the moment. Southern African Leaders under pressure to come up with a plan to help in may some recently was made here and there are a to decide what to do about the and raced in mozambique but after the talks the meeting ended without any concrete agreement and many people have died thousands have been displaced by the violence which seems to be getting worse. Northern mozambique is rich in natural gas some projects to be worth more than 60000000000. 00 analysts say that could be one reason fueling the violence they are concerned attacks by armed groups could spill over into neighboring countries thats already been seen in other parts of the continent such as the way since the hell region and the horn of africa. Have. Still ahead here on aljazeera the traditions are gone now as the u. S. Prepares for a Democratic NationalConvention Like never before. In colombia arranged a funeral protest for. Hello there playing out across much of indonesia and some very widely scattered showers and thunderstorms as we go through the choose say that rain once again quite heavy across Northern Arizona and working its way studly across to more central and southern sections of the philippines not about some showers across java out towards sumatra but it does become havea as we head on into wednesday slightly to western as a small. Across much of the mill a peninsula and then all straight much of central little strainer is fine and dry and then to the south plenty of clouds and plenty of showers as well not just awesome fairly gusty winds this isnt just rolling its way sadly across the great by bringing those gusty winds and showers across across into melbourne and in fact not a bad day so far this month of august mania seen some of his heaviest orchestra in for nearly a decade plenty of rain on his way towards new zealand sunny cloudy they choose across Western Australia those showers really further to the south so not about day wednesday in perth 18 degrees but still that rain will persist across much of the southwest and again those fairly strong winds particularly. Through the strait now as i ask the news even the rain is on its way throughout choose a working its way southwards becomes very extensive and once and of course we will see some snow to the mountains. From fossil fuels to modern day renewable as societies develop the energy demands increase requiring Innovative Solutions to meet such the mountains as a Global Power Development of Investment Company nebraska power is uniquely positioned to deliver against these 2 mounds we provide Business Growth promote social economic benefits and provide innovative safe and environmentally sound Energy Solutions for future generations the breastpin pioneering future energy. Or. Again you want your arms there has reminder of our top stories this hour for the 1st time since last weeks a species election belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko has hinted he is willing to share power and comes as workers from state owned Companies Joining a National Strike against his reelection. Efficient number of corona virus deaths in india has surpassed 50000. 00 but some experts suspect the actual total is far higher because of low levels of testing india is the 3rd worst affected country behind the u. S. And brazil. And japan has reported its worst Economic Contraction in modern history mainly because of the coronavirus the worlds 3rd largest economy shrank by 7. 8 percent in the 2nd quarter as worse than even the most pessimistic forecasts for the economy already in recession. The millions of people who live in gaza facing a possible power shortage the only power plant that could be shut down on choose day due to a lack of diesel israel closed the main goods crossing with gaza making it impossible for fuel shipments to get in israel says its in response to rocket attacks and fire bombs fi hamas is in west jerusalem with more on the restrictions. We are seeing egyptian mediation once again delegation has just been in ramallah talking to leaders of the Palestinian Authority they are traveling through israel to go into gaza today for talks with senior hamas officials but really in the short term whats been happening has been a pretty stark response from israel there have been a series of strikes the defense minister an alternate Prime Minister benny gantz who made a big show of saying during his repeated campaigns against and netanyahu in the recent elections that he would take a much tougher line on gaza he has been overseeing the strikes also reducing the fishing zone to 0 no fishermen are allowed out into gaza waters and of course this closure of fuel going into the strip that will mean we are told that the plants the power plant will close on tuesday thats 80 megawatts of power that will suddenly be taken out of the system again as it gets about 160. 00 megawatts from israel a much smaller amount from egypt but were talking about potentially a 3rd of the supply being cut off already the official hours are 8 hours on 8 hours off its been less than that because of the overload during the summer so were talking about a real impact on peoples daily lives and as a singer dancer is talking about being a rich being a return a house address every balloon launched well these measures dont just affect us obviously they affect the entire population of the gaza strip. U. S. House of representatives is being recalled to vote on legislation to protect the Postal Service the postmaster general has made cutbacks the department has been summoned to testify before a Congressional Committee and comes as protests as a kid limited joy of trying to sabotage the mail network ahead of novembers election like hanna reports from washington d. C. For the 2nd straight day protesters gathered outside the postmaster generals home they accuse him of sabotaging the Postal Service. With a view to restricting mail in ballots in the election essentially backing President Trump in what many view as naked photo suppression the American People have a right you know where were not frogs slowly boiling in a pot we see whats happening and were going to fight against it were going to exercise our vote and were going to get rid of this corrupt. The president wrong created this situation and then my estimation and many other some in this it says its a maneuver by him to. To improve his chances in the election and its all its all about he and mr joy there. The poor and the strings here democrats in congress of now summoned louis detroit to appear before an Oversight Committee in a weeks time and if mr joy refuses to appear. He should be stamped return to sender he shouldnt be allowed to be the postmaster general if there are all this destruction he can answer to the American People what he is doing the Oversight Committee chairperson Carolyn Maloney has also proposed to pull that would reverse the changes detroit has made since taking over in may be using clude an end to overtime the firing all reassignment of senior managers the decommissioning of at least 10 percent of aut