Look at the human cost of a conflict hospitals in the disputed region of me going to cut about filled with victims of the war between armenia and azerbaijan. So the World Health Organization has announced a record one day global jump in corona virus infections were talking nearly 339000 people diagnosed with covert 19 over the past 24 hours that means as we look at the Johns Hopkins university virus track of the total infections in red on the left is now up about up above 36000000 the number and white shows more than a 1000000 people who are known to have died there are though always worth pointing out more than 25000000 people who have recovered. Ill take you around europe with the pandemic is getting worse as winter approaches france 1st of all which is recorded more than 18000 new cases 2 days in a row now pressure is growing on hospitals particularly in and around paris germany which had been praised for its response to seeing 4000 new cases in the past day and the u. K. Is considering even more restrictions 17 and a half 1000 new infections there in the past day the virus is spreading particularly fast in the north of england and thats where well get this report from jonah how he is in oldham in Greater Manchester. Ive come from the Council Street by street door to door this is what it takes to contain an outbreak because theres been a rise in this particular area with a team of testis with us these are mainly unpaid volunteers working with the council in oldham Greater Manchester an area turning the tide on rising covert infection rates while the rest of manchester remains the current u. K. Hotspot i think its brilliant and i hate it and just. Think its brilliant should do it this everywhere manisha. Theres doorstep testing here but severe testing shortages elsewhere confusing local restrictions are having little effect so oldham is doing for itself what the government is struggling to keeping people safe the Central Government needs to learn from those in oklahoma about what weve been doing and whats been successful ready to listen to us and rather than doing broadcast devising where they tell us what we called what is there in which its not always clear whether or not its backed up by the science that dialogue needs to be 2 way we need to be feeding back up into the government what were doing on the ground thats working and then they need to learn from that and roll out some other areas rather than imposing kind of top down restrictions that are not always but by the science and illegitimate blossoms of people. Another aspect to why infection rates are spiraling so alarmingly up here in the north is that when the National Lockdown was lifted to or in the summer it was done on a london centric basis leaving infection rates still uncomfortably high in parts of the north well social and economic inequalities have combined since then to do much of the rest its known as the north south divide higher levels of unemployment overcrowding and poverty that are now contributing to rising hospital admissions too in the north west regions of all the. Places for example thats really quite rapidly started but it was 15 days being used in the northwest and but at that moment it got to about. I think about it so almost a factor of 10 increase and there are students lots of them back on campus since september most know confined to cramped apartments and halls of residence a predictable wave of student infections increased manchesters overall rate 10 fold some may be tempted to think this is all happening a long way from the capital but as the government prepares to announce new lockdown rules that could be economically disastrous up here the predictions are that london could be just 2 weeks behind jonah hill aljazeera manchester right so thats the u. K. Now weve got john mccain in berlin reporting on the situation in germany and elsewhere in europe. This is the reality of covidien ukraine another life claimed by a virus whose 2nd wave is now sweeping across europe here in the town of stepanek a hospital designed for 100 people now has 106 corona patients alone. We are catastrophic li short of doctors the pressure is incredible and the Infectious Department we have one doctor per 47. 00 patients. Around the continent the number of new infections is surging austria has announced its highest daily figures so far in poland 2 unprecedented numbers of people are testing positive for the virus prompting the government to say it will introduce a general mask rule for all people outdoors and perhaps impose a state of emergency elsewhere as here in belgium the spike in cases has forced ministers to say no more than 4 people will be allowed to meet together in public but in spain the rate of new infections has slowed in recent days and a partial lockdown for the capital has been thrown out by a madrid court which said it infringed peoples fundamental freedoms whilst in germany a surge in cases is causing deep concern at the highest levels. Of the Current Situation worries me a lot we dont know how things will develop over the next few weeks its possible that we will see more than 10000 cases a day its possible that the virus spreads uncontrollably in the german capital Officials Say that Testing Capacity has reached 95 percent with little scope for greater testing if numbers continue to climb. One of the measures being suggested a full season already in place here in the socalled triple traffic light Warning System with 3 different poses criteria on. The number of intensive care beds occupied by corona patients the awful reproductive rate of the virus and the number of info. Sections 4100000 residents for the moment the federal government believes its existing measures are enough and. Germany so far managed this crisis well when you look at the map of europe youll see until now germany is a solid rock in this pandemic but we are seeing rising numbers across europe so far theres no suggestion of another National Lockdown politicians are perhaps fearful of the damage such a step would wreak on an already suffering economy and they know there are many people here who believe the existing measures are too strong dominant cane aljazeera berlin. Iran hospitals are running out of beds in their intensive care units the worst affected middle Eastern Countries reported another 230. 00 coronavirus deaths with new infections also about 4000. 00 for the 3rd day in a row so restrictions are being tightened masks will become mandatory outdoors in teheran from saturday. The. The from but the restrictions on public gatherings didnt stop thousands of iranians from flooding the streets of tehran to mourn the death of a legendary singer hundreds gathered outside the home of mohammad reza. He had been barred from performing or releasing albums because of his support for the antigovernment protests back in 2009. Worst her then snow oh i heard forward. To johnny the 2 time grammy award winner he died at the age of 80 after a career spanning more than half a century his voice was regarded by many as one of irans National Treasures he sang in support of irans Islamic Revolution in his early career we spoke to him they got mortazavi appear in iranian american journalist and political commentator about the also a columnist for the independent and says iranian sort out in as a cultural icon you mind is how can you know a lot of his recordings oldsmar decades and generations and he would also pull concerts of rod ive been to his concerts here in United States and across the world hes they world we not you know as a master also version you say and he continued to be able to notice and it is present in certain settings but then at the same time his recordings and his songs and his lawyers is something thats going to continue to stay with iranians up various generations of all walks of life and even among different political factions receive dissidents the opposition who he was loved but in the same time we also see the iranian president the current president who has that en mass search of condolences for him so he was merely trying to stay above politics and was a national. Culture of the entire country. Staying with iran and the u. S. Is tighten sanctions on its Financial Sector measures against 18 banks that were already under american sanctions ramped up have now effectively been cut off from the International Financial system irans foreign minister jovan serif tweeted his response this is what he said. Amid covert nineteens pandemic us regime wants to blow up our remaining channels to pay for food and medicine iranians will survive this latest of cruelties but conspiring to starve the population is a crime against humanity culprits and enablers who block our money will face justice more from rosalind jordan on this shes in washington d. C. Perhaps the biggest criticism of the trumpet ministrations sanctions regime against iran is that the culminating impact is that this is hurting the iranian people certainly we have seen that criticism coming not just from e. U. Nations but also from a wide range of humanitarian organizations around the world now the Treasury Department went in announced this latest round of sanctions against these 18 iranian banks said that these banks would still have exemptions so that they could bring in funds to facilitate the purchase of emergency food and medicine to serve the iranian people of course people have criticized the u. S. For making it much harder to get that sort of humanitarian aid to the iranian people but leave no doubt the trumpet ministration has made one of its key Foreign Policy objectives the International Isolation of iran because of what it says is irans attempts to develop a viable Nuclear Weapons program and it believes that by cutting off all avenues of getting cash into the hands or the under the control of the iranian government that the trumpet ministration ultimately will be successful but we have not seen that at least not as of right now i was pleased to talk to Hillary Mann Leverett on aljazeera shes with us from mclean virginia a former white house and u. S. State Department Official a guest i spoke to him he was saying this is targeting banks and that the United States doesnt want to go after the iranian people isnt that what happens when you go off to the banks. Absolutely i think there is there is really no doubt that the trauma ministration is going after the iranian people the hard what i would call the hardliners in the tribe in ministration in that me seem a little bit hard to believe many would think caster why russia over the entire Top Administration is hardliners but there has been a split there are real hardliners in the Administration Like the recently appointed or elevated envoy for iran affairs Elliott Abrams who i worked with in the white house in the 1st Bush Administration and its important to understand that these hard liners someone like Elliott Abrams they were around in the 1990 s. It was their thinking it was their policy advice that led the clinton and Bush Administrations to impose these kinds of sanctions on iraq in the 1990 s. From 1902003 these type of sanctions were imposed on iraq where over a 1000000 people died 500000 of them children and nobody cared nobody in washington cared at the time the secretary of state Madeleine Albright said it was worth it worth it for what the point here is not to change behavior it wasnt to change Saddam Husseins behavior in iraq its not to change irans behavior its to fundamentally weaken these countries by weakening the population that was what was done in iraq and that is what is the intent here with iraq what does that do to u. S. Relations with its going to say allies but lets face it right relations and start with allies all of us youve got 3 European Countries the 3 countries who are saying who will who oppose this does it put the u. S. And them on only even more of a collision course. Well yes but its quite intentional within the trump ministration and again getting to these hard liners with whom i worked in the Bush Administration it is very intentional to put these allies or what who they would call socalled allies really on the defense and to force them to go along with u. S. Policy u. S. Policies that they dont like remember britain france germany and france also didnt like the u. S. Invasion of iraq in 2003 but that was something perceived as good within the Bush Administration to force them to have to go along with these u. S. Policies it really shows and how light u. S. Dominance when our allies and our foes cannot stop this exertion of u. S. Power what can iran what can. Use the phrase get around the sanctions but i mean in the end its about securing its Financial Lines and jobs are if was saying money and food and medicine as well. Its a very difficult situation now iran is not like iraq under Saddam Hussein in the 1990 s. Iran is in many many areas a selfsufficient country with incredible industrialisation and economic power within its own country and it trades vigorously with it with its neighbors but still there are some things that iran needs particularly during this pandemic during the kobe 1000 pandemic that it has to import medicines medical devices peepee either were always talking about iran cannot produce enough of it fast enough to affectively deal with its population so it will cause iran pain but again iran is not like iraq in the 1990 s. It is a huge country with enormous resources and it will get by but it will be hurt and every effort always a pleasure thank you for joining us thank you. In the news ahead Rights Groups in colombia say activists are facing increased danger is a golden week for china people celebrating the annual holiday generate billions in revenue for a struggling tourism industry. But. How i would also very wet some windy weather making its way towards japan over the next couple of days in the form of typhoon chan home thats the position of the storm and its going to drift up towards q. C. Not quite making landfall in center of the store but its been a huge amounts of rainfall very very strong winds as well storm surge always an issue with these things move that close to land. The wettest weather on friday that little gradually make its way across much of honshu as we go on into saturday thankfully its moving pretty quickly brightest guys do come back in behind more in the way of sunshine sunny and fired across much of the Korean Peninsula maine moderate along with the good parts of china say no such problems here but you follow the system down to actually see the waves coming in from the north easterly direction driving quite a crop of showers in across india china there you go theres that northeasterly that on shore breeze faded some big downpours into Central Vietnam heavy showers there also running across thailand not a little clutch just storms a just noticed over towards the philippines bringing some potentially flooding rains here as well for the same china still to pushes out since the andaman sea and a gamble looking at some very heavy rain coming through here now this may well develop into a tropical system affecting the east coast of india. But. There are people in the world who want all forms of verification to just go away so we need people. Fighting against reality trying to see if its a fake video may be in syria but in a different time they risk a great deal to find out the truth in very complex situations that include major global play as weve been told to buy from russia through this conflict kept. Troops in approach truth world and on 00. These are the top stories this hour on aljazeera the World Health Organization reporting a record daily rise in close global coronavirus cases more than 338000 of them in 24 hours and 5 and a half 1000 deaths warnings are being sounded as well about rising cases across europe france reported 18000 new cases in the past 24 hours in the u. K. It was 17 and a half 1000. And the u. S. Has tightened sanctions on irans Financial Sector measures against 18 banks that were already under american sanctions have now been ramped up they have been effectively cut off from the International Financial system. Russia has invited the Foreign Ministers of armenia and azerbaijan to moscow for peace talks in an effort to end their increasingly violent conflict over the region of the going to cut about earlier on thursday armenia accused as iraqi forces of shelling the historic holy savior cathedral in the going out of hundreds of people have died in the fighting over the last 2 weeks the disputed territory officially part of azerbaijan but it is ethnically armenian but it smith has a report now from the regions main city of step on account since you know much of that. Theres not much time for anything else but dealing with new casualties at stepan curts main hospital. Its 10 times busier than normal since the 1st shells started falling 11 days ago the head of the emergency unit was telling us as this patient came in more than 350 armenian soldiers have been killed and hundreds more injured since the start of fighting with azerbaijan the azeris do not release figures for their killed