Brings a first ever visit to south korea by a member of the norths ruling dynasty kim jong il and sister what is behind her diplomatic trip across the border. And skiers are falling hard for these slopes the all time mountains in northwest china are off the beaten track but tourists are flocking here now to the land where some say skiing may have been. Time sumi so much going to thank you for joining us the leader of the germanys the social democrats martin chill says he will no longer seek the post of foreign minister in a future of grand Coalition Government or any other post in the new cabinet now on wednesday shows his party struck a deal with chancellor Angela Merkels conservatives shuls gave up at the Party Leadership and announced his intention to become foreign minister but that ambition drew a strong criticism from his partys members who must ratify the Coalition Deal in a vote chills said he had made this decision to ensure the success of the vote. And he said earlier i declare quote that i will not be taking up a post in the German Government i sincerely hope that this will end the arguments about who does what within the past p. D. Lets bring in our Political Correspondent tom aspera with the very latest on this thomas what triggered this decision as sensually decision was triggered by the fact the debate within the s. P. D. About personnel about who does what overshadowed the debates about the actual content of the Coalition Deal that was agreed a few days ago and that was what triggered the decision by martin shows today that he presented in a statement saying that he would not take up that post now its important to stress that there was a lot of criticism towards martin shows because he had in the past promised first that there would be no grand coalition and second that he would not serve as a minister and merkel two announcements were soon to be reversed as the s. P. D. As we saw has now signed a Coalition Deal with im going to local conservatives and then he announced himself that he planned to be foreign minister so there was a lot of criticism within the social democrats about the fact that he has some alleged put his personal goals and ambitions before the ambitions of the party still this is the first of potential minister stepping away from the post just two days after a Coalition Agreement was reached does that mean that this coalition could be at risk. It is still too early to say but it does stress the wobbly circumstances around this Coalition Deal the fact that were talking here about conservatives and social democrats who are just to put it simply reluctant partners neither the conservatives nor the social democrats really wanted to form a coalition the conservatives wanted to form a coalition with two other parties the social democrats had announced that they would enter opposition that they were not for another grand coalition with Angela Merkel but circumstances made them become partners again and signed that Coalition Agreement so this just shows how tricky it will be both for the conservatives and the social democrats to Work Together under this new grand coalition and it seems also thomas to show that theres a lot of disagreement within the social democrats at the moment Martin Schultz himself referring to that but was he speaking about. Well lets not forget that theres a big hurdle that the grand Coalition Partners still have to overcome namely the fact that the entire membership of the social democrats and were talking here of four hundred sixty three thousand people have to vote on the Coalition Deal that was signed this week were talking one hundred seventy seven pages under four hundred sixty three thousand members will have to say whether they approve that or they dont approve that and martin shows himself said that but debate about personnel within the s. P. D. Actually threatened the yes vote that he believes would be the correct decision for the party the Party Leadership has stressed on various occasions that they would like that you know grand coalition but there are many members within the s. P. D. In particular the youth branch of the s. P. D. Who are staunchly against a new grand coalition and we can just see that debate within the s. P. D. Happening days before that vote is announced that a vote for the results of that vote about whether the s. P. D. Party members actually give the go ahead for another grand coalition and thomas you know just about a year ago martin chills like he looked like he could challenge chancellor merkels post and now he is saying that hes not going to become the foreign minister where does this leave him well lets not forget that martin should have been voted with one hundred percent to become the party leader only a few months ago world that idea then martin troops could become the beacon of hope for the s. P. D. Is clearly over and it just shows what a difficult position hes in right now and also what kind of internal debates are happening within the s. P. D. The s. P. D. Is clearly a divided party in germany and that will be certainly a problem for the grand coalition if the Party Members do decide to move forward with this grand coalition of these Political Correspondent to thomas spare of force thomas thank you for bringing us up to date. Now the twenty third Winter Olympics has officially opened with an extravagant ceremony in south korea president mungy indicated the two thousand and eighteen winter games opened with fireworks going off over. Nearly three thousand athletes from ninety two countries entered at the sold out stadium during the Opening Ceremony of the games have to overcome multiple hurdles ahead of Winter Sports most prestigious event the i. O. C. And the athletes will be looking to put all their troubles behind them and kick off the olympics with a bang. And we have met her but from your sports with us here in a studio matt what did you make of these opening ceremonies but i thought they were spectacular this is the kind of pageantry that we dont often see outside of Something Like the Eurovision Song Contest you know fireworks hundreds of dancers acting out somewhat inscrutable tab started out with a group of kids spending some quality time with tiger not a real tiger thank goodness and they went in kicked off the athletes parade that kicked off with nigeria because nigeria happens to be the first equivalent letter in the korean alphabet and actually africa are well represented in the games the bobsled team womens bobsled team made it for them. The guy who stole the show that was the guy who stole the show in rio peter. Of tonga hes back he was back he was there for taekwondo in rio hes a very athletic guy so hes also good at Cross Country skis here as well the korean team came through as a combined force with north and south korea with a combined Korean Peninsula flag they got a big welcome from the crowd and then they went back to the sort of unusual pattern how many drummers is that i cant even count how many and finally they finish things off by lighting the torch and one of the sort of iconic korean athletes of modern times you know kim lit the torch and pronounced the games lets get really you know what has been the big story as these games have opened. The doping story sort of hung. Over the games in the months and weeks ahead and the you know socalled a limb pick athletes from russia since they are you know competing under an olympic flag and not the red white and blue flag of russia. They lost in court the court of arbitration for sport ruled that despite a lot of their athletes having had their lifetime bans vacated the bans that apply to this Olympic Games do stand so forty seven athletes who were hoping to get into the games after being barred they are not getting in however russia or olympic athletes from russia as theyre called still do have one hundred sixty eight so there will be a lot of people from russia winning medals in this game we should also point out that some events did actually begin before the opening ceremonies yeah including i mean we saw curling and ski jumping yesterday earlier today we saw for example the Short Program of the Team Figure Skating this is a complicated story but the real big story to come out of it is patrick chan one of the favorites in the singles competition for men didnt have a very good Short Program yet he took a tumble. Luckily for him his team mates you know skated quite well and canada actually came out on top of the team Short Program which means that the ten teams that took part in this Short Program five teams go on to the finals for just get their long program and he will get a chance to skate his long program coming up on the weekend what he said however was the fact that these letters are taking place in asia away from the two Main Television broadcast sites europe and north america has meant that theyve kind of shifted around the competition times he was actually competing in late morning which is that was a very unusual for him figure skaters are very much used to skating at night or maybe in the Late Afternoon so he said he didnt blame it on that necessarily but he said it did feel kind of weird all right well he was just getting warmed up all right matt herman from database for thank you very much. Well these games also have an historic a political aspect a high level government delegation from north korea is attending the opening ceremonies officials from pyongyang include kim il jones the sister of north Korean Leader kim jong il and this is the first a member of the norths ruling dynasty can visit the south officially these two countries are still at war but these olympics appear to have started to thaw in relations at the Opening Ceremony athletes from the two countries will walk side by side as we heard under a unity flag. And lets cross over to correspondent Jason Strother hes in ghana going outside of a young chang for us hi jason good to see you so tell us more about the significance of jong visiting south korea. All right i mean its unprecedented that a member of north koreas ruling family would come here to south korea and i guess shes the second best thing to rule there kim jong il and her big brother you know i the whole world was shocked to begin with when kim jong un announced earlier this year that he was going to participate in the olympics at all and ever since then south korean president moon j. N. As as done his best to try to make north koreas participation in this libya had go smoothly as possible and just how the South Koreans been reacting to the fact that north korea is participating in these games. Well certainly i think many people here are happy for the reprieve that the olympics have brought to the peninsula last year we had missile tests after missile tests we had transit in trump and washington threatening to totally destroy north korea we had many tirades coming from john young so certainly for the past month or so that type of rhetoric has died down and i think people here are glad not to hear it but there is perhaps not as much excitement about the unified womens Ice Hockey Team as perhaps the organizers thought there would be there was a survey out a few weeks back that showed seventy percent of respondents here did not favor the unified team they evidently didnt want to share the spotlight with the north korean athletes so theres not much enthusiasm about that unified team do people there believe that this thaw in relations could lead to some sort of sustainable peace oh well well have to see and several weeks from now of course i think during the games i think. The easiest way to make the peninsula safe during the olympics was to invite north korea here but once theyre gone and all the foreign athletes go home thats another question and the u. S. And south korea are set to hold annual military exercises in late march that always antagonizes the regime so if the good if any of the goodwill that was generated here actually last will know after the games correspondent Jason Strother reporting from outside counts hank thank you jason. Now to some other stories making news around the world a brief u. S. Government shutdown is set to end after the house of representatives passed a bill to fund the federal government through march twenty third the Senate Passed it a few hours earlier the bill also increases overall spending limits over two years President Donald Trump is expected to sign the bill into law rescue operations in taiwan have started to wind down after a devastating six point four magnitude earthquake rocked an area around the eastern city of this week the death toll now sits at twelve dead with five people still missing. The Reuters News Agency says an investigation into the massacre of ten were hinge a men by me and maher soldiers led to the detention of two of its reporters while on and are awaiting trial on charges of illegal possession of state secrets while reporting on the ongoing crisis. And seven of the ten taurus arrested for pornographic dancing in cambodia have been released on bail they were arrested in january after photographs emerged of people imitating sex acts at a party those out on bail cannot leave cambodia their passports have been confiscated. Now reports of even more carnage in syria with Government Forces laying waste to the countrys last few rebel strongholds activists say airstrikes going on for five days now in Eastern Hotel near the capital damascus has killed nearly two hundred thirty people the bloodshed has led the United Nations to call for an urgent ceasefire to evacuate civilians and deliver humanitarian aid. Even by the bloody standards of the syrian conflict the bombardment of the rebel held unclear but Eastern Ghouta has exacted a fearful toll. For days of Government Air raids have left more than two hundred civilians dead among them at least fifteen children thats according to the british based syrian observatory for human rights. Eastern goot is one of the last pockets of antigovernment resistance near damascus in a separate incident in the east of the country u. S. Led Coalition Forces killed around one hundred government backed fighters in darios or province the Syrian Government condemned the strikes as a war crime. The u. S. Described the action as selfdefense the coalition observed a slow build up of prohibition forces over the past week our forces have the inherent right to selfdefense. We are not looking for a conflict with the regime any action that takes away from our Ongoing Operations to defeat isis is a distraction of all get out the u. S. Or at one level cease fire and syria what is your position about that you understand this not really stick we would like to see a ceasefire. With with the terrorists. And agreement to be used oh yes just a question as rescuers rushed to just really to help the wounded in eastern guta the prospects for a cease fire in syria look as bleak as ever. Right now Global Markets are skidding again ben is here with more on that thank you sumi the big folds on wall street overnight soured the sentiment across asia and europe fears of inflation have infiltrated the Financial Markets the u. S. Stock sell off can now be classed a correction being a ten percent plunge investors are hoping this wont turn into a crash. After the Global Market rout earlier this week investors were warned of increased and more frequent volatility in the next weeks and thats what theyre getting as seen by the dallas plunge on thursday some analysts say that algorithm based trading in preprogram sell orders are to blame others point to market based indicators first u. S. Investors fretted over a potential rise in borrowing costs as inflation picks up on increasing wages and they were anxious over the Government Shutdown some investors are taking a longer more sanguine view bracing themselves for short term discomfort or in one of these environments right now what do people have to realize the stock market and the economy are two different things. The technicals of the stock market are going to fight the fundamentals of an improving economy maybe for the rest of this month asian markets have followed u. S. Stocks deep into negative territory chinese stocks are on track for their worst day in almost two years and analysts have a similar outlook as to how long it will last also given the seasonal factor so it would take some time of course the mid february in the new year holiday and everybody would go to their homes to celebrate the new year and. Come back until may be. Fair bruce so there you see. The march sort of. For a good number of the stock market in february just go home and relax and improving Globa