this is due to the news live from berlin guilty twice kremlin critic alexander valley will stay behind bars a court upholds the russian opposition leader's sentence for violating his parole and find him guilty of defamation in a 2nd trial we'll go live to moscow also coming up. american president joe biden declares a major disaster in texas where people have been forced to line up for drinking water after a catastrophic winter snowstorm wreaked havoc across the state. and the art of

reentering the deal biden's administration aims to get the 2015 iran nuclear accord back on track reversing a key trumped foreign policy decision. by sir welcome to the program accord in moscow has found russian opposition leader alex a no valley guilty of defamation earlier today another court rejected vivaldi's appeal against a jail sentence in a separate case but it did reduce his sentence slightly taking into account time already served under house arrest now spend around 2 and a half years behind bars for violating parole the kremlin critic was unable to meet his parole officers because he was in a german hospital receiving lifesaving treatment after being poisoned with a military grade nerve agent. and correspondent emily sure one has

followed the court cases and joins us today from moscow emily you watched for seeding so what were the highlights. well alex enough when in today in today's double bill of court cases with a good dose of humor and cynicism i think he was joking all day he was smiling he even joked with the journalists watching the case and waiting for the verdict that he had actually picked cooled cucumber is in his prison cell in a plastic bag he also very much to use today's court cases where the verdicts in some senses in some sense were no real surprise as a platform to address his supporters to address the public and to address. international viewers and readers as well he used his 2 closing

statements to say that he didn't regret coming back to russia he. quoted both harry potter and the bible to say that he didn't feel alone and that he urges his supporters not to feel alone as well and he also talked about his vision for the future of russia a future in which as he said truth and justice matter and russia can be free and really what reactions have there been to the verdicts including perhaps in the criminal law and media. well i think the verdicts came as no surprise and these allies came out after that 1st verdict they rejected appeal saying that it's a.