captioning sponsored by wnet >> sreenivasan: on this edition for sunday, june 14... confronting vladimir putin. the pentagon plans to move heavy military equipment to countries near russia. foreign workers living in squalid conditions as qatar prepares to host the world cup. and prepping for long-term space travel. even if would-be astronauts can get to mars, can they get along on the way? >> pbs newshour weekend is made possible by: corporate funding is provided

corporate funding is provided by mutual of america-- designing customized individual and group retirement products. that's why we are your retirement company. additional support is provided by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. from the tisch wnet studios in lincoln center in new york hari sreenivasan. >> sreenivasan: good evening, thanks for joining us. the latest round of negotiations between greek and european union officials ended today in brussels without an agreement, and an e.u. spokesman said" significant gaps" remain. a greek official said the e.u.'s insistence that pensions be cut remains a major sticking point. greece could default on its debts by the end of the month. the e.u. says it will only send money if greece cuts spending by two billion euros. prime minister tsipras has called that "absurd". german vice chancellor sigmar gabriel said today the repeated negotiations make the process

look "ridiculous" and that "an ever greater number of people feel as if the greek government is giving them the run around". the israeli government today issued a report calling its conduct during last year's war against hamas on the gaza strip" lawful" and saying it had done all it could to avoid civilian casualties. israel accused hamas of using its own people as human shields during the seven-week conflict which claimed more 2,200 palestinian lives. 73 israelis also died. >> ( translated ): whoever wants to know the truth, let them read this report. whoever wants to continue with baseless blaming of the state of israel, let them waste time reading the report by the u.n. commission. we, for our part, will continue protecting our soldiers. they will continue protecting us. >> sreenivasan: the report was apparently meant to preempt the impending release of a separate report by the u.n. human rights council which is investigating whether israel committed war crimes during the seven-week conflict. israel has accused the u.n. of having a pro-palestinian bias. hamas said today that israel is trying, in its words, to control

the international narrative in anticipation of the u.n. report. president obama's point man in the fight against isis said today that the islamic militant group poses an unprecedented threat to the united states, but he said pro-western forces are making gains against the islamic extremist group. presidential envoy brett mcgurk spoke on meet the press. >> in northern syria, as we speak the kurds with arab, free syrian army fighters an some christian organized units, they are taking, they are really giving a beating to isis and they are very close to cutting off the main supply route that isis has into its capital of raqqah. so there is a lot going on chuck. i think watch the euphrates valley over the next six months from raqqah to ramadi to fallujah. we're gonna be focused there. >> sreenivasan: and now to american politics. during an appearance tomorrow at miami dade college, jeb bush is expected to formally announce his candidacy for the republican nomination for president. today, on twitter, he released his campaign logo, jeb 2016. during an interview broadcast today on cnn, jeb bush was asked

to define himself. he answered this way: >> who is jeb bush? >> well, jeb is different than george; jeb is who he is. my life story's different. >> sreenivasan: from california tonight, a report that accidental gunshots by los angeles county sheriff's deputies have more than doubled in the last two years. this according to the los angeles times. the number of incidents reportedly jumped from twelve in 2012 to thirty last year. the increase coincides with the department's switch to a new kind of handgun that does not have a safety lever and that requires less pressure to pull the trigger. also in los angeles this weekend, mayor eric garcetti has signed into law a bill, which, during the next five years, will increase the minimum wage to $15 an hour. the current minimum wage there is $9 an hour. an estimated 600,000 people in los angeles earn the minimum wage, the vast majority of them minorities. the increases will be phased in businesses with fewer than 25 employees will roll out the increases more slowly. and good news from space today.

the first robot ever to land on a comet has reawakened after falling silent for almost seven months. the european space agency's" philae" probe landed on the comet in mid-november but stopped communicating two days later. yesterday, german researchers captured a signal that lasted 85 seconds, long enough for the probe to send a new batch of chemical data from the comet's surface. for the first time since russian forces annexed crimea last year, the united states is reportedly poised to send heavy military equipment into several eastern european and baltic nations near russia. it's meant to reassure american allies and to deter russian president vladimir putin from what the west considers military aggression. new york times reporter steven lee myers broke the story and joins me now from washington d.c. to explain the pentagon's possible plan.

so what kind of equipment are we talking about here? >> we are talking about a brigade's worth of heavy equipment that would include tanks armored vehicles artillery pieces and so vorth. >> and where would this be stationed? >> what they're looking to do is to deploy it in several of the nato allies, a bulk of it would be in a place like poland, they are looking at bulgaria rowe main app yah -- romania, and baltic nation that are seen as the most vulnerable to russian attack. >> have these countries been asking for it? what is their sense on the ground of why they need this equipment now? >> they have been asking actually. and it's other nato members who are a little bit reluctant. including the u.s. nato didn't look at russia as an adversary but now the crimea and

eastern ukraine they're looking to reassure the allies about the united states the alliance's willingness to deefns these countries. since the annexation of crimea last year nato has been stepping up a number of exercises they have been doing, training missions and so forth. you see a lot of increased activity. every time the united states participates, they have to bring the tanks a enormous logistical lift. to have that equipment prepositioned in the place wrest these troops will rotate more and more frequently and for the time being. >> so how far along is the is plan to deploy these weapons, this equipment? >> the pentagon has been working on this for a number of months

now and it's expected that the secretary of deerchtion ashton carter will present this to the nato defense ministers when they meet later this month. >> is it in anticipation to an increased amount of aggression from russia? >> i think it's in response to aggression. russian exercises on the borders ftes in the baltic area particularly but also in the south around obviously eastern ukraine and the i think that the nato allies, nato commanders are looking at this as a way to build up assurance a trip wire if you will that you know, any move against any of these nato allies very quickly american military equipment and the troops who could quickly respond and falling on it. >> one country's prepositioning could be another country's what is the response from the kremlin

or has there been one yet? >> there hasn't been one, and there's no question they'll view this as an aggressive act. putin for a long time has been complaining that nato specifically the american military is encroaching closer and close are to russia's borders. and in fact the united states hasn't but since the events over the last year it has become more and more a reality what putin feared most. s i think there are a lot of states that don't want to see us back response and counter response tit-for-tat buildup but the fact is with you know so many russian troops so close to nato's borders with the baltic state's that you know the pent gone is considering believes it necessary to show a little bit more resolve for the alliance. is. >> all right, steven lee myers

of the new york times, thank you very much. >> sreenivasan: investigators warned earlier this month that qatar could lose the 2022 world cup if it is proven that officials from that persian gulf nation bribed international soccer officials to get to host the games. that country has already started work on new stadiums, hotels, highways, shopping malls and airports, huge construction projects said to be worth billions of dollars. it's an opportunity for foreign workers seeking higher wages. and tens of thousands of nepalese have made the 21- hundred mile trip in search of work there. but as i.t.v.'s international correspondent john irvine reports, once they get there many are living in squalid conditions. and some are even dying.

>> qatar airways has three flights a day into kathmandu. taking÷!e!kathmandu. this woman waits for her husband but for mina when he left for qatar six months ago she was his wife. today she's his widow. a sad sight, the authorities didn't want us to film. the husband's coffin 27-year-old sheva tamang died on a building site accident on april the 19th. to combine his widow's grief, these people believe in funerals as soon as possible after death. the delay flights convention here.

as if a single coffin wasn't bad enough there were two others on the same flight. again the bodies were those of young men, one had died in a traffic accident, the other from a sudden heart attack. cardiac arrest is the amounted to being worked to death. but he disagreed, saying it was an orientation problem. >> when they finish the job they come back to their room and then sunlt they open the aj, air conditioner. so that is why in that case they have like a heart attack something like that. so that's why we need a good orientation. >> with no work available at home these be nepalese men are queuing for permits to go to the gulf countries including qatar. i have concerns but i have to

feed my family said this man. last year we were invited to qatar to look at a new accommodation to block migrant housing workers. but we found these other squalid quarters cramped full of be nepalese laborers, sleeping 18 room. other british journalists were followed, arrested and interrogated. the qataris claim that significant improvement has been made in improving the loss of be workers but she disagrees. >> we haven't seen any marked changes in the way the worker are faring in qatar today, as opposed to five years earlier. >> so the world cup is not the catalyst for change that you had hoped for? >> i don't think so, no.

>> the body was taken from kathmandu airport for cremation. as monks perform rituals, his widow passed out and his mother wailed. the qatar world cup is now under investigation. the fbi and the swiss are counting the alleged cost in bribes. nepal is counting the actual cost in lives. >> sreenivasan: it has been almost a year now since we first saw the video showing the choking death of eric garner as he was being arrested on staten island here in new york. that event, along with the police shooting in ferguson, missouri, of michael brown, triggered nationwide protests. we're now learning much more about the circumstances that led

to garner's death. reporter benjamin mueller is us with the latest. one of the first reports police made about the incident made no reference to actually anybody's hands being on his neck or his arms anything being a on his neck or his arms anything being around his neck yet you quote the autopsy as saying on external examination of the neck there are no visible injuries on the inside were tell stale signs of choking. why this discrepancy? >> you're right. this is an internal police document prepared soon after his death and soon after the pivotal video came out that is showed the choke hold. it came out from supervisors on the scene and showed no contact with eric garner's neck. she saw a choke hold and told us that she told the police department officials who interviewed her that day that she saw a choke hold too. the statement attributed to her is different than the one she

said she gave them. >> so if it wasn't for that video there was a chance that version of the truth could be the record. she's also behind the second video that shows how the emergency responders, the ambulance folks came in the medical technicians. supposed to be taken to the hospital right away. what happened in this case? >> from the start the emts who responded knew very little what they were responding to. the call came in as unknown, low priority. they did not know that police officers were involved, they didn't know eric garner's condition was, all conditions that helped them prepare. there were communications breakdowns. the oxygen supplies were not kept by his side, in fact they are carried away from his side by an emt trainee who was on the scene. there are no fire department

supervisors who are assisting but this didn't start as that level of seriousness. >> what happens happened since? there are still investigation underway, they haven't wrapped up but are there police department changes that have been created because of this? >> they have created a new centralized unit to investigate deaths by shooting by police officers. it is not surely how that was connected to the garner incident but surely that is the string of deaths of unarmed black men around the country that set off calls for a forum. >> benjamin mueller, thank you very much. >> sreenivasan: how can the often fraught relationship between police and minority communities be improved?

watch our interview with two former policemen from earlier this year. visit pbs.org/newshour. this weekend in hawaii, a group of three men and three women completed the longest space simulation ever conducted by the idea was to simulate conditions astronauts would face living in cramped quarters during a prospective mission to mars in the 2030s. the newshour's saskia de melker has our report. >> reporter: high on the slopes of the mauna loa volcano in hawaii, six people, three men and three women, have been living inside this dome completely isolated for the last eight months. nasa and the university of hawaii are funding and leading the project known as the hawaii space exploration analog and simulation or hi-seas for short. the ultimate goal? to study social interaction among crew on long term space missions, like the one to mars that nasa hopes to launch in the 2030s. and driving up to the site on mauna loa, it's easy to see why they chose this location. >> the site is very geologically

similar to a young mars. there's no signs of human life, there's no signs of animal life very little plant or insect life. >> reporter: kim binsted is the principal investigator for the hi-seas study. we caught up with her via skype from her home on the big island of hawaii. >> nasa certainly has a lot of technical concerns to consider but also there's problems to do with the human side of the equation and that's what we're trying to address. so things like how do you pick a crew so that they'll continue to work together well over the 2.5 to three years of a mars mission. and how do you support them so that, to be honest, they don't want to end up wanting to kill each other. >> you don't have a lot of privacy and personal time and we all have so much going on. >> reporter: to test their individual and team behavior the crew completed numerous daily surveys, tasks, and computer games. they also wore devices called socio-meters that measure the distance between them and the volume of their voices. >> if two people are standing very close to each other, the

volume of their voices is very high, you might assume they're having a fight. and similarly if two people have never come near each other, then maybe they're avoiding each other. those might be warning signs for a problem that is developing amongst the crew. >> reporter: their communication with the outside world was limited and on a 20 minute time delay. but the crew did make and share periodic video diaries of their experiences. >> so one disadvantage would be the food. >> reporter: they were faced with a number of conditions similar to those that astronauts encounter on space missions. >> so here for example is the green and red bell pepper and then we just put hot water and soak them for a while to rehydrate. >> reporter: they could only eat freeze dried and shelf stable foods. >> on this side we have one of each of our meats. so we have sausage, beef, chicken, turkey. >> here we have our electrical system for the hab. >> reporter: life in the dome is powered by solar panels, and resources, including water, were restricted. >> so we have a timer here that helps us keep track of how many seconds and minutes we spend in

the shower >> reporter: each person was allowed just eight minutes of shower time a week. >> mission support this is hi- seas engineer zak and i'm requesting assistance. >> reporter: on the rare occasions when they went outside, crew members had to first request approval from ground control and wear spacesuits while exploring the volcano's mars like landscape. most of the time though they were confined to the one thousand square feet dome. >> here you have the only window of the habitat. >> we're doing a type of composting that's called bokashi. >> reporter: each person had their own individual project to keep them busy: from research on microbiology and hydroponics. to work on robotics and 3d printing. and then there were daily group routines including exercising together. >> besides dinners we also make excellent desserts. >> reporter: cooking together. perhaps the biggest challenge for crew members wasn't being

separated from the rest of the world, but the inability to separate from each other. >> there is really no place in the hab where you can stand and not be heard. >> zak, how's my coffee coming? >> it's not quite ready yet but do you want cream or sugar? >> both please. >> reporter: yesterday the simulation came to an end. to celebrate the crew took a jump "back to earth". and, they're all still smiling. >> even when you choose very low drama people and we're not a reality show, what we're looking for is not a way to eliminate all problems from happening but a way to choose people and to train people so that they know how to respond to conflict and can do that in a really resilient way. >> reporter: it will take some time to synthesize all the observations and data collected during the study. but another hi-seas experiment will be starting soon. in august a new crew of six will enter the dome. this time for an entire year.

>> sreenivasan: yesterday we reported on the push in los angeles to end homelessness among veterans there. as part of its effort, the city is studying what effect the architectural design of new housing could have on those who sometimes have spent years on the streets. special correspondent john carlos frey reports. >> from its outside sculpture like form to its sleek light filled halls, the star apartment building in downtown los angeles is an architectural marvel. but this complex isn't for the city's hipsters. all 1,000 units house former homeless people. >> the isolation that sometimes people first experience after they come off the streets. >> mike alvidras is the executive director. it has amenities like arts studio and community gardens.

>> good design is thoughtfulness. it's really thinking about how you lay the building out, how you promote spaces that are conducive to people having the opportunity to resocialize in a positive way. that gives people a sense of pride, particularly those who have been out on the street. >> what's this place like? >> oh it's nice, you know, you have peace of mind, you have your own space and they need more like it. >> in fact, architecturally strike housing for homeless is starting to pop you around the country. including washington, d.c, new york city and in san francisco. alvidras says good design ask also win away skeptical neighbors. >> they can see this new building as an asset and not something to be afraid or feared

because it has homeless people living in it. >> sreenivasan: a bit more news before we leave you tonight. some remarkable pictures from overseas. floods in tblisi, georgia killed 12 people and swamped the zoo, allowing dangerous predators to escape and roam through that city of more than a million people. that's all for tonight. i'm hari sreenivasan. captioning sponsored by wnet captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

>> pbs newshour weekend is made possible by: corporate funding is provided by mutual of america-- designing customized individual and group retirement products. that's why we are your retirement company. additional support is provided by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you.

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