moscow is once again shrouded in smog despite firefighters winning back almost three quarters of the areas across russia previously engulfed by wildfires.

japan marks the sixty fifth anniversary of america's atomic bombing of the japanese city of nagasaki with the impact still being felt today by its victims. and spies in the sky the european union considers a controversial new surveillance system monitoring airline passenger behavior during flights as an anti-terrorist measures but critics say it breaches the fundamental right to privacy. broadcasting twenty four hours a day live from moscow this is r t now look at our top stories firefighters have further cut the area affected by wildfires in russia but thick smog has returned to

the capital blazes are now covering only a little more than a quarter of the territories they did a week ago but the relentless flames have devoured entire villages and towns in their path leaving more than three thousand people homeless the record heat wave in central areas triggered blazes across more than twenty regions while firefighters have been enjoying recent successes they're still battling in the reason and a bloody me of regions neighboring moscow wildfires there have caused poisonous smaug to return to the capital after a few days of clear. guys i tease you catherine mcgrath cio of the consequences. this summer as wildfires differ from those in previous years the disaster was not only widespread but highly visible especially in the capital a blanket of smoke covered moscow for several weeks so too did it envelop the country's economy. to its sure the situation is very severe as about a quarter of all grain fields in the country have dried up as

a result of the drought unfortunately many firms are now on the verge of bankruptcy the government has already agreed to provide financial help to agricultural producers who were faced with hard times the government responded by banning wheat exporter until the end of the year it sent world grain prices to their highest for two years the danger is that given we've been through two thousand and seven two thousand and eight and we saw we prices per se it rises in other prices of commodities the danger is that financial markets start to anticipate price growth and other commodities and that's actually what causes a more general food price spike the short term effects of the wildfires have been quickly reflected in the price tags of some essential food and while customers can already feel how much cleaner their wallets have become this summer the long term effects of the catastrophe are still to because it. over fifty people died in the

fires while the death rate in other smoke shrouded regions has doubled at its height in moscow alone some seven hundred people were dying each day the long term effect on the health of august want to be known for years when you have forest fires not only do you have the smog but you've also got curved monoxide and you've got small particles which are unjust and alarms and cause problems breathing the country's ecological lungs are badly damaged two eight hundred thousand hectares of forest. fire in an area the size of cypress morton yes they can be planted but it will take time for them to grow it will take several decades to make up for this loss we've lost the lungs of the moscow region i mean the woods contributing to air purification and oxygen production which is a considerable blow against the environment of the metropolis. what took decades to grow has been obliterated in one long hot summer now russians are wondering whether the unusually high temperatures are just a freak of nature or if the herald

a time when most won't be just known for its freezing winters but for its scorching summers as while you sit in the pressure of r r t. more than one hundred sixty thousand firefighters army personnel and volunteers are trying to defeat russia's wildfires but not all of them are fighting on the ground parties and he said now he joined one of the emergency teams operating in the skies above one of the worst affected regions. this is how it all starts with a small flame that can quickly and golf the entire forest making this a very fierce battle for emergencies workers and volunteers plouff. one of the biggest operations in fighting these fires happened from the air port an airport in the resign region one of the worst hit by these fires and the emergency services has invited our two to come along for a ride on this ill seventy six. the

. water line they. want to drop over the past. service by. the same plant down below our first. lines. friday. night if you look. at it. as you can see helicopters are also working to put out these flames it was quite a ride we took the my guys said one of the worst case major incidents in fact why prime minister vladimir putin chose to come here to fly on one of those planes we

just flew on and see the process himself of course it's not only authorities and volunteers trying to contain these flames ordinary people citizens are doing what they can to help gathering whatever items they can food water clothes to help those who have lost everything and we're terribly hoping that this crisis will soon come to an end and he says now way our teeth design reach and. later this hour we look at whether the u.s. can really see. it's deadline to get out of iraq analysts say the promise more to appease people at home rather than a fair assessment of whether iraq's ready to go it alone. and we look at why so few female murder context get the governor's parole in california despite being cleared for early release by prison boards. japan has marks of the sixty fifth anniversary of america's atomic bombing of nagasaki a tragedy which left around one hundred forty thousand people dead and shocked the

world i traveled to japan and talk to some of those who survived the disaster. sixty five years ago sumi taro taniguchi was enjoying a simple morning bicycle ride when in a tragic instant his life was changed forever. i was thrown to the ground and i stood in piecing sound i thought i had been killed but i encouraged myself not to die that it was important to go on living. at first noticed his bicycle had been twisted and bent out of shape but as he started to move he began to realize the severity of his own condition. on my left arm and shoulder all my skin was dripping off and i had severe burns on my body. eleven year old yoshi kawi was at home with his twin brother just two kilometers from the blast center on that fateful morning. at eleven o two i saw the force of flights and give to the floor to cover my hand eyes and

ears there was a wave in our entire house crashed over us. go and his brothers crawled from the rubble and went into the city to look for their father who worked at the mitsubishi munitions plant close to the heart of the explosion on their way they found countless charred bodies and a terrifying scene. while crossing the river we were drawn to a woman who was walking with what looked like a wide belt or cloth trailing behind her but when we took a closer look it was her intestines coming out of her stomach there was nothing we could do. this is the hyper center of the bomb which means sixty five years ago it exploded five hundred meters above this exact spot and the people who suffered that horrific event well their stories are truly amazing but what they didn't know back then and just as disturbing is the long term effects of that radiation the effect is continuing. cutting her life that is sixty five years sixty five

years so that it true that. radiation is affecting human bodies for sixty five years. has had continuous surgeries throughout his life to remove tumors on his back caused by the radiation now he declares that the war did not end in one thousand nine hundred five but rather the effects continue to this day and even though. he wasn't as severely injured initially as an adult he has endured liver disease and two types of cancer attributed to the mom as well as the psychological damage of the event. the atomic bomb was extremely cruel america should never have dropped the bombs and human beings the tests in new mexico should have be. the end of nuclear weapons once the two power of these weapons was known. but having experienced the wrath of the world's most devastating weapon these two survivors

have one shared message. people use the word deterrent but i do not believe that human beings can co-exist with nuclear arsenals a reason why the a bombs survivors of hiroshima and nagasaki are pushing for peace and complete global nuclear disarmament nagasaki and hiroshima are the only two cities in the world ever to have been attacked by nuclear weapons now sixty five years later they embrace a message of peace their citizens determined that their cities will be the last ever to experience such. ten years ago saw the sinking of one of the russian navy's most advanced nuclear submarines the curse with the loss of all one hundred eighteen lives on board memorial services have been held throughout russia and the families of the crew who perished. into the sea. went down during. the official investigation concluded that fuel routed from a torpedo sparked an explosion leading to

a chain reaction of detonations and catastrophe the. worst naval disaster in russia's history. the e.u. is facing a flack for a new scheme which could see every day. on commercial flights it's designed to detect irregular behavior patterns that might ask potential terrorists but liberty campaigners have denounced the idea as a violation of the democratic right to privacy reports. all through a week in the sun but if the european union project goes ahead these people could have conversations and movements monitored while left flying the plan has a long civil liberties campaign as who fear further growth in the surveillance state but at passengers a divide. this kid is like a private person i don't know. if you keep. the regulations and i think it's so prevalent already. that this expected you watch t.v. you watch t.v.

you'll be surveilled to be surveilled that is annoying me but nothing to hide so i wouldn't worry me as. the e.u. project is aimed at tackling terrorism by analyzing the way passengers behave in a bid to isolate potential bombers or hijackers when they're already on board at the moment surveillance on planes is mainly limited to a c.c.t.v. camera near the cockpit persons of the most watched people in the world with more c.c.t.v. cameras per capita the. in any other nation there are cameras on motorways in train stations and in at ports and it's here at the university of reading that the new in-flight surveillance system is being developed it won't just include cameras they'll also be microphones and special systems for monitoring unusual behavior behavior the system will eventually be able to pick up include sweating moving around the cabin in an erratic way and repeated visits to the toilet dr james

ferryman insists it will distinguish between potential terrorists a nervous fliers now one way we could do that is to look very carefully at the types of cues that we detect so for example someone may be acting nervously were anxiously sweating and or solution of course it doesn't say anything it could be just. but it could be a terrorist but we only know that when we combine this information with other sources of information that come into play it's a lot to think of it as not big brother watching big brother looking after you not everyone sees it that way campaigners say prissy is one of the litmus tests for democracy and mass surveillance erodes it enormously troops. and completely complex the main. democratic. and. continuing surveillance of mass. communications.

that seem to just be. completely goes against that. democracy apart from the civil rights issues many question the efficacy of an on board system if a terrorist isn't course at the airports they say by the time a plane's thirty thousand feet up is it is already too late nor and it's r t london . and you can join the debate on that burning issue on line authority dot com now let's take a look at what else is lie. on the site right now billionaire belt tightening at stamford bridge find out why all of woman of the movie is giving his chelsea players the blues by keeping bonuses on the bench. and follow the oscar winning director of titanic and avatar james cameron as he visits russia to take the plunge in the world's deepest freshwater lake that and plenty more online

now at r t v dot com. russia has announced and that it's a getting ready to launch iran's first nuclear power plant next week the russian nuclear agency building the pushchair facility will start loading the reactor with eighty two tons of nuclear fuel on august the twenty first the plant's likely to go fully online a few weeks later under strict monitoring by the united nations nuclear watchdog russia will help one of the stations supply fuel and remove the waste for reprocessing the un recently imposed strict sanctions against iran to make it abandon its uranium enrichment program but russia says western fears that the plant can help tehran make a nuclear bomb are groundless. you cannot and you call the use nuclear power plant

in your head but they needed. to give bob bland just the right that you just said. is true that there i am. we call the double double over this is rich we'll spend your money. well this is a limb and say we give our souls are in your responsibility because back in the supply with nuclear fuel sure nuclear bombs fall the lifetime downhills big response you're back to the process of the russian aria. in a few minutes why india's a band class structure is proving hard to cast off as parents of children in schools where food is prepared by people seemed to be from a lower order. the united states says it's sticking to its target to end all combat operations in iraq by the end of august

and to withdraw almost all troops by the end of next year currently there are over sixty thousand u.s. troops in iraq but that's expected to drop to fifty thousand in the next few weeks however iraq's top military officials warn that american troops could be needed there for up to a decade more of the country's security forces are ready to fully take over that are an investigative journalist john pilger told r.t. the media aren't asking enough questions about this proposed withdrawal. this announcement by obama. would be the end of the combat mission next two years nonsense and that's another example of the of the media simply taking at face value something that told by authority in fact there's going to be something like ninety four bases left and sixty thousand troops and the surge so-called that is an increase in the number of mercenaries they call

them contractors so far from getting out there was a great expression by a great irish investigative journalist called claude coburn never believe anything until it's officially denied we should apply that to all statements like that. meanwhile in afghanistan the new coalition commander has admitted president obama's two thousand and eleven target date to start withdrawing troops may not be possible u.s. general david petraeus says forces will be pulled out only if as he put it conditions permit the security situation continues to deteriorate despite the heavy military presence for american troops july was the deadliest month since the campaign began almost nine years ago what's more a united nations report says civilian casualties rose by twenty five percent in the first half of two thousand and ten compared to the same period last year the number of children killed soared by more than half the white house says thirty thousand

more soldiers will be deployed by the end of august. american women who've been jailed for murdering their abusive partners are apparently being denied parole because of political ambitions rather than serving justice campaigners argue the prisoners killed only through fearing for their own lives but as christine explains state governors are keeping them under lock and key to secure future votes. meet norma khun pm when i first came here my son wasn't even a year old and i think that he. kind of sees me and the other women that he's met here at the visiting room he kind of sees like women that have. gone through a lot and ended up still standing on our feet now forty years old she's been behind bars since one thousand nine hundred ninety two convicted of killing her abusive boyfriend during a violent attack one of many in their relationship this is somebody who doesn't belong behind bars somebody who made

a terrible mistake and readily admits that she made a terrible mistake by picking up a gun in the first place in two thousand and nine she was found to be suitable for parole by the california parole board that decision was overturned by california governor arnold schwarzenegger a reality shared by many women here at the california institution for women in los angeles most have long histories of abuse from the person for whom they are convicted of killing a down the road the university of southern california law school has taken up the cause of many of these women in a program called the post conviction justice project professor michael brennan is one of the founders our clients for the most part have committed a single serious crime in their life and that's a crime that they're serving their sentence for they are represented by law students like andy martin i'm representing maris or garcia who was at the age of thirteen trafficked into the united states and sold to a man who for six years physically emotionally and sexually abused her garcia was

forced at gunpoint to help with that man drag and bury the body of the man he had shot then convicted of aiding and abetting so far she has served seventeen years in march she too was deemed suitable for parole the parole process is really the beginning of a long legal battle for the convicted it's not the end of the. story it turns out it's not even the end of this chapter parole for both garcia and could be and was just reversed by california governor arnold schwarzenegger of the four thousand cases that go before the board each year just about seventeen percent are found suitable for parole and of those governor's fortune egger has overturned more than sixty percent previous governors reversed ninety percent so why why this obsession with incarceration because most governors in california

certainly at some point in their career feel that they may have. possibility of running for president they're concerned about granting parole to inmates who might go out and commit a serious crime but many of these women's records show they would not be a danger to society that they were young and scared for their lives or for the lives of their children. yeah. ok those are the number we. heard earlier were meant to be on the one. end of the line for many is here. in prison for life despite their sentence you can't turn parole board of sentences into. what we call l.-wop sentences life without possibility of parole simply because. victims rights groups or others think that if you've been convicted of murder you

should never be paroled a broken system chance is given then taken away and still hope the system will change for campian that she'll be reunited with her son it will work out in the end if if you really truly love somebody like the way that i love him i want him to be the best like even if i have to stay here forever i just want him to be. the best in los angeles christine for zero r.t. . now let's run through some other global headlines during a visit to flood ravaged pakistan the united nations secretary-general ban ki moon has called for an unprecedented response from the world at least fifteen hundred have been killed in the country's worst ever natural disaster survivors face starvation and illness as emergency crews struggled to reach the worst affected areas at least one case of cholera has been confirmed spreading fears of

a wider outbreak pakistan's prime minister said twenty million people are currently homeless. flags were at half staff. scuse me flags were at half mast across china on sunday as the country declared a day of national mourning for the twelve hundred victims of last weekend's landslides around five hundred are still missing after a massive avalanches of mud and rocks all public entertainment was suspended emergency services are working to help those still trapped under the debris and trying to prevent further flooding. attempts to bring equality to india by eliminating the centuries old hindu caste system are proving tough to enforce and though such discrimination has been banned for more than fifty years it's still a force in the indian world and seeing reports. it's a problem that's been simmering but now suddenly davey sees it's fast reaching boiling point she's

a newly appointed cook in this primary school and john import here to prepare the government funded midday meal but despite sony's best intentions some of the students turn their noses up at many creations because she's a doll it or untouchable in traditional hindu society only upper caste cooks. community minos. and some upper class children don't want to trued me by me their parents consider the food polluted by my time what can i do i'm here to make lunch in the school and treat the children here just like my own kids one hundred twenty million children across india receive a meet every working day in the largest school lunch program in the world but when the education ministry decided to send the it cooks to get schools where the majority of pupils are upper caste hindus many found it too hard to swallow.

the media a meal can entice poor parents to send their children to school the kids look forward to it but there are some parents who don't want their children to eat food made by low caste people and have removed their children from here and also threaten us as well i mean the same family a member of the upper caste raj board community they refused to allow their ten year old son but him on and to continue studying in a school which they felt didn't respect their customs and pulled him out immediately. we are upper caste we believe strongly in the cost system we cannot eat food made touched by somebody from a lower caste that's why we moved our child from this government school and picked him into party activists say this kind of reaction demonstrates the difficulty in a radical system discrimination on the basis. of cost is illegal in india but the practice is still entrenched in rural areas where the kind of work you do and who

you can eat with is largely divided along lines are held at home much loved past people are treated like at the upper castes or just about they tell us stay on one side watch the utensils that anything to humiliate us they want to surround mainland and never rise up. the government says legal action will be taken against villagers who oppose books in schools the earlier this is done the better after all this attempt to get children of all castes to eat together irrespective of who's made the food is a small but important step in the country's journey to bridge social divisions got unseeing r.t. but back. in just a few minutes we'll look at how china's rapid growth is a source of both success and a suspicion that's coming up here on our team live from moscow.