campaigning is over in the head of sunday's volatile parliamentary vote security services are on high alert with the shadow of violence looming over the central asian republican. candidates and now in the running for the. most get amongst the names of the prize. also this hour kickbacks racketeering corruption and intimidation that's the treatment some georgians claim they're getting from the government.

live from a studio in central moscow this is twenty four hours a day security is being stepped up and campaigning is now for a bit. ahead of sunday's elections the vote will create central asia first parliamentary democracy and it's all teas you go reports why the authorities believe taking power away from the president is necessary. this is truly a crucial vote because it's meant to and instability and political chaos in the country for the past half a year or so. has been plagued by violence and the seldom course of the country where we are now are among the most affected areas and there are fears that this violence could flare up once again during the election the former soviet republic has been struggling to achieve normality since former president. was overthrown from power in deadly street protests across the entire country especially in the capital bishkek violent riots left dozens of people dead and put the entire country

in a state of chaos people were protesting policies which led to people living in poverty and failed to increase the quality of life in kyrgyzstan for years the interim government held. them which voted to build a parliamentary republic which is a milestone not only for kyrgyzstan but for the entire central asian region since this election will be held successfully it will change the way. it's planned that the president's powers will be curbed well the prime minister will have more power than the formal head of state this is significant for central asia since traditionally countries in this region are ruled by leaders and this way. from such a political model for the first time in central asia twenty nine political parties are taking part in this election which is an all time record for kyrgyzstan however

there are genders or relatively similar to one another there is skepticism on the ordinary people here in kyrgyzstan who say that this election and improve their lives because simply not ready for such a transition and probably won't be as effective apart from political unrest or just and there's also been suffering from ethnic violence in june. there were deadly ethnic clashes here in the city of where we are now which is populated both by. and nationals and as a result hundreds of people were killed thousands were injured and thousands more had to flee their homes and at the moment peace is really fragile here in the south of the country and in fact at the moment many people fear even going to the polling stations on sunday there have already been reports of threats sent out to the local population of mess for many people at the moment the main priority is to rebuild their homes and businesses after june as well it's rather then to vote for any

politician but despite this the authorities are still calling for people to go to the polling stations to take part in this election promising that it will provide the long awaited stability of saudis are on high alert across the entire country both police and volunteers are monitoring the streets of the city's international observers have already arrived to the region and authorities say that everything is ready for the vote on sunday. reporting that the battle to become the new mayor of moscow is down to the final full united russia party has handed a list of contenders to president who now have to decide who leads the russian capital in the future so has the details. the show the. full names that have been submitted by the united russia party president. on that list includes the deputy prime minister. now he's considered a strong front of full of the position by many commentators so no surprise that

he's being included in the list he's also considered a very close ally of prime minister putin having worked with him extensively during his presidency and now in his both as prime minister so he's certainly a very strong hand but also on the list we have russia's transport and communications minister igor levitin and the governor of michigan of course of valery have now he actually spent ten as the full of a deputy up until two thousand and five and to ninety ninety six when i was running for that position and. was running for the position of vice and was we did an assassination attempt against him after an explosion there his home which he survived the suddenly interesting bit of background will not come to the only female of the group with mila. and now she is the current at the moment and her poll actually includes

a lot of the social issues such as unemployment and health care and she is considered one of the most experienced candidate having worked in the government since ninety ninety four and also in her position at the moment perhaps one of the best place to deal with some of the issues the president the fate of his already highlighted as will be some of the main challenges facing whoever will become the new. i think all four candidates are perfectly capable of becoming mayor of moscow the city's leader and he be responsible for quality of life being social issues carrying on the policies in effect and to dealing with future challenges the capital demands a series of new solutions which we will discuss with the new mayor. one of the main challenged. the reforms now muscovites going to be taping at the some of the social programs initiated. this pope will be making things such as we travel on the most pension is

a benefit to teachers but they're stressing that many issues that they need will still be attempting to solve issues such as policemen and of course the constant headache muscovites which is the traffic problems. that will be some of the issues facing now another major key role that. will be to gain the public's trust especially head of the parliamentary elections that will be happening at the end of two thousand and eleven knows this lack of trust of the cited as one of the main reasons the full the dismissal the need to have around a good to make an impact on that must buy up all the controversy surrounding this because he was always very good at bringing out a united russia from the muscovite the party going to be hoping that whoever select it will have the same sources sway with the public ahead of the elections next year . that's reporting there from central moscow well still to come this fall to the

race for the. russians so they have evidence to support the country's territorial claims in the rich region. first the georgian president has proposed a new constitution that's supposed to put the country on a course towards becoming a european style democracy one of the many businessmen say version of people's rule is that olds with their experience. you claim corruption and kickbacks of the real forces in the country. the so-called patchwork beth's and central police see is the perfect place to relax and have your portal taken on the way out the historical building is now owned by a private company but a few years ago it was taken from its previous owner by the government getting all his and he should really still fears for his life he says in two thousand and seven he was approached by government agents who claimed he used illegal schemes to

purchase the baths allegedly through the use of threats the officials forced the man to give up his business going to court says get a goal was not an option you could. they said that they know where my son's school is and they could say tomorrow and bust him for drug possession but he said that they will make me sell everything and still it won't be enough to pay the market you're going to be begging for mercy i couldn't have done anything underneath my business to this day. immediately after seizing the property of the government solved it off since then google has been trying hard to get his business back. i wrote six complaints asking them why they made me give out my business but the authorities are silent so we have not received a single response here why is it going to finance it. a human rights activist says this case is not unique according to the salient have

been numerous cases recently where the georgian government has illegally seized buildings wound and other property from private individuals large and small companies. when your thirty's openly use police in the prosecutor's office to take away people's property there's no other way to coolant tera it's a kind of official racketeering aggressive and legal and purely criminal in its nature we can say directly you can make a our second team is responsible for terrorizing the business sector. some georgian entrepreneur explain the greed and political ambitions of the country's leaders these businessmen say that in order to work safely and believe see you have to make generous donations to the ruling party will argue so powerful entrepreneurs in georgia make voluntary donations by paying off the government june the elections all of them pay no less than fifty five thousand u.s.

dollars these are official sums we can only guess how much they have to pay on official. golf feels betrayed by the government he's still hoping to point justice for this man and many others who have seen for themselves so often president saakashvili his words differ from his deeds change can't come soon enough well georgian officials claim that they have created a corruption free me to do also lost their businesses due to pressure from the state it's nothing but spin and even though only if you want to speak out it looks like the movement against such a continuing in tbilisi is getting stronger does. well plenty more have you here this hour on r.t. including pig to the rescue. but he's not on a mission to save people he's a latvian superhero squealing litterbugs and making sure the country's forests stay clean. but first russia norway denmark the u.s.

and canada all the asians locked into a race to claim the vast untapped resources thought to sit beneath the arctic region and russian research is a working as hard as anyone in the far north to support their nation's claim well. over went to meet them. there is a perception that it's hard to find a living soul in the arctic but not today this is how members of russia's north pole expedition with their colleagues on board the academics break up the fir drip is the flagship of the northern fleet of beer chill floating lab or a tree around a hundred scientists have spent seventy days in the arctic gathering evidence to support the claim that the man also bridge is part of russia's continental shelf the head of the expedition looks more than pleased with the results almost year but due to d.v.d. today we have fully confirmed the geological outline are a leaf at the bottom of the loss of ridge we have recovered quality material that

corresponds to international standards. russia's biggest evidence gathering weapon is a multi beam eco sound known as spec it's hard to see and impossible to touch but it's talking to scientists from the bottom of the coldest ocean in the world. they can go as deep as twelve kilometers so it practically covers the whole spectrum of the ocean's depth there are no depths if you cannot measure. it brings it to our competitors are using the similar equipment the american icebreaker healy for example works with the same sound it is convenient to analyze and compare collected by the same standards. rushes in a hurry to collect evidence for its implication to the un sheffield for twenty thirteen the same year another applicant canada comes up with the clays the russian president's envoy to both poles says he's people are ready to work around the clock

to fulfill the mission. pretty dismissed some say the russians doing in the arctic on apollo night we're not going to ask anybody water when we should do that the arctic belongs to russia they're working on it. hornswoggled international treaties and we will work day and night if necessary. another deepwater equal sound will do its part of the job within the north pole expedition it will be installed on a movie. and gas information on the models a breach nonstop for the next year the arctic maybe of ostend embassy in popular image a nation but it is that stimulated that it contains a quarter of the world's untapped falso fuels flotsam gold diamonds and other precious metals around sixty percent of total octave gas lies in the russian exclusive economic zone so even without the models of reach being divided it seems

that russia has already won becoming grace it's in the pressure of our team from the island of visa in the arctic. what are some other international news this world of dates the hunger and pillage of college has been evacuated due to the threat of a second deluge of toxic sludge it's feared the weakened wall of a nearby reservoir may collapse hungry declared a state of emergency after thousands of tons of waste flooded several villages this week killing seven however despite the sludge reaching the river danube officials say there is little sign it has been significantly polluted. pakistan says it will reopen a key border crossing used to transport supplies to nato troops in afghanistan it was closed to protest at nato helicopters killing two pakistani soldiers and their strike the ten day blockade caused tension with washington and left stranded trucks ponderable two attacks in the latest incident suspected taliban militants armed with rocket set fire to around thirty tankers carrying fuel. thirty three

chilean miners trapped underground since august to being reached by the drill digging a rescue tunnel now a specially designed capsule will be tested before it starts to bring the men up to the surface one by one chile's mining minister says it could take anything from three to ten days to begin the rescue process. more than two hundred passengers have been rescued from a burning lithuanian ferry off the coast of germany several people were injured some of them taken to hospital by helicopter the fire was caused by an explosion on the upper deck officials say tragedy was prevented by the fact there were several other vessels nearby to help the burning craft. also in a world update this hour north korean t.v. is broadcast rare footage of the country's leader kim jong il with his son kim jung un widely rumored that the youngest kid who's in his twenty's is being groomed to take over as the country's leader he made his official political debut a week ago when he was given the rank of general and appointed one of north korea's

top military commanders. one of his mission to protect latvian forests from those who act like swine's is identity unknown his duty find the little bugs and exact revenge artie's tom barton went to meet a twenty first century superhero who's dressed as a pig. a legend on the trot this is the pig man snuffling for some rather unpleasant truffles he's the last the in state forest sunset to one of its greatest problems rubbish well just look at this mess scoundrels how could they little like this this peson outed snuffling super swine's spends his days charging around latvia trying to clean up the woods and make the culprits squeal for mercy there's even a legend to accompany him if you will with her in the forest you will turn into a pig and he's not just how mean it up this old bore isn't all. the border

about once a forest warden called us and said he'd found the remains of a car by the serial number we managed to find the owner and find him two hundred black they're still out there off and it wasn't long before we found some potential literacy of our own there. but they were keen to show they were on pigments side it's a no for problem. i love it all the way it's done this man and your campaign that's it i can't see any more. when he started his work six years ago latvia's forests had become a pig sty with fly tipping and littering rife since then pig man who like all superheroes refuses to reveal his true identity to save their bacon he works with police educate school children lobbies parliament and keeps on the hoof rooting out literature and raising public awareness in fact he's become quite a lot being

a celebrity. here where the world has for superheroes superman batman spider-man and the like the uncertain and people man you can see how this forest is terribly littered who else but me and. clean it out so i will do this i will clear up a lot for you in forests i promise. meaning that if you are planning to litter you might reply more than you sound big man could appear anywhere at any time so if i behave like a swine and do this. i'm soon going to have to clean up my act tom watson artie latvia. can you think of any more pig puns. by the way you can get the latest on everything we're covering a moment on screen at our website that's t.v. dot com online all the time here's a quick look at what's there for you at the moment.

blasted off into space on its way to the international space station to find out about its mission it's the story on our website. also on our side to not new to crack. a russian a prima ballerina risk a photo shoot proved to be too much for. more than a third of exported afghan drugs equivalent to five billion heroin doses end up in russia every year well that's according to the head of russia's agency for it to evolve he spoke to r.t. about the war on drugs and under current circumstances it can't be won that

interview is coming your way in just a moment stay with us here on r.t. . today we're talking to the head of a service i think that mr pena thank you very much for joining us today first. on afghanistan is the number one producer all opiates in the world when we talk about the transfer of the drugs to russia what kind of amounts of drugs are we

talking about. afghanistan produced about seven thousand tons of opium last year which is equivalent to seven hundred tons of heroin we believe that about thirty six of these tons end up in russia that's a lot about five billion doses and it's about thirty five percent of all drugs exported from afghanistan because in fact afghanistan exports less than half of the drugs it produces as drug addicts throughout the world are unable to consume everything that comes out of afghanistan so afghanistan stores a huge amount of drugs russia and other countries estimate it's about thirteen to fifteen thousand tons of opium so even if drug production stops in afghanistan the country will still be able to supply the international market with heroin for another twenty or even thirty years. what about the main mode of transportation of the drugs could you talk about the roads or the countries to which the drug trade flows into russia. out of i.c.u.

there is the northern route. which is sometimes called the northern silk route after the seventeenth century trade route the reason the silk route is popular is because after the collapse of the soviet union new nations are merged and while their borders exist on paper in reality they're not even probably guarded so essentially there are no effective borders between afghanistan and russia with such poor as a borders it's very easy for traffickers to transport drugs the biggest part of drugs flows through chad he can stand and kazakstan and onward to russia another part goes through iran across the caspian sea and the caucasus ridge and ends up in the north caucasus or deeper in russia's territory by the way this provides a source of financing for terrorists and extremists in russia's caucasus because. of the americans that have got us and say that they cannot eradicate most of the puppy fields because a lot of danny's depend on their livelihood on these fields by producing the

opiates what can be done about this is their solution to the problem. when the u.s. says you cannot deprive farmers of their livelihood it actually sends a message to the afghan leadership as well saying they shouldn't do it because first this will destroy people's livelihood and second you push farmers into the hands of the taliban i think this is merely an excuse furthermore since u.s. special representative for central asia richard holbrooke first suggested this idea that instead of eradicating drug crops the u.s. should target drug labs and traffickers which was almost a year ago the number of labs producing drugs for russia has tripled a year ago we knew about one hundred seventy labs in afghanistan today we know of more than four hundred laps of producing drugs for russia does this not seem to be a paradox that when afghanistan was under the control of the taliban the production was significantly lower than it is now and it has risen dramatically after the u.s.

invasion nine years ago what what is the problem. how is this fitting into the picture and the statements that nato is trying to fight the drug trade in afghanistan in your opinion there was i thought it was. you're right i had a meeting with my pakistani colleagues here in islamabad and they too were amazed at this phenomenon there's only one way to explain it when the taliban sought official recognition for its kabul regime and they took on president of measures to eradicate opt in poppy crops they consistently took serious steps in one nine hundred ninety eight one thousand nine hundred nine and two thousand when they introduced capital punishment for poppy cultivation as a result they succeeded in eradicating drug crop on ninety percent of afghanistan's territory all the provinces they controlled the only place they couldn't do it was a northern afghanistan which was controlled by the so-called northern alliance but then operation enduring freedom began and the situation changed drastically only

a competent government that has the support of the people can really control the country and take serious steps to destroy drug production how can we talk about the military solution to the problem when most of the poppy fields in afghanistan are located near in areas of the most intense fighting or where foreign military personnel are stationed where where's this listen to that. the nine years of the military operation in afghanistan have demonstrated that the more fighting there is in the country the smaller the chances are of destroying drug production they're growing alternative crops is a risky proposition the risks are immense you can lose your crop at any stage opium on the other hand does not require any effort poppy grows all by itself and buyers come straight to the field and purchase the crop with so it's obvious that you can destroy drug production this way the russian federation has developed a plan which is called rainbow two because it consists of seven points we presented this plan to the european commission the european parliament nato our partners in

the us in of ghana. and here in pakistan the plan calls for a comprehensive approach first of all this huge problem should be officially recognized as a threat to international peace and security in other words this is a separate problem that kills more than one hundred thousand people each year hundreds of millions of people suffer from this problem which everyone has been talking about for almost a decade second as i just said we need to eradicate opium poppy and the international security assistance force which is in afghanistan today under the un mandate and therefore has assumed responsibility for the future of afghanistan should play very active role in our medicating the crockery then of course afghanistan needs economic aid we need to rebuild its infrastructure by the way the legal afghan economy today operates mostly thanks for the one hundred forty two industrial facilities that the soviet union built there as far as i'm aware no.