which brightened if you move from phones to pressure. for instance on t.v. don't comb. marlon for peace kyrgyzstan is heading to the polls in a bid to bring stability to the state ravaged by a repeat of violent unrest. mourners are gathering in russia's city of smolensk to remember six months after a plane crash claimed the lives of poland's president many of its top brass. join me alice it was in the old it's true because we travel to those sites all the tropics. and in our review of the week nine years of war with casualties in afghanistan ever on the rise critics say the campaign is rapidly spinning out of american control. plus three new cars minutes are in orbit on the international

space station we follow the steps of their journey beyond earth's gravity. it is nine am in the russian capital you're watching our t.v. after six months of political turbulence and violence the people of kyrgyzstan are casting their ballots for parliament that will rule the country the vote will take power away from president and give it to m.p.'s in what will be the first such case in central asia it's also hope to stabilize a region where hundreds of. people died in brutal clashes in recent months and earlier i spoke to our correspondents who were going off in the rest of the southern city of osh and you know the car in the capital bishkek. this is a landmark election for the country and regardless of how many people show up at their lection it will still be valid even once it's over kurdistan will become the

first central asian country to become a parliamentary state where a prime minister has more power than the president and it's accountable to the parliament tradition essentially asian states are ruled by all three tarion leaders on in april when former president by key was overthrown the country was wracked with political violence that took lives of dozens of people and left many more injured people were unhappy with the former president's policies and many lives and after the president was overthrown temporary government held a referendum during which it was decided to turn the country into a parliamentary state there are still rumors however that more political rights will follow this election is special in the country stars and regions if you go or so what is the atmosphere like an arch which was rocked by violence the summer or so where we are now is just on the second largest city meaning people call it the second capital and this is a mall many places in need of the girl you the most in the country because first of

all it's populated both wise curious and was very compassionate and last june there were mass ethnic clashes in the city which resulted in the deaths of hundreds of people and that's according to the most modest figures thousands of others were injured and thousands more had to flee their homes the city still recovering from very violent and there were fears apparently this violence could return with the start of the voting in fact many people even feared going to the polling stations there have been reports of threats sent out to the local population where the mass reports of wires and posters distributed in other. so i'm going to use cities calling for violence but it nevertheless polling stations did open at eight am and the locals are coming in and policing their votes to tell him to go back to you now tell us how people in the capital feel about this well do they believe in change at all well we've spoken to quite a number of locals and people do have quite tight hopes for this election we also

visited several polling stations and people started showing up early in the morning a lot of people have showed up a record number of twenty nine political parties is registered for this election however many of them have more or less similar political agenda there are still those who remain skeptical about this election we have heard rumors that some of the leaders of the political parties may get attacked however the country's temporary government says that its security forces are completely ready to resist any at any political rallies that may take place during this election i'll go back to. the region remains on stable we're hearing so what is being done to provide security and concerns of possible violence well security is trying to across the whole country but especially here in the south police officers are present at each one of the eighty two polling stations in the course and are also were trolling the streets accompanied by volunteers i know that around fifteen hundred volunteers

have been recruited for the job previously around five hundred swat like commandos have been flown in to or from the capital bishkek and also the authorities have been holding previously various drools to be on guard in case of emergency so we will be monitoring the situation as the events unfold the polling stations are going to close at around eight pm local time or expecting to hear the first preliminary results around midnight and of course we will report on events here in austin as the day goes on. how correspondents in. can often tell you know we go i talked to earlier in the program now ceremonies are to take place in memory of a plane crash in russia the killed president of poland many of its high ranking officials it's been six months since the tragedy took the lives of ninety six people near the city of somalia and families of the dead are planning a pilgrimage to the site that was hibbard is a small and screeching. moral service is all being held at the request of the

families all of the victims and to separate ceremonies ology to take place the will to remember the tragic plane crash on the tenth of april twenty eighth when the whole ninety six film with the tupelo one the only pool. as they were making their way to be a seventieth commemorations at the scene amounts of when the twenty tea towels and prison of rules were killed at the hands of the soviets secret police it was a tragedy on the unprecedented scale of this crisis within just the one day since president that speech since he his wife maria and touch me all of its military top brawls in russia it was very quick to alter its sympathy for the polish delegation will begin by going to the place where de vry from the plane is being held they'll then move on to the size of the actual crash where plant has been erected and alter the move on to the memorial complex on nights of the massacre itself however one

person that will not be attending at today's events is the brother of that the kitchen scanned the leader of putin's main opposition party that's yet his love kaczynski he's been a very quick to criticize the handling of both the russian government and the polish government into the investigation of this crunch immediately in the almost a month of this tragedy president dead of appointed commission to head up a joint commission russian investigation into the cool says of the crash namely the polish few months they studied the flight recorders the flight old as well as all the manner of materials available to the what they've managed to confirm is that out as the plane came in some. had some land. balled russian traffic controllers did twice warn the crew members and not to land it's also been confirmed that the plane was in good working order they've also ruled out the possibility of a terrorist attack or some sort of explosion or fire taking place all know of.

boards the polish military has been safely that conducted the raid this separate investigation i want spin confirmed from both sides of the normal crew members were in the cockpit at the time of coming into the hands of the question as to whether or not these pilots were was under pressure to land has not yet been confirmed but a number of causes for the crash have been put forward including the way in which the plane was prepared with the flight the willingness of the crew members to refuse orders given to them and also the ways in which the crews were prepared for the flights colins now says that is very pleased with the way the investigation's been carried out and i have been very pleased with the transparency all foods from what the rush to the investigation is and that joint interstate aviation the committee has now finished its investigation and within a matter of days will one day a detailed report to polish aviation experts and they promise to make them public

and in three days polish oncologist will conduct an investigation of the site with him for any remaining plane day or victim day three. now this week the u.s. led campaign in afghanistan reached the grim milestone of nine years and there were even more losses of civilian and coalition troops it's a critical time for the u.s. halford as it struggles to turn around the fight against the taliban ahead of next year's expected withdrawal of international forces afghan officials continue to back the coalition's efforts but even they admit that after all this time there is still no tangible result and as archie's policy reports the online antics of american soldiers are not helping matters. a false goes up in smoke and with a justified or not tempers flying in the afghan capital the culprits soldiers who can be heard saying fantastic before posting. on the internet he ran here if by

burning the house accidentally a copy of the koran is housed that can be easily used as a tactic or as a means of acting more. religious history with them to go and joined the taliban and al qaeda and it seems to be working more and more islamic extremist websites are posting direct links to videos put up on the web by the soldiers themselves in blogs and social networking sites it's the enemy who is now helping the taliban fight its cause they can easily be copied by the taliban. make. the us forces fail the behavior clips. in some cases the us soldiers videos are prankish and childish other times they're

downright criminal or extremely provocative in this clip u.s. soldiers burn the bodies of dead muslims facing mecca today in afghanistan the internet is becoming more and more popular but look around it's no surprise that in a place like this there's still only a few people who have access to us so you'd sometimes home connection is so unreliable that every afternoon he's here watching videos that make him angry one of the only cause we see hundreds of videos about afghanistan nato and the americans are talking about human rights you can see the proof online it's along the. internet cafes all the buzz in downtown kabul hundred have been has managed the small and overcrowded cafe for the past two years and although the connection is slow it's fast enough to keep people logged on. it's

easy for people to watch these videos put out by the american soldiers because the most popular videos are on the first page of you tube also when one guy sees a video he tells his friend. less than a decade ago when the taliban was in power home computers were banned there were only three places in kabul that had internet but now the global jihadists understand that sometimes an email might just be myself then the sword. wants a new email and so. by mobile phone and. make money but a good loops the word it seems always has a way of getting out of good people not to see this kind of thing in the internet because everything you see this consumer is the life but the taliban picking up on the form of communication it once banned it now forced on coalition troops to censor themselves point of the r.t.

kabul. and critics say what the us started in response to the nine eleven attacks has turn out to be a quagmire like the vietnam war and brian bakker and i work alicia national coordinator believes it was draw of coalition troops from afghanistan will not lead to increased violence. the american government in its propaganda arm just as they did during vietnam tried to paint a picture that there would be a terrible bloodbath if the occupation forces left but if the occupation forces leave that means drone bombing attacks of afghan and pakistan villages will stop it will mean that the level of violence instead of ask relating every month with more and more thousands and tens of thousands of foreign troops coming in troops who obviously don't understand the country don't speak the language don't understand the culture and are largely demonizing the people and have all sorts of racist caricatures of those forces when they leave the bloodshed will diminish that doesn't mean that we know what will happen in afghanistan but the american presence

has escalated the violence the cycle of violence throughout the country and throughout the region. which in one thousand live from moscow still coming up later this hour is our t.v. america's enemy us overseas broadcasting seeks to pump its influence weeks or whether the country's going on and information for say. an alleged russian gun runner has appealed against a thai court's decision to extradite him to the u.s. the lawyer for victor borge says there is no evidence against him and insists the judge hears statements from witnesses but with no indication of whether the court will accept the appeal books relatives fear for his future. it's quite possible the extradite him and just look him up in some area and force him to give would have a testimony of the u.s. once he gave i think he'll go as far as it takes to get it and i'm sure everyone understands they're playing to fleece to do these days.

on tuesday the thai criminal court cleared the way for blix possible extradition after dismissing charges of money laundering and fraud citing insufficient evidence those claims have delayed his handover following an august ruling confirming he was to be sent to the us the so-called merchant of death to nice accusations of terrorism and supplying arms to colombian rebels he was arrested in an american land sting operation in march two thousand and eight in bangkok a former u.n. arms trafficking expert says even though it's extradited a u.s. court might not allow all the evidence to be examined. i have concerns about what's the big two will be going back to a very strong girl knew the person who in recent times who's been convicted on a sting operation involving the fox the colombian rebels is a man called monster all counsel who was an arms dealer who strangely also was of assistance to the americans on many occasions and when his lawyer sought to bring

back into the courts he wasn't allowed to do so or not presidents i think it's of monthly that he's depends team will be able to bring into evidence the fact that the house on occasion being to systems first of the time to go unto us and nato countries in providing acra i think it's unlikely that people who want deliberately to harm anyone but i think calm is sometimes done as part of the process but what people may see is getting good get you move through thought of somebody she my concern always has been not the sort of is necessarily innocent of all charges it but the sting operation is some he didn't do quite clearly just think operation and he's not the merchant of death which the media put sorry about as well i would agree he's a witness of some of the. russian president dmitry medvedev has slammed the belorussian leader for calling moscow it's anime in his video blog with a bit of said president look statements made during his reelection campaign were

not only undiplomatic by a downright indecent follows the bill of russian leaders accusations that russian politicians are trying to tarnish his image and sponsor the opposition who did have suggested the focus was on domestic problems such as the disappearances of many fellow russian citizens russia's president stressed the current tension must not affect the country's peoples and their partnership. the u.s. might claim to be a pioneer of freedom of speech however it seems there are tolerance and when it comes to news from iran venezuela china or russia are he's going to check out reports on whether america's international broadcaster is going on an information crusade it's a common belief on capitol hill that the best way to raise money from congress is to scare them walter isaacson the head of a government agency that manages u.s. international broadcasting apparently wants a lot of money the cars to fight america's enemies in the media which he identifies as he ran venezuela russia and china we care allow ourselves to be communicated

by our enemy. there's that freedom house report that reveals that today's autocratic leaders are investing billions of dollars in media resources to influence the global opinion you've got russia today iran's press t.v. venezuela's tell us and of course china is a launching international broadcasting twenty four hour news channels correspondents around the world spence portably set aside six to ten billion dollars we got to go to capitol hill with that number to expand their overseas media operations to me it sounded like a declaration of information war but later mr isaacson backtracked i don't take a russia or artsy as an enemy and certainly did not mean to imply that they're an enemy so that's just not right maybe mr isaacson really did not mean to offend russia or china it's all a pitch for more money from congress which he's trying to kind of appeal to by

saying that other countries are spending more on international communications gear is really the buzz word that's used to try to generate money for the defense department a cia intelligence agencies and now for international broadcasting but getting the u.s. message across this costly there goes that mr walter isaacson is heading is called broadcasting board of governors it includes radio stations voice of america one of them and they're fairly unpopular middle eastern t.v. channel and all this the board spends more than seven hundred fifty million dollars and it's way more than the budget of our t.v. iran's press t.v. and as well as their list or combined so maybe money does not really make out for global media clout mr isaacson says that it's truthfulness that will make the difference and in the and the truth is on our side and it's that statement that raised an alert with some freedom of speech advocates somebody who says that truth

is always on the united states side is a propagandist and that. journalist and i think that's bad it sets a bad example for other countries when that when they say that because obviously other countries have their perspectives many times u.s. media is slanted toward the united states even the private media and the credibility of the broadcasting board of governors was under even more scrutiny when reports came out about the white house influence on the b.b.c. reporting after iranian presidential election and some experts say american broadcasters that once used to be a powerful voice in the international media are now facing a crisis the problem that they are facing is that the messages they have. how the world is supposed to work is not resonating it's not getting traction it seems washington is still getting used to the increasing volume for media voices

giving a fresh perspective on world issues kind of chicken or t. washington d.c. . aarti dot com has a lot more in store for you here's some of what you'll find online right now exploring the markets frozen expands on a challenge the floating eyes russia's scientists meet in the middle of the ocean to share breakthroughs on your country's claims to hold the treasury. and meet lobby a superhero with us now the big man has a valid typically have every piece of rubbish that's why it is the country's forests find out more at our t.v. dot com. a simulation of blowing up school children in front of their classmates may seem an unusual way of trying to convince people to reduce pollution but that's exactly what british campaigners did and have a global day called tan tan just because the producer for weddings and a funeral made a short film to suburban atlanta reducing their carbon emissions by ten percent by

its body images lead to complaints that it was gory and needlessly violent it was cool from cinemas just hours after release the film's director said it was always risky trying to be funny on a serious subject however environmentalist peers corben believes it's not the way to promote ecological friendless. suppose these images were directed against any ethnic or religious minority like black people or jews then there would be absolute international ups will in fact in this month wouldn't have even thought of making the film but somehow he thinks he can get away with it by attacking the children of people who happen to disbelieve even their four children saw arms and want evidence by sots i mean it is utterly unacceptable the message is a lawyer they can only get it across by this sort of nonsense the fact is there's photo choice. to haunt them so they got no difference other than this emotional

blackmail styria lawyers. malevolent and dangerous people and they have to be stopped. and now to some international news in brief the evacuation of thirty three miners trapped underground chile for more than two months is due to begin on wednesday engineers have drilled through to the chamber where the miners are sheltering sparking celebrations across the country the top part of the shaft needs a steel casing which would take about a day and a half for example engineers now also must test whether the skate path a safe to prevent the risk of collapse. the son of north korea's leader kim jong il has made a rare public appearance alongside his son kim yong known it happened during a military operates on a break in the sixty fifth anniversary of the country's ruling party recently appointed to jan are all the younger kim is expected to succeed his father as head of the nation if here it is being viewed as a further sign of official confirmation of the succession. over two hundred

passengers have been evacuated after a ferry caught fire in the baltic sea fire was caused by a blast on the upper deck injuring twenty people the ship was near the german island of fairmont three months on its way to lithuania firefighting ships have been spraying the stricken ferry with water to keep it from breaking up and from spilling the one hundred seventy tons of fuel on board. at today journey of the upgraded so you spacecraft is and it successfully at the international space station two russian cosmonauts and a nasa astronaut will spend the next six months on board the ice as the new comers joined another three space men who are presently manning the station since they arrived in june and there will be a remarkable reunion in february nasa scott kelly will be joined at the space station by his identical twin brother mark and other astronaut who will fly a shuttle mission and watch the brothers say goodbye at the baikonur cosmodrome. in space within

a few months kelly and his brother mark both astronauts will be in orbit together. there's a huge group. i thought we would be in this. you know unique in a privileged position to be able to do this the build up to scott's launch of russia's baikonur cosmodrome on friday was filled with technical questions but there was a human moments to go there yes there was smiles. and goodbye to his when his brother mark joins him on the i assess in february it will be the first time they've worked together for a very long time we have occasionally flown together in the navy as a test pilot but before that i think we always work at a dairy queen or a twelve years old bought the for us for the last year of the last job we really had that we worked together and then the time came mark said goodbye scott and to the rocket those two russian crewmates everyone went to it's only twenty minutes to go until the launch one brothers on the ground the others preparing for glass so

that they both know first moment what they're counting down. not what his brother fly away into space the trip he'd made three times himself. it's you know it's a credible to watch any rocket launch and all my brothers are board makes it even more exciting i've seen oh my launch three times now and it's pretty incredible thing to see when they both meet again on the international space station in a few months time it will become a family space station tuesday but just like his brother mark doesn't want to be too sentimental it's going to be a busy busy fly but you know to get a chance to do that with my brother is a great opportunity scott and mark on celebrity twin oxygen or so yet but it'll be a uniquely human moment when the hatch door the siblings meet in space somebody ati. had just a few minutes we focus on the human cost of the war in iraq in our special report and i'll be back with our top stories in

a moment. forty two thousand americans die each year for accidents for me a thousand. seven hundred thousand people. and thirty two thousand will kill themselves cancer in all its forms kills five hundred sixty thousand of us here part disease is even more devastating.