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much ado about something as france is paralyzed retirement age increase and angry protests are expected in the u.k. which has just announced its biggest social spending cuts since world war two experts say the massive public outrage is an overreaction. believed to be behind the attack on the chechen parliament. to demonstrate his strength to al qaeda. and human trafficking laws in india needs of thousands of shattered lives as british girls come to the big city promises of a better life and. around the clock around the world this is r.t. in moscow good to have you with us in france public transport has paralyzed flights

canceled and three million people protesting the mounting the government backs down from retirement age reforms people took to the streets hurling stones and bottles burning cars and breaking windows in stores the protests erupted into violence after president nicolas sarkozy felt his conservative party would press ahead with raising the retirement age from sixty to sixty two still lower than in most european countries police used force him to gas to push back the protesters. but his countrymen server explains what caused the have. these people who have been here for hours against what they believe will be a crippling reform to the country's politics domestic policy specifically of course and much protest said sarkozy plan to prolong the pension reform and actually prolonging the age when people retire by two and a half years saying of course that this shared see the country the boost it needs to overcome the effects of the globe. a financial crisis and it helped the european

and french economy out of its stagnant period but the people here certainly don't believe in any of it they say that it is against their constitutional rights that they demand their special reform be shelved and they're prepared to stand outside the senate and in many other cities throughout the country to see that their will is done of course on the one hand it is a constitutional right of the people to protest against something that they disagree with and for something that they believe it but in many situations and specifically in france when something is done too much it becomes a farce rather than a reality and a standstill the protesters on one side and the police standing just a few meters away is symbolic to the entire economy of the country when everything is that can still pending some sort of a decision after the french government has been in situations like this previously gummi david ben was forced to give in and abandon his student you know his youth

reform where allowing people to hire more young people but with less social benefits of course nicolas sarkozy is already saying that he will not back down and the pension reform will continue and will take place the people of course saying that they will continue to stand on the streets for as long as necessary and we will see the their will is done and their voices are heard according to the local trade unions over three million people took to the cities above process to protest the decision of the lesson goes even to implement this pension reform according to the police it's closer to a million but one thing is certain the fact that these projects are having on the country's economy are tandoori the country is losing so much money and the french government it seems is losing patience while france is very badly affected by the global financial crisis something like this is definitely not helping the statistics of course show that over. sixty percent of the country's people do

believe that taking their voice to the streets and taking their opinions to the streets is something that will actually help them with only forty three percent of the people saying that they disagree with the decision to literally cripple the country's economy and infrastructure by putting the people out into the streets however nobody seems to be willing to leave and simply stand continue until their voices are gone until their horse with anger whether of course this will change anything all that so uncertain nicolas sarkozy certainly seems to be very keen on standing by sticking to his guns and pushing the pension reform forward many is so many of course believing that it will give the country the necessary economic boost that it desperately needs in this time of crisis but according to the people on the streets this is not something that they're prepared to tolerate and pull their political professor from the universe says that francis demonstrations all on

reasonable. the problem was the retirement ages are being raised actually a number of years ago because of the observed democratic demographic trends and so there are actually several attempts before to streamline the system to. increase the number of years that people have to work in which is still in france lower than the average in other countries as well but all of these measures have been insufficient and so it's come to this measure of raising the retirement age which is only a raise of two years and it's still it would still be one of the younger stages to retire in europe so it's true that the public got to be aware of the of the issue but it's true that also that they have been used to a generous benefit regime and it's very difficult for them to we're actually except to let go of it of course it depends on your generation as well you have different

positions from younger active workers who are currently paying into the system paying in for the current retirees and of course they know that within a few years the system if it's not reformed is going to go bust so they have an interest in the reform as well it's probably people who are nearing very closely to retirement to find it more difficult to realize that they have to maintain themselves professionally for two more years and the unemployment rate for over fifty five years is a rather high in france in the same way that it's rather high also for youngsters between fifteen and twenty four so that actually creates a lot of resentment and anger and that's one of the reasons why we see these protests and there is another european country bracing itself for even more austerity u.k. government has announced its largest cuts in public spending since world war two the new plans will have the budget slashed what eighty three billion pounds. and

a couple around half a million public sector jobs the state pension age will be raised to sixty six by the year twenty twenty that's four years earlier than planned one of the hardest hit will be welfare benefits which will be slashed by seven billion pounds thousands of taking to the streets to oppose the measures but dr richard wellings the deputy editor of the right term at the institute of economic affairs thinks the government should have gone even further. i think actually george osborne should have gone further with the cuts let's put it into perspective by two thousand and fourteen fifteen overall government spending will only have fallen by about three percent so this is actually a very tiny cut so i think you should have gone further he's relying on economic growth and rising tax revenues to make the bulk of the deficit reduction and he actually this is a big gamble because we can rely on economic growth being strong for the next year i'm really but my recovery that. you mentioned the two thousand and fourteen two thousand and fifteen will by then something like over five hundred thousand public sector jobs will be lost what will happen to those people obviously some will be

retired off but surely those people will be have to be absorbed back into the jobs market if not they'll need unemployment benefits so surely that's going to cost the government even more isn't it with all those people out of work well again they're actually six or seven million public sector workers in the u.k. so this is five hundred thousand spread over four years which is around one hundred thousand or so each year so that's only about two percent or so of the public sector workforce and i think a lot of that can be absorbed through natural wastage though obviously some departments are facing very severe cuts but it is definitely patrick and let's not forget as well that every pound the government has taken from the private sector in either types ational so you're not actually taking money out of the economy i mean we've seen huge number of job losses in the private sector during the recession and at the same time the public sector of expanding in pensions where welfare benefits went up so you need to restore the balance in the economy and we've had a huge transfer from the productive private states to the non productive public

sector and this is very unhealthy for long term economic prosperity. u.k. will also have to put off its nuclear deterrent system and withdraw twenty thousand british troops based in germany after the government announced multi-billion pound cuts to the country's defense budget. talks to people in london to find out if they are aware or even care about what was being spent on british troops abroad. cut is the word on everyone's lips this week in the u.k. public sector cuts in the say put the comprehensive spending review which will see nearly half a million jobs in the next four years and it's cuts to the defense budget too which will mean that the u.k. will no longer be able to mount an international military intervention on the scale of iraq or afghanistan and another thing the military certainly won't be able to do is to station large numbers of armed forces in germany twenty thousand military personnel operational

a legacy of world war two prime minister david cameron's announced they'll all be pulled out over the next ten years but did the british people even know they still have troops pasted to germany and was today think that doing that no more all right we should our church. strength. don't cross-post did you know if that person still had street stationed in germany . and what do you think they're doing that. may be protecting global peace what do you think they're doing that. you've got the foggiest idea talking to people on the street see it looks like the government has room to cops and it was all to get in london was sort of come to. visit one of the world's most polluted towns. price to pay for the economic damage has been enormous with the social and environmental cause if they investigate if there's any hope of

a cleaner future for a place. legacy of pollution and deprivation. but first the gang splits could have been behind tuesday's strike on the chechen parliament the russian republics interior ministry said a man thought to be behind the terror attack may have been trying to assert his authority in the region to al-qaeda. has the details. we're standing in front of the chechen parliament that has been attacked by the militants three people were killed and seventeen injured as the chechen terror minister reports the man behind this attack could be where same cry of any real leader of the chechen militants and this is the way his show when al qaeda what he's capable off forty year old guy kind of orchestrated an attack on the whole village of the church and president runs on god doing this august twelve militants broke into the village early in the morning they will be blocked in one of the streets as a result of the counter terrorist operation six police officers died more than twenty people were injured all militants were killed this also involved in train

suicide bombers and there have been several suicide blast in grozny this year before percenter kind of was operated under more of their taurus and most wanted criminal in russia mark is the man behind moscow metro blast which killed forty people talk omar has been on the most wanted terrorist list by they do or say just to remind you that the militants drove into the parliament harkins killed a security guard opened fire and stormed the parliament the federal forces blocked the militants inside the building and the operation was success all militants were killed and this is how ramzan kadyrov commented on the situation. the police did a very good job we sent two teams of six people in there it took them fifteen minutes to kill all the militants but also evacuated all members of parliament from the building the whole area right now is been cleaned and today the church and

parliament resumes its normal working hours and victims as far as we know will be receiving compensations from the state. india is working to combat a sex trafficking problem which campaigners say is the most rampant in the world thousands of girls from neighboring nepal are being brought to major cities like mumbai with promises of good jobs instead many become victims of human traffickers trapped into a life of virtual slavery as ots currency investigates. rush me may be young but she has gone through more than most girls her age to leave her village for the bright lights of mumbai only to find she was heading for life in a brothel he said he'll sell me off once you reach my why did you go with them then . i didn't want to you force me to india is the epicenter of this extra freaking industry right now in the world and the reason is that there is no enforcement of laws against traffic. and joins it's taught more than a quarter of

a million been trafficked in india each year some are as young as nine and come from the rural areas of neighboring heading for mumbai. neither the parents nor they have any idea of what is like the parents mean or little bit if television is in the village about what barbie is and to them they would represent a life state rather than a broad. it's easy to cross the border between india and if there are well established routes for trafficking in the northern state of bihar rescue groups keep an eye on the trains passing through we have identified. being trafficked an order them from the train but. when we ask youngsters where they are going they see they are going to study if a girl is travelling with a boy she says he's her brother but when we demand their identity cards we see the aren't related. the two girls are questioned by the local police but claim they are

travelling to mumbai to work why is that we have no work in our village i have two young children and when i was promised a job in mumbai i decided to take up the offer with two. girls are misled by people offering them jobs in big cities we apprehend them and then hand them over to women's shelters they're also girls who are convinced they can be part of a dance group and are conned into coming to india. it's easy to convince young girls in a village hundreds of kilometers away that they can make it big here in mumbai but once your brothers there are condemned to a local bondage now campaigners want to see villagers and given more warnings of the dangers and the police more active in clamping down on traffickers god and c r t mumbai. the town of calabash may have once been a center of economic activity and wealth for sentries here in russia but it has fallen into disrepair years of industrial activity unlikely to be called green such

as smelting copper transform the town and pollution is choked this once charming place sara first reports from the toxic town nicknamed the black point of the planet. thank you it's a bleak sight that greets you when you're right in the small russian town of care about a legacy of environmental destruction once earned the title of one of the most polluted towns in the world it's going to a large copper smelter and a century of toxic fumes and chemical waste left the landscape here devastated but it's the residents who really suffer from the horrible cardiovascular diseases respiratory diseases or just of system diseases are going on in the world on quad core diseases here and is rather high. under new ownership since two thousand and three the plant has begun cleaning up its act the progress is slowly.

we immediately began renovation but you can see for yourself the problems that our company of inherited were doing a lot to preserve and develop care about but of course lots more still remains to be done. the smelters found it to explore the region's rich copper deposits and has contributed to the economic progress in russia over the last twenty years the price to pay for the economic boom has been enormous with the social and environmental scars. tool hills of black industrial waste surround the residence a caravan when you're in the town the air quality is extremely poor. today the wind is blowing and different usually you can see your own outstretched arm because of gas concentration people are being literally poisoned but the plant is the town's life blood when it was closed in one thousand nine hundred seven after being branded an environmental disaster zone the town fell into poverty so it was

a relief to the people here when it reopened even though residents knew the more of the same pollution and unhealthy working conditions they were at least able to provide for their families. while this industry is really dangerous. it's a rule everything the units often feel and all impurities come to time on the other hand things did used to be much worse so there have been some improvements despite millions in investment to modernize the plant when we visited the working conditions still seemed whately inadequate at times we found it really hard to brave many of the staff appeared to be working with neighboring equipment whatsoever but there have been some successes here the waste used to be dumped into the water his start and the company say that they're winning the battle to cut emissions and with further investment plans. for a cleaner future. we are done with the plant yet we're going to turn the plant into

a modern european type factory so everything you see around the plant will soon become history. for the residents of the mystics the past the time being remain ever present so i see care about. time now to check out some more world news at this stage of the day violence has broken out in these encounters two thousand demonstrators rallied outside the presidential palace the protesters have been demanding the head of state's resignation because there's been no change in the country since he took office a year ago police used tear gas to disperse the crowd but at least one man injured in similar values across the country with some protesters setting cars on. emergency are scrambling to get aid to flood victims in central region currents of killed at least forty people and some two hundred thousand homes have been swamped as one of the death toll could rise as the search continues police say a bus what to wait two days ago by heavy waters over the main highway has been found in the bottom of

a river but divers have not been able to determine how many of the missing twenty passengers are trapped inside. russia's proposal for a new pair and european security treaty is not in that narrow objective and it will help all the participants well that was one of the messages of the russian president dmitri medvedev as he met with all those taking part in the munich security conference. at the going to first proposed new pan-european security treaty there was a mixed reaction some said it is time to change the old system that russians are trying to deceive europeans but security is a serious thing it's inappropriate to make one country or book safe at the expense of others known that russia's voice is being heard by my counterparts in france germany and other countries personal relations do not decide everything in foreign policy but they really help a recent reset in russia u.s. relations could not have been successful without our good relationship with president obama some of us believe that it was a good idea to push the reset button but some of us believe that we should actually

go try to go further. and write new software. have better programs and more cooperation in munich security of annual meeting of high level officials from around forty countries founded in one thousand nine hundred sixty two you have the leading nato discussion meetings now attracts more a more nations they're not that are not actually in the bloc well this year the conference is taking place here in moscow. on our top russian diplomat responsible for smoothing the path with europe told r.t. russia's relations with nato would thrive when cold war stereotypes a dropped the phone interview is coming up for you in just a few moments here on r.t. . thank.

you well mr barak cough it's good to have you with us today on. the image of modern russia evokes fear in many europeans why does all the prejudice come from. indeed i sometimes notice that russia in the eyes of europeans is a country that in essence continues the tradition set up by the soviet union or something like that but i don't think this approach is entirely correct russia is a completely new country it has a new foreign policy it has gone through substantial reform. and there is no longer any difference in ideology between russia and the rest of the world the reason for all this prejudice as i see it is the fact that we still bear the legacy of the

cold war my generation grew up in a time when it was absolutely obvious that the world is split into there was the world of the warsaw pact and the nato world a western world in an eastern world so this dogma still lives on in the mind of some people especially in the west how close is the link between e.u. russia relations and the new strategic concept that will be put up for approval in november is it possible that the nature of our cooperation will change. as for russia e.u. and russia nato relations we see them as two different vectors of our foreign policy you see the european union is a conglomerate of countries that are united first and foremost by the fact that they face the same economic problems nato is an organization that's aimed at resolving military and political stability problems that is why our dialogue with nato is self-contained it would be a bit far fetched to talk about a connection to our relations with the e.u. so we have a full fledged dialogue with nato we are currently working on

a list of threats and challenges in order to make our cooperation more specific these threats are terrorism drug trafficking and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction i think that nato has new strategic concepts should be free from such atavistic concepts perceiving russia as a possible threat or hints about nato as global role in circumvention of international laws these things are unacceptable for us and attempts to bring them into the new strategic concept will hardly help improve our relations with nato russia is actively promoting a collective security system for here. does europe need this system and how should it work. our initiative which was filed under the name president medvedev is initiative is very simple the essence of our suggestion is to devise a legally binding agreement that would be signed by fifty six zero a c e states including the u.s. canada european states and the russian federation be agreement would restrict each of the countries that signed it from using military means except when sanctioned by the un security council no country would be allowed to strengthen its security at

the expense of the security of any other state it is a very simple method and it's very effective a similar legally binding agreement is currently in effect between nato states but between east asia and european countries outside of nato this agreement is not legally binding but purely political we want to make it legal bring it into the judiciary doesn't apply a different degree of responsibility for those that would violate this order you know that n o s e e session is planned for this year the first one after nine eleven year recess this was also brought about by president david's initiative the summit will focus among other things on individual security and the modernization of europe's security structure i think the forums participants will carefully consider the suggestions we've made on the subject and in time take them into account because we will not be able to move on until the cold war ideas are dropped . is it possible that a successful resetting go fresh air here as relations may become less important in the russia america triangle. you know i would have

stained from using megalomaniac metaphors such as this triangle but there are things to consider like for instance the g.d.p. value the role and share of the g.d.p. in an economy russia's g.d.p. share is six percent of that of the us it looks a bit better if we compare it to the e.u. that's why picturing these relations as a triangle is somewhat megalomaniac on russia's part i'd rather say that we could form a triangle together with the european union so if you insist on using a triangular shape to depict international relations. in our case the callers would be the u.s. russia and the e.u. and china that would truly be a global triangle does the e.u. view russia as an equal partner in all areas of its work it gets difficult at times due to the fact that the e.u.'s path toward unification was a long and troublesome things europe has learned as it walks that path our partners in the e.u. whether they represent the union as a whole or individual states they are very proud of these ideas but this pride is

already starting to turn into self admiration and even selfishness this is why it is sometimes hard for us to negotiate this is why we often see the position of we've negotiated on it within the e.u. and your only option is to agree with us this makes life difficult of course it makes it difficult to bring our states closer together since diplomacy is the art of the possible it is the art of mutual concessions that make it possible for each side to find solutions to their specific problems in balance i think cooperation with the partner side there is another aspect to the e.u. has its own vision of how russia needs to be modernized how well does this vision correlate with russia's own plants we are talking first and foremost about exchanging experience and high tech we have also plans to cooperate on innovation in the energy sphere for energy efficiency raising the share of green energy in our overall consumption and promoting green energy on both sides in order to correspond with the ease regulations on environmental protection we're discussing in exchange .