good to be with you as we take a look at today's top stories and a look back at the week's news here on our team after months of delay a landmark nuclear cut steel between russia and the u.s. is on the verge of being brought into force the week saw a new strategic arms reduction treaty or start being approved by both russian and american lawmakers the state duma the lower house of russia's parliament voted in favor of the treaty and is likely to ratify it after new year holidays agreement will face further review before the final vote start will slash the deployed russian and u.s. nuclear arsenals by a third once it's ratified by both sides it was actually signed by the two presidents back in april but the u.s. senate only approve the deal wednesday after months of heated debate or he's got a cheeky odd was following the process. low. and on this resolution are seventy one days twenty six nays two thirds of the senate president having voted the affirmative the resolution of ratification is agreed to . and with this approval russian the us will start the new year with

a treaty that has become a symbol of trust and cooperation between the two nuclear superpowers i am glad that democrats and republicans came together to approve my top national security priority for this session of congress the new start treaty. this is the most significant arms control agreement in nearly two decades and it will make us safer and reduce our nuclear arsenals along with russia both states have some very significant reductions underway over the next ten years the countries will cut their nuclear arsenals by a third down to some fifteen hundred fifty deployed warheads on each side the deal also limits the number of delivery vehicles and launchers but even with those cuts both russia and the u.s. will still hold more than ninety percent of the world's nuclear weapons so many agree that the value of the new arms reduction treaty is not just in reductions but i think it's also important to say that the significance of the treaty is much larger than the implications for arms control it really does give

a lot of momentum and boost to the broader u.s. russia reset and i think puts obama and medvedev on course to cooperate more closely on a whole host of issues and it may well be that this is seen as a turning point in which the russia u.s. rivalry of the past is finally laid to rest for weeks and months the president of the united states all members of his administration the military all living former secretary of state and of defense were calling for senators not to ruin this reset opportunity for us who are sure relations and the message did resonate with many senators every senator knows when you're trying to get things done relationships matter and the relationship between the united states and russia has been critical since we fought together in world war two and will be continued will continue to be so this is an on parallelled opportunity to enhance that

relationship and to say by signature and by ratification of this treaty that yes the united states of america wants to work with russia despite the huge support the treaty has. sieved on many levels a number of republican senators nearly sabotaged it their actions provoked an avalanche of criticism from the country's top security experts who feared that the truth it could become a victim of political games on capitol hill the arguments the treaty adversaries brought up on the hearings ranged from there's no earthly way to do all of this within the time that we have to even more unsubstantial ones like we don't have to have this treaty if we don't have a nuclear treaty with the u.k. and one we don't have one with france in the final days of debates on start some republican senators tried to rewrite the deal which would have actually killed it

you know they wanted to take out the line in the preamble which makes the connection between offensive and defensive weapons start straitjackets the united states' missile defense capabilities but all of those from the military who testified before the senate said the connection between offensive and defensive weapons is obvious they also maintained it's not start to stir up make the us weaker the treaty itself explicitly says either side can pull out of it if at some point they deem it threatens their national security and for russians this new start is about balance and equality and they will be in it as long as the u.s. respects that balance in russia the outcome of the vote in the u.s. senate has been will come from many in moscow it's a signal that the u.s. and russia can now open a new page of cooperation with the molecular president obama did a really good you know under rather difficult conditions if you managed to get this important to listen security for the next few years will be based on this treaty and in general i can say that it's easy for me to work with president obama list

because you can really listen to him and he does know he's not impeded by stereotypes of wood and what is probably the most important thing for the illustration that will he keeps his promise the russian lawmakers made it clear they had no objections to the treaty. advocates of the treaty see the outcome of the vote not so much as obama's victory but a victory for the whole world which on the one hand is going to have considerably fewer weapons of mass destruction and on the other hand tools nuclear superpowers former adversaries actually trusting each other and looking to work in hand to provide their security gonna check on our team washington d.c. . moscow has repeatedly said it could pull out of the start treaty if it feels threatened by u.s. missile defense systems in europe connecting the two remains key for russian political animal analysts dimitri since law says the country's lawmakers will reinforce this the parliament's resolution will follow the line of the preamble of

the document and they will stipulate to the facts of the linkage between the offensive and defensive weapons that were nuclear weapons and missile defense system basically and second i think the russian parliament will repeat perhaps more strictly in the context of the russian unilateral statements that was published by the russian foreign ministry on the date of signing the treaty in prague that russia might school or might consider pulling out from the new start treaty if it considers if the development of u.s. missile defense system reaches the level of the russia will interpret as a threat. commentary from political analyst. stay with us here on r t coming up fueling the anger find out how the u.s. congress is criticizing american air base in kyrgyzstan and what it all has to do with the revolution in the country. plus trying to extend its political influence in europe by offering to help struggling economies but is it

enough to save you or he takes a look at the moment. but first the aftermath of freezing rain is causing major delays and disruptions at one of moscow's main airports i stopped electrical cables have ruptured and caused a power cut airport for more on this we go live to our correspondent sara for with more oh sorry so what's happening where you are how bad is it out there. well it's been pretty chaotic today you really got a feel for the people who are trying to travel out of a double whammy they've had to think. of how the. cables. take it out of the check in taken out the baggage the flight landed as. it happens. that baggage to be given. they're all domestic flights. registrations.

we've had stories from. the time on the planes that are grounded at the moment. with. to get a generator up and running to try and get the power. who knows what is going to happen and they really have had. people waiting around with the luggage and the traffic going in. and the weather really having this. what does this all mean for planes that are currently in the air. the weather's. obviously russia and is used to dealing with cold weather nice if i think the elements the last couple of days we've had a lot of rain and that's kind of phrasing on the ground i made it really dangerous to get around. to the flies on the traffic i know that with the flight one hundred

on the data but. fifty is there much of that would have happened regardless. we know that some of the flights coming in and being we directed. both of us still going in and out of it really quite dangerous it is not just have been affected around one hundred forty thousand people in the mostly region have been left without electricity as well. in light instance happening. with the weather affecting things around people of the thing on the ice but also that been a few incidents with trees where they phrase it and that's not things that you love to see being told to be very careful when they're asked about officials giving any indication right now as to how long it'll take to fix this or. will they tell you know as we said they're trying to get the emergency generator up and running but they don't really know when that's going to happen. that that's that is quickly as

possible but as we said the domestic flights of the maybe they're able to get the registration surveys done so some of these all go away but it's not looking like it's going to happen any time in the state it was interesting because you can hear the planes going today so everyone was wondering well that was the that is the domestic flight just be trying to i think telling people to try to find a time to travel arrangements for the immediate. you know you can hear the planes going but you can't see anything back there in the darkness behind you thanks for staying on top of the story for us arkansas or for that of the airport. in north korea soldiers who reportedly took part in the shelling of a south korean island last month have spoken out publicly about the attack they say the act was in retaliation to seoul holding a live fire military exercises in disputed waters four south koreans were killed in the shelling of a border island more than a month ago since then so it's been holding more military drills provoking stark

warnings from the north terry chief says the country will launch a retaliatory nuclear strike if the south these quote provocations it's the worst tension on the peninsula since war sixty years ago korea expert glyn ford says a new war is unlikely but the possibility remains so long as the north keeps feeling. the danger is if we have new military exercises at sea because the problem is the land borders very clear the sea border is been arbitrarily and unilaterally established by the south koreans along the northern limit line which is not recognized even by the united states and the the recent shelling of the of the island. was called squanto poem the south koreans intruding into what the north koreans consider through their waters the dangerous escalation what you hobbes sized korean maneuvers which in disputed waters which led to the north korean response of. the artillery shelling of the island we've now seen

massive joint u.s. south korean exercises which clearly are leading to the north koreans upping their . upping their readiness for for future for a future attack or military adventurism i don't think anyone's intending to start if you want a full scale war at this point but it is a danger with escalation is it gets out of control. which is something we need to we need to be concerned about for the future what we need to see is some gestures from either side to try and step down maybe an offer from the north koreans for example to give up their with their fuel rods from the only real nuclear reactor and try and ship them to the saddest will be something that might be allow us to start scaling down the current levels of tension. commentary from korea expert glidden ford. at least eight suspected militants have been killed in a counter terror operation in the capital of russia's southern republic of dagestan

authorities say one of them was the leader of a local terrorist group artie's excitedly hunch over who's at the scene of the violence we're just a couple of meters away from the building where a group of militants has been a block today in the center of. the counterterrorist operation has started early in the morning when the militants wolfie used to surrender and opened fire on the residents of the houses nearby and were evacuated and the full area has been blocked by the police then the special task force told the fled where the militants were hiding as far as we know by now several militants have been killed and they get to be identified and as the russian enter terrorists kmita says this group could be behind the killings of the police officers in the region and launching a serious altera attacks there is also information that the head of the high school a terror only was among the militants and that he was eliminated this is yet to be confirmed by the officials the biggest on has been a very troublesome region this year with many terror attacks launched by the

militants trains derailed and the whole situation in the reason is very troublesome . artie's accidentally hunch over a reporter from the scene of a shoot out with militants earlier on sunday stay with us here on r t coming your way shortly carving up the desert the israeli government accused of pushing the arab tribes off the land that's been their home for more than a century we find out why a few minutes. but first this week the brother of the late polish president claimed the body buried in krakow does not belong to lech kaczynski jaroslav kaczynski his twin brother and a former prime minister of poland says he's not yet decided whether to have the remains exuma poland has rejected moscow's report into the april plane crash that killed lech kaczynski and ninety five others investigation said pilot error was to blame still not clear whether warsaw is contesting that point the current polish prime minister donald tusk said the findings into the accident in the southwest russia are unacceptable and more than one hundred fifty pages have been reportedly

sent to moscow detailing where poland believes the investigation was flawed aviation expert chris yates says the russian investigation seemed thorough and no further international inquiry is necessary but i think the key is to fool the polar so it is probably quite a significant amount of criticism of the polish air force and in particular the captain of the croft and his copilot operates in that across the. tragic consequence and i think primarily major pulls. a. new. draft report which we postpone to publish the. look so this issue since the accident. examined the the cockpit voice recording transcript and so on and i can't fault any of the

conclusions that have been leaked by the the russian authorities i don't believe personally that if we bring. an international investigating team in to be equation that the findings will be any different to watch. which seems to be the pressure groups in some way shape or form. the pilots and copilots. to make them attempt to learn and that's an important weather with no conditions at school too low and too much focus not enough visibility and a lot of pressure being brought on the pilots conspire to cause that accident perspective from aviation expert christian gates the united states congress has slammed the pentagon over shady jet fuel deals for an american military base in the central asian republic of kyrgyzstan fuel worth about two billion dollars was purchased for civilian use allegedly to avoid higher tariffs but it actually went

to the manasseh airbase a key supply hub for the u.s. campaign in afghanistan peters all my of the eurasia democracy initiative says the deal helped spark the un arrest that ousted the keurig as president in april. what the congressional subcommittee on national security and foreign affairs. dealt with in the report was allegations of corrupt dealings between the subsidiaries of the pentagon which was supplying few will stand to prosecute the war effort in afghanistan and members of the family of the deposed former president of kyrgyzstan but key if the same report stated that these subsidiaries namely the mino corps and red star back in two thousand and nine tempted to reach out to the former president's saw on the scene but has subsequently followed his father in exile and is now in hiding in the u.k. to try to engage in bed or negotiations with the pentagon regarding the future of

the base following kyrgyzstan's announcement that it would shut down the base so what we saw in that case was another proof of the fact that the president's family and so on was calling all the shots in the country for the most one of the places what would eventually happened was the direct result of this relationship what we saw what april two thousand and ten when president bush was ousted was the direct result of the popular anger that was stirred by the complete lack of accountability lack of transparency in the deals that the pentagon was cutting with. their government analysis from peter is all my of with your asia democracy initiative. china says it's willing and able to help out struggling european economies at an economic forum in beijing the country's vice premier praised the e.u.'s efforts to cut down debt but suggested that more can be done ones proposals for china to buy

bonds from at risk euro zone nations but economist marco peter pollie says the move will not be enough. this extends china's political influence in europe by making a lot of european states dependent on china to buy to buy their debt but it doesn't get away from the fundamental problem in europe europe has a big big sovereign debt crisis and they seize if you like a patch to try and help the situation until the europeans managed to put together some some proper reforms some proper fundamental structures to help the euro stay together moving forward and to date they've been very much dragging their heels in and patching up greece and ireland rather than coming to the table to put together fundamental reform of how the euro actually operates turning out to

some other stories making headlines across the globe violence following ivory coast disputed presidential election has forced some fourteen thousand people lead in neighboring liberia at least one hundred seventy people have been killed in clashes so far close to those fleeing are supporters of opposition leader our sign a. new wave has recognized as the winner of last month's vote incumbent leader laurent gbagbo is refusing to step down. a tourists have died more than twenty others injured when their bus collided with a truck in southern egypt the bus was traveling from the southern city of us want to the ancient temple site of abu simbel it hit a truck laden with sand which had broken down and was parked on the side of a road. a series of powerful aftershocks has rocked the new zealand city of christchurch months after a powerful earthquake struck the region at least twenty buildings were damaged power lines were cut off the tremor blew out glass and shook the brick work but

there are fortunately no reports of injuries police cordoned off parts of the central business district and the special units are inspecting all the buildings scientists warn the tremors could continue for some time. palestinians in gaza have fired two rockets into israel hours after israeli aircraft killed two suspected militants in the region the israeli army says militants were trying to plant explosives near the border and israeli officials warned last week that another war was quote only a question of time while hamas has threatened a quote strong response to any aggression. staying in the region now the israeli government is operating arab tribes from the desert they've lived in for more than a century the jewish state says the bedouins built their homes without permission but local activists say the aim of the crackdown on the arab villages is to replace them with jewish settlements artie's policy reports from the negev desert. in the middle of no when the remains of a keep village. for the third time in two weeks israeli police came with

a few cases and in little more than an hour demolished sixty houses. from a flood no this is my land i have a paper i have a document this is my land i ask this government how do i live and how can i afford to buy the same land elsewhere in israel and i can't what they want me to sell my land i won't agree. and as long as he and hundreds of others won't the police will continue to raid seven times they've come so far backed up by a government whose official policy states this is their land but i think the unofficial policy underneath it is that the land should go to the jews not just the big ones on a medic arabs who have lived in the negev desert for more than one hundred years they claim they used to pay taxes during the autumn and period in british mandate but off to israel took over in one thousand nine hundred eighty they've been hard placed to prove their ownership of the land they don't have any legal documents

proving that this land is theirs they have a grievance of buying and selling between themselves but according to the law the state of israel ownership of land can only be proven by registering the land in a public office israel says it's built alternative cities fill them with all the facilities they could hope for but they keep coming back to the desert. they're not abiding by the law they live inside graveyards with horses donkeys she was the animals mess all over the graves and make it difficult for us to move them but we have to because they need permission to build on the land and they don't have it. i think that. the government they would like to push them into the townships where they could become simple workers they would like to give the land to many of the army and jewish settlements who. who

will. change the demographic status of the negative just look around here at this vast uninhabited is it is home to only seven percent of israel's population several years ago the government launched an ambitious program to the value of six hundred million dollars to try and attract new jewish immigrants and israelis to live here it aims in the next three years to have more than a quarter of a million of them living in the desert but is because the desert is it seemingly not big enough for jew and arab jew mel torme has lost his way house and seven houses but he hasn't lost his result of. peace we don't use the gun as the man who came to destroy our houses with other bad phases of this land we did not fight back when they came but the fight will continue because tomorrow when the sun comes up will build again and in a few weeks these raids will return. in the negev desert israel. for

more on this story never stories are recovering you can always click over to r.t. dot com here's what you'll find on live right now. in a scathing reality we look at afghanistan's efforts to rehabilitate the country more than a million heroin addicts. and on a lighter side if you want to get mary was something a little more sophisticated than eggnog this festive season martina may have the perfect recipe for you click on over to r t dot com for more. coming up shortly russia's president discusses the major events of two thousand and ten in an interview with the country's top t.v. channels coming your way a little later this hour but first a look at the headlines stay with us.

it's.

it's six thirty pm in moscow good to have you with us as we bring you today's top stories and a look back at the week's news here on our team washington game start the green light throwing the ball into russia's court moscow has already given its initial approval to a treaty that will see nuclear arsenals slashed by a third the deal was signed earlier this year by president medvedev and obama has been hailed as a major diplomatic breakthrough. between north and south korea

souls' ongoing war games close to the border provoked pyongyang into threats of a sacred nuclear war soldiers who reportedly took part in the shelling of a south korean island last month said their actions response to provocation. open and thorough aviation experts back moscow's reported to be a plane crash that killed the polish president and ninety five others but poland refuses to accept the findings more than one hundred fifty pages have reportedly been sent to moscow detailing where warsaw believes the investigation was flawed. and happening right now freezing rain leads to major delays and cancellations at one of moscow's main airports as the russian capital is covered in a sheet of ice the first few domestic flights have reportedly taken off check in luggage transport and customs are still working manually with no power. the russian president shares his views on the events that shaped twenty.