more. song.

hello this is artsy it's nine pm monday night here in moscow my name is kevin zero in our top story former tycoon mikhail khodorkovsky has been found guilty of stealing billions of dollars worth of oil by a moscow court hearing is now over but the reading of the verdict is still not complete and could take several more days at his country has the latest from outside the court. so far we know that because of that and his former colleague. of russia's once biggest oil giant company you cos have been found guilty of stealing up to twenty over twenty billion dollars worth of oil and embezzling the funds that of course is that the latest verdict in the second trial of the bill that goes keep

him and his colleague up currently already serving time for a first conviction delivered in two thousand and five this of course is something that the prosecution seems very happy with they originally asked for fourteen years for me and his former colleagues the defense attorneys are of course saying that the trial has been politicized the evidence not substantiated and in fact the case itself has is somewhat ironic because according to their argument the trial so that is accused of stealing the very well that he was found guilty of not paying taxes for in his first conviction so these are the arguments that they're using and they could say they will continue using in their appeal they've already confirmed to the journalists that they will appeal this guilty verdict and if it doesn't happen within russia itself they are prepared to take matters outside the country and go to the european court for their appeal now prosecutors of course maintain that everything was done by the book that every piece of evidence was submitted in

accordance with procedure and that they are of course not prepared to comment on the verdict any further until it has been read out in full that of course can take days because there are fourteen files in the verdict itself each filed comprises of what the nearly three hundred pages and today the judge managed to read around a hundred so. that the math is pretty simple it will take days before the verdict is read in full and the most interesting part right now of course the exact amount of jail time that me hypothetical state employed by neighbors if the. well served will be delivered right at the very end my colleague that it was over looked at all closer at the man his life and his work. once russia's richest men he's now russia's most prominent prisoner coming to the end of it eighty a sentence for the biggest tax fraud in the country's history he and his partner. were charged with stealing two hundred and eighteen million tonnes of oil worth

twenty seven billion u.s. dollars from a subsidiary company of eucharist the verdict has been announced guilty khodorkovsky supporters say he didn't break any laws. or was not to blame because he had a whole team of very experienced lawyers who used to tell him that. there is a he did was within the law it was the blame of the laws that had with those loopholes and them the former tycoon rose to great wealth thanks to one of the world's largest non-state oil companies ucas the company grew from a state selloff in the one nine hundred ninety s. when government assets were being hived off in often cittie circumstances it soon became russia's fastest growing oil producer but the fourth to success headed outside to a associates were later found guilty of a number of murders. the thieves place is in prison. is accused of stealing

tax evasion and fraud with the new charges he faces it's about stealing hundreds of billions his company's security chief is in prison for murder. he has always insisted he's innocent of the fraud charges which put him behind bars ever since his arrest in two thousand and three ignoring his past many in the west believe that he was singled out for prosecution among the billionaire businessmen because of his political ambitions the russian authorities say ucas is pure live victim to the economic crimes of its manager. and i think there is a strong upper edge on the part of many in the media in the russian liberal media and definitely in the west to to politicize it as much as possible there is no question that. our cause and the rest of the crowd who participated initiated and was very active in the criminal privatisation of the ninety's are guilty of the

crimes they're accused of so in that sense i think very few people would fatha khodorkovsky is persecuted for nothing yes there is a very strong case i think against him public opinion is divided i think that most of rush will probably smell a recollected if you're all those people i call that of course and that's why i don't think that i want. broad public unlike liberals for whom really that i can he can find compassion for the prosecutors had asked that her that he was forty seven at least six years on top of this current sentence. is expected to last several days and the sentencing has yet to come down marty. moscow's airport is struggling to get back to normal tonight following a blackout that caused the cancellation of over one hundred flights this weekend

thousands of travelers remain stranded because of the disruption with some attempting to break through passport control out of frustration r.t. sarah ferguson the capital's main international airport with. well it's the second day of travel starts the people traveling to or from. you can see the huge number of people that are still around trying to get their flights incredibly chaotic situation still is of course off of the trouble that we saw yesterday when the entire airport had a power cut because of the substations the power the airport the power cables in russia and that obviously take down the checkin meant that hundreds of flights were canceled and hundreds and hundreds more passengers left stranded here flight was supposed to be yesterday and we still don't know if we're flying to the you by the . yes we have been me and my mother. actually we stayed at

a local hotel it was pretty nice and comfortable and we're back here today to see if we can get on a flight you know the airport with howard around nine pm yesterday and then they managed to stop processing some of the flights domestic and international flights started running at about midnight of the sle it has caused a huge amount of trouble a lot of the flights were diverted to share a match of. course. feeling the strain we share much of a spokesperson say they've really been trying to deal with the bad weather conditions and they've had some problems a day icing the fights before they go to the moment on the date of really trying to clear the streets backlog that they have of the problems yesterday get the flights priced and get people where they want to go but we've heard that it will take a couple of days before the flights was the completely back to normal you can see the traffic coming into the day to pull it's still experiencing some slight delays but certainly nothing like we saw yesterday then this is a completely understand so you have people getting out their calls and walking with

the luggage to just try and make it to the airport but of course the weather conditions still having an effect on the rain that we've seen come down over the past few days has frozen up and essentially turned. everywhere in so like an ice rink it's been pretty treacherous to get around another of the fact that we've seen the trees freezing up and nothing we've already had a number of incidents where people have been injured with pulling trees and of course pretty dangerous when they're by the right you can see how lay some of these we've seen the workers today around the airport actually trying to clear away this debris to avoid any further delays of course yeah of course as we said now working really very hard to clear this backlog i get the poor running the full capacity. of first reporting for r.t. coming up the season to be joey it is. not for everyone to your pockets of civil americans the way millions who don't get a job for christmas some little or nothing to celebrate as we reported. first

the russian president surprised his kremlin colleagues during a meeting monday dmitri medvedev began a session of the state council a modernization commission by addressing the recent racial violence in the country the country groucho the reports. the president today said that as in a phobia and asyik tensions are threatening the country's stability and here he was addressing local governors and said that they should work more closely with that new groups to prevent the kind of mass clashes mass riots that happened in moscow and inside because barrack on december eleventh over a bought thousand people clashed with police in these two cities in moscow it was just outside the kremlin they were chanting russia for russians and beat ethnic minority groups represented just mostly from the north caucasus those mass riots followed a killing of an african russian the sparta football fan representative and three of

the four suspects who were released shortly after that of course it urged drew to fire football fans in moscow it also drew the are a both the president and the prime minister the squeak released after such a short detention and they carried out their own investigation whether those policemen were somehow under pressure to do that of course that all raise concerns about a rising tide of xenophobia in the country and also the government's bungled reaction to that today the president urged police to act more fiercely to act more harshly to disperse reuters next time but i will continue to name one of them i'm tempted inciting racial he should in provoking violence should be stamped out with extreme prejudice forget about loyalties criminals don't have a nationality they must be isolated and punished regardless of their ethnic and social background from the prime minister putin who was also present at this

meeting admitted that as nick balance that was formed in russia through saying true is now changing and these changes are rather painful and prime minister putin urged young football fans not to try to settle scores up to the games by breaking the law and he also urged them to. stay away from the radicals and extremists are actually nothing to do with the game it's no surprise that the country's leaders beat the alarm the country just recently won the bid to host the twenty eight hundred football world cup and of course it's unacceptable for a country which is preparing to host such a pristine savan that's similar attacks and similar conflicts clashes between football fans and police take place. katrina which over appalling deeply entrenched on obvious and sides of a fragile peace israel and lebanon are fighting a problem again and the battle of and won the hearts and minds of their own peoples the two rivals now of the sights set on tourists and as i found some of the

attractions of war than authentic. it might not be quite the real thing but it sure brings one up close and personal dozens of tourists flocking to hizbollah strongholds deep inside lebanon at the low we decided to create and develop jihad tourism in order to thwart attempts to distort and falsify history. dubbed pallywood hizbullah land or hamas would these theme parks offer through all of their own their appeal the danger here is all too real and we try to tell our visitors about real events that took place in this region many stories are about those who gave their lives for their brothers. and in the space of sixty thousand square meters all the trophies collected by hizbollah fighters are displayed captured his radio weapons and tanks alongside katyusha rockets and grad missile launches. it's given us a chance to see first hands her wars are fought. but what is jihad to tourism for

one tourist is nothing short of terror tourism for another here and now under other side the bunch of criminals they don't they don't they did tell the world they want that they go there one of them over this group of tourists is visiting the jewish state through a specially designed package titled the ultimate mission to israel in the course of one week we brought them to meet with shin bet officials will sign an intelligence brought them to the defense ministry to the border and gas that soviet eleven hours they live in is their forward positions and the highlights include a visit to an israeli unit that carries out targeted killings a tour of the lebanese frontline and listening in on army trials of hamas suspects i'm looking forward to seeing the and getting a better picture of the fighting. actually this is. one of your books as long as it's based on facts and it's not propaganda it's not based on

deception and force on a jaish and. presentation it was more than ok and so the battle to win the hearts and minds and pockets of visitors on the mop up operation after the real war in the arena of pop culture and entertainment taking people to those places is a very powerful event for those people to shape their mind and to convince them wasn't to be convinced about when it probably hit home with photographs and memories but far from the usual snapshots these ideological holiday makers have a different experience to share point three hour television. still ahead on the program sending best wishes from both. of us for the lowdown deal i love you so much it's really dan in the world of happy new year old joins in the holiday spirit being sent hundreds of kilometers above the ground. the

world news update now two suicide bombers have killed at least fourteen people in central iraq the attacks were the second this month targeting a government compound in ramadi one bomber blew up a car minutes later another death and they did an explosive vest people gathered at the scene at least four of those killed were police officers forty seven people were wounded in all. my are in court in britain charged with conspiracy in terrorism offenses it's alleged they were planning a large scale attack aimed at landmarks banks and government buildings around central london the men were among twelve suspects taken into custody last week during dawn police raids in the u.k. the three did detainees later were freed without charge. missiles fired by a suspected u.s. drone have killed at least fifteen militants in northwestern pakistan u.s. drone attacks are common in waziristan which is a harbor of taliban and al qaeda they have been more than one hundred attacks by

pilotless u.s. aircraft in twenty ten most of. in north waziristan. in ivory coast protesters in the city of abidjan have demanded a compromise in the ongoing power struggle with incumbent leader laurent gbagbo is ignoring warnings from neighbors threatening force if you refuses to step down and be recognized winner of the recent election is called for a nationwide general strike but says that attempts to oust him could lead to civil war over one hundred seventy people have been killed and fourteen thousand fled violence following last month's disputed polls. millions of people rather world enjoy the holidays many americans are struggling to find reasons to celebrate sun employment and an expiration date on welfare is up the ante is the money runs out resorted lauren lyster reports was some of broke others are still raking it in . in the u.s. to use the season for holiday cheer charity and this year for some of millions of

jobless americans despair now why did i work all of those christmases why did i give up that time with my family if now i have nothing and all of the work that i've done in my life for no reason for theresa this used to be her busy season at work but she was laid off from her job in the gas and heating business more than two years ago and has been unable to find any steady work since i look for work every single day i feel like applications u.s. lawmakers reached a deal this month to extend unemployment benefits for millions of unemployed americans we're all going to have the best holidays we can but lost in that story are millions of jobless americans like teresa who don't even qualify for this help any more benefits expire at ninety nine weeks but a job doesn't magically appear by their own accounts and activists buying on their behalf these americans no longer count in this economy left out in the cold and out

of the statistical surveys when for many for example their phones are cut off they are not counted and no one can say that they are there struggling arguably the most to get by merry christmas you're fired there are people like sixty one year old gabrielle a laid off veterinary nurse like a record one in seven americans to eat she now relies on a government program that helps pay for food known as food stamps meanwhile no work is on the horizon it's very hard i mean. the truth of matters are really nothing out there despite the tough financial situation so many are facing these will be happy holidays first of all st thanks for what the lavish christmas decor is just the tip of the iceberg big banks like this one are expected to post their second highest near profitability ever recorded second only to last year and still. the average banker bonus may come out higher that means the average year end bonus would exceed last year's of more than one hundred twenty four thousand dollars

a person but if banks are in this money what's so wrong with that many of the banks that are doing well are only doing well because the public bailed them out so we're seeing is a transfer of wealth from in a way the needy to the greedy is unemployment soars last quarter american companies posted their largest corporate profits ever recorded in u.s. history and while the rich may be taking those earnings to the glitz that new york's fifth avenue for holiday shopping in the shadows or those struggling to see a little light at the end of the tunnel lauren lyster r.t. new york thank you very much. the stories on our website r t v dot com let us know what you think about it if you fancy also the tonight were a one in the back of it seventy eight years ago in fact when the more than possible it systems introduced and then go online to see what it was abolished for a period of time and who wasn't allowed to get

a passport interested been reading there are also work sure photos and videos going to personal look around the historic beautiful modern ski theater of opera ballet and some people as we take you beyond the doors to take a look. now just four days until new year our team has been checking the festive spirit around the globe and beyond the crew of six current living on the international space station of planning a new year's party this year complete with tree and presents tom bob was lucky enough to talk to our cosmonauts ahead of the big day. down here on earth will be celebrating new year all around the planet in our customer fashion with celebrations and parties but there will be six people who won't be here they'll be one hundred kilometers above on the international space station and they'll have

a bit of a different take spirits cut off from the rest of the planet as it were have limited communication each of the crew will be up there for six months they've been doing experiments and living quite quite a different life to most of us down here here at mission control in moscow we were able to day to get a chance to talk to them on the on the live link up to the international space station hello my name's tom barton from russia today television merry christmas and happy new year then fix it. fix really in down here what's your message to the world. happy new year we wish everyone good health love happiness success in all the new beginnings and plenty of room warning achievement in the upcoming year. also here was father frost the russian father christmas he turned up and on a live link gave greetings from the russian people and from palace earth to the

crew of the international space station and had a quick chat with them he also was with some children here today the children of the astronauts and cosmonauts up there and they were also split over to speak to their parents. below daddy i love you so much you are the best dad in the world and happy new year all. physically it seems that the spirit and the festive spirit of new year and the festive season will be able to penetrate even outside the atmosphere. bit later this hour we'll look at issues surrounding the apparent rise of domestic violence in the united states and try to find out what can be done to prevent it it's a subject of our special report coming up tonight first though we're talking business in just a moment. bringing

you the latest in. the future coverage. business the price of oil hit a fresh two year high on monday a combination of an opec production freeze and in the u.s. pushed brant over ninety four dollars a barrel this morning before edging back lies sweet has also lost ground but remains just over ninety dollars. also is here remorse go sell off to china raised interest rates increasing fears that its economy will slow process central bank has also hopes of the interest rate charged the group of the count's most of the blue chips fell on monday after almost three percent after announcing production will

stop from thirty first december tenth of january gazprom also fell off to saying it will change exports supply. is low off the talks on expanding in liberia russian markets closed on friday for a ten day break but alexander zurich of analyst finance says many of vestas have already gone for the holidays market with a slight decrease most probably on the news of china increased interest rates but what can be saying now is that the market is quite in. really low and we don't see it we we are not in scraping any. more substantial move till the end of the year and for tomorrow as well because most of the braver traders are already all norrington in and been the long qualities. predict the further strengthening of russia's currency the ruble as oil prices remain high market watchers also remain

confident in global stock exchanges for next year but in a caution of a report. the russian ruble strength in two point eight percent against the us dollar and nine point four percent against the euro between january and of them by twenty ten december has dragged yet more games rising oil prices and returning confidence in russia after the crisis a few. the rally forecast for the ruble remains flat even though it's hard to make predictions i believe the ruble will strengthen in twenty eleven and remain stable the central bank of russia says it may relax controls on the ruble further next year i said aims to make the currency free floating. this is key in realize the the government's ambition to promote it is an international reserve currency the importance of the ruble has also recently been giving a boost by the start of trading against the chinese yuan on the my six given all those factors you know. chief economist from dortch

a bank thinks the ruble has chances to strengthen into an eleven do not foresee a complete. free float for the next several years i think given the dependency on oil prices given the volatility that we see in the markets the central bank is likely to be cautious although i have to say that the flexibility of the volatility of rubles movements will certainly increase in the coming years but when it gets down to it the ruble is still have really depended on commodity prices to diversify the economy are slow in bearing fruit that so many analysts expect commodity price inflation in twenty eleven particularly as u.s. authorities print more dollars and that bodes well for the ruble my dinner which no business r.t. . that's the latest you can always find more stories on our website dot com slash business.

it can hit doctors wives policeman's wives ministers why i just prayed that if you didn't find me if i could slip through the night that i would get my kids out of here because i knew that what was going to happen was that he was going to kill me many victims.