you're watching our t.v. now let's have a recap of our top stories for this hour. b.p. swap stocks worth billions of dollars as they team up to explore the top of the works of art because we felt it's the first major deal for b.p. following last summer's oil spill disaster in the gulf of mexico. as more americans continue to lose their jobs in the country's continuing economic crisis some work for the government in washington d.c. are doing just fine in the recession enjoy bonuses and pay rises goes to the private sector for a little shelter from the harsh realities of the reception. of

a few bowls and in kashmir are being forced to give off their traditional winter break after separatists foreigners shut their schools in the summer they now have to make up for lost classes but some say the move is also the beginning of a backlash against suffragist impacts. well as the key arms reduction deal passes its second of three readings in the russian parliament we discuss its future with the head of the state did was foreign affairs committee constant did cause a child well that's next on spotlight here on r t.

hello again or welcome to spotlight the interview show on r.t. . and today my guest is. the united states ratify the new start treaty like in december last year they added a resolution which allows the u.s. to develop its nuclear military muscle if necessary russian m.p.'s are now developing their own resolution to balance the rights so far this new arms race is out of folding only on paper but where will it end up we're asking the head of the state duma foreign affairs committee. the new year has started with new challenges for russian foreign policy alexander lukashenko won the presidential elections in bello whose and harshly suppressed opposition rallies shortly after europe is unhappy and is preparing sanctions against minsk moscow has so far of frain from any criticism but has stopped pumping oil into the country however the biggest

issue is the start treaty ratification by the russian duma the document is called the hallmarks of president obama's reset policy and the biggest success in recent russian u.s. relations. because chairman welcome to the show do you agree that this that the the the question of the ratification of the new arms deal with the united states is the main is the biggest foreign affairs issue at least for for for russia this this month definitely years and this for two reasons. one is that. this treaty he's to replace the previous one start one to eat it reach was conducted ninety ninety one and the latest the show the soviet union existence and that previous treated included not just the united states and the soviet union

later on russia but other nuclear parts of the former soviet union like ukraine the other russia and kazakhstan this treaty is out of question right now this is fulfilled but we do not have anything else on the area or for strategic armaments and this is bad because we do not know what the other parts of the other board does we have no possibility to stewart to verify the the existing stocks stockpile so for warheads and curious the missiles and the so on and so forth or the treaty is really important for itself but the second reason is that this is definitely one of the most a touchable result of the reset program in relations between russia and the united states and we could see how the opposition to mr obama in the states tried to block the certification for the simple reason they consider it is a big success for mr obama indifferently this is

a mutual success not just for him but for mr miller as well as well on friday the the state do a pass the amendments to the starts start treaty really the cation law conditioning russia's possible was drawn from the treaty is that the russia's armed sir to the to the u.s. senate resolution passed simultaneously with the treaty ratification yes or no the option of withdrawal he's in the treaty itself there is a certain article number fourteen and of course this is equally legal for the for the united states and for. russia each part may withdraw from the treaty any time secondly we have already warrant our american partners while signing the treaty there was a you know literal statement by the russian federation published the same day the treaty was signed in prague that russia may have used rule from the treaty in case of the. state of affairs for four anti missile defense systems

in the world will change in equality if we saw these option exists since the very first day of the treaty existence now in our amendment to the law not to the treaty to what to the writ if occasional or about the treaty you know man meant we. current are the. syrian pickle or maybe a habit hypothetical situations where russia may consider it's possible and necessary to draw from the treaty to believe that our american partners and friends have done the same type of analysis and definitely they have their own list of terms and conditions of being inside of the treaty or outside of it so nothing dramatical dramatic has happened no definitely not and for me you know this is the kind of all the early warning mechanism now we both understand the degree to

equally important for the russia and for the united states and most bars are related to proceed with the realisation of this treaty but already you know we really see two door american friends look this will happen or this may happen in case you do these or that and this is a do for for me this is a fair play and they believe that this is really important for our american friends to know for sure what will happen in case they will continue to develop their strategic plan to missile defense systems when the two presidents were just about to sign the. we were talking and we were talking about the future ratification we all talked about about the fact that it should have been ratified simultaneously by the two parliaments now the synchronicity is broken i mean the americans have already ratify did the russians are still considering the ratification well well as far as i understand this have this been because of these these amendments these

resolutions that are attached to the treaty by the why do we need do they add self-esteem to you to your colleagues across the ocean is what you are completely right the way the two presidents agreed or on the. ridge if occasion was more a board of the original the original format of the certification yes we are ready for of the treaty point and this is of the way both presidents presented the treaty to door due to the congress and to the federal service or for usha later on unfortunately our american colleagues in the senate decided to amend the british occasion document on the american side and in certain cases they thought this somehow into fear it in the. in the body of the treaty which to my mind is not good and i know that that was done not for the reason that we could self

head to be commanded had to be interpreted but for the reason republicans and democrats were competing each other during the second half of the previous year the election campaign to do it will do that to the congress and bosporus could it could drive two two two two two two two see whether this if you creation would be good or bad for their own political internal political services then bill got to moderate a common sense now about politics whether it is you know more or less more or less we could have could have it worded this development big. as now we have passed our amendments our amendments balance the very man most and real are again in the same position we were on the eighth of april when the two presidents signed this treaty in prague well despite attempts by some of the republican senators to sabotage the new start treaty it was finally ratified by the u.s.

senate in december it's now up to the russian parliament to give the green light to the agreement spotlights the me that has more in this. the signing of the new start treaty was the most dramatic episode in russia u.s. relations last year it came at the end two years of negotiations on the key arms control deal and became the symbol of the resetting relations it was two were serious test when it came to really find a document in the u.s. senate there had been strong opposition to the groom and from republicans who were convinced the treaty hampers u.s. security it took months of wrangling between the white house and republicans the democratic defeats in the vendors mid-term elections didn't make the tuscany easier for president obama's administration the u.s. senate finally ready find the new start nuclear arms reduction treaty with russia last month in a seventy one to twenty six vote it is now up to russia to really fire the treaty

russian lawmakers list said this would not be a problem but things appear not to be so easy as the u.s. senate added eleven pages of resolutions to the treaty it's now been conceded by russian lawmakers who in their turn have been working on resolutions of their own the treaty has been criticised by communist m.p.'s who claim it infringes russia's national interests however they represent a minority in the parliament and then you start is expected to be finally ready fired on the twenty fifth of january. this because a. of mystical to charles a you you said that we as americans both need this they had this agreement as a working document so ratified but in one of your recent interviews you said i quote russia needs dark three more than the us do and quote did you really say that is not in this quotation why yes i did say that and they may confirm it now and the

reason is quite simple the united states is a much richer country than russia that they are related to or not richard jones of commonality of money definitely and americans can afford to spend much more money on defense including nuclear armaments and there we these nuclear deterrence existed in the previous decades when most parts were concentrating their efforts just on offensive weapons not on defensive weapons is not enough for american partners any longer and they want to add certain elements to the previous deterrence concept by their will being until missile defense systems and by developing new types of non-nuclear weapons of mass destruction strategic weapons reach me reach the north korea or iran or any other

country which the united states consider as an enemy from the territory of the united states this is a completely different situation which demands much more money and reach i believe is not affordable for russia so for us to keep the united states within the requirements and commitments of the street here is much more important and president bush the predecessor to mr obama i believe was on the way to ignore completely russia as a partner in. the question lobel stability and to start a unilateral process or for securing the movie the defense or the national defense of the united states the pro chill mr obama is quite different and he's ready to make deals with russia and to to to to or to sign agreements with russia long suit ejects the benefit for the result of

a bomb i believe that the united states needs russia as a partner and they believe that mr obama is much more right in that the session than mr wolf was so i ask because they do cause such of the head of the state do what foreign affairs committee spotlight will be back shortly after would take have great cell stay with with us we will continue this interview in less than a minute don't go. too much brighter. moon about someone from plans to crash in some of.

these funds down totty dot com. download the official antti application to your i phone i pod touch from the i.q. zaps to. watch on t.v. lights on the go. video on demand parties my fuel costs and all recessed feeds now in the palm of your. question on the dot com. welcome back to spotlight i'm al green of and just to remind you that my guest in the studio today is constrained because such of the head of the state duma foreign affairs committee mr carson show so we've discussed we've discussed the problems

the shows around the ratifying of the start treaty agreements in the russian parliament russia stay duma so many people still say that by the end of january it will be done as the head of the foreign affairs committee do you believe this is true. this is probably true for the reason we know what will happen in terms of the serious reading called these are difficult document we are going to propose to the state duma to pass two more accompanying statements statements accompanying the unit if occasion and we will ask the president of russia to include one of these statements to the british occasion package then i hope that the council for the ration of the opposition will of the russian parliament will do their work and as far as i understand they will be ready to proceed on their the next day after the receive these relief occasion from this the duma and they know for sure that the president or for russia would be really have to sign this

certification package for the simple reason he has signed the treaty itself and our war our war does not change the content of this treaty it interprets certain positions and this is done for the reason as i told you miracle of the dissing ok now let's go on with some of the burning for an issue as well the issue of the of this commission that worked and the results of the reasons rather of the plane crash that that killed nearly half of the polish government in russia the polish side obviously didn't like the results of the this investigation and we said that that that the crew was to blame and that the high ranking officials on board the plane who dictated to the captain the what to do work to blame for the crash so there's a lot of pilots of politics in that and there i've heard your one of your opposites not numbers i think he was ease the deputy head of the foreign affairs committee of

the polish polish government who said that this thing about the investigation may affect the relations between two countries very seriously because the elections are coming up what do you think about this whole situation. will number one of the report which was published recently by the russian or the multi multi a multilateral government and intergovernmental commission does not make any conclusions the world who is to blame who was right who was wrong it just states the facts what and the what happened this is it and yet this is optional and this is for the law enforcement what is to determine the level of response ability or any involved personalities this is number one number two as far as i can see nobody on the russian site not a single russian politician has made and their conclusions or comments hiring

the president the prime minister or anybody else has made any conclusions. drawn any of. the thoughts about who is to be blamed and this is what makes our attitude different from the polish one because on the polish side as soon as they receive a certain piece of expert information expert conclusions the immediately start drawing political conclusions made by certain politicians and in this case i do respect the approach the entity would by the president of poland mr komorowski and the prime minister of poland mr to say they are both under huge pressure from their friends rather public opinion because public the public opinion of it would have preferred to see immediately that of all those russians live killed our president there is possible for everything and so on and so forth this pressure does exist then in this situation both. the president of poland and the prime minister of

poland i believe but to do what they can in order to not to let it harm the by letter of relations between poland and russia and we do appreciate it but on the other hand they have a position in poland including the. the brother of the late president of poland a mystical ski and they make their ridicule statements without i believe without reading the texts i could see the first comment of mr kaczynski probably twenty minutes after the report was published here in russia it's not possible to make any conclusions when you have not seen that this and this is purely political i do respect the feelings of these people who are personally involved in this tragedy and they do accept it but i don't accept when certain politicians and when paula drive to make big politics on this tragedy in case we will continue to disagree on certain positions and this may happen in case experts

will continue to disagree on that there is only one way to proceed and this is to address a certain international multinational body which would would compare of the of the of the arguments and draw their conclusions and this is the only way anything else like political statements made by mr kaczynski and his brother in the opposition are not acceptable in the the you should not be accepted by our by bias here in russia ok another political issue january seventeenth in paris there will be a pace hearing on the current situation with regard i'm quoting to the consequences of the war between georgia and russia well this planned meeting they didn't invite neither neither a settee or a party or to participate in this meeting well why is the european union and the european political establishment ignoring these two nations these two two countries

can can there be a result in such a meeting without hearing the voice of a surprise in the cities who have declared their independence differently or not and they believe they have the major mistake in each. of the georgia. france and they will use this word the george influence you are doing is they continue to call these countries or territories has occupied territories because in this case as soon as you use this definition of occupation you just throw out of this dialogue people who live there because they are not occupants and they're not occupied and this is obvious for everybody as soon as you call these territories has occupied territories you have nothing but to continue to speak about the us here in russia with of them there in washington or in the brussels or

anywhere else if you will not lead georgia anywhere this is their dead lock and mr saakashvili personally is responsible for that they had long hair the will not to speak about the previous tragedy in august two thousand and eight the hearing in stores when in paris the seventy or so of january yes the title of this hearing is still completely wrong this title is based on the previous resolutions of the parliamentary assembly of the council europe reach defiance of the the conflict is a war between russia and georgia and this is wrong and i don't think that the this approach has led the parliamentary assembly anywhere it is still outside it does not contribute anyhow to the. peace process in the region he just makes comments and i feel storyboard there because i believe that the potential of the parliamentary assembly of the council year of the potential of the council of

europe is much bigger than the previous reason lucian sent us who will participate in these hearings i am not sure the georgians will participate but we will participate and definitely we will insist that further on the next steps would absolutely involve people from and representatives from our presidents also see here and another comment i want from you before the end of the show it's on by the roots in the beginning of the show we mentioned that this is also one of the main political political intrigues of this new year well the the results of the elections were condemned widely across europe especially the way to look at the treated the opposition after the election he is really very popular but the way to be treating the opposition is so strange well there was no outspoken reaction from russia does does that mean that that moscow moscow political class is happy by the way the situation is developing in bill the rules that there couple of russians are

still under custody in belarus if you are why aren't russia supplying gas to go the wrist ways and russia supply oil despite of the existing contracts. well number one i would like to keep separated the issues of gas and oil on the one hand and the issue of the political situation and the other russia is not connected this is not connected definitely and the problem is deliver us right now are dependent on certain disagreements on the existing contracts and these contracts are made by the private. companies on the russian side at least so it has nothing to do with the state ball is still russia number two number two you know we are not hip the world what is going on the inability russian but we understand that whatsoever goes on there the president of the russia mr lucas schenker e's the elected president

of bill russia and the outcome of this election could have been more transparent it could have been more democratic and by that. accepted in the better manner by but by the outer world russia included it has not happened it does them much of the reputation of the other russia it was the deliberate choice of the current bill or russian leadership and they believe that the current leadership has made a big political mistake by treating the election campaign by tweaking their position of the week the deed but it does not change the final result of the election and mr lucas schenkel who whether we like it or not is the elected president of the russian by the he's the partner for russia and any other country for for the years ahead thank you thank you very much for being with us then just to remind you that my guest in the studio today was constantin cos i charge the

head of the state duma foreign affairs committee and that's it for the hour from all of us here if you want our viewers in the spotlight or maybe have someone in mind if you think i should into the next time you drop me a line that al do you know of at didn't does. are you let's keep spotlight interactive we will be back with more from what's going on in there and outside russia until then stay on r.t. and take care. doesn't. play. well with. bringing you the latest in science and technology from the realms of russia. we've got those huge earth covered.