tell us the rembrandt the creamy the chesterfield. the royal the rubens hotel. this week's top stories on the. tragedy dispute the final report on last april's plane crash that killed poland's president sparks debate says it leaves questions unanswered. to all giants team up as russia's. peace what is in a deal to jointly explore the arctic's potential energy treasure. and the land. cuts treaty between moscow and washington moves another step forward as russia's parliament approves it in the second of.

its their weekly here on auty we are running down the weeks made headlines the final report on last april plane crash in western russia which killed the polish president lech kaczynski has caused some controversy this week warsaw says the interstate aviation committee report is incomplete while the agency insists it's given the polish side all the relevant information and he said now it reports. for the first time the last seconds are heard before polish president lech kaczynski plane crashed near small down south korean on one day we're. right. right yes. right. i mean the crew ignored warnings from the aircraft's automated says. time to pull

up and advice from air traffic controllers to land at an alternate airport plus or inexperience and flying in bad weather the interstate aviation committee highlighted what they found to be the main causes behind the tragedy in their final report and there's never a failure to make a timely decision to land at the reserve airports based on multiple becoming day sions about poor weather conditions at smolensk airport descending lower than the safe minimum height necessary to make a second language an attempt at failure to react properly to automatic amongst those are the reasons which led to the tragic crash of the aircraft into the land and the death of those on board. the findings also claimed passenger pressure on the crew to land as soon as possible played a vital role in the incident here is evidence the crew was afraid of disappointing someone if they didn't land. it's

not clear whether the navigator was referring to the polish president or the commander in chief of the air force who was in the cockpit and later alcohol found in his blood poland was not satisfied with the draft report compiled by the i.a.c. which found pilot error was to blame and insists various factors at play caused the accident but aviation experts have confidence in the findings my experience with the russian investigators has been very good they're very high quality organization that i believe that it was the investigation was generally carried out in accordance with the international civil aviation organization and team which is the international standard for accident investigation the committee concluded that no single person can be blamed for the accident but now that the final investigation report has been delivered a criminal investigation can be launched and perhaps more light shed on the crash that killed the polish president his wife and most of the country's political.

elite and he's now a r.t. moscow. well prime minister donald tusk has acknowledged that part of the blame lies with the polish side however was or intends to carry out its own investigation and is currently setting out a formal response to the findings but as r.t. is covering us out of our reports even in poland opinions on the tragic plane crash remain divided. state of bringing closure to a very painful chapter in recent russian polish history the final report has opened a pandora's box of doubt denial and political mind games from rational disbelief so let me just. the goal is not a compromise but a complete disclosure of the truth of diplomacy and politics cannot and will not hamper the presentation of the facts our efforts are not to alter the facts facts are facts of the rule polish investigators are working on adding the parts of the report to the missing not changing what is already there to emotional outrage. but

today we see the consequences in the shape of the report blaming polish pilots in poland in general for this catastrophe and making it a one sided matter without any evidence we're dealing with speculation without any basis. but is this grief talking or shrewd political experience some believe mr catchin ski the twin brother of the deceased president and himself a failed presidential candidate could be attempting to use this tragedy to his political advantage. in poland is hard for many reasons. and first of all we are approaching the parliamentary elections i am afraid that. all this could be one of the most important battles of. contention between major political forces well some of owning our political leverage in their sights others say the cause of the disaster is clear cut. very complicated.

simple people. interested in so sometimes it's easy for. conclusions. in my opinion. both poland and russia have insisted on keeping this debate from influencing the recent foreign ties but with a story far from over it looks like some in poland are keen to keep things for. polish newspapers of their front pages with strong action minded words war against the report toss curses the aviation committee we will find out the truth and so on but these headlines that are how catchy are just words what actions the polish government will choose to undertake and how they will affect relations between

russia remains to be written. catherine as r.t. warsaw poland. well dave you're live on from the flight global magazine says that poland may be eager to distance itself from the blame but he can't find fault with the official report i think that the polish government is i think desperate to put at least some of the blame in somebody else's direction but incidentally i completely go along with the russian verdict on the on the air traffic controllers powers incidentally the air traffic controller did not clear this aircraft to land he had with withheld clearance for the aircraft to land and he wouldn't have had permission to stop an international flight like this one anyway if it had been a russian air force aircraft the controller could have told it to divert an international flight especially of this status the controller would simply go along and do everything that he could to help the captain achieve

a safe approach but it's a very very emotive happening for for the polish people however i can tell you this if they try to carry out their own report in order to allocate a little more of the blame in the russian direction i think apart from some minor technicalities they will totally fail to do that. b.p. has dubbed as historic its multibillion dollar joint venture with russia was all from after the companies will now join forces to exploit potentially huge deposits of oil and gas buried under russia's arctic continental shelf floor and that now reports from london where the deal was signed. it's a deal that both parties are calling a groundbreaking strategic global alliance russia's biggest oil company has signed a deal with b.p. it's the first major partnership between

a national and international oil company when it's done after the stand to be paid in exchange for a nine and a half percent share in the russian oil made. chairman deputy prime minister told r.t. it's the beginning of a new direction for the company. which is working on a new strategy aimed at transforming the company into an international energy holding our deal with b.p. is of course part of the strategy they've gained a great deal of experience including the gulf of mexico oil spill cleanup operation b.p. has learned from this experience and our joint venture will be carried out with the greatest level of measures aimed at protecting the environment we've been working with b.p. for many years they are competent and have strong experience of russian companies the aim is that b.p. will team up to develop three areas on the russian shelf that's potentially a lot of oil and gas down there which rosneft owns the license to exploit it's

a huge area around one hundred twenty five thousand square kilometers and it will be easy to extract the resources the arctic the highly inhospitable environments and requires sophisticated technology and billions of dollars of investment but aside from the cast b.p. c.e.o. bob dudley says they've got the life experience. has been working with us now for twelve years now and we've been working for us since two thousand and four working with. and i think to be honest we learned a lot about what happened in the gulf of mexico and the company's core focus on safety and risk management. for the environmental care of what we do the russian government's behind the deal and prime minister putin says all parties are ready for the challenge but you're proving that with the systems i would like to let you know that the government of the russian federation supports this joint operation

this is a project that could become global much can have a significant influence on the world's oil and gas industry russian's arctic reserves are estimated to be five billion tons of oil and ten trillion cubic meters of gas such a project may require tens of billions of dollars of investment and state of the art technology and we are fully aware of the recent which is the optics a highly contentious area with many parties wanting a slice of the potentially lucrative pie but experts agree this deal would trigger a muddy down but what lies beneath the exploration area that they're talking about is in the south car sea it's off the north coast of russia as far as i'm aware it's not territory that is disputed by anybody so i don't see this as being contentious in that sense it's being branded around the world as a breakthrough deal opening russia up to billions of dollars of investment now and opening a potential door to similar ventures in the future arguably this deal improves the

u.k. energy security and it also puts b.p. on a service financial footing following the massive losses it sustained from the gulf of mexico oil spill it's also a huge vote of confidence for the russian oil exploration industry you're at it. and still to come here are just a few moments of dispute over guantanamo. detention is once again the subject of strife between cuba and the u.s. says he wants his land back. and a happy ending to an icy saga as for three hundred people are told to safety after being stranded off russian far east coast for almost two weeks. well the pivotal deal between moscow and washington to cut arms is now one step closer to reality russian lawmakers promise to ratify start by the end of the month after it was approved in the second of three readings the treaty would see the country's

nuclear arsenals slashed by a third and it was signed by president medvedev and obama last year it was given the go ahead by the u.s. senate just before the new year after months of debate congressman out of several key changes forcing russia to counter-balance those amendments to keep the treaty intact the head of the se dumas foreign affairs committee constantine cause such off told r.t. that washington is responsible for the long drawn out ratification process but he also expressed fears the u.s. may one day pull out of the deal. they amended the senate resolution just the very dramatically and they left us no other option but to amend our decisions on the twenty fifth of january and we are going to rectify the treaty as it is and. to add two more statements by the state duma. to be included in the british occasion document but this time i believe the risk is

quite obvious on the american side that they will proceed with the strategic not regional but strategic and in the defense system small not the current president not the current government but probably the next president the next government each has a completely different strategy on this issue and in case it happens yes the treaty may be damaged and yes there may rise the conditions for us to to pull out of this treaty but again we are not there yet and we still have time to to make better agreements and to avoid any misunderstandings and that will be our invasion. this week portugal's prime minister repeatedly insisted that his country can deal with its own financial problems and doesn't need a bailout george socrates vowed to continue with strict austerity measures such as pension cuts and tax increases his comments follow speculation that portugal is next in line for a loan after greece and ireland the eurozone is currently in the grip of

a debt crisis that is threatening the block's financial stability experts fear portugal's demise could trigger spain's collapse which could be too big to bail out but financial adviser to pauline says that any survival package won't solve the fundamental flaw in the concept of the eurozone. this is not in any kind a way a final solution for the european debt crisis it is just buying time for these countries so that hopefully they will be able to get in control of their fiscal situation and the markets will start to to believe in them again that they are able to service their debt moving forward in reality what's happening is burdening this country with these countries a lot more debt to service and the jury is still out on whether they can actually turn their fiscal position around over the next few years you can't save all the banks and save all the countries because at some point someone's got a fire or all which is the other option which we've been pursuing so far is that we

just carry on printing money and everybody carry on printing money and we end up with hyperinflation and most currencies then become worthless so at some stage someone's got to fail but what we're doing is patching up patching up patches up hoping that the issue's going to go away pushing the can further down the road now the europeans have to start thinking about a complete reform of the european structure. this is all to life for moscow quantum of bay detention center has now entered the tenth year of its controversial existence and there are no signs that u.s. president obama will be shutting it down anytime soon the notorious prison in cuba after a deal struck over a century ago but calls are growing stronger from havana which says the u.s. presence violates its sovereignty and its reports the cubans want their land back. it's a place forever immortalized by images of torture known by its abbreviation get america's

notorious detention facility in guantanamo bay cuba has been the source of world condemnation abuse lack of legal recourse and indefinite detention is the norm it's also been the subject of decades of strife with cuban authorities who argue the forty five square mile military base violates cuban sovereignty and amounts to a military occupation the to greenland under which the u.s. has to be on cuban kuantan a moment let's hear it taste. from earlier earliest years of the twentieth century the plot amendment was imposed following the u.s. occupation of cuba after the spanish american war in one thousand nine hundred three was extracted from the day and cuban government under under threat under duress and in clear contravention of international laws like the vienna convention

the u.s. government threatened to continue its occupation of cuba unless cuban authorities agreed to lease the land for america's military base indefinitely or for as long as it paid the cuban it's a yearly run after the cuban revolution swept the island nation one nine hundred sixty it's revolutionary leader fidel castro cashed only one check and he insists it was an accident no checks had been cashed in protest no such he would never be signed today no such treaty signed today would never be internationally recognized the united states. will hunt down. and punish those responsible after nine eleven the bush administration swiftly turned its military base into a detention facility declassified documents show the us government used cuban soil to evade national and international laws to interrogate terrorist suspects a strategy journalist that they escobar argues is convenience you can ship to cuba

and never bring them to the u.s. mainland and they are going to live there for ever in a state of legal limbo most of the remaining one hundred seventy three prisoners at guantanamo bay have been detained there since the facility opened nine years ago awaiting a trial that afternoon president obama recently signed away his right to bring detainees to u.s. soil making it unlikely that any of them will see a trial or freedom any time soon some argue the u.s. violates cuba's sovereignty for this reason because this is the only latin american country for the past over this past fifty years has said you know then you straight to the eye of the american government or as they would say the american empire a country cubans believe should give rights to its detainees and give back the land that's right fully there is to handcuff this our t. washington d.c. . the music of

a rap metal band rage against the machine was played up to seventy two hours nonstop during interrogations. but ironically the band was always trying to fight the system that kept those prisoners incarcerated as its guitarist tom morello explains. when we learned that the united states government was using rage against russians music to torture people guantanamo bay we sued the state department to get to stop and we were unsuccessful in that suit and pursued over the course of a couple of years and i think it's a thing of the crime my only hope is that they hopefully at some point not the too distant future when the. war criminals of the bush administration are brought to trial by one day wearing their yellow jumpsuit and black hoods it will be the music of rage against the machine that is popular sells twenty four hours a day. and you can see the full interview with rage against the machine guitarist tom irrelevant about ten minutes time right here on r.t. . well the maritime drama is almost over for an ice bound ship that had been stuck

off russia's far east coast for two weeks more than three hundred people were trapped on board the vessel that is now being escorted through the frozen seas by two ice breakers two other smaller ships have already been towed to a safer waters the three vessels got trapped in ice in the sea off before the new year extreme weather conditions and technical failures had been hampering the operation. but wiki leaks founder julian assange could end up facing the death penalty in the u.s. if he's extradited to sweden but that's the fear of his lawyers according to legal papers released on tuesday the attorney said if assigned went to sweden it would be easier for washington to extradite him to the u.s. washington wants to prosecute him for espionage relating to the release of classified government documents and claims the sex assault charges against him in the scandinavian country are politically motivated and one european politician told r.t.

the case is becoming over politicized. i'm sure there's lots of political maneuvering inside the powers that be a very difficult position the americans want to get their hands on a sign which the authorities now think the game's up people can see what the european arrest warrants are about we don't want so my guess is our car know what they're going to do but i'm fairly confident that they're going to come up with come some kind of cynical fix that will allow him either to go back to australia or possibly to go back momentarily to sweden if some kind of deal is done about what charges will be laid against him but what they'll want to do i'm sure is put to bed this whole public media publicity about the european arrest because this is just this there are other legal instruments coming through which remove our freedoms in other areas of life all down in the name of integrating europe's legal systems. well there are always many more stories for you on our website at r.t. dot com and here is some of what's waiting for you on line right now the economic crisis in the u.s.

has brought many businesses to their needs and left millions unemployed but find out how government workers in washington have managed to flourish during the recession. and welcome to cardboard town this new game community has its own tyrant and invites guests to build their own identity using cardboard find out more on our website that's spot dot com. all right now let's get to some other world news in brief this hour and it to news you know political leaders to resume crucial talks over the formation of a unity government after weeks of widespread violence force the former leader from office it comes a day after the country's parliament speaker was sworn in as interim leader security forces are patrolling the streets trying to restore law and order amid chaos and looting in the capital tunis on friday the president ben ali fled to saudi arabia from where he will reportedly not be returning. but more than six hundred people have now been confirmed dead following severe flooding and

landslides across southeastern brazil soldiers and the military doctors are also taking part in rescue operations to find survivors forecasters say heavy rain will continue for several days in areas already submerged in water president dilma rousseff has declared three days of national mourning for the victims in the wake of the country's worst natural disaster in four decades. early results suggest that southern sudan has overwhelmingly voted in a referendum in favor of splitting from the north for results will not be announced until next month but the region is widely expected to secede ninety seven percent of the southern sudanese diaspora in europe voted for the split it's hoped to end a cycle of devastating civil war that would create the world's newest state. well to. of thousands of asylum seekers in the u.k. are now untraceable due to a home office blunder the border agency has built up a backlog of almost half

a million unsolved cases with some dating back decades robin simcox from the center for social cohesion says the u.k. has lost control of its borders due to e.u. regulations britain is essentially lost control of who is coming into the country and once you can secure your borders you can't secure your country this is a outrageous situation that's allowed to develop why there's a huge problem with the britons inability to deport generally being part of the european union we often can't deport people but country of origin because it may contravene the european convention on human rights on top of this there's a systemic problem where the huge backlog of cases and we have something like a half a million backlog of cases simply can't be processed and can't be dealt with quickly enough so you have a lot of people and net immigration last year into the u.k. was around two hundred thousand people more coming to the u.k. than leaving it to any out on top of the asylum seekers and the backlog and of course we're going to have a massive problem we just need to be much much stricter criteria on who should be

allowed into the u.k. and i don't think we've got it in control in anywhere near the amount enough because it is a very. the shooting massacre in tucson arizona has led to calls for gun control laws in the u.s. to be reexamined he's also known as the resident took to the streets of new york city to find out how people there feel about guns and today's society. do guns kill people people kill people this week let's talk about that i think it's ok you know god's not concealed weapons with the different. walking around in public with a gun is probably not a good thing but i don't have anything it's hunting so how do we prevent people who have guns for hunting from taking them out in public. you have laws against saying people can't walk around nude in public what about the argument that you should be

able to have a gun for protection you can use other objects for protection i think the more guns you have the more they're you able to use them actually in these seats to have it the more you allude to use it i can't believe how free you are to have guns here in america but what about the argument that if guns are outlawed then only criminals have guns. yeah i guess it made my own go underground but i still think they should be a lot more legislation on he can and can have guns is that possible in a violent society though. people who don't agree with policies put in or. need to be done and laws that need to be. politics or guns are more violent and deadly i think politics are more. you know it's part of humanity's constant struggle to figure out how to. before the bad thing happens prevent it.

it comes down to education whatever the topic is i think yes whether you think guns or people kill people. i think we can all agree on the bottom line that violence is wearily the answer. all right i'll be back with a recap of our top stories in just a few moments. the

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