close ne hold. this week's top stories on our t.v. tragedy dispute the final report on last plane crash that killed poland's president sparks debate as warsaw says it leaves questions unanswered. teaming up as russia. swap says in a deal to jointly explore the arctics potential treasury. and the nuclear arms treaty between moscow and washington move another step forward as russia's parliament approved in the second of three readings.

you all with r.t. as we are running down the main stories of the week the final report on the last april's 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. reports. for the first time the last seconds are heard before polish president lech kaczynski his plane crashed near smolensk turn on one board. the crew ignored warnings from the aircraft's automated system to call up and

advice from air traffic controllers to land at an alternate airport plus were inexperienced 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 let's let my failure to make a timely decision to land at the reserve airports based on multiple recommendations about poor weather conditions at smolensk airport descending lower than the safe minimum height necessary to make a second landing attempt failure to react properly to its magic 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 a very high quality organisation and 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 set 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. meantime prime minister donald tusk has acknowledged that part of the blame lies with the polish side however warsaw 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 all reports even in poland opinions on the tragic plane crash are 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 diplomacy and politics cannot and will not hamper the presentation of the facts our efforts are not to alter the facts the 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 the two emotional outrage.

today we see the consequence is 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 kaczynski 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 these could be one of the most important battles of. contention between major political forces well some of only got political leverage in their sights others say the cause of the disaster is clear cut vision is

a 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 thawing 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 to us versus 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 and poland remains to be written. catherine as r.t.e. warsaw poland. security expert chris yates told us here at odds are you that the official report presents a complete picture of what happened. there is nothing more to be said quite frankly i think they. the committee that did this investigation has done next job and they've they've they found what they found which is that the primary blame should be one of the truth. you know there is one important line in the transcript of the conversations between pilot and ground during the. final approach of the aircraft into the airport and that is that there is no condition for landing at this airport

and quite frankly with that sort of information being given to the pilot the pilot should then have made the judgment to follow traffic instruction and transferred to another airport nearby where better visibility better conditions for the landing might well have persisted. b.p. has dubbed as historic it's a multi-billion dollar venture with russia is all from last year after the companies will now join forces to exploit potentially shoot deposits of oil and gas buried under russia's arctic continental shelf now lore and 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 five percent of b.p.

in exchange for a nine and a half percent share in the russian oil may cross next chairman deputy prime minister told r.t. it's the beginning of a new direction for the company but. it 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're 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 the 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 cash 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 on the arctic for since two thousand and five working with our capabilities our expression capabilities and i think to be honest we learned a lot about what happened in the gulf of mexico and the company of the core focus on safety at risk. for environmental care what we do the russian government's behind the deal and prime minister putin says all parties are ready for the challenge but. 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 and 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 in state of the art technology and we are fully aware of the recent home which is the optics a highly contentious area with many parties wanting a slice of the potentially lucrative pie but experts agree this deal will trigger a muddy but what lies beneath the exploration area 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 server 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 are at it. still to come here on r.t. in just a few moments cuban fury the notorious for autonomy is a once again the subject of strife between cuba and the u.s. as a banner says it wants its land back. and a happy ending to an icy saga as three hundred people are total safety after being stranded off russia's far east coast for almost two weeks. or 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 that would see the two countries nuclear arsenals slashed by a third was signed by president obama last year it was given the go ahead by the

u.s. senate just before the new year after months of debate congressman several key changes forcing russia to counter-balance those amendments to keep the treaty intact the head of the state duma's foreign affairs committee constantine costa trough 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 with the senate resolution just very dramatically and they left us no other option but to amend our decisions on that main to feebs of january we are going to rectify the treaty as it is and. to to add two more statements by the state duma. to be included in the british occasion document the story made believe the risk is quite obvious on the american side that they will proceed with the strategic not

a regional but strategic aren't in the defense system small not the current president not the current government but probably the next president the next government has a completely different. created geo on this east to end in case it happens here so that we can may be damaged and yes there may rise the conditions for us are to 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. well this week portugal's prime minister has repeatedly insisted that his country can deal with its own financial problems and doesn't need a bailout shows a socrates vowed to continue with strict austerity measures such as pension cuts and tax increases portugal managed to relieve some concerns as it raised over a billion euros in a bond auction but this might not be enough for it to escape the fate of buying

probably greece and ireland experts fear portugal's demise could trigger spain's collapse which in turn could be too big to bail out but financial advisor mark opiates reportedly says only any survival package it just won't solve the fundamental flaws 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 control of their fiscal situation and the markets will start to to believe in them again that they're able to service their debt moving forward in reality what's happening is burden in 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 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 patching 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. the quantum a big detention center has now entered the tenth year of its controversial existence and there are no signs that us president obama will be shutting it down any time soon the american presence there follows a deal struck over a century ago but calls are growing stronger from havana that the u.s. is violating cuba's sovereignty artie's reports. 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 instead of decades of strain with cuban authorities who are you the three five square mile military base violate cuban sovereignty and. amounts to a military occupation the agreement under which the u.s. has to be on cuban kuantan ammonia 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 it was extracted from the dense human government under under threat under duress and in clear contravention of international laws like the vienna convention the us 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 cubans its yearly runs after the cuban revolution swept the island nation in one nine hundred sixty it's revolutionary leader fidel castro cashed only one check and he insists it was an accident no checks have been cashed stands in protest no such as he would never be signed today knows the 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 invade national and international law to interrogate terrorist suspects a strategy during this debate 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 believe there is jan hopkins aren t. washington d.c. . and it's not just turning on twenty minutes past the hour here in the russian capital you with r.t. and the music of rap metal band rage against the machine was played for up to

seventy two hours nonstop during interrogations at guantanamo bay but ironically the band has always tried to fight the system that kept those prisoners incarcerated as it's guitarist tom morello explains. when we learned that the united states government was using rage against machines 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. but that they hopefully at some point not the too distant future when the war criminals of the bush administration are brought to trial are one day wearing their yellow jumpsuits 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 morello in about an hour's time right here on r.t. . what the maritime drama is almost over for an ice spell and ship that had been

stuck off russia's a 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 a pair of other smaller ships have already been towed to safer waters the three vessels got trapped in ice in the sea of before the new year extreme weather conditions and technical failures have been hampering the operation. well with the leaks founder julian assange could end up facing the death penalty in the u.s. if he's extradited to sweden well that's the fear of his lawyers according to legal papers released on tuesday the attorneys said that if a stange 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 a staunch claims that sexual assault charges against him in the scandinavian country are politically motivated 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 the silence the authorities now think the game's up people can see what the european arrest warrants are about we don't want so my guesses are quite know what they're going to do but i'm fairly confident that they're going to come up with some some kind of cynical fix that will allow him either to go back to australia or possibly to go back voluntarily to sweden if some kind of deal is done about what charges will. we laid against him but what i want today i'm sure is put to bed this whole pub media publicity about the european arrest warrant because this is just this there are other legal instruments coming through which remove our freedoms in other areas of life all done in the name of integrating europe's legal systems. all right well there always are many more stories for you on our website at r.t. dot com and here is some of what's online waiting for you right now the economic crisis in the u.s. has brought many businesses to their knees and left millions unemployed but find

out how government workers in washington have managed to flourish during the recession. and welcome to cardboard town in this new game community has its own tyrant and invites guests to build their own identity using cardboard find out more on our web site that is r t v dot com. all right now let's get to some other world news in brief this hour. political leaders are to resume crucial talks over the formation of a unity government after weeks of widespread violence forced the former leader from office it comes a day after the country's parliament speaker was sworn in as interim leader security forces have been 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. and more than a six hundred people have now been confirmed dead following severe flooding and

landslides across southeastern brazil soldiers and military doctors are also taking part in rescue operations to find survivors forecasters say heavy rain it 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. and only new 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 earlier ninety seven percent of the southern sudanese diaspora in europe voted for the split its hope to end a cycle of devastating a civil war would create the world's. newest state. or the recent shooting massacre in tucson arizona has led to calls for gun control laws in the u.s. to be reexamined artie's at lower half an ist also known as the resident took to

the streets of new york to find out how people there feel about guns in today's society. do guns kill people or do people kill people this week let's talk about that i think it's ok you know god's not concealed weapons what's the difference. 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 say 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 you are able to use them actually and you see it's to have it the more you were you would use it i can't believe how free you want to have guns here

in america but what about the argument that if guns are outlawed then only criminals have guns. yeah i guess 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. it was like politics you know people don't agree with policies but still. need to be done with laws that need to be so do you think politics or guns are more violent and deadly i think politics are more leaving guns 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 as i think yes whether you think guns or people kill people i think we can all agree on the bottom line that violence is rarely the answer.

a few minutes time here and we report on the rebel. leant against the war that gripped american soldiers in the one nine hundred sixty s. but first will do i remind him of all top stores.

i got out of the military in one nine hundred sixty six i got over because the things i saw the things i was doing and this reasons that we were given for doing them it was a personal protest. during the vietnam war and to war movement emerge that altered the course of history this movement didn't take place on college campuses but in berets and on ships it penetrated only military colleges like west point and it spread throughout the battlefields of vietnam. today few people know about the g.i. movement against the war in vietnam. after the army we always said free the army or fun travel and adventure but it really meant we are. hungry for the full story we've got it first hand the biggest issues get a human voice face to face with the news makers.