how would. this week's top stories of. the. plane crash the pilot. of the world join forces russia. moves another step forward as russia's parliament approved.

the look back at the week's top stories and the latest developments here in moscow good to have you with us. so the final report on last april's plane crash in western russia which killed the polish president lech kaczynski has caused some controversy this week was source says the interstate aviation committee report is incomplete while the agency insists it's given the all the relevant information. as this report. for the first time the last seconds are heard before polish president lech kaczynski his plane crash near smolensk turned on 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 flying in bad weather the interstate aviation committee highlighted what they found to be the main causes behind the tragedy in their final report there's never a failure to make a timely decision to land at the reserve airport 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 blind 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 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 sad 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. prime minister donald tusk has acknowledged that part of the blame lies with the polish side however it was so intense to carry out its own investigation and is currently setting out a formal response to the findings but as catherine as ever reports even in poland opinions on the tragic plane crash are divided. stead 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 mindgames from rational disbelief back if there were but the investigation is incomplete diplomacy and politics should not hamper the investigation of facts for us facts are the most important investigators will add to the report the parts that are missing but will not change what is already there this tragic catastrophe was not and does not have to be a blow to good polish russian relations. to emotional outrage. but

today we see the consequences in the shape of the report blaming polish pilots and 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 this could be one of the most important battles of. contention between major political forces well some of owning up political leverage in their sights

others say the cause of the disaster is clear cut vision is a very complicated matter the 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 thaw in 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 task force is 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 warsaw poland. security expert chris yates told r.t. the official report presents a complete picture of what happened. there is nothing more to be said quite frankly i think the. the committee that did this investigation has to make simply read job and they've they found what they found which is that the primary blame should be for the truth. you know there is one important line in the transcript of the conversations between pilots 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 pilots 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 its multibillion dollar joint venture with russia's oil firm last miffed the companies will now join forces to exploit potentially huge deposits of oil and gas buried under russia's arctic continental shelf were and it reports now from london where the agreement was signed. it's a deal that both parties a 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 to be

paid in exchange for a nine and a half percent share in the russian oil growth next 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'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 russ nafta owns the license to exploit it's a huge area around one hundred twenty five thousand square kilometers and it won't

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 on the arctic for since two thousand and five with ross staff 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 we're going to focus on safety and response. 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. 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. 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 film 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 down 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 the third best by not 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 ahead for you this hour on r.t. cuban fury. is once again on the subject as once again the subject of strife between cuba and the u.s. says it wants its land back. home for your happy ending to an icy three hundred people have turned to safety after being stranded off russia's far east coast for over two weeks. but first the pivotal treaty between moscow and washington to cut nuclear arms is now one step closer to reality russian lawmakers promised to approve the start agreement by the end of the month after it passed the second of three readings the treaty that would see the two countries nuclear arsenal slashed by a third was signed by presidents but veteran

a bomber last year was given the go ahead by the u.s. senate just before the new year after months of debate congressman added 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 told r.t. that washington is responsible for the 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 at this time i believe the risk is quite obvious on the american side that they will proceed with the strategic not

regional but strategic. defense system small not the current president not the current government but probably the next president the next government which has a completely different strategy on this issue and in case it happens yes the treaty may be damaged and yes there may arise conditions for us 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 mission. this week portugal's prime minister repeatedly insisted his country can deal with its own financial problems and does not need a bailout just as socrates vowed to continue with strict austerity measures such as pension cuts and tax increases political matters to relieve some concerns as it raised over a billion euros in the bond auction but this might not be enough for it to escape the fate of bankruptcy synonomous experts. could trigger spain's collapse an

economy which could be much too large to bail out but financial advisor marco pierre tripoli says any survival package wouldn'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 are 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 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. the guantanamo bay detention center has entered the tenth year of its controversial existence and there are no signs that us president obama will be shutting it down anytime soon the american presence there follows a deal struck over a century ago but calls a growing stronger from havana that the u.s. is violating cuba's sovereignty. has this report. it's a place forever immortalized by images of torture known by its abbreviation 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 greenland under which the u.s. has to be on cuban soil kuantan ammonia literary piece. from earlier earliest years of the twentieth century the plot amendment was imposed following the us occupation of cuba after the spanish american war in one thousand nine hundred three was extracted from the then you've been governing 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 agree to lease the land for america's military base indefinitely or for as long as it paid the cuban early runs after the cuban revolution swept the island

nation one nine hundred sixty its revolutionary leader fidel castro cashed only one check and he insists it was an accident no checks have been cashed tents in protest no such she would never be signed today knows the treaty signed today would never be internationally recognized the united states. i 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 u.s. government used cuban soil to evade national and international law to interrogate terror 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 have profits are t. washington d.c. . in addition to what you see on screen here there are always more stories for you on our web site at www dot com here's some of what's online right now because of the crisis in the u.s. has brought many businesses to the news and left millions unemployed but government workers in washington have managed to flourish during the recession. and also

welcome to cardboardy of tell this new role playing community has a certain tolerance and invites guests to build their own identity using coal board . a lot of stories on our team dot com. the maritime drummer is almost over for ships that have been. russia's far east coast for two weeks more than three hundred people were trapped aboard the vessel that is now being a scorching through the frozen seas by two ice breakers smaller ships have already been towed to safer waters three vessels got trapped in ice in the sea before the new year stream weather conditions and technical failures have been hampering. we could. could face the death penalty in the us if he's eventually extradited there that's the fear of his lawyers according to legal papers released on tuesday and is currently on bail in england and sweden seeks his extradition on sex charges which

were previously dropped but which he says. one of his lawyers says it would be easier for washington to seek his extradition if he sent to sweden some american politicians want him prosecuted over the release of classified government documents 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 sounds of sorties now think the game's up people can see what the european arrest warrant we don't. know what they're going to do but i'm fairly confident that they're going to come up with some kind of cynical fix him are there to go back to australia or possibly to go back to sweden if some kind of deal is done about what charges will be laid against him but want to. put this whole. 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 down in the name of integrating europe's legal systems. staying in britain tens of thousands of asylum seekers there are now untraceable due to a home office blunder u.k.'s 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 british have lost control of their 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 a lot about why there's a huge problem with the britains 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 that immigration last year into the u.k. was around two hundred thousand people more coming to the u.k. than leaving it churning out on top of the asylum seekers and the backlog and of course you can 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. other world news in brief for you this hour in our world update policing gaijin a gun battle in the interior ministry in the center of the country with reports saying two government being killed or rotting has followed crucial political tool over the formation of a unity government after weeks of violence forced the former president from office and to flee the country comes a day after the speaker of parliament was sworn in as interim leader on friday the president ben ali fled to saudi arabia and expected long term exxon.

mobile 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 will continue for several days in areas already submerged 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. but the results suggest southern sudan has overwhelmingly voted in a referendum in favor of splitting from the north full results from not being answered till next month but the region is widely expected to secede. ninety seven percent of the southern sudanese in europe voted for the split so to end the cycle of devastating civil war would create the world's newest state. the shooting massacre in tucson arizona has led to calls for gun control laws in

the u.s. to be reexamined. stores and then as the resident took to the streets of new york to find out how people 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're able to use them actually in d.c. it's to have it the more you allude you would 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. it was like politics you know people who don't agree with politics but you know. 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 and move out of that we think 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.

well those were the week's top stories. with headlines for you in just a few moments stay with us here live in moscow.

i don't know the military in nineteen sixty six i got up because of the things i saw the things i was doing and this reason said 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 penetrated elite 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 the army. wealthy british style. that's not on the times.

markets. find out what's really happening to the global economy. global financial headlines. report. more news today. these are the images. from the streets of canada. today.