vicky to say really i mean we do we have heard today that sweden's prosecutor's office does plan to charge him because the main arguments in court today will be that britain should refuse to extradite you to an assault on the grounds that he hasn't yet been charged with a crime one of the main principles of extradition is that one has to be charged with a crime you can't just extradite anybody merely for questioning because you fancy that they might have done it so that step one point of course this is the first day of a two day extradition hearing is going to carry on on choose day and we're not even sure that we're going to have a result at the end of choose day in fact the judge might says that he might take several weeks to deliberate the outcome of this the charges that julian assange is wanted for for questioning in sweden include allegations of rape molestation and unlawful coercion made by two women back in august in sweden he has always said i thought himself that these charges are politically motivated as in relation to the

released of u.s. embassy cables on wiki leaks which are deeply embarrassing for the american administration now the defense argument that's being heard today includes the fact that students. human rights are understood to maybe be being violated sweden has in the past extradited people to egypt which has been accused of torture so that's one of the arguments and there's also his lawyers say a risk that the u.s. will seek his extradition in turn or even illegally subject him to a legal rendition to the u.s. and then from then on there's a risk they say of him being held in guantanamo bay or indeed elsewhere they will say they say arrest that he'll be subject to the death penalty and if they can argue that then his extradition looks like it won't take place because e.u. countries can't extradite jurisdictions that have the death penalty too i mean we'll have to wait and see what the outcome of this is but it looks like we're not going to know for at least several weeks. when you talk about

a possible illegal rendition to the united states we've got some politicians in america calling for the execution of julio saw an extradition to the us suddenly seems to be the biggest threat for songs at this point but what are the chances it could go that far. well it prosecutors in sweden say that's. protected under the new law from transfers to the united states is strictly you wrote rules that prohibit that they say that just because sweden gets hold of him it doesn't mean that from then on sweden can do whatever it likes with him they would have to apply to the u.k. for permission to extradite him but certainly. came and washington have a very close relationship and that may mean that it's easier for politicians to get involved and extradite ourselves to america although again the prosecutor's office says that politicians are not involved in the legal process in sweden but my colleague i need to now a has filed a report on relationship with washington so let's see what that says. so we

didn't a quiet little neutral scandinavian nation the foreign policy establishment in sweden has a remarkably close relationship with the united states of the country that gave us our flat pack furniture for dollar meatballs top model and one bombshell may not be so neutral after all american influence is everywhere from food to feature films but in sweden it seems to be supersized just the other day the deerhunter film was shown again on swedish t.v. for the. sixtieth time it's an awful film it's the worst propaganda of politics through the back door like swedens times with nato you have the military and some politicians cooperate intensively with the united states and with nato and the large mass of the. totally unaware of all the stuff going on but it's not just

what swedes are taking in but also what their leaders are ready to give from julian assange ons to terrorist suspects to nato support when america wants something they get it but why and what's in it for this so-called neutral nation they get. all the benefits of being an intelligence partner of the united states without the baggage of being in nato it's a partnership decades in the making there is been a willingness to. do the errands of the united states over many years from. questions of. making asylum seekers in sweden of a that both to the cia buddies is particularly strong now with a right leaning government in sweden and with the u.s. wanting him for spying and sweden wanting him for sex crimes julian assange is

wanted by quite a team and the songe wiki leaks case seems to be just the next continuation of this very old intelligence relationship here's some other relationships we dug up julian assange just ticks off the u.s. with fierce reaction from one of the country's most notorious neo cons is not a particularly credible source and love and he see as a you know tamil in my mind as it is a criminal only ought to be hunted down and grabbed and put on trial for war used earlier these words from karl rove who claims he's part swedish and just happens to be advising the country's pm while the former swedish minister of justice is a partner in the firm who filed charges against a songs for sex crimes with another link to the us thomas von stroheim is claimed to have handed the cia asylum seekers from sweden who were then tortured the question about neutrality became even even clearer thanks to some. the documents

from exactly wiki leaks and if the u.k. can secure asylum for bodies because off ski and ahmed zakayev both wanted for serious crimes in russia it could be argued there's another room in the british justice system to protect julian assange from the united states of sweden merica and let him keep blowing his whistle and he's now a r t stockholm sweden or me time journalist iran right now i told me only i thought sweden that the u.k. will face heavy pressure to comply with washington's interests on the julian assange because so many horrible crimes have been revealed already and the united states continues with the same policies they make some excuses here or there and their former president it makes it in his own autobiography that he gave orders for torture so i'm skeptical that just because one knows how bad the the devil is that that will curtail them from from prosecuting. on the on the other hand sweden of

course or great britain if they if they delivered him that would be bad propaganda for them the people would be very upset and most people i think would be very upset but again that's not the only determining factor for a government to make a decision as to whether or not they cooperate with the united states i mean the united states has so powerful they can they can harm economically and politically both the swedish government and the british government. you without a life are moscow words now just approaching the ten minute mark of the hour now stuck in a vicious debt circle an increasing number of americans find themselves unable to afford the bare necessities of life the looks of a wave of bankruptcy and the government's struggle to cope with the debt crisis. let's turn our attention to egypt now where the anti-government protesters show no sign of giving up after two weeks of revolt the country's new cabinet is set to

have its first meeting as thousands maintain a human chain in cairo's central square they're still demanding that president hosni mubarak step down but as always paul asli a reporter trees in the egyptian capital she says that parts of the city are trying to return to normal life. life here in downtown cairo is slowly returning to some kind of normality a short time ago i got caught in my first traffic jam and a policeman helped me cross the street so the police are back the cars are back shops businesses and banks are opening albeit for a limited time today there are still though thousands of protesters out in turkey a square there well and call has not changed they say they're going nowhere until president mubarak steps down now just yesterday sunday there were talks between the government between vice president omar suleiman and opposition groups those talks do not seem to have yielded much more than set up a committee to discuss constitutional reforms that committee has one month in which to deliver its results and also for the state of emergency to have ended earlier i

compiled this report. it didn't get more than a passing mention in the mainstream media hizbollah her mass and muslim brotherhood members in a jail break. from here and one two are going on there is no way to go to lebanon from egypt to go through this or to fire so who helped them any one of the thousands of protesters in egypt streets was the support for the demonstrators has played fast and although the muslim brotherhood the country's largest opposition group with an islamist agenda got involved only on day three that says mamdouh ramsey is part of the plan the muslim brotherhood will appear when they're sure the presidency will follow and when they have the support and power to control everything as they work in every arab country there they're below the surface and they're now talking with the government and the supporters are here shouting on the streets in two weeks of demonstrations they are rallying call hasn't changed step

down mubarak has moved any living of his friends traveled for forty eight hours to get here they've come all the way from him a trailer to be part of what they believe is the new revolution sweeping the middle east i was in eritrea and i watched everything on t.v. i wish i was here before. but coming here now is my contribution to the mail i am asking all my brothers in egypt to express their opinion without fear will never leave the blood of our martyrs who was killed in this revolution with a living then will bugger the brotherhood get some of its funding from the ran and tehran is already cashing in its foreign minister says the protests show the need for an overhaul in the region and ayatollah ali khamenei has called the protests and islamic awakening there's an opportunity for an increased role for muslims in the international arena from a political and economic perspective for the first time in quite a long while six years ago the american national intelligence council which is linked to the c.i. eight warned of exactly this it mapped out

a report on the global future it consisted of a caliphate one big muslim state created to social unrest a snow down in the economy and feel that really just movements if such a pan regional union did genuinely coming to being such a regional union would necessitate the breaking of very strong very resistant bonds that exist between the u.s. and many of the participants in such a putative arab muslim world and the u.s. is already feeling the heat with confusing messages coming from an administration that's unsure what to do when the protests first started president obama was careful not to abandon his old friend hosni mubarak but his loyalties soon shifted and he sided with the protesters to trying to keep on top of things while solve the shore of the muslim brotherhood reach the top of egypt's though impose their special agenda will go ahead to establish a religious state and despite them saying they don't want to be in the government they do they want to rule egypt and it's not just egypt many fear much of the arab

world today saying if it can happen in the streets of cairo back that it can happen so as the brotherhood sits down for talks of the government it despises it's not just egypt's future that's at stake but so to that of the region policy r.t. . russia's law enforcement agencies will go through a fundamental overhaul after the president signed a new reform bill and evolves a complete rebranding and the introduction of new standards of service that in a culture has more on this. bts a long awaited report what is a key plank of president made better if the reform agenda ideally this law on police said was just part of this major reform of russia's interior ministry which the president started about two years ago and he has said that the main aim of these police reform is to make russia's police officers more efficient and the work of police transparent. i've been asked many questions as to what exactly this will

mean it's just what we need it's a detailed regulation of police rights powers and. it's fundamental for police to work effectively not to be tempted to abuse their powers even though this is why the bill is a breakthrough should look like any other law it's not ideal and we should bear that in mind from the very outset i'm sure that implementing the law will trigger a number of suggestions and opinions you know which we can also use in the future russian milly's have a but image for a professional shortcomings for not living up to social romney to protecting its citizens said russian police officers are known for severely basing demonstrators for being corrupt for not following the rule of law themselves for power abuse one of the worst examples of that was the so-called court case when a police officer went on a shooting massacre in moscow killing two people at a supermarket and endangering the lives of over two dozen others but the most

obvious change will be the change of tan from his post soviet name elite it will be renamed into sorry state europe leads to russian court police well another dramatic change was actually how the law was at all. cost in russia because for the first time the public was invited to contribute to this debate on this trial bill all among the mountains introduced on measures to increase public and paul mantra control over the police and to ban the forest from the private security sector where it is now the key player also. no i'm not the restrictions imposed on the police is a ban on the use of rubber but songs that tear gas during demonstrations even if these are in sanction rallies also it allows for a telephone call to war and interpreter in case of detention this is something new to russia's legislation on police all and all over the thousand to man must work considered and four hundred of them rejects it now that this bill has been so good

we've the signature of the russian president it will go into force in less than a month. reporting that moscow has rejected renewed japanese criticism of a visit by president dmitri medvedev to russia's a coup real islands the japanese prime minister had described trip to the islands which tokyo want to reclaim as their own posterous and inadmissible islands in the pacific ocean actually passed to the soviet union after the second world war and have been part of the russian federation ever since. paid an historic first visit to the coup rules in november russia's defense minister also went just last week foreign minister sergei lavrov gave short shrift to the japanese criticism and said moscow only wants friendly relations with tokyo if. you have new people with each skew the expressions used by the japanese officials are far from diplomatic and in great contrast with the polite and friendly tone of the meeting between

president give and prime minister naoto kan and you can. i don't know perhaps it's due to the so-called northern territory's day that's been celebrated in japan today at the same time as we have said repeatedly we are still willing to closely cooperate with the japanese in carrying out specific projects regions of russia. now as the u.s. budget is slashed and the specter bankruptcy grows even larger with americans finding themselves in a vicious circle of that some are wondering whether the government is really coping with the ongoing financial crisis lauren list of reports. that suggests it's the reality america cannot escape with the city's roughly two hundred eighty million dollars debt more and more people are talking about bankruptcy news of debt like that hitting cash strapped cities and states all over the country altogether it could amount to two trillion dollars and

a bill many may not be able to pay the problem of the state and local debt is more serious than the real estate bubble serious because with millions of americans still unemployed and losing their homes there isn't enough taxpayer money to pay creditors local governments which aren't allowed to operate in the red must come up with the cash this means some may be choosing between default or devastation in many cases it will be fairly simple for cities to cut services before they actually default on their debt cities and states coast to coast seem to be trying this route and the toll it's taking on the streets of america is undeniable. camden new jersey is the second most dangerous city in the country you didn't see many cops on the streets to begin with and now may really any the city's had to lay off nearly half of their police force in detroit a city where people have been too broke to bury their dead the city's too broke to

repair dying infrastructure to fix roads or lights in the desert state of arizona cuts have been a matter of life and death. governor jan brewer taking a lot of heat over the death of another transplant patient after the state cut funding for the operations here in new york city huge piles of garbage like this one are all over city streets this city's behind on picking up trash after getting behind cleaning up after our snowstorm now public officials blame that on any number of reasons but one accusation that keeps coming up is this is the result of budget cuts cuts have consequences you can't just sort of cut and there isn't enough wasteful spending so to speak to cut your actually do have to cut services that people depend on analysts say the slashing will amount to an increase in unemployment and a lowering of wages dragging more americans down and the economy with it while the prospect of bankruptcy is threaten the pensions of public workers and may cause a run on municipal bonds so that will push the city counties over the over the

cliff in the past not the solution either scenario seems to be causing a widespread decline in the american city once relegated to ancient history it's a feed back towards economic shrinking downsizing and the urban is ation exactly the same thing happened in the roman empire when in the end broom was left almost a deserted city and all of the production shifted back onto the land that's what you're faced here although the land in this case looks like it'll be broad rather than in the united states as investment flees to other countries threatening to take with it the american dream lauren lyster r.t. new york. all right now let's have a look at some other news from around the world this hour. and troops are battling for a fourth successive day over a disputed border area a conflict is centered around a temple internationally recognized as belonging to come bodega although thai

authorities dispute this the clashes have so far claimed a five lives since friday and forced thousands of villages to leave their homes come. has urged the u.n. security council to intervene to prevent the conflict from escalating. the president says he'll support the southern part of the country's secession ahead of the announcement of the official results of an independence referendum preliminary results from late january showed that nearly ninety nine percent of voters wanted a split from the north but instances of over voting meant to some ballots were discounted southern sudan is expected to become officially independent in july. which fires are driven by hot summer winds are raging on the outskirts of australia's western capital perth almost sixty homes have been destroyed and many more damaged hundreds of people were forced to flee the area which has been declared a natural disaster zone meanwhile the cleanup from floods and cyclons which struck

queensland and victoria on the east coast last week continues that left thirty five dead in course an estimated five point six billion dollars of damage. and i'll be back with a recap of our top stories at half past the hour but next it's the business news with dimitri. thanks very much rory first of all in this program we look at one of russia's largest mining companies us nor snicko it's suspending its share buyback program following a ruling from a court in the caribbean the injection in st kitts and nevis will sort by elected in part because roussel which owns twenty five percent of north dakota the adamantium company is in a fierce takeover battle with. into ross group for control of the mine and there's been talk in the market that norse nickel would scrap its dividend to fund the buyback program now this was seen as a blow to roussel as it would not receive money to pay off debt. and to the markets

now european stock markets are advancing still on monday ahead of opening the markets in the u.s. banks are among the strongest. and shares of mobile phone maker nokia rallied on the thoughts of a planned management shakeup in russia quite the opposite the situation here trading in the red this afternoon the r.t.s. is shedding half a percent my six is losing under one percent financials then as you share there among the biggest drags on the indices p.t.b. is shedding one and a half percent this out of weakness is in the banks current share price it's seen by on this as a buying opportunity actually we're all kali's up a notch following reports that shareholders have approved a merger with the net and noticed nickel is below the line at two and a half percent on that news that suspended its share buyback program. such as examine head of g.e. rose around three percent in london the most in two months after the producer discovered while in two of its fields the stock as

a brand strongly since the start of the year reflecting steady growth in output. italy's biggest insurer generali could become the anchor investor in the privatization of better misty daily reports generally maybe back up to five percent in russia as the second largest lender that's as d.t.b. which is currently eighty five percent state owned starts the road showed sell ten percent stake in the bank to raise around three and a half billion dollars as the first big sale in russia's privatization program but it was stumbled out the head of research at uni credit says b.b. is a special case. i don't think that success of displacement real have any influence on on the whole predation problem this kind of special case the possible investors will be of use to investment funds where there is so for investment funds or insurance company for example or certain today i think and where the mr could tell i'm sure it's going to be probably

a long term investors which are interested in the russian financial market. russia's largest independent gas producer nov attack expects to increase output by up to fifteen percent this year and january and performed better than kaspar on which decreased production by about forty percent compared to last year now i would like is currently building a plant in the gas rich peninsula the first deal is expected in five years time the company says it's investing one hundred million dollars into the liquefied natural gas project this year in addition to gas producers looking for us to teach you pod not to take the forty nine percent stake. there's shell there's to attack of there's. exxon mobil has looked at it conoco phillips smaller companies i've looked at a couple japanese firms are look out so we're looking at a series of foreigners who have studied the particular geology who have studied the concept we're finishing the exploration started we're drilling three wells this

year there's already been fifty five exploration wells are drilled and then will engage the contractor who which was c.b.i. loomis to start with what we call the feed study and so we've completed the initial work and now all the infrastructure activities underway in the i'm open insulin. well be back in one hour's time we'll be looking at how the u.s. markets will open and russia's reaction to that before it closes monday's session see that. the but. the big.

culture is that so much observant of their future visit israel about finding the mark let's call it takes them a graphic a recent pew research report predicts muslim populations around the world will increase significantly compared to. the bulk of. bringing you the latest in science and technology from around flushing. we've got the huge earth covered. me it is easy to.

see. the book on. the by by the .

it with all of the law from moscow to the headlines now the embattled founder of whistle blowing web site wiki leaks is in a london court fighting attempts to have him extradited to sweden julian assange stockholm could possum onto a u.s. prosecutors. egyptian officials trying to woo the defiant opposition with concessions hosni mubarak's regime has held on president talks with the muslim brotherhood which is banned in the country but after a fortnight of rallies demonstrators in cairo say they won't leave until the president resigns. and russia's police force are in line for a massive overhaul after the president signs a bill to have them a rebranded and

a reformed the changes are aimed at fighting corruption and abuse of power by offices. well despite the traditional wartime casualties many forget to acknowledge the long lasting environmental damages our special report on that topic is coming up next. sometimes we think that it's easier to make war and to work to prevent it or to clean up after it the military is a major player in terms of environmental outcomes. the environment is war's silent casualty when we talk about the costs of four we really focus on what happens to the wire and the animals we really focus on that which sustains who live the life.