but since the recent revolution in tunisia it's become swamped by thousands desperate for a better life in europe who are willing to risk all. ten of them and we got into a storm and. i survived six of us and. these are some of the boats which were used by the refugees to get here and now they have these signs on them from the authorities saying their use is prohibited by italian a lot they've been only here for a couple of weeks so it's pretty clear their initial condition is far from seaworthy nevertheless sometimes up to two hundred people can cram on each one bitterly and tunisia used to have an agreement under which most tunisian refugees were intercepted before even reaching the island but now that the government has been overthrown the floodgates have opened and we were not ready for this according to one produces mir is becoming increasingly hard to keep the situation under control with scuffles between migrants and police. they're worried you've been

cases of robbery and vandalism it's really hard to identify them some of them may be criminals or even terrorists most of the refugees are held at a center where they're provided with basic help but it's equipped only for eight hundred people. we brought in additional staff members including police and even psychiatry just one hundred people in total but that's still not enough. with a wave of violence political unrest sweeping north africa and the middle east italy is warning of an exodus of biblical proportions it's calling for cash to help handle the influx of refugees but for now rahm is planning to deploy its army to the island to help the gateway to europe you go it was going off. it is. the brits scenario. the danish institute for international studies told us the

global community could result of sanctions to deal with the uprisings the prospect of massive immigration has always been europe's wars tonight in europe will be able to do that it depends on the ability of actually core donating among some of the governments that are most affected most concretely there is a prospect for from tax which is the agency in charge for protecting the borders to install some more effective lines of protection in terms of patrolling of the sea borders the instruments. bill to the international community in the short term are very limited yesterday in brussels are the meeting of e.u. foreign ministers the talk of sanctions was was voiced and definite death prospect is there i mean imagine if in two months time karl gadhafi is not overthrown i mean business cannot proceed as usual after this so something will

have to be done and clearly one obvious thing to do or one immediate thing that could be done is a visa ban on the regime if the violence continue at this at this rate. that would at least avoid calling prevent a corner of gadhafi from traveling europe and put up his tenants in several european capitals as he has done over the past few years anything beyond that including freezing of assets it's going to be more complicated but clearly targeted sanctions is the kind of symbolic as well as concrete answer that the international community can get if the if the violence continues at this rate. well in the past hour the libyan leader vowed to fight till the end and die a martyr calling on his supporters to take back the streets from the opposition colonel gadhafi just appeared on state t.v. he was there for more than an hour and his latest attempt to cling to his forty one

year rule amid the nationwide revolver sensitive second week now gadhafi said protesters have been brought to drugs and quote serving the devil is address comes after a day of reported army airstrikes against demonstrators in the capital tripoli more than two hundred have been killed in a four thousand injured in the riots making this the bloodiest of all the arab revolt some libyan ambassadors of quits over the alleged use of force want the u.n. to intervene world leaders repealing to the country's authorities to put an immediate end to the clashes. and russia was among the states preparing to evacuate their citizens from libya amid the escalating political crisis one hundred fifty russians have reportedly been trapped at a railway construction site in the desert although there are over five hundred currently working in the country at a meeting of the national counter-terrorism committee in russia's north of setia president dmitry medvedev warned the mounting violence in the arab world could bring dangerous consequences r.t. sarah furthur of course. we've heard president speaking today at

a security meeting and he was addressing the situation in the middle east and north africa and what we heard him saying was about talking about the real danger now let's go instability throughout these regions the decades to come so that if you look at the middle east could shatter into pieces the situation is extremely tense we could witness the disintegration of large and densely populated countries. but the thing is the situation there was quite complicated before and now there is a possibility that religious fanatics could seize powers that would set the region on far for decades to come and would spread extremism further extremists prepared such a scenario for russia before and they could try and make it a reality now but they definitely will succeed what from that list no we see russia's response to the situation throughout these regions is that it's been markedly different to that of other western countries certainly much more cautious

where we saw the u.s. being very bright and most practical we had a lot of that rhetorically coming out especially at the beginning of the protests russia's focus is really been actually takes more political dialogue the foreign minister sergey lavrov is really revolution does not a democracy make what now needs to be the focus it's about having a democratic structure is put in place and as we heard president medvedev saying that there's a real risk that that won't happen and certainly over the coming weeks and months there's going to be a real look at whether these countries we've already seen egypt and tunisia having their government savings right now libya potentially following in the states that whether these democratic structures can be put in place and whether these countries are capable of running a modern democracy we've heard from the foreign ministry that the evacuation so they snatched those that are working and living in libya at the moment has it has gone under way now of president medvedev orders they've dispatched four planes we know that libya has actually given permission for they still play so there's over

one thousand two hundred people at the moment actually waited over five hundred days and russian nationals themselves many of the specialist in the working on high tech investment projects in the country now remember of course since libya's been open for investment since about two thousand and eight we've seen a number of these high profile investment projects get up and running one of. one of the biggest is the russian railways high speed rail way link. to be completed in twenty twelve gazprom has also come out and said that it's going to be evacuating its workers there just last week they stein's a deal with an italian company to jointly work on an oil field in the country but of course with the potential overthrown of these regime now with thing these foreign investments are really being called into question. so first for reporting for us now a little later this just looking ahead for you how

a trip to mars got slightly off track find out what happened and why one of these where they ended up on the floor of the red planet that's coming up on. russian special forces have reportedly eradicated three gunmen in a counter terror operation of the north caucuses some of those killed are suspected of shooting terrorists in the country's southern republican cari last week on saturday two masked men stopped a minibus heading from out of these three to respond killed two more injured as the gunman opened fire. so world news in brief now to bring it up to date with officials say four americans have been shot dead by pirates off the boat was seized off the coast of oman last week u.s. forces had been negotiating with the hijackers until gunshots were heard early tuesday morning troops stormed the yacht detaining fifteen suspected pirates and killing another for the americans have been taking part in a rally when they were attacked. rescue operations are underway in new zealand for

the six point three magnitude earthquake that killed at least sixty five in the city of christchurch thousands of people in emergency shelters the powerful quake brought buildings tumbling down in the business district at lunch time office blocks collapsed trapping schools and people and raining debris down on busy streets and food some two hundred might still be beneath the rubble tonight the second earthquake to hit the city in five months it is this though is the country's deadliest natural disaster for eighty years. to rein in naval warships into the sewers canal choose day on route to the mediterranean israel which views around the threats already called the move a provocation iranian officials say the frigate and supply vessel are headed to syria for a year long training mission it is the first time the rounds military ships of sail these waters since the country's islamic revolution of one nine hundred seventy nine egypt's defense ministry said that iran's request stated the vessels would have no military equipment or nuclear materials aboard.

for all of the stories we're covering as well of course features blogs as it was so much on our web site and a chance to have your say take a look at r.t. dot com here's what's online few right now a couple stories we've picked out for you gunning for an education find out how college students a lecture is in texas might be given the right to carry loaded firearms on campus that's getting a lot of hits tonight r.t. dot com and the circus is coming to town legendary canadian troops said to stage the latest show in the. palace when they visit moscow next year. will come to the coop in a blizzard of winter blues. slopes and try out some new tech has got a little calendar excitement in its southern melting. triggers to keep you in top

form and watch you walk on the goal line carving the trail the sochi twenty four. on technology update here on our q we've got the future cover. the official location. i pod touch from the. life on the go. video on demand. costs and feeds now in the palm of your. wishes. dot com. one of the strong no to our top story the trouble in north africa in the middle east the british prime minister's of held his decision to take defense for representatives with his tour of the middle east critics are accusing david cameron of exploiting the events there lot though that's get some perspective on this cross

live to london there were joined by our correspondent laura discuss this a bit further so just what is the british prime minister hoping to achieve during this to at this time it must be said. well yes i mean his stated during this visit is to promote democracy in the middle east and he is the first leader to have visited cairo since mubarak was toppled so that is the stated aim of his visit but it has then emerged that in fact he's not going on his own he's not going just with his entourage he's in fact visiting with eight of the u.k.'s leading defense manufacturers now this is a tour which was planned well ahead of time and in fact coincides with the arms in abu dhabi which there are a further ninety three u.k. companies trading defense companies they are companies that manufacture and sell goods such as rubber bullets and the c.s. gas for crowd control to name just

a couple that kind of thing small i mean mission and of course as you say it is the timing of this visit that has brought it under so much fire we've seen this is a huge amount of chaos in the middle east across these countries libya bahrain yemen before that egypt and tunisia and the police cracking down on these protests in certain countries and in fact there's a former foreign office minister here in the u.k. a member of the labor party denis macshane who has called the prime minister's visit with defense companies at this time insensitive and crass his huge incentive in class to seek to bolster the u.k. arms deal with countries in the middle east at this very sensitive time. could possibly comes to move leases are playing a part in some of the accusations now. well it is i mean we've seen just just very recently embarrassment for the u.k. after it was forced to revoke arms licenses to both bahrain and libya amidst fears

that british arms had been used against protesters during the trouble but of course you can't sell arms to countries like this and to to police and military like this without being and still remain in control of what they're used for so although david cameron is now trying to ascertain that they weren't that british arms weren't used in the suppression of protesters one just can't have that kind of control if one is an arms selling country we've also seen in the past accusation of the u.k. selling arms in exchange for oil particularly in relation to saudi arabia and we've also seen over a number of years a very in a marriage to relationship between thora tarion gulf governments and the military and police forces of this country and in fact british police have frequently gone to help train police forces in countries like libya bahrain abu dhabi and qatar and saudi arabia and these are all police forces that have a propensity towards violence and some of them have shown violence towards process that in recent days the u.k.

has also over number of years authorized the supply of tear gas crowd control ammunition to these countries as well as small arms ammunition and we also have seen a tradition of the elite coming to train at sandhurst which is the officer training institution here in the u.k. and in fact by current heads of states formally trained horse the king of bahrain the head of jordan kuwait oman and cats are all trained at sandhurst here in the u.k. and of course this all comes against a backdrop of cuts in defense spending in the u.k. so it would seem that one of david cameron's missions is to ensure that the u.k. defense. product will always have a market in the middle east but the question that people are asking is is that morally right during this time of intense. in the region all right laura thanks your input there got some a column about this story as well from kay stedman from the campaign against trader say that cameron's praise for democracy just to cover his real purpose is selling

arms to undemocratic regimes and take a listen. you've got to remember that david cameron originally set this tour in order to seal arms deals with various middle eastern countries he took a quick trip quick to taught to egypt where he talked a lot about democracy and freedom praised the people in tahrir square but that really was a sideshow what he's hoping to do is sell arms and lots of them to the middle east and i have to say so far british arms sales do seem to have been very successful there but of course the main reason for these arms sales is seems to be for internal repression obviously it would have been great if we hadn't sold those arms to libya or to bahrain because then we could talk with a little bit more credibility about the importance of freedom and democracy unfortunately the way the british government works and it's not just mr cameron's

government it was the former labor government as well is that the british state is set up to support them for all on the part of u.k. trade and investment their defense and security organization specifically is there to promote arms sales and they have a lot of arms in the middle east including to saudi arabia which is one of the u.k.'s best customers so unfortunately it seems that you know no government has been willing to take the crunch and say we're going to be ethical we're not going to sell arms to dictators and she human rights abuses which is what these governments are. ok stearman they're from a campaign against arms trade in london it's ninety minutes past eight o'clock watching r t from moscow big day to day for space for the final walk on mars has been completed in a virtual experiment ended studying the demands of deep space travel this was the last three simulated strolls on the mock martian surface mars five hundred is

a project studying the physical and psychological. effects on people if mankind was ever to undertake such a long journey in the future a group of six volunteers is taking part of three russians two europeans and a chinese man there now at the halfway point of the five hundred twenty day simulated journey spent in isolation in the moscow lab six for this mission a bit further now we're joined by the founder of the capital science connection is a company which specializes in scientific innovation who better to talk to than mr fuller good to you thanks for joining us on the line from london let's start with this latest war today before the long trip but we hear it didn't all go quite to plan we got some pictures to show it and it seems that one of them tripped and fell dropping some specimens ok it's only a mock mission but i guess it does highlight doesn't it the safety implications if there really were nine months away from this world on another planet what happens if they were taken ill or injured. well that's right they are on their own it's not like

a trip to the doctor over the weekend where if you've forgotten something you can just pop back on a saturday morning in this case if you haven't got it with you you can't use it but there is actually a substantial body of experience gathered from other space missions thinking particularly of the recovery from apollo thirteen and from the experience of those people who are in the antarctic over the long long winter in the british there who've had to in some cases carry out quite complex surgical procedures as a result of illnesses that people are suffering so there is a body of there is a body of knowledge that can be drawn on there what makes this particularly challenging in a real mission when you're on the surface of mars or a long way from the earth is that if you need to consult somebody to help the radio messages take a twenty minute round trip so that really does add an extra and rather more difficult dimension to the whole thing you know how realistic can this be at the

end of the day ok the crew is halfway through their five hundred twenty days of isolation on this mission psychologically where do you think there are because knowing at the end of the day they are still actually on terra firma they're not up there is it really the same sort of condition and is this the hardest stage now halfway through. but it's really interesting isn't it ponder that and think try and put yourself in the position of these guys and think i've got another couple of hundred days or so before i get out of this and yet just the other side about war is reality you know it's not the real thing but i think the point is that these people have been psychologically prepared for this and we see in things like role playing games and so on that people really quite quickly get into the spirit of things and believe that they are where they are so i think these guys are really bound up in this but i think you're right that maybe just maybe the hardest part is

to come you know they've had in the first part of the mission the first half they've had their landings to look forward to they have the exploration to think about now they've got the long journey home and of course they've got home coming at the end of that but at the same time they've got a long period of boredom ahead of them and that could be quite difficult but i guess looking at it all i know the way i just just look at the broader picture of an awful lot of. a lot of time left are we any closer than to a real life journey to the red planet. well psychologically of course we know a lot more about how people will perform under these conditions now but the real challenge one of the real technical challenges that remains is working out how we protect cosmonauts on this long journey from the solar wind the charged particles that come from the sun because that really will be one of the biggest difficulties that future technologies face in in carrying out this journey thank so much so i

think and i think we're a long way away from it ten fifteen twenty years at least ok we won't put we won't put our bets on tonight that could see absolutely all right let's talk sport ahead jacqui twenty four minutes past eight o'clock moscow time kate syria twenty minutes times you got news that big football much taking place right now in moscow good news for football fans against pugs along occasion of the latest if they get through it's big news for them but before that kareen is here with the latest business or not i'll have a dave spade you know that those oil prices of a spike how is that affecting the markets all markets are affected everywhere kevin u.s. stocks decline as the price of oil rallies investors fear that the crisis in libya could spread to other well wishing countries in the region or lead to higher gas prices now we'll get back to that in a moment but first to the top story now oil prices have climbed to the highest level in more than two years as the crisis in libya fuels concerns over crude supplies w.-t. i blend has risen as much as ten percent in less than one week now trading at

around ninety one dollars per barrel libya which has africa's largest oil reserves has cut supplies by fifty thousand barrels a day with the opposition threatening to stop all the deliveries alexander nazarov from metal bar believes or prices could spike much higher if the unrest in the region spreads. conflicts will not stop in the next couple of weeks we probably see the. price at about one twenty and i'm afraid if we'll see some conflicts in iran will probably be historical marks more for one fifty maybe i'm even more if conflicts will stop and you know that peace will be there for a long time i think will come being drawn into you know in the short term. and staying with oil may seek compensation from b.p. if their deal to join to develop bridge arctic fields fails that's according to the wall street journal citing deputy prime minister. ross nafta and b.p. concluded the deal in january but were forced to put it on hold afterward drew

opposition from a are that b.p. is russian partners in a joint venture. so a are claimed the deal while its exclusive agreement with the british all major. now turning to the markets and violence in libya is affecting markets worldwide u.s. stocks declined as the price of oil rises investors fear crisis in libya could spread to other oil rich countries in the region or lead to high gas prices there is some good news though consumer confidence in the west reaches highest level in recent years despite mixed feelings about jobs and european stock markets drop sharply as well extending the previous sessions heavy losses airlines ranked among the hardest hit stocks because of the shop spike in oil prices shares of air france p.l.m. dropped three group point two percent and easyjet eight percent. here in russia markets closed in the red tracking those losses in europe and asia the r.t.s. in the mines it's finished over half a percent lower on tuesday after posting their highs climb more than

a week on monday and now let's have a look at some of the individual share moves financials were under pressure would spread bank adding almost two percent lower bank of moscow jumped more than four percent on use the city authorities have sold its stake to the t.v. over shares slipped back toward the end of trade the biggest gainers of the day were in the energy sector help not just by rising oil prices but also the prospects of a more favorable tax regime here in russia. was also. a focus on the oil sector because it has been a major article in that the mystery this morning regarding the potential oil tax reform which is supporting the many economists including our house here that the. export crude tax will decrease from sixty six percent to sixty percent which is very possible they will name so we've seen oil names such as ross ness of performing the market today quite significantly. russia's uranium holding arms boosted output by twelve percent to more than five tons last year the company

consolidates all uranium mines in russia along with during a mining related assets in other countries arms said production grew thanks to its financial strategy on external markets and its deal with time as we read in one in which it became the biggest shareholder. that's all we have time for for this hour but join me and about fifteen minutes from now with about the business update here an hour to. move it with.

the news today violence is once again flared up. these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada. trying to corporations rule the day. oh jeez available in the ground. the ritz carlton hotel motel hotel new millennium hotel. you can see. hotel mcconnell. hotel macau of an asian market resort hotel the same.

with resorts mccall's. potomac riviera hotel macau cintra hotel macau. with stories tonight thousands fleeing from political unrest in north africa or the middle east but as they arrive in european countries looking for safety they're accused of bringing violence and instability with. anger with the government reaches boiling point in. protest and reported. to. the country refuses to step down. decades of turmoil if the protests continue this comes as moscow sends in planes to pick up hundreds of russians working in libya. plus the red planet guests for now with

making their final mock martian surface as part of a simulated mission to bars the volunteers and i halfway through the five hundred twenty day experiment in moscow in the box tree. time more now on the ongoing unrest across the middle east and north africa next getting prima coffee's former russian foreign minister and an expert on the arab world we ask about the implications of the unfolding events that. super michael thank you very much for finding time to talk to us you take us to go speaking of the recent uprisings in north africa and in the arab world how possible is it in your opinion that they might.