desperate for a better life in europe who are willing to risk all. we got into a storm and our tiny boat sank i survived but six of us drowned. 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 eagerly 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 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. there have already 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 one hundred people in title but that's still not enough. with a wave of violent 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 rome is planning to deploy its army to the island to help the gateway to europe you've got this kind of. italy. from brazil from the danish institute for international studies says the global community could resort to sanctions to try to deal with the uprisings. a specter of

massive immigration has always been europe's was a nightmare brought to europe will be able to do 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. will appeal to the international community in the short term are very limited yes the name brussels at the meeting of the 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 colonel gadhafi is not overthrown i mean business cannot proceed as usual after that so something will have to be done and clearly one obvious thing to 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. put at least avoid call and 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. but within the last few hours the libyan leader vowed to fight till the again to die a martyr he called on his supporters to take back the streets from the opposition colonel gadhafi just appeared on state television a few hours ago for more than an hour in his latest attempt to cling to his forty one year rule of mid the nationwide revolt that's entered its second week khadafi

said protesters have been bribed drugged and the quote surge ignited hope is addressed comes after a day of strikes against demonstrators not covered in the police more than two hundred children ever since the first week of riots making this the bloodiest of all the arab revolts some libyan ambassadors and quit over the alleged use of force and they want the u.n. to intervene with leaders repealing countrified to put an end to the clashes. russia is among the states preparing to evacuate their citizens from libya amid the escalating political crisis hundred fifty russians are reportedly trapped in a railway construction site in the desert all together there are over five hundred currently working in the country at a meeting of the national counter-terrorism committee in russia's north of setting a president to be from event of war that the mounting violence in the arab world could bring dangerous consequences syria furth reports. we've heard president medvedev 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 political instability throughout these regions the decades to come solidity most of . 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 power that would serve 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 pro diverse 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 these democratic structures 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 in tunisia having the government save its right libya potentially following and they fit steps 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 for they snatched those that are working and living in libya at the moment has has got under way now a president made vader's orders they've dispatched four planes we know that libya has actually given permission for they still land in tripoli so there's over one thousand two hundred people at the moment evacuated over five hundred days and

russian nationals themselves and many of the specialist that are working on high tech investment projects in the country you know remember of course since libya has 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 the. one of the biggest is the russian railways the railway link project that is the to be completed in twenty twelve gazprom has also come out and said that it's going to be evacuating its work is there just last week they stein's a deal with their and 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 their foreign investments really being called into question. so a further correspondent there let's cross note to london to get economics perspective on the consequences of the rest was seeing unfolding in the arab world financial advisor market republic joins me live here in to you know these recent

events in libya they've already as we've seen pushed all prices to a two year high as you see it how much worse could it get could we see the price putting all records that we saw back in summer two thousand and eight good evening kevin i think yes well prices could go higher as things stand the ore price recent rise in the last few days has been more trying to price seen the potential risks rather than there actually being any disruption to supply as things stand but of course where the market's looking forward and seeing what is happening what if this this spreads and there's contagion and if all supplies. are disrupted and this could keep prices high for some time to come lot of could if so but at the moment but what could the knock on effect be what are we likely to see all of us on a day to day basis financially. course all prices have

a knock on effect to the cost of of most most items because of course you need energy to. to make products and deliver them to shop so. if for prices continue to stay tastes a high that will have significant inflation pressures on on europe and the world again hindsight so is a great thing isn't it but what measures if indeed any could have been taken by the world to counter the problem now at this point to stop it getting any worse and is there anything more that could be done to safeguard the world from financial ramifications of regional crisis like this in the future should any reforms be brought in. well i think that's a very big question i think that when it comes to the middle east traditionally over the last few decades stability has has come from. but nine in many cases benign dictatorships in some cases not so but nine dictatorships and that has

created stability in many of these dictatorships have been supported by by the west and if you like it's a it's a hangover from from the cold war long term stability can be created by by democracy but democracy can't be created overnight it takes years and decades maybe longer to to actually establish the proper institutions in all these countries which is separate which can't be taken over by. one individual or group of individuals like you have in a dictatorship so there's no there's no quick fix the situation the middle east is extremely complex with. lots of different ethnic groups and religious factions and is not something that can necessarily be resolved quickly or in many ways that the west could put some kind of preemptive measures in place and

i don't think that is possible and of course all this happening at a time when europe struggling so much to balance its books because america as well . well americas is showing some some renewed strength over the last six months but of course the the gorilla in the room. as you would say is course the huge budget deficit that they have in the u.s. which still hasn't been dealt with but overall in europe things are not going fantastically well save a few countries like germany that are doing far better and any increase in pressure with increasing foot costs such as higher oil prices will have a a significant effect on economic activity and may also affect consumer confidence in general if they fear that things might get worse if there's no end

game if this middle east. situation actually carries on for for a few months or maybe maybe years and there's no guarantee that this is going to be resolved in the near term marco so much of what we're seeing unfolding in north africa in the middle east as a result of rich and poor and has a wealth expert yourself what you think of duffy is worth what's the latest estimation and how much is that had to do with inflaming the protests we're seeing right now tonight. well of course of course that gadhafi is probably worth quite a few quid and he's put sure put a lot of way over the years a. significant civil unrest comes from the huge difference between the rich and the poor but it's not just live you have this across many emerging markets where a lot of the country's wealth in terms of natural resources tends to be taken by the few at the top and the average person doesn't see the benefits of the wealth

that the country has and this creates resentment and civil unrest over time that can spill over into the sort of situation that we have at present so. in many ways not looking after the poor is easy is the one way of. not guaranteeing but of. of perpetuating a situation where it may end up in a revolution at some point marco polo financial advisor on loan from london tonight here in r c good to see you thank you. well the other story british prime ministers of held his decision to take defense firm representatives with him on his tour of the middle east now critics are accusing david cameron though of exploiting the current events there. correspond more on this story for you it is the timing of this visit that has brought it on to say much fire we've seen that this is a huge amount of chaos in the middle east across these countries libya bahrain

yemen before that egypt and the police cracking down on these protests in certain countries and in fact there is there a former foreign office minister here in the u.k. a member of the labor party dennis shane who has called the prime minister's visit with defense companies at this time insensitive and he's insensitive and crass to seek to both u.k. arms deals with countries in the middle east at this very sensitive time we've seen 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 they 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 in relation to saudi arabia and we've also seen it

over a number of years a very in relationship between storage area and gulf governments and the military and police forces of this country in fact which is 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 number of years authorized the supply of 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 which is the officer training institution here in the u.k. and in fact 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 on rest in the region. and correspond with their will because about the stories were a little bit later. now also to come later in the program to your walk on the red planet. these. made it up there and what moscow allowed has to do with the germany picture didn't quite go to plan to get a seat on those pictures no you're not you can stay around for that a bit later than see it on t.v. . russian special forces have reportedly and radek eight hundred three gunmen in a counter-terror operate in the north caucuses some of those killed are suspected of shooting tourists in the country's southern republican the noble courier last weekend on saturday two masked men stop to many heading for mt elbrus at least

three tourists were killed and two more injured as the gunman opened fire it's twenty one eighteen moscow time some world news in brief for you now to bring you up to date with officials say that four americans have been shot by pirates after their 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 then detaining fifteen suspected pirates and killing another for the americans have been taking part in a rally when they were attacked. rescue operation underway new zealand tonight following a 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 the business district at lunch time office blocks collapsed trapping scores of people and raining devry down on busy streets it feeds it's feared some two hundred might still be beneath the rubble the second earthquake to hit the city in five months it is and it is the country's deadliest natural disaster for eight days. to rein in naval ships enter the sewers canal

choose their route to the mediterranean israel which views around as a threat so already called the move a provocation iranian official said frigate and supply the vessel heading now to syria for a year long training mission it's the first time the rands military ships of sail those waters since the country's islamic revolution of nine hundred seventy nine egypt's defense ministry says rand's request stated that the vessels would have no military equipment all nuclear materials aboard. the final walk on mars has been completed in a virtual experiment studying the demands of deep space travel this was indeed the last of three simulated strolls on the mock martian surface today mars five hundred is a project aimed at studying the physical and psychological effects on people if mankind were ever to undertake such a journey in the future a group of six volunteers are taking part that's three russians to you piers in a chinese man and then at the halfway point of a five hundred twenty day simulated journey that they've spent in isolation in

a moscow lab patrick flick is the founder of a company specializing in scientific innovation he told me earlier that even though this experiment is quite accurate in reality the mission will be much harder. 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 for help the radio messages take a twenty minute round trip so that really does add an extra rather more difficult dimension to it 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 when the charged particles that come from the sun because that really will be one of the biggest difficulties but future technologies face in carrying out this journey. right now but no to

our top story the truck trouble in the middle east and north africa news that british vehicles apparently been used in libya against the protesters get some more on this one tonight all of a sprog is the u.k. arms program director of amnesty international mr spragg evening now your own organization says that video footage confirms british vehicles are being used this is highly embarrassing if true to the u.k. government surely isn't it. well it's certainly true that in two thousand and eight the u.k. government issued arms export licenses for riot control vehicles the videos it's very hard to see because of the footage that coming out of the terrible scenes we're seeing in libya is obviously quite shaky and difficult to see but it does seem to us that the vehicles that we have seen on the streets in vain goals and elsewhere a remarkable resemblance to equipment supplied by the u.k. company and the u.k.

company have themselves that admitted that they have indeed supplied ten of these vehicles but with the necessary export licenses from the government the issue here is of course that we don't think amnesty doesn't think that the government should have licensed ten armored vehicles to libya ok but surely they could have seen this coming some would say i guess but earlier on the program david cameron as we've reported is visiting the region along with defense firm representatives and he has defended his actions saying that britain has got tough regulations about who it sells weapons to but i guess those regulations not quite tough enough bearing in mind what we're seeing playing out now. well that's it but it is true to say that the u.k. does on paper have very strong rules that it's not supposed to sell any equipment where there is a reasonable risk that they will be used to fuel armed conflict and human rights violations in this case in libya and in elsewhere and elsewhere across the region but particularly in libya i think the judgment has been wrong and i think they have

agreed the sales when when they should have done because i think it was clear back in two thousand and eight two thousand and nine when these licenses were being approved by by the previous government actually that there were very real risks that they would fuel human rights atrocities exactly what we're seeing on our t.v. screens right now what could the repercussions be now. well just today because the situation is so serious in libya and the city has called on the u.n. security council to impose a full arms embargo i mean obviously we've been calling on the u.k. government to freeze all future impending supplies of military equipment to libya but i think more importantly this is an international problem it's not just the u.k. that's involved here a lot of e.u. companies and governments have been trading in military equipment to libya so has russia russia has significant defense contracts with with libya and just next week at the united nations in new york governments are going to meet once more to slash

the tails for a new legally binding arms trade treaty now i think the lessons of what's happened in the middle east and north africa over recent weeks need to be learned and governments really need to commit to a treaty that's very very tough on rules that stop weapons sales in these kind of situations your organization is calling for a total arms embargo to libya but what we've witnessed the last few days again that's a bit late isn't it well this is this is entirely the point in this is the message that we would say this is why we need this is a treaty that's based on very strong international rules because the vehicles that we've identified that appear to have been identified from from the youtube footage should never have been sold in the first place and it was just amnesty saying now an influential u.k. parliamentary committee was very critical of that decision back in two thousand and eight. thanks for being on the line with us over sprog from amnesty international speciated. you're watching our team from moscow stay with us for continuing developments in the middle east throughout the night but let's catch up the latest

business now it's having an effect there of course the spike in oil prices kareen is here next. welcome to business well prices have climbed to the highest level in more than two years as the crisis in libya fuels concerns over crude supplies. has risen as much as ten percent last week now trading 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 due to the. prices could spike much higher if rest in the region spread. if conflicts will not stop in the next

couple of weeks we probably see the. price at about one twenty. i'm afraid if we'll see some conflicts in iran probably. one fifty maybe even more conflicts will stop and you know that peace will be there for a long time i think. in the short term. and may seek compensation from b.p. if the deal to join to develop rich fields fails that's according to the wall street journal citing deputy prime minister igor session rosneft and b.p. concluded the deal in january but was forced to put it on hold afterward drew opposition from a b.p.'s russian partners in the joint venture taking b.p. . claims the deal violates its close of agreement with the british while nature. looking at the markets now violence in libya is affecting markets worldwide u.s. stocks extend losses and the price of oil surged to

a two year highs as wall street signaled distress will violent unrest in which stocks are shedding the most on the prospects of fuel costs delta airlines american airlines parent amy are corp united continental holdings and u.s. airways group all dropped by five percent. and european stock markets dropped sharply as well extending the previous sessions heavy losses with the last point three percent germany's dax three point six points airlines also ranked among the hardest hit shares of air france dropped three point two percent and easyjet in the south. and in russia markets close in the red tracking those losses in europe and asia in the mind experienced over half a percent lower on tuesday after posting their highest climbs in a moment a week on monday. that's all we have time for i'll be back with more and less than one hour john.

top stories tonight thousands flee 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 instability with them. reaches boiling point in libya with clashes and protest as reported. the country refuses to step down. decades of turmoil if the protests continue. to pick up hundreds of russian.

and the red planet see that it's last guess for now with a six man crew making the final walk on a mock martian surface as part of a simulated mission to mars volunteers and a half way through the five hundred twenty day experiment in moscow. next artie's adventure man james brown head south to the pens a region to get to grips with the shooting skills there and indulge them nineteenth century poetry. in russian terms the pens region is just a short hop from moscow around six hundred fifty kilometers southeast and only an hour's plane journey away it's an area that any traveler should explore. the capital plans are is home to more than half a million people and although it's a modern city with a driving business and cultural scene there are plenty of nods to its past that around the streets. so this is where the history of penza began.