just in science and technology from around russia. we've got the future covered. in the. pro-government forces in libya reportedly advance on the rebel stronghold of benghazi despite bearing a cease fire. dismisses the u.n. as a no fly zone of resolution. it could be the move that sparks question france the united states into launching a decisive strike on the duffys regime under a united nations resolution joy need want to see it from the libyan capital in a few moments from all. the international community is accused of double standards with world powers focusing their attention on libya largely ignoring violence in bahrain and. engineers

a desperate battle to avoid meltdown at japan's a tsunami damaged fukushima power plant struggle to restore electricity. it's a good cooling systems could be pushing tomorrow but tracing the radiation now being to take it into. it with r.t. live from moscow bridge and i was just after four pm here and three pm out in tripoli now reports from libya suggest that forces loyal to gadhafi are carrying out attacks on the rebel stronghold city of benghazi despite the government's so-called cease fire. has called a u.n. resolution to enforce a no fly zone over the country as in balad all this as foreign powers meet him in paris to decide on what action they're going to take and libya french officials say

it's possible that military action could begin within hours of the end of the summit of these policy has more from tripoli. according to the gadhafi regime it is a hearing to that immediate ceasefire that a call for yesterday friday afternoon it's contrary to reports of a hearing from rebel fighters it is not attacking the rebel stronghold of benghazi in fact the gadhafi regime has gone so far as to say it is the rebels who are not hearing to the cease fire and that they're the ones who are on the offensive very different story emerging from opposition leaders there insisting that the city of benghazi is under attack they say they conduct the soldiers have taken up positions around the southern parts of the town that they firing from tanks there they're also reporting that they have been is strikes since last night and that many of the targets are civilians we're hearing form where the leaders of that many people have been injured many more have been killed early this morning a fighter jet was shot down over there in gaza all these reports conflicting as they are concerning because they come just hours after the libyan foreign minister

said that the gadhafi regime was implementing a cease fire that followed a decision by the united nations for a no fly zone to be implemented as soon as possible but we certainly have heard an increasing urgent calls by opposition leaders for the international community to get involved in light of what they say is watching what's happening on the ground caused by the gadhafi regime the leaders attending to emergency summit in paris have indicated that if gadhafi is in fact breaking the cease fire they will be very soon to act and then i guess we could see a no fly zone being implemented as soon as tonight saturday pushing has already indicated that it's since it's typhoon and tornado jets to this part of the world they also say that they are on board to launch military strikes as soon as possible the same word coming out of france now the american president barack obama has given an ultimatum to gadhafi he says that if in fact his forces are fighting if they are not appearing to the cease fire and if in fact they're not allowing for humanitarian access well then the international community will act immediately

there is a growing concern certainly on the ground here that the naval fields are being created. so much more foreign involvement it is true that the rebels want to see a no fly zone implemented as soon as possible but no one in this country once just to be an excuse for foreign intervention there is growing concern that under the banner of humanitarian assistance we could see through scale foreign intervention happening here the whole idea of a no fly zone has shortcomings we need to remember there were no fly zone was implemented in iraq saddam hussein remained in power there for another ten years in bosnia after the no fly zone was implemented then we had this sort of i mean it's a massacre these kind of examples can be used to illustrate the limitations of the no fly zone and that is why people here in libya are very fearful that the international community might decide that a no fly zone is not enough and some people use it as the beginning for a full scale military intervention in this country which nobody here one's. reporting that violence is raging across the arab world the u.n.

security council is only moved so far in libya while people demanding changes in countries like bahrain have been left to fend for themselves longest in our exports the difference. you may find some images in this report is startling. god is great. the final words of this purported peaceful protesters in bahrain. before he appears to be shot allegedly by buffer a new security forces since martial law was declared this week the bahraini government has crackdown on pro-democracy protesters clearing them out of pearl square where they've been demonstrating. and viral videos though the details can't be confirmed have been surfacing on the internet appearing to show police shooting protesters. point blank it's reminiscent of another uprising against an autocrat i want to address the situation in libya when images and reports of violence against

protesters they could doppies hands in libya reach the u.s. we saw the president take a stand. as. early on president obama called her plans for a no fly zone over libya now here at the united nations the security council has since taken the lead on that but meanwhile the united states has already sent warships along with humanitarian aid in libya's direction it's tough economic sanctions on the country essentially freezing it out of u.s. banking systems and reports suggest the u.s. has also played a more cofer role in the north african conflict an opposition that the cia. for thirty years right now. according to people in direct contact with activists on the ground in bahrain they too are begging for help from the u.s. .

the u.s. has a military base in the island country the navy's powerful fifth fleet and six thousand troops are stationed there. and in response to the brutal crackdown the u.s. president has wielded his authority to pick up the phone and call the king of bahrain the president expressed his deep concern over the violence in bahrain and stressed the need for maximum restraint and words of forces on the ground now backed by one thousand saudi arabian troops don't appear to be listening to critics say the talk doesn't amount to any help for the bahraini people it amounts to this absolutely there's a double standard in the way the u.s. deals with friend versus flow unlike libya brain is a strong u.s. ally in the oil rich persian gulf it's all about oil it's also all about trio

political military strategy the us has a lot of military assets in the persian gulf right now we want to make sure they stay there and us interests coming at the cost of people's lives and at the cost of the values of human rights and democracy the us claims to care so much about some of the blood is worth this and blood is more important it's just a political stand that goes against everything we believe in in this country but you're looking at american. gunships. and protesters in the capital and that is where the united states stands on the issue tacitly behind autocrats. or against depending on the threat to u.s. interests not to lives lauren mr r.t. new york you can follow all the rest of elements in libya on our twitter and facebook pages links also to our videos and our regular.

it's. hard now for more on the escalating situation in libya and let's talk to our jim brown who's an answer walk across town joins us live from london. so i guess the coffee declared a cease fire but now we're hearing that he's called the u.n. resolution valid and is attacking rebels in benghazi what are his motives here what is he doing is he is he possibly just playing for time. well i think he's quite. for all the appearance that he gives and obviously gives the appearance

of eccentricity on the other hand he's quite an astute operator. and the story is the illegality of the u.n. resolutions goes i mean just from the point right i mean or i think that's a perfectly valid point to make but that's a different question obviously from its tactics on the ground and. precisely what's going on of course i can't say from sitting here in london but there does seem to be a clear difference between what's coming out from. from the fish was a blip you know one saying there's a ceasefire. the i think it was the foreign minister yesterday saying that libyan forces probably by the resolution well it's hard to say whether or not a ceasefire is in effect because we just you know. are shot down over benghazi that the rebels claim the jet belongs to them. does belong to the rebels tell me this

how will the international forces act if the no fly zone is imposed under the resolution to have to shoot down the rebel planes as well is that correct. while it does say no flights within libya so. i mean i think the whole thing is a mess so the resolution itself is full of holes like that. because i think you have to question the whole process and once you start in the process the. arab league contradictory and full of then you end up with more and more pitfalls along the way when you say quite frankly i will oppose the resolution states the resolution one hundred seventy three it states that quote any and all action may be taken to protect civilians in libya seems rather a broad scope of a resolution that. well exactly but that's that's the point i'm making but you can interpret so many things and then i mean what on earth you mean by protecting civilians. presumably it means protecting civilians from both sides because there

are. suggestions of. of atrocities on both sides you know one sided thing. but of course i think the central point is that the whole thrust of the intervention is not just you know sort of the principle thing and that accounts for the. for the contradictions and the holes in the resolution or if we if we just step aside from the resolution one nine seventy three from the u.n. security council at this very moment world leaders are meeting right now for an emergency summit in paris i would expect not will be here next. i don't think anything major will come of it you have this i mean any clear departure will come from that you will have this process rolling on with its with its. killer features you have this thing that. for example

stayed very largely out of it and then suddenly when the resolution was passed yesterday makes very specific demands which clearly were not in the resolution of the demands that for example the. government forces pull back from a series of town. that kind of thing so you have a clear intention through of different parties to make of it what they will and i think that we will see that process roll on what do you do as as these external western parties get involved here should they be getting involved in the process. no i think i think that i think you have to look at the last week as a single thing then you have to look at the middle east or the middle east right north africa as a single space because what you have is a very similar situation going on in in bahrain is in many ways exactly the opposite feature so enough rain you have for example robert gates united states

defense secretary goes through. we could go as talks leave and two days later the. gulf cooperation council especially saudi forces go in and they go in and they intervene on the side of those who are suppressing we're about. that potentially clears the way for the frees up the embarrassment they hope so that when they all could operate in exactly the opposite way that say to intervene on the side of the rebels against the government in libya as you say that as you say intervention should not be taking place from external western powers you're from stop the what do you just what do you want them to stop the war in libya. well we we do have a line of. broadly sympathetic to the whole revolt in the in the region in general. we. i mean for example we want

if you put it that way to stop the war in bahrain but they're stopping the war in iraq rain by effectively intervening on the side of the government whereas in the case of libya they want to quote stop the war by intervening on the side of the rebels i mean the hope the opposition since for me completely untenable and i'm full of holes all right you've run from me i stop and walk on issues like another thank you. right now they may be absorbing dangerously high levels of radiation but teams at the fukushima power station are continuing their battle to restore electricity to the plant's crippled reactors it's believed to be key to restarting the cooling system and avoiding a nuclear catastrophe parties are burning up and join us live with all the latest about the. tepco claims the power could be restored any minute now but it's been a day already counting the look at the moment any progress there at this point.

well there is progress yes some power actually has been restored to parts of the nuclear plants not the crucial areas yet there's cooling systems in the reactors but that's what they're aiming to get but what are doing and what they have done is meet our cables to reactor number two trying to do it the other reactors electricity hasn't yet been turned on because if they do that they fear that it might now function so what they're doing now is doing the checks saying if they if their electricity will go through without any problems if that does happen i think they will be at a good clip to speak to both cooling systems and cooling plants and get them started as early as tomorrow now that will be a massive relief for those fifty workers who are doing everything they can because that's what they've been trying to do for the last eight days get those cooling systems up running get the temperature down in the meantime of they've done is trying to pour water into the reactors and they've had again military fire engines on the ground shifting canons of water into the spent fuel pools of the reactors

number three and four because the water levels in those believed to be dangerously low if it falls below the fuel rods and exposed exposes those to the air then there is fear that radioactive substances could escape now earlier the u.n. did actually say these those engineers there those fifty workers known as the thug regime and if the they base a race against time to get the situation under control if they get their electricity restored to the water comes tomorrow they might just win that race that either we're getting reports here about traces of radiation being found in the tap water around and some other areas that could have dire consequences or being the number one source of public water there was another the news on the ground of people reacting to this and how are they. we've heard those reports on the japanese news agency needs and i should stress that these are just traces of radiation it's not nothing dangerous going on thought but it is a worry and even as early as last saturday

a week ago when there was news of these the first explosion of the year one of the reactors at fukushima people were buying bottled water and even in tokyo as far as bad as the absentees came out and the government was issuing warnings people just in the area of the same boat remove all three cases of contamination so that it was spreading south and in from all the way up. up as far as sendai where i was though it's weak of the water as it was in short supply even a few days ago and take it. out and were empty there as people were trying to avoid getting tap water from fears of contamination and those theories have spread to food stuffs as well and the government did send checks on milk and spinach in neighboring prefectures to fukushima earlier today and they found found radiate radiation levels leak of normal again no danger to one's health but there is is obviously now. the government spokesperson a cheap cabinet secretary has said that radiation levels outside the thirty

kilometer exclusion zone. and not harmful to the human health lot of governments are believing that they're getting it their nationals out and also an imagery the fingers are being pointed now questions being asked who was the blame for this could have been avoided in the main issue is coming up now months that exit experts worldwide is the issue of privatization of japan's nuclear power because tokyo electric power company owns the plan and the questions now being asked if it was safety compromised for profits. no matter how hard they try disaster still looms at fukushima attempts to cool the reactors have been applauded for bravery but it's been a week since cooling capability was lost and there's no end in sight to this crisis the implications are that radiation already has spread a fair distance there probably will be an area around the plant like turn or wall that will be uninhabitable for the foreseeable future could get far worse than less

the plant's cooling systems may have been crippled by natural disaster but some are now questioning the merits of the manmade decision to build reactors near the so-called ring of fire this is completely a human a guess aster because that plant should never have been located there in the first place and citizens have pointed out the fact japan's nuclear industries also in private hands has led to accusations profits were put before safety fukushima's owner already has a questionable past with a history of falsifying safety records at the site back in the eighty's i think we also have to review the idea of privatized nuclear power because privatized nuclear power cutting corners and i think we're watching those corners being cut today what we'd like to see is the government take over these these these nuclear reactors private corporations because private corporations need purpose for existing is to maximize profits and by next most in profits in the nuclear sector we're talking

about i mean amazing concerns the public see it and lost private investors may be needed to get the ball rolling it's the other way around if things go wrong i think it's going to be inevitable and the state will take over in order to contain these plants though they'll probably need to be covered with concrete and sand much like a train or was and i think the state will take over responsibility for that. i think whether the state has it or private companies do it. it's very difficult for anyone to mystra japan's no stranger to nuclear tragedies this is where the second atomic bomb was dropped to nine hundred forty five they're trying everything they can at fukushima to furthur another disaster but it has nuclear watchdog is already expecting wider consequences the question is how many will be affected either bennett's r.t. my second thought actions and emotionally teams working at the fukushima plant know

their mission to avert a nuclear disaster could end up taking their lives rattle thompson three mile island in pennsylvania after a somewhat accident one nine hundred seventy nine now explains what risks the workers are facing what the people in japan are going right through right now it's kind of hard to tell because no one has access to them as far as i can see and i fear for their safety in fact they fear for their lives sometimes the radiation is so high that a person going into say hot room can only be inside there for maybe three minutes and then they have to come out someone else has to go in to finish their job so you can imagine the intensity trying to say trying to change a vowel you go in with the welding machine and. it takes you three or four minutes just to bring that in there you haven't even plugged anything in yet when you have to leave you're done for the month we don't know the input conditions inside the plant though most of us. from the industry confirm that it's very very dangerous i

think pouring water in in massive amounts and they should be probably taurean worry gas or boron in in massive amounts as well is the really the only cut the only thing they have left it's almost like a hail mary pass my only real regret is that the entire area was not evacuated sooner as soon as the evolution started that would have been the moral thing to do and that is not been accomplished and for that i'm very disappointed. well meantime what robert allen who was an expert on environmental and energy policy sighs that there are many thank you. from which you must station making the situation potentially more difficult to control the. japanese authorities appear to not still have control over the situation they are taking measures that are of a desperate nature that or i guess you would call it improvisations on the playbook and it doesn't appear at this time that they're working the concern to have had

about this is the hazards of the spent fuel storage pools the water has either completely or partially drained and it's likely that the spent fuel. has is to catch fire is already caught fire cesium one thirty seven is really the bad actor in this because it volatilize is and it has a half life of thirty years it gives off external penetrating radiation so if it lands on the ground in any significant quantities then you're standing here by the gamma rays coming off it or exposing your whole body multiple organs are moments when it over time it mimics pap potassium and is accumulated by a cumulated in biota in the food chain and so it sticks around for a long time in the rule of thumb is that it takes about ten have lives for this

material to do it be kate on the levels that are presumed to be safe supportive nuclear power i say it's a clean and relatively safe way to produce change with the current crisis on holding up the question about it being forced to balance the benefits and potential dangers of atomic stations as we have. as you can struggle with a nuclear crisis are you concerned about the stability of nuclear facilities near you this week let's talk about that. some a field is called not a nuclear plant in england but it's pretty safe you feel like it's safe. we ourselves live across the river from a nuclear power plant virginia and it's it's it's it's a concern certainly it's better than spending a lot of tax dollars on a new energy source for something you know it's like this go to you know you look

at cell phones you know cell phone chargers radio waves if a report came out tomorrow their cell phones cause cancer if you're going to cell phones down no they're not so people take the nuclear energy if it saves even works people are really interested in you know surfing wins and different kinds of alternative energies leaving about us. enough companies put enough money into the research of this enough research dollars that it's not going to be a viable alternative and what pays for those is tax talisay correct so if you stop spending money on war we can start spending money on energy getting that would never happen. hopefully in my lifetime i find it amazing the amount of energy what's being used here in eric rose in light specifically here on times square so i think people are. maybe a bit too much used to use loads and loads of energy so i guess it's what's going to be quite hard to get them to use. to spend more on green energy because they're

going to be more expensive do you support nuclear energy you know right now well because it's a disaster i think you think it's a disaster waiting to happen absolutely so what should we do because we consume a lot of energy on idea i have no clue i go if you don't know then how can we rule out nuclear energy why are still many people so afraid of nuclear energy i know that this is happening right now but most plants are pretty safe show i think it centers on people always thinking the worst and maybe that's the reaction from nine eleven even with people always think of the things that can get bad so i think there's an armageddon feeling whether or not you support nuclear energy the bottom line is that with all of our energy out since there comes in one form or another a high price to pay. our talk back with the headlines saying that just a few months. it's

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