market. scandals find out what's really happening to the global economy for a no holds barred look at the global financial headlines to cause a report. this is see the international news broadcaster from moscow is kevin i was here this hour with a top story update for you it is a growing number of senior libyan officials are reportedly fleeing the country the regime has resumed attacks on a rebel held city meantime seven mil civilians are said to be killed coalition air strikes. a prison term for investing in georgia an israeli businessman gets seven years in jail for bribery but his moyers claim he was entrapped by the country's

authorities would show the investor one hundred million dollars. and japan's authorities are under fire for the way that the dealing with the fukushima nuclear plant disaster and their own willingness to expand the exclusion so the criticism comes amid an admission from officials that the evacuation of tens of thousands of people around the place is passivity said the long term. one of those top stories for the situation in libya in crosstalk where people of all us his guests if the coalition is about to support its by arming the rebels. came. along in the welcome to crossfire computer lavelle arming to win the conflict in libya has reached a stalemate should western powers expand their intervention and arm the and take adopt the rebels would this be tantamount to choosing sides in

a growing civil war and as time passes does an end game in libya become even more elusive. can. you discuss the ongoing stalemate in libya i'm joined by jim el-gamal he's in london he's a libyan writer and political activists he's also a british coordinator for the rebel interim national council of libya in washington we have ivan eland he's a senior fellow and director of the center on peace in liberty at the independent institute and in tucson we have leila hudson she is an associate professor of near east studies at the university of arizona and another member of our crossfire came you know on the hunger all right this is crossed out that means you can jump in anytime you want if i could go to tucson or should you the united states and its western allies one way or another legally or illegally or a split the difference between the laws and what we want to do morally give arms to

anti kadafi rebels and i'm not going to use the word democratic right liberals yet until someone can convince me they are democrats go ahead. what i believe or not is not really the issue we've already taken the first steps down this road and if you look at the last twenty four hour news cycle you'll see that there are special forces on the ground in libya right now and in an afghanistan style scenario that is the first step towards ever greater. involvement in the conflict on the ground there are two different interpretations of what's going on on the ground on the one hand these special forces these u.s. special forces are probably doing much more precise and specific targeting on behalf of the air attack the tactical phase of the air attack

but if you look at the washington post this morning the argument is in fact that intelligence on the ground is actually trying to figure out who the rebels are in order to better position the united states politically so again whether one is pro or anti intervention the first steps down the slippery slope already been taken jim in london if i can go to a view you support having the powers arm be and i could offer you force is it will that make a difference in the stalemate that these two are we can see on the ground right now a stalemate will that make a difference will it make your side when. well first of all we have to remember that the security council there is a consecutive council resolution banning export of weapons to libya however and the other hand we can see now it is not is not only in even situation that that he has very have having our military armory tanks he has multiple rocket launchers he has

artillery his shelling cities and towns and residential areas whereas the fighters of the revolution or the freedom fighters out of very very lightly armed so did comes a point where we ask the question well you know just because there is an empowered group or because we should not on one side can we just sustain this this mass killing can we just turned a blind eye and say well you know it's tough you know we can shell and you know launch all these rockets and kill all these the brilliance but we cannot out of the other side is i don't i think there is a very strong moral issue the on the other hand also really peons have frozen assets outside libya in tens of billions we have also oil which we are we can no export through and an agreement with qatar so why not be allowed to buy buy weapons to defend ourselves against a mad best world who has who is insisting on going and going on killing his killing

the libyan people on mass and anywhere frank are you in washington we've already chosen a side is the west already chosen a sign it's going to be it's incumbent upon the west now because it is chosen a site to start making sure its guys on the ground women mean this is the slippery slope that we were all worried about and it seems to be playing out right in front of our eyes. yes and it's happened time and again we haven't been too successful in the past of. arming rebel movements remembering goa remember nicaragua remember the worst case was when it seemed like a great idea to arm the mujahedeen against the soviet union during the cold war and look what we got that we got the only threat to the u.s. homeland since the war of the twelve so i think we really have to be careful about unintended consequences and certainly i risk i wish the rebels well but i think. your other guest made a good point if they have the money to buy the weapons i don't mind them buying

them but i don't want the u.s. getting in too involved in on the ground training and that sort of thing because i just don't know and of course there's a doubt about whether the rebels are competent enough to use these weapons they don't have very good leadership they don't have very good tactics and they don't even really know how to use simple weaponry so i'm not sure you know how they get the training but they can purchase training. overseas from countries that are willing to sell them the weapons but i don't really want to see the united states can evolve because i don't think u.s. vital interest is involved here and i think we need to be careful and i as far as humanitarian goes in kosovo we started bombing for humanitarian reasons there was limited and ethnic cleansing and of course after we after we started bombing the regime had nothing to lose so it just went whole hog and i think that same thing could happen here and we may face a stalemate all cut off he has to do is keep tanks in the major cities how are these rebels going to get him out of there that's. a fail safe last resort.

option there because it's going to be very difficult to get armor out of cities and that sort of thing. if you dig xin and uses the cities as human shields against nato airstrikes so we could have a stalemate we could have. position that we don't know much about they could turn on the radio are present in that opposition there seems to be some indication of that we've got to be very careful here there are many of intended consequences that could happen from this really so you know as we heard but where would you like to emphasize because i was a lot of points mentioned there i mean what would you like to amplify. yeah i'd actually like to go but i'd like to go back to a point that jonah raised. that i haven't picked up in the context of using rebel financial resources to actually finance and coagulate

rebel command and control i've been arguing this for about two weeks now that in fact one of the key steps that would be far more seems to me beneficial and empowering to the rebel cause is the step that just happened i guess in the last couple of days namely using the resources of the eastern libyan. company to contract separate oil deals and to finance the rebel cause now interestingly it's only cut who has taken the rebels up on this and who has begun to take on this rather risky business of doing deals in a conflict environment and yet i think this is probably the most promising outcome rather than all the back and forth all the sort of half starts and fits and divided

. as you fly zone let me ask you a question because it sounds like you know you could end up getting a partition state that's really what it looks like because if we just don't know the rebels do not want that yeah i mean i would ask that's the dilemma isn't there that's the dilemma danger here yeah it's a huge dilemma actually and yet it's. seems to me that because people whether it is the transitional interim government for whom the motto is of course a unified libya of which tripoli is the capital and there's a very strong reaction against consolidating down into an eastern syrian aken been with as the best stronghold because it seems to yield the west to khadafi i understand that sensitivity entirely but it seems to me that what we've seen in the last twelve days of the no fly zone is not

a superior solution ok one day we see this back and forth now on the road basically of this coastal highway back and forth between ras lanuf and in all these different towns one day the rebels are advancing the next day khadafi is advancing and it doesn't seem as if the nato airstrikes are allowing the kind of quick decisive rebel advance i think that everyone would like to see interestingly of course it's qatar that is beginning to facilitate the rebel financing which would allow the rebels to pay for and finance their own weaponry and they're going to do learn this when the early voting rolls out where. when and if i go to you are you getting prepared for the long haul a long civil war and we're talking about weeks or months are we talking about eventually a partition state because as has been pointed out on this program is that the the rebels whatever groups there are they're not very well armed they're not very well trained or not very well disciplined and they don't have

a whole lot of communication i mean you don't get an army at a snap of a finger even though it takes a while to get yourself together to fight a civil war which essentially is what's happened what do you think. yes first of all partition is not on the table we will never contemplate that we really never agree to it whatever it takes because libya will always be united with people as its capital secondly there is no civil war in libya there is the whole of the libyan people against a mad sport who is spinning out of control waging a mass war against a population that does not want them thirdly the some people think that the whole of the east is free but the whole of the west is under god that is controlled that is not correct misrata is that third largest city in libya nearly half a million population is only one hundred eighty kilometers east of tripoli that's just over one hundred miles is not under the deficit control although he's been in

golfing it and shelling it constantly constantly the whole of the western mountain region from about two hundred kilometers south of tripoli all the way to the algerian border is not under the gulf is controlled all get out your control is just tripoli and couple of towns south of it and now tripoli is going through a very very tough period i'll tell you just before i worked into the studio other quote from tripoli tripoli is run out of fuel it's running out of food there the bread the bread queues are very long people are getting very very good to the job here with the crowd were breaking could you deal with this after that short break we'll continue our discussion on the events in libya and stay with r.t. . it. still. has a few. listen

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first for the fifty first. place to pick. up. the lead. welcome back to talk i'm curious about the tree mind you we're talking about what many people call the civil war in libya play. the. lead. but first let's see what russians think about how to resolve the libyan crisis. and well when he says the goal of the western led effort in libya is in question when i wonder if the people of libya are really being helped in their hour of need the public opinion agency led by this and

also questions what the internet can do to stop the bloodshed and to protect lives fifty one percent of those polled say they should be no intervention thirteen percent say economic sanctions against the regime as a solution to the problem twelve percent believe that this asses should be frozen ten percent think that closed space can help and seven percent support the ground operation in libya the future of the libyan people is far from being clear. ok and it's very sad down and to do this program nato still is very very well it's actually very again start arming any groups in libya the united states britain france other members of nato are not so separate members are not so clear on it in we've heard from the u.s. that they're going to they're entertaining the idea of if i go to you i mean i'm i'm the biggest cynic i know i mean by arming the rebels and with nato air support

it's just a matter of time before you can polarize down because alfie regime though it may as you pointed out earlier the program you could take a very long time it could be very very nasty but it's a pride issue now i suppose for mr obama isn't it arming the rebels the west particularly the united states is a major stakeholder in the future of the country's politics and economy and its oil . well that's the that's the old adage if you break it you bought it and i think. we're breaking libya right now and i'd like to point out that even a partition country even if it's not perfectly east and west is better than what you had before with gadhafi running everything so i think if you could even hold it to that people should be happy of course to reality is that obama despite him saying that the goal is not to remove gadhafi on the ground that's what's happening in of course everyone anyone will tell you behind the scenes that is the goal

they're hoping by some miracle that his army will overthrow him or something like that but i think that's remote as long as he makes battlefield gains like he did yesterday and you can have big name defectors and that sort of thing but i think he's going to win for a while because it takes time to train an army against him and i've not denigrating with the rebels have done they've been surprisingly and they have a great spirit but the problem is he's got people with military training he's got mercenaries he's got heavy armor and artillery especially and of course you know you can only do so much in that unless you are armed but the problem that we have in united states is that it is a slippery slope and we need to send trainers if you're going to send him u.s. equipment you need to send u.s. trainers u.s. maintenance all this has to be tied in this is not done in short period of time so they better hurry up or it's going to or they're going to wipe out the rebels maybe

i don't know if western airpower can probably keep them out of benghazi it already did but again you're going to have this stalemate for a long time until you can get the rebel army trained up but i think that if the rebels want to buy. weapons and buy the training from some other countries that's fine but i would really not like to see the u.s. take the lead on them jim if i know back to you in london. this is a very good point here is all about logistics. really in the end. if you see it you see a regime like daffy's and we've heard about we've heard talk of the international criminal court we'll talk with her the issues about human rights violations war crimes what what reason just gadhafi and his clique have to really negotiate now or do you just fight to death i mean you know they have no initiative now to negotiate or even to surrender i think you're missing other factors in the dynamics what's happening is that. that his group is using this revolution started with

peaceful demonstrations get that close to wage a war against the people and prevent them from demonstrating peacefully we are in the street where we are today but look what's happening now yesterday and today top club get that the aides are jumping ship of course our foreign secretary today only three x. four and secretary you and boy it is a way you know the head of the parliament actively. dorda acts prime minister the head of the intelligence and others they're all jumping ship that's good everybody . can i can i ask you a question about these defections there's i mean it's very interesting as we move forward do you think do you think those members of the people who have defected very high profile for foreign minister and whatnot i think a former head of intelligence would you be willing to work with him if he joined your side is he is he somebody that you want to work with and would he be an ally for the west if you were to join your coalition your your opposition group. well if

they are people who have no blood on their hands they have not perpetrated any crimes against libyans if they are to just pull the diplomats or politicians who are not involved in any wrongdoings i would say as a as a person personally it is my personal opinion yes we would welcome them because obviously what they are doing is weakening capacity but if it's somebody like must of course always got the and the tories record of blood on his hands of course we will not welcome them so no my point is you who's left with him his sons and close aides and cousins from his own tribe how long can you sustain this soon the military brass those who are over controlling the the security brigades and doing the fighting for him the top generals and officers will realize that they are fighting a hopeless battle that they will die so soon they will start defecting as well soon his is machinery and his and his neck and his hierarchy is going to start to

degrade and disseminate and just wither away he cannot sustain it tripoli is suffering now people are fighting today we have stories of people killing each other over fuel and bread and food there is no cash in the banks he'll run out of cash i'm a going away figure how and how and where these ranges the great irish national question is going to jump in. but i was going to say you know i hope that i hope. other guest just said is true because i like to get rid of gadhafi myself and here i am is all these things were said about saddam hussein that they were going to be to factors after the first gulf war and that's the u.s. plan seems to be get it get in partially into these things and then hope for a coup well i didn't say that happens in some countries it doesn't happen in other countries but it didn't happen with saddam after the first gulf war so i think we have to be a little skeptical that that's a u.s. good u.s. strategy to go in and then hope for it is the idea acidy of hope i guess to the president's own saying to to run a strategy like this or we're going to get in do some bombing and that sort of

thing and hope for the best and i just don't see going to war in that way is responsible and i can't believe the u.s. foreign policy establishment is supporting that type of a half baked option in line and it can but this is something that can go ahead but this isn't good but this is not the u.s. against gadhafi in fact the u.s. has taken a back a backseat role this is a forty three countries internationally the u.s. again i'm not even country it is the u.s. against the kind of we're providing most of my documents this is my point please can i finish my point please when i finish my point out of countries two five out of countries two of them are engaged in the military action the third key norway canada. netherland sort of denmark forty three countries france britain you know if this is not the us against gaddafi and we are we have not invited to you as you come in we have asked the security council the

legal entity who is the responsible for protecting people all around the world doing to protect libyan civilians while being killed on mount nobody is talking i haven't heard from above from you or sort of from your guest the gentleman did anything about this but but it must can and i guess the whole population what's happening in libya is another one day not a tough. what is your guess that the gentlemen were quite popular allow that to happen. even if they had since they could but i mean please keep keep your ideology of the american administration out of our i mean we had many things i used to say to play kazan i've been provided up to the very beginning of the program and i don't think it's out to be pro or anti american it just it being pro practical and seeing what has happened in the you know from no no no no no i mean it's always very easy you know as with all due respect sir it's always very easy these days they have the americans bombed them for us ok the americans will support us here they'll give us this ok could i do but that's what that's what this is to

internationally what is how to save money how do people hide behind it it's all i'm sorry doesn't look good americans you know the money but it was the french who saved one guy's he's the second biggest city and all that money comes we're not asking that much because to come back at that increasing i think right ok but at the end of the day if you don't have your u.s. is you a little at the end of the day it's footing the bill and if things don't change you know yes it is obviously and i know you know this i mean washington go ahead is that a bit of that is that basically to kuwait and you look at his answers he was still providing eyes to the strikes and they're also providing intelligence tanking aircraft aircraft you know logistics and that sort of thing that no other air force has when you have a you have a coalition air strikes and you have a clue as well and it has such a turn for whatever thing is on the podium i give the briefing it's u.s. driven and it's us behind the scenes the u.s. is letting the french it is not believe it is not on this server you are right there are a number of french and british aircraft as you know and the strikes they have us

who are going to have to sell drugs that those will invade and they turn into afghanistan and it may turn into iraq and i think that's the major concern. is what that is the europeans and the americans got to look at going down the slippery slope of intervention for a group of people with. all due respect sir we really don't know who you are yet we hear that feels there's an element of i don't i don't find it is there a very strong there are still there are other people there are thirty other agendas where we are you know who we are it's very much described as it is if you want to label we are a society we'd like to know before we take your i think that's fair isn't it and i have misconception it is not a tribal society that is wrong that's a misconception ask me and i'll tell you who we are and we are not a tribal society ok well can you tell us what you're going to say she's well we've got twenty seconds go ahead. that the interim council is a national broadly based council there resenting all cities and towns in libya they

have lawyers judges human rights activists academics women liberals generals it we are not the type of society to produce two million gazans one million muslims have already gentlemen to join and have to jump in here many thanks and i guess again london tucson and in washington and thanks to our viewers for watching us here r.t. see you next time and remember crosstalk pools. keep . still.

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