the week's top stories here on alt c and the former generals denies charges of genocide in front of the hague tribunal while the serbia finds having him over has done little to speed up the event which. was extension call for the trick campaign of libya and deployment of attack helicopters response concerns that a ground operation could be next in the country. and a spreading hysteria over cuba to come scribbles european vegetable market system pushing strain prematurely accused of starting to get lead outbreak to the brink about.

who we thought see as we highlight the stories that make headlines this week welcome to the program now prosecutors in serbia want commission to question rocco melodic show as a potential witness in their own investigation into what happened in the balkans conflict back in the ninety's. and you know general is in custody at the hague where he's accused of eleven counts of war crimes including genocide now this week he made his first court appearance before the tribe you don't he didn't make a plea but prosecute disks and charges against him were monsters innocent of not just his next appearance will be and one month live it had been on the run for sixteen years before being arrested in serbia just over a week ago and you said his extradition was key to the hopes of joining the union but it's all these kind of reports the e.u. dream it doesn't appear to be any closer. still waiting for the green light

serbia's arrest an extradition of former bosnian serb army chief outcome luggage was one of the key conditions for a chance to get one foot and the european union's door potential membership could mean billions of dollars worth of grant aid and for struggling serbia it's a lifeline but what two official belgrade is a step closer to the e.u. is actually a no step at all and they go secure this you play this is very big news this is a very courageous decision by the serbian president this is one additional step for the injured gratian of serbia into the european union one day is really i know go there so that is your. other steps remain to be taken your right to say to the rest of the political chief of croatian serbs go and had d.h. who is still in hiding look true legislation with all engagement in regional cooperation with neighbors for serbian president boris tadic there is no task too

challenging to take on in the quest for a new membership sure that we're going to. rest. next few weeks. for us this is a crystal clear the sort of gets a feel for going all the natural nations but all officials prepared to jump through yet another euro hoop most wonder if the list of conditions ever some visuals are also talking about the fact that. serbia has to recognize the fact the recognize of some provinces possible before it can really get into the e.u. as long as the target isn't paul or and his party the list of demands will be endless still serbia hopes its co-operation will be rewarded and continues to be a path to the e.u. door the officers of the e.u. delegation to serbia proudly display the flags of all of their member states and serbia really wants. to join a group but the worst of conditions are part of the expression seems to be

neverending and for official belgrade membership is always visible and always out of reach catarina as are the parties belgrade serbia. oh says that he needs more than the official thirty days to study the charges against him but his son says no matter how much time he's given he's simply not able to take part in a trial. you can't even read it has to go through thousands of pages to be able to testify in court but police simply unable to do that he has difficulties with speech too how will you consult with his lawyers it's impossible you can watch the full interview with. her son of the former bosnian serb general ratko blow dry website of course it is r t v dot com. now this week nato intensified its bombing campaign in libya and decided it would last for at least another three months a u.n. report has accused you of war crimes alleging the rebels are guilty of similar

abuses meanwhile britain and france have deployed at low flying combat helicopters to the country the move has brought operations closer to the ground prompting concerns over an imminent land based offensive it's causing russia's foreign minister to warn that pushing the boundaries of the u.n. mandate in libya may lead to future resolutions losing their credibility when we expressed our opinion over this escalation of the military operation we think what's happening is a shift towards a ground operation at least would be very regretful because divine illusions of the security council resolution already taking place are more than enough to think about the attitudes towards us decisions on meantime our independent journalist james coburn believes that the escalation shows that nato's real motives in libya are questionable. be surprising on one end if he has held out this long especially given the extent of the onslaught against him and the the attempts to assassinate

him and the killing of his son and grandchildren and i think that was perhaps not foreseen in the original action it was a part of the idea of protecting civilians by bombing civilian populations it's on its face ridiculous and in itself exposes that this is not about humanitarian intervention and that lie has been has been it fairly exposed i think by the fact that the initial no fly zone turned pretty much overnight into a bombing campaign which turned into a campaign which we were promised was not to overthrow the regime and to get gadhafi out of there so i think it's just been a lie after lie and i think that pretty adequately exposes the fact that this is not intimately about humanitarian intervention the nato powers will not stop until gadhafi has been. unseated from power of the inevitable end here is regime change and i don't think anything is going to stop until that happens. i'm go during nato intervention in libya colonel gadhafi loyalists are using cluster bombs these are

ones that dispersed many mines over a wide area with civilian casualties almost inevitable but as artie's so forth reports it's embarrassing for my john rube because the money trail behind the weapons leads right back to spain. which is one strike a cluster bomb can spread bals ins a small explosives if a wide area is fired into populated areas if they were in misrata recently they always guarantees civilian deaths one of the many reasons more than one hundred countries and their production the markings on the shells found in the libyan city belong to spanish company instead. there were arms that one twenty s that are prohibited that were purchased by gadhafi that were used against the residential area in these are and they were produced by a spanish company and financed best managed. to get out the forces come to acquire spanish made arms in two thousand and seven and still isolate them most of the

lifting of sanctions against libya as the chip leader sheen fell back into the favor with the west. spanish company won a contract to supply get out these horses with their custom. until two thousand and eight when spain signed up to the international convention banning the u.s. . with libya now once again the enemy spain is part of nato finds itself fighting a regime that it itself helped to arm and the trail goes back much further to spanish banks which provided the financial firepower to instill laws and to make their deadly weapons a pool if you want to bring this thing forward use this as kind of a way to illustrates what things there is between a bank and civilian deaths in conflicts without legislation remains a direct connection between civilian deaths the weapon produces and the banks that

finance and therefore to the banks customers really transparent about what they are using the same sievers money for so it's not that easy to point it out a recent report by spanish n.g.o.s it's revealed that as many as fourteen banks since they own the funding weapons produces the b.v.a. is the spanish bank this being most active in financing producers of controversial weapons and it's exactly this kind of large scale financing they complain is now trying to rein in pushing for the development of more robust policies to ensure the banks are held accountable many of the banks named in the investigation and now coming forward to say their policies on funding arms production are to change with or without legislation that's until that happens in the murky world of arms production will remain as a profitable business sarah r.t. the curate. and while the profits of war in dangerous to billion lives in libya in

afghanistan the deaths of innocent bystanders goes punished look at this hour here on our team report on the controversial acquittal of polish soldiers who killed a number of civilians in a mistaken attack on an afghan if you're. going to miss this previously seen video of an iranian planes a deadly crash during an air show that happened two years ago. germany is considering a spain after it wrongly accused the country's cumbers of causing a deadly e. coli outbreak is so far claimed nineteen lives most of them in germany now the negative publicity over spanish produce has destroyed the country's vegetable exports and has a lower end reports it may mean another round of global hysteria. some cucumber scale that much is clear and it's also become apparent that although germany planed

spain as the source of the it's not that's costing innocence spanish fruit and vegetable export is around two hundred million euros a week. all the statements show an absolute lack of responsibility what is happening today is a challenge to the spanish imaginable and through industry calling the european health watchdog discredited russia says it had no choice but to all three thousand vegetable imports from the entire european union a reaction in brussels called disproportionate. explain the european commission say russia's decision goes it is the spirit of the w g o frankly i don't know about that but if you can lose that keep people out of the a.b.m. that's not the kind of thing that raises your spirit but it's a very delicate time for the spanish economy which is teetering on the edge of needing an e.u. bailout this is decidedly not

a good moment for one hundred fifty thousand tons of put used to go unsold. simply because of. all the. time we. cannot hold all. cynics say all this is just a media whipping up its latest health hysteria in two thousand and five the united nations warned the world that bird flu could kill up to one hundred fifty million people in reality the seven years until the end of two thousand and ten saw three hundred three people die more recently swine flu was the killer encouraged by pharmaceutical companies european countries spend billions of dollars on unnecessary vaccines and probably will see a very soon behind all of this. from the. lord. pharmaceutical industry like they did with the swine flu but they have something to protect people against

. screen and so true. across europe all these health scares adversely affected economies this looks no different and germany's baseless accusations may be what finally pushes spain into bailout territory spain will now seek reparations from the relevant all sources in europe after its prime minister criticised the european commission for not supporting that country enough particularly after the infection was proven not to have come from spanish cucumbers spain had to tighten task ahead of its repairing its reputation as a reliable exporter of free some vegetables all over the new position essential to its ailing economy your avatar to brussels. continues to attract on the situation the latest on the situation in europe where you can try to. look at your screen right now and. tweet. about the infection grows no one's taking

any salad for the weekend picnics. with of. you on top of that story. well this week saw breakthrough in the investigation of. assassination that was five years ago the main suspect a chechen fugitive has been officially charged with the murder of the prominent russian journalist now police say they have enough evidence to prove the thirty seven year old was the one who pulled the trigger. reports on this latest. this is the man investigators say fired the shots which killed anna politkovskaya. had been the subject of a wide ranging manhunt after spending two years on the run in belgium he was arrested by police in his home village in chechnya on tuesday and later charged with the murder. of the rest was carried out with the help of belgian police or he

had been hiding for several years we've been in constant contact with them and it was this cooperation that helped us capture the suspect belgian police triggered the manhunt and mark would have was forced to leave the country investigators are currently questioning him in connection with the murder of anna politkovskaya mahmood of two brothers along with a former police officer who were acquitted of the murder in two thousand and nine cuti lack of evidence but the russian supreme court an old verdict and ordered the investigation reopened. son told me the family hopes this arrest will bring them closer to finding out who killed his mother of course it's a very important step but we have to wait and see if are still to will be proved but even that is not enough we have no clue who the mastermind of the murder is nor about the organizers it's a significant part of the journey but it's certainly not the end and internationally renowned journalist anna politkovskaya was shot dead in october two thousand and six and she returned home she was famous for investigative work

particularly reports into human rights abuses former colleagues believe the duty of the close family ties of those accused of the murder there will always be some unknown surrounding the crime on as well as the point of it's hard to tell how many people are involved we have the three mood of brothers and their uncle he's a criminal boss and could easily be the mastermind of the murder had relatives especially chechens are unlikely to testify against one another the poet calls guy a murderer isn't the only high profile case to see a recent breakthrough journalist of a thinks there. along with the conviction of the killers of freelance journalist i understand see a billboard over and human rights lawyer stanislav mark a lot of children these type of murders do get solved in today's russia this is definitely a landmark victory into fights against impunity in boston journalist murders not just journalists but also human rights defenders voyeurs. and we see that as

a very significant step forward mahmud of currently in moscow where his lawyers are preparing his defense while for the family and friends about a quarter of their long wait for justice continues peace roll over r.t. moscow you are watching the weekly here on r.t. it's good to have you with us to poland now where a military court has cleared seven nato soldiers of killing civilians in an attack on an afghan village four years ago the panel ruled the evidence was not sufficient to support war crimes charges saying that honest mistakes or forty communication may have been to blame but as artie's daniel bushell reports the verdict outraged many observers and calls for troops to be pulled out of afghanistan. civilians killed nato soldiers go free the same old story in afghanistan the threat and for a moment to be different polish soldiers were put on trial for deaths including a pregnant woman and

a child. on the sixteenth of august two thousand and seven mortar shells that were fired by polish troops at the afghan villages. as a result six people were killed and three were severely wounded but the soldiers were cleared of all charges one of the cues told r.t. it's all been a big mistake we didn't see. we were accidents decides again was because it. was. something of. a problem we. agree made mel functioned and missed its target by five hundred metres claims a shit scheme but prosecutors alleged it was revenge for a roadside bomb which killed another polish soldier earlier in the day experts say it's unlikely anything could go so catastrophic leigh wrong this is not logical.

that more could not make such a serious error with such a large distance the question is did they decide to open fire themselves or did they receive this can and from a book but there is no doubt they were shooting at the village not the nearby hills the defendant commanders ordered the attack and these should be the one standing trial activists while the conflict continues civilian deaths from nato bombing or inevitable will only rise you know the longer the war goes on their war situation is so the answer is i think quite simple to withdraw troops from afghanistan as a beginning of any process of stubbies ation of the country because their troops western troops doesn't bring stability. just the opposite as the death toll goes up on both sides support for nato as mission plummets a majority in europe say opinion polls now think the conflicts going in the wrong direction this was already unpopular in the e.u.

there's the hundred billion euro because while services are being cut at home the size of our boys coming back in coffins is even worse leaving the death of civilians on punished for the weakens the case sustain afghanistan even the afghan president's turning against nato after the latest fourteen civilians were killed hammett cause oid delivered his strongest words yet giving a final warning and threatening war if it happens again can you push your party. well you can give us your thoughts on the stories we're covering just by heading over to our news and analysis updated every single minute of his i want you to right now a devastating blow to several villagers in a central russian republic as and i mean additions depo disaster lights up the night sky impressive pictures i would be killed in the video waiting for you or you don't. understand how hundreds exercised amendment rights of the

jefferson or morrow in washington by dancing it's after five people were arrested last week for a similar flush proving and also you american prisons are without police action is described as aggressive constitutionally. now israeli security forces have opened fire on purpose to protesters on the syrian border reportedly killing for at this stage. as details from one of. hundreds of palestinians have gathered on the syrian side of the israeli syrian border and every long day today a group of about one hundred and fifty of them made their way to the border face we're being told that they were actually trying to cut that border face when israeli soldiers fired warning shots in the air now those one shots seem only to have inflamed the crowds because israeli soldiers very soon followed up with actually taking aim at some of the protesters and syrian media suggesting that at least four people have been killed there hasn't been any statement from the israeli

army they haven't confirmed those dates but certainly this is a day that there has been preparing for several days now the country is in the stage of prayers and has been ever since the call went out for palestinians from lebanon syria the west bank and gaza to make their way to the borders with israel and for today to try and close those borders today is the fourth anniversary of the one nine hundred sixty seven six day war now that was a war that is well done but it is a war that palestinians referred to as the arab down forward but of course human rights activists are very critical particularly of the fact that somebody if we also believe this through the forceful people have been killed today and ten people were killed back amazed at the ten they criticized the israeli army been very quick to fire at demonstrators. parties are policy reporting right now as a as israel's relationship with his neighbors becomes ever more tense r.t. looks at the plight of community is on the egypt and gaza border due to israel's decade long blockade the civilian population has resorted to underground smuggling

just to stay alive they live only next to the border of the guns in egypt but also on the border of peace and war. they are responsible not only for themselves. but also for their loved ones. they are ready to take any risk. to the streets one or. you're watching their weekly here on our team now a revamped version of the tried and tested soyuz spacecraft has just been towed into position it's ready up last off in just a few days it will carry three crew members to the international space station for a six month mission on the on board of course

a black eyes most remote outpost in the francis at the baikonur cosmodrome. the twenty eighth expedition to the international space station blasts off in just under three days from here at the baikonur cosmodrome so far everything is run according to plan very smooth indeed we've got three people heading up into space from here russian cosmonauts sergei volkov japanese astronaut such food will power and american astronaut mike fossum and with us is mike fossum son he's going to give us a little inside story as to how it's been living and preparing for a space expedition with an astronaut what is it like actually living with an astronaut day in and day out he's just a normal guy you know we were just talking a minute ago about how he seems like a nice guy and he really is he is really down to earth and i feel like a lot of these guys are that is their just due to managed to get this job and now he is going to space is going to what are the things you notice about your dad

being comes back from a trip up there we know he's kind of a macho man and so you know he likes to think that he's going to be ok when he comes back i will see because you know they're really weak when they come back will be out there for six months and his muscles will be weak is supposed to be weak so we'll see if he if he takes the wheelchair like so many of the other astronauts do or not thank you so much for talking with us we will all right guys this rocket is being put into position to hold steady upright for the next three days until launch until then we'll be keeping a close eye on the operations seeing how everything is going to make sure that it is smooth sailing for blast off on june eighth. i don't think that lindsey france right there will more space stories coming your way next hour as that knocked up mission to mars enters its second look at the challenges faced by the participants in the longest ever space flight simulation to the referendum and back. our cars here has paid its final respects to its late president sort of who died in

moscow last weekend after major surgery thousands of mourners attended a farewell ceremony in the capital so home before laying the body to rest prime minister of lot of who was among those paying tribute sixty two year old the fuck up here for more than five years during which the republic gained its defacto independence from georgia it's not yet clear who will take its place when an election is held. you with r.t. let's check out some other headlines from around the world this hour a gunman have attacked the presidential compound in southern yemen i'm pulling for soldiers president ali abdullah saleh has also suffered injuries and has left the saudi arabia for treatment there's no speculation over whether or not he will return to the country has been hit by an arrest for three months at least one hundred fifty killed in the government crackdown. now a chain of volcanoes started erupting in start and chile is causing thousands to

flee from the area plumes of smoke and ash are rising ten kilometers into the air there have been no reports of injuries so far the volcanic chain has been dormant for decades so it's lost a major eruption in one nine hundred sixty. i'm going to stay with our teeth all in depth coverage of natural disasters later in the program we interview a russian oceanographer who says the phenomena are here to stay. now a previously unseen video footage child surfaced online allegedly showing of the crash of an iranian military jet i don't air show two years ago you may find these pitch. just to stop the second video was filmed by the crew of another plane flying in the show just outside styron it captures the moment and i all seventy six military plane falls to us and exploded softer a midair collision with a fighter jet seven crew members were killed in that crash.

why were you off today for now i'll be back with a recap of our headlines and our week's headlines in just a few moments here on our to do or do stay with us. live not only next to the border of the gulf of egypt but also on the border of

peace and more. they're responsible not only for themselves. but also for their loved ones. and they are ready to take any risk. in the streets of an orgy. wealthy british style it's an estimate on the paper tiger. markets finance scandal. find out what's really happening to the global economy in the kinds of reports on our t.v. .