all.

thousands of demonstrators remain outside the greek parliament and the government gives its final approval to hard hitting spending cuts and tax hikes. this is growing bigger and bigger and if there is going to be a political solution if it's going to be a political movement is going to come from over in there it's not going to come from inside the parliament and if you people know that and that's why that crowd is drawing in size. budget cuts has also flared in the u.k. as a one day public sector strike twelve thousand schools in england and wales. the teachers civil servants and border control officers are staying at the plant want to turn to the reduced pensions as the first industrial protest against the government's austerity measures is taking over london lead and even diplomatic approach russia calls on the un to carefully consider its handling of syria. foreign minister sergei lavrov says the u.n.

security council shouldn't be contemplating taking action against syria during what he calls a civil war taking place in yemen a bit later on. broadcasting around the world of the top news and headlines this is r.t. direct from the heart of moscow glad to have you with us let's take a look at your top story greece has voted on a second bill in the final step towards implementing the next wave of austerity measures it is the last heard. all that athens has to jump to qualify for a new stack of european bailout funds the plans met heavy public resistance with two days of rioting that has left more than three hundred people injured financial journalist dimitri kovtun us right in the middle of the action at the syntagma square. yesterday was the worst day we've seen we saw chemicals used that were not

just tear gas we saw illegal chemical use like expect seeding agents and things of that nature you had massive amounts of police brutality and the films all over the all of the internet and as evidence for that you had people beaten well away from from the square where tourists were people screaming and people saw all that stuff today and they came back to square what they can do is they can go in into into constitution square amount of political resistance that's their only option that's the only constructive option because fighting this thing with sticks and rocks is not going to provide a constructive solution i'm a top of this government they may send a country to anarchy but that's not what we want this particular thing that you see right here is very constructive because it's a pull and this is where political movements come from they come from within a society and leaders emerge from the society and the way this this is set up you've got one mike one microphone and you have people that can express the optimism or the rage or whatever it is of the side and they can stand up and they can speak and that's where leaders come from and greeks in particular need very

strong leadership we've seen that in the past in our history the people that are able to leave lead this nation of people of exceptional character and this is a marketplace a marketplace of ideas and a marketplace of politics it's a free market of political ideas and that's what you're seeing here and it's where a possible leadership movement can emerge that can not just topple this government but provide a real answer a real solution and a real model for ireland and portugal and spain and other countries that are tired of their political elite and want something that's real and true and to the ground and response to what people want and the people's hopes and and ambitions and not to their fears. professor. from the university of london told our team earlier that greece is being enslaved by europe. economically what is happening to greece now and what has happened over the last year is that we had imposed upon of european kountry what we used to call an economic structure adjustment these measures mean

that the salaries and pensions of people in the public sector have been caught up to forty percent they mean the unemployment is going up to about sixteen percent with forty five percent of youth unemployment in it which means of the whole generation of young people is being destroyed but politically also what this happened over the last year is that the i.m.f. the e.u. and the e.c.b. keep sending every couple of months. gang technocrats to offices they go to the ministries they ask to look at that and then they decide what should be done and what's not be done so we have a situation in which the main structure of greece is no move from athens into brussels and the other european centers and the greek politicians and the greek public has been really to implement what they would have been decided then. and of course your opinion counts visit our web site r t dot com

and have your say in our latest online poll today we ask you what should greek people do once the new set of austerity cuts is approved so far most of you think they should defend their rights until early elections a close second with thirty four percent is the opinion that they must prepare for even more scots with bankruptcy still looming other less favorable responses are the greeks and should consider emigrating and that they have lost the fight and must tighten their belts. on the view k. now where a strike by public sector workers closed almost twelve thousand schools in england and wales on thursday the industrial action over pay and pensions also hit job centers and passport offices. has been following the developments. teachers the team members the politics. are all expenses up to express their funds in this enough to be sent but since the trip planned by the government as far as we know it's not just the college students and people saying teachers that are in

strike out but we do want to say that about ninety percent of london. that say also they're expected to belong to the airports because customs and immigration officials are also striking as well all these people are demanding that the cuts will not be processed the government does not go along with the cuts they do say that they do want to change it you can see they did not want to work longer hours that the blood banks have to take will. come up some of the teachers will be back to the sixty eight it will take sixty votes are being made in the wrong direction so they're not being made towards the end because the sponsor of the current financial crisis. those most responsible for our current predicament are. largely untouched the government seems to be writing the terms of some agreements halfway through without due consultation to the people most of. the

changes that it may consider pensions or voted necessary to this way to address so i think we do need to make cutbacks in things i think. cry and cry the teacher which is why so much of it is too hot we're not expecting any significant disturbances other than the laws that possible traffic disturbance this could take place at the same time there are organizations such as the education act does not work for the toll on people to turn thursday into days of all the rage against the foreign led coalition sunday may be the ones to get a little bit reality the same time we also must not be. that and i also take to the streets and make some damage. but other than that people are expected to protest peacefully again it's one of the million people that are going to be marching from the center of london. to make their will is that. the pension party jobs plan by

the government. reporting for us there are no activist daniel garvin says that the government is penalizing the wrong people with its tough spending cuts governments line is that you know any any changes to the pensions or any other public safety cuts are entirely necessary because we have such a large debt we need to remember where this came from this came from eight hundred fifty billion pounds that was pumped into the banking sector a couple of years ago and still continues to this day so you know we have a debt and now we've got to ask ourselves how do we deal with that and instead of going to cause the financial crisis and some of the wealthiest people in our society were avoiding some twenty five billion tax pounds in tax every single year the government plans to basically go off to ordinary working people if you've been struggling for pensions is just one of many public sector cuts to come over the

next cult following is basically. a huge amount of anger in this country because it's incredibly unfair that ordinary working people have nothing to do with the financial crisis being to pay for a crisis that was caused by by the. so on the way the controversy over scientology . find out why some of the works of l. ron hubbard the founder of the divisive church have been declared illegal in russia . plus a new wave of violence in egypt we talked to well into farai from the national defense university in washington to find out what it means for the region. the russian foreign minister has highlighted double standards at the u.n. over the organization's approach to the arab world sergey lavrov says the crisis in syria and yemen are provoking vastly different and unjustified approaches artie's of peter all over reports from moscow. mr lavrov was addressing a meeting of the foreign affairs committee of the duma just behind me now he

highlighted and says out really where russia stands concerning the ongoing situations in the arab world now he gets out of what he sees as a western desire for regime change in the middle east saying that this was unacceptable and the russians would not support it on the any circumstances he also went on to highlight the fact that this was actually against international law bellman russia feels a little disappointed to say the least about the way. the the situation in libya has progressed russia of course abstaining from the vote on the u.n. resolution that allowed international intervention there they very disappointed at the way they see that mission has gone beyond the parameters laid out in the u.n. resolution and keen to avoid a similar fate a similar situation occurring in syria or yemen held hostage jill of role pulling no punches he hits out at those that have have criticised russia's stance on the

u.n. security council and also had a few of the same self about what he sees as a lack of consistency by the u.n. body. many have been criticizing russia and china's position on the u.n. security council's resolution on syria for the fact that we consider such a resolution inappropriate i'll give you a simple example the situation in yemen is no easier than in syria there's a difficult civil war going on there but nobody's going to the u.n. security council to try and stop it. if they're reiterating in some ways words he has said before that russia wants to see peace brought around brought about in the arab world to discussion and diplomacy and not international intervention something that they will not support. artie's peter of are reporting there from moscow now sergey lavrov has also announced that moscow is waiting for confirmation from libyan rebels that they have received weapons from france if proven true the

russian foreign minister says it would be a serious violation of the u.n. arms embargo french officials earlier admitted the military has elicited on the country it's the first time a nato member has owned up to supplying weapons to libya since the bombing began over three months ago the alliance is pressing paris to explain why it acted unilaterally without consulting brussels the un mandate on libya does allow military intervention to protect civilians but falls short of authorizing a ground invasion in arms supplies but paris based political analyst john walker lindh says three countries have hijacked the mandate. the admission that france is arming the rebels is very obviously an admission that what's going on in libya is a fight between the government and armed rebels and armed rebels are not civilians so any attack by the government on armed rebels in libya is therefore not necessarily a war crime in other words this news is not only incompatible with the case that's being made for war in libya it completely contradict it there is no doubt that the

three countries britain france and america who are waging this war under the disguise of nato of course wish to see the rebels seize power by force and overthrow gadhafi we must be careful about using the word nato this war is being fought by britain france and america they use nato is there a fig leaf but nato itself is of course much bigger and there is not unanimity in nato only a few days ago the italian foreign minister said that there should be a ceasefire in order to allow humanitarian aid through so i think that this latest news from france will possibly increase tensions within the coalition although i repeat that the war is being waged by three countries using nato as a disguise. pakistan has urged of us to shut down and leave an air base in the country's southwest the facility has served as a launching pad for washington's drone attacks against militants on the volatile afghan border pakistani political analyst author made qureshi thinks the only way

to stop the violence is to end of the war on terror one of the main reasons for the for the continuation of violent activity on the box down of ghana's done border is the mess that the us military has created inside of coniston over the past decade the mass there the way they have alienated a large portion segment of the afghan population in terms of the push to try to the way they have conducted the war on terror their the way they have alienated a large pockets really of the country is a big reason for why we have a country new ration of violence in afghanistan and how that violence is spilling over into pakistan and most pakistani commentators believe now that one of the ways short short cuts really to controlling violence and extremism on the pakistan afghanistan border is really to end the war on terror the way the u.s. military and the way the cia has been conducting this war over the past ten years

one step forward is of course what president obama has declared but still words we're yet to see really actions of the ground and we have yet to see whether important agencies within the u.s. government like the central intelligence agency the cia would really cooperate robert gates has retired as u.s. secretary of defense after almost five years in the job but with three ongoing wars involving america his replacement former cia director leon panetta isn't expected to make dramatic changes to pentagon policies a retired u.s. army general steven anderson says the new person in charge should do a better job managing finances. i don't think we're going to see any major changes in pentagon policies i'm hoping though that he will do something about the a tremendous energy expenditures of the united states armies to expand the iraq and afghanistan we have a tremendously inefficient energy base over there and we need to do something about

and i'm hoping it will bring about some change in the money should be using united states to work domestic programs i mean we're essentially bankrupting many elements of of our nation in order to win this war in iraq and afghanistan but my point is that we can be expending energy there are much much smarter than we are if you understand the relationship between energy efficiency and military effectiveness and you can see we can win the war and we can actually actually save a lot of money and i'm hoping that secretary panetta will do something about that my point is that there is a very high to goal easy pragmatic approach and that is essentially insulating our structures in iraq and afghanistan and we can say really we're presently spending about twenty billion dollars a year simply dirty dish thing inefficient structures in our combat zone where i think that americans should be outraged that we're not doing more to spend or energy consumer energy in a smart way. and if you need more news there is much more available for you right now on our web page r t v dot com we have the latest from wimbledon as russia's

maria sharapova recovers from a bad start to clinch a victory and a place in the finals. plus in the trial of ukraine's former prime minister yulia timoshenko and the latest judicial moves against ukraine's iron leading. egyptian officials have ordered a probe into fresh clashes between police and protesters in cairo hundreds of people have been injured as more riots sweep the country are angry with the interim government saying that there have been no improvements since hosni mubarak was toppled in february while leader far as from the national defense university in washington says egypt may just be swapping one tough regime for another youth movements a woman's movement the minorities in egypt labor you win students are not very happy with what they see right now and they thought that they would get rid of the authoritarian regime and that the those in charge of the military council would

help them and be neutral on political affairs and would open the path for fair and you know reductions what they are seeing now is that all the promises are not happening is then that egypt is moving towards a new type of authoritarian mandate so that's why they are trying to tell the world with their demonstrations that democracy is not yet in egypt the international community must have support not just for this government but basically for the political forces the new political forces who will be ready to go for elections and the problem is that the legislative elections are going to happen too soon. van forming new political forces so the revolution would have produced and new regime for all political forces not for the new political forces now let's take a look at some other stories making headlines for you this hour as many as twenty

people were killed in southwest afghanistan when a land of mind exploded under a passenger bus the bus was traveling from kandahar to a route also used by afghan police military and u.s. led coalition forces officials say women and children are among the victims the incident took place in the same area where two buses had roadside bombs last year killing thirty people the. u.n. backed tribunals has issued arrest warrants in connection with the murder in two thousand and five of lebanon's former prime minister rough week officials say they warned name for senior members of hezbollah members of the group denounced the tribe you know and have vowed action against it rafi car really was killed along with twenty two others in february two thousand and five in central beirut when a bomb exploded as his car passed by. a russian court has found that some scientists scientology literature distributed in russia is illegal the writings by

l. ron hubbard the founder of the church have been ruled extremist and anti-social are outside the scientology headquarters in moscow. scientology here in russia and indeed in many countries around the world has proved controversial lots of debate about whether it should actually be considered a religion there are lots of countries do you think scientology is actually more of a cult or sex now this court decision we saw today concerns the banning of all of the books by the found scientology our ron hubbard they were actually the main headquarters then you can see the big job they've got on the lower floors they sell some of these books to those materials that were considered by the courts to contain cools for extreme activities now this ruling actually mirrors a similar thing that we saw in a court in april of last year that was in the siberian city. and in that instance it was very similar books that was thought to be found to contain cools the religious hatred and people to work against law enforcement activities now in that

instance the justice ministry actually overturned the decision of the day the court decision hasn't actually been in full. haven't yet been banned from being sold as they still are in the show we actually spoke to the p.r. director of the church of scientology and we can handle what she had to say about the decision. decision is surprising l. ron hubbard's writing has been going around the world for sixty years people across hundreds of sixty five countries have been using books to make their lives bitter and new countries if you found them to be extremist who think the key issue is how moved and appropriately and who make an appeal until the court's decision is brought into force who keeps wanting to boost just like before ten million followers worldwide and those we said scientology often coming into the limelight for that controversial practice and again this is another example of where that's happened. first reported force there are no i'll be back with look at your

headlines in just a bit but next we talked to british union leader mark who says that public sector workers won't stop until the achieve their goals. today i'm talking to mark hughes one of the brains behind the june nationwide strike in the u.k. he's head of the public services union three hundred thousand members are walking

out the proposed reforms to the pension scheme. this is possible. public spending in this country just how drastic are these cuts going to be give us an impression of what they might mean for the. projected to mean half a million jobs lost in the public sector six hundred thousand jobs in the private sector as a direct result. in many of the communities up and down the country. everything that people have taken for granted as. you seem to see these cuts in terms of rights and a moral position but isn't there. to be respected example they didn't.

look like they might be able to. this is the fifth largest economy in the world and if you look at the british economy for. fifty consecutive years from one thousand nine hundred on words our debt as a proportion of our g.d.p. was double what it is now then we build millions of houses schools hospitals welfare recognizing actually economically these cuts will make it worse far better to cut the deficit by employing people who pay tax and insurance rather than throw them onto welfare where actually they depress the economy and we think things worse you've said that the government cuts just attack working people but how do you think the strikes. affects the. ruling class is what having three quarters of a million people from four different unions on strike is something that hasn't happened in this country for decades it's the start not the finish to the

government is if they try to ignore will come back in the autumn when we may well see millions of people on strike so the idea is to build pressure so the government realize that working people reeling from back to the u.k. are not just going to let them get away with what they're doing and we believe that pressure forced them to change direction the government's bill for pensions at the moment is around thirty billion pounds which does seem excessive a lot of money how do you suggest that they would you say. i don't think they should reduce i'm quite clear that retirement of dignity and old age where you don't have to struggle to make ends meet should be what we aspire for in the fifth richest country in the world so my view is public sector pensions and all pension provision is important and instead of a risk to the bottom where we see the worst pension provision in the private sector becoming the model i'd like to see a raw using the pension provision and saying it's a priority for people to have a decent retirement could be done in many ways cutting the renewal of trident for

example would save us enough money to pay for those pensions for three or four years. where the richest people in britain avoid paying over one hundred billion a year. that would actually mean these pensions look fairly cheap in comparison and you mentioned the private sector and private sector workers say that see the public sector has a very good deal when it comes to pensions a lot better than a lot of private sector provision do you think there's really public support for what you're doing or the opinion polls seem to tell us already a majority of people actually believe the public sector pensions are important arriving at the right level should even be higher that's incredible when you think of the propaganda we've had over the last two years from politicians in the media telling everybody the public sector pensions are the cause of people's problem my master's to private sector workers because they're being exploited by their shareholders and by the company chiefs not by public sector workers pensions and we should have a campaign that seeks to drive all pension levels up not down to the worst what.

would you accept in terms of pension reform what i personally believe that it is not acceptable to make anyone to pay a penny more for their pension when the valuation of public sector pension schemes say they're costing less because that's not about pensions it's about raising taxes to solve the deficit i don't believe people should be forced to work longer and i don't believe people should have the levers of their pensions slashed so where we are in the talks at the moment unless the government fundamentally accepts they have to talk about those things and i believe the industrial action is going to take place you have said in fact that the government doesn't like it's prepared to negotiate so what's the point of striking. when the point is to change your mind and saying you won't negotiate just when they're having a chat with a few people in a room is one thing saying you won't negotiate when there could be millions of people taking strike action is entirely another we actually believe that the six million trade unionists plus the thousands and thousands or hundreds of thousands of pensioners and students all becoming a joint campaign is going to be prolifically very powerful we've already seen in

a march of one hundred five hundred thousand people three months ago transformed the political mood in this country. however there is well what could strikes actually how exactly do you think that change the political needs is transformed in that it was on the front page of the newspapers it was on every t.v. station and it gave people the confidence that however small the community and i have a small they seem for example keeping a library they understood they were part of a much much wider problem and i think that's given us confidence to move from a march to now for unions balloting members and members voting overwhelmingly for a strike so it's clearly transforming not just people's confidence but the opinion polls clearly are shifting whereas a majority before said they oppose strikes now in the most recent polls a majority says they are sympathetic to them not so welcome thank you very much thank you.