thousands of people that have turned out here to the river boat station in khazan which was to be the stopping point of the bulgaria on its pleasure cruise up the volga they've come to lay flowers and to pay their respects to the people who drowned either trying to get out of the ship or those who were trapped in it in sunday's tragedy there's also a funeral starting to take place today of some of the victims twenty three families will start burying their relatives today from the sinking of the bulgaria ship but downstream from the rescue efforts are going on with divers going to the wreckage to try and search the rooms inside the ship they're moving into one of the most difficult parts about operation into a large play room and it's thought that a large number of children there but that they simply weren't able to escape and they all drowned in that room first came terror and tragedy the good news the boat leans a bed there are three of them in the cabin my son my daughter in law and my grandson

my son said he tried to open the cabin door holding his child when the wave crashed into them and he lost grip of my grandson he said he swim towards the light and made it out alive but i can find my grandson or daughter in law. now amidst the grief comes the anger and the questions you're like p.c.'s do your job you don't understand a thing. the bulgaria pleasure boat sank in just three minutes on sunday now some people are saying it should never have been on the volga atoll at the. area past two hours before it looked an awful condition of their done a pretty voyage before it would never have been allowed to sail that growing evidence seems to point to gross mismanagement of the vessel including a broken engine ignored by the captain and blocked in the agency exit. it's blowing

it and not long ago on the twenty third we travelled on these motives he was in a poor condition then yes he cast messed up several times during her trip but it would have to stop for some of our years because the engine was working properly the vessel was first built in one nine hundred fifty five and as recently as last month was given official clearance to sail. despite this rescue teams say it was hopelessly outdated the crew that was working tell me they notice water coming in through the windows at such a pace the boat went down through quickly all of this will come to the fore when the ship itself is raised to the surface for investigation but it's the hiring accounts of what happened on the weekend pleasure cruise the told the real story we still hope that our daughter has survived your house in an air pocket or some other way but yet we still believe that our little angel is a light for the start of the didn't talk is that people were basically buried alive in time metal coffin we managed to get out through the windows i was there with my

ten year old daughter i couldn't rescue her she swallowed too much water when i was pulled out i realized my child was gone rescue workers will continue their efforts throughout the coming hours and days but hope has now gone they will find anyone else alive leaving just the shock and grief. the vulgar bank central russia. plenty of anguish but there's also now a growing anger following claims that two vessels passed the cruise ship as it was sinking but did nothing to help a criminal case now has been launched against those ships captains and i forget we've got more on the human side of this tragedy at our website r.t. dot com and there you'll find an interview with the divers working at the scene will give a harrowing account of the underwater search for dozens of bodies and because of that you can read that and of course further news and analysis of. the french parliament is due to vote on extending the military campaign in libya

that comes after recent remarks by its defense minister suggesting that the rebels should talk to colonel gadhafi that has sparked rumors that one of the most active advocates of the nato led invasion might be starting to back pedal on the campaign and as our daniel bushell reports anxiety is indeed growing in paris that what was intended to be a short lived mission is turning into and embarrassingly long haul. not tell me which. books is like bragging will destroy the repos lives they're often wrong and gets a surprise i french foreign minister ship a posted france would be a encroached days weeks the war's into a fourth month and the final round inside the last sarkozy with his western allies seeing short little opponents fighting back well it's not just an

embarrassment for sarkozy it's an embarrassment for all nato for the whole west paris even admits being libya's rebels but on some somalia. wench to libya for training within the last two or three years that's documented we have to fly records and everything else so it seems strange in many ways the whole western support of some of the rebel groups in libya must be questioned because in some cases i think we are effectively arming al-qaeda. it's all making a mockery of the u.n. vote on foreign intervention in the country now by leading it never. giving up. none of. this. witnesses at the two of libya's causing widespread atrocities for every one military personnel that was supposedly a casualty there were ten civilians. fraud's categorically ruled out cindy grilled

troops predict is the only way male to break the libyan deadlock the moves the splitting the nato coalition silvio berlusconi head of keep italy admits invading libya was a mistake and did a stunning u. turn the fridge defense minister says the rebels should negotiate with muammar gaddafi this is the same man that they already indicted in the international court so. i mean from a legal point of view it's even impossible brochure abstained did the us vote warning bombs would bring havoc in libya to play said the latest count supports the love ruffle quote lloyd lee diplomats speak for. with elections just more in months away saw go advisors said a successful war could resurrect his chances instead one paper writes libya's

becoming a slow motion call crash for france's deeply unpopular president. so because these are jogging fans excessive sweating is understandable this is libyan spring is turning into a marathon don't you see paris right now or to discuss this story further we're joined live by john laughlin the director of the interview from ocracy and cooperation in paris thanks for joining us today so opponents accused nicolas sarkozy of trying to score political points by indulging in imperial politics as the operation seems to have become a stalemate do you think he's still happy with the role that france is playing. no i expect those very great concern in the elysee palace as there is quite clearly across the whole political class the fact is that france and britain and america went into this libyan adventure with exactly the same intention as they started the attack on yugoslavia in one thousand nine hundred nine on both occasions they

thought it would be a short campaign which would bring a dictator quick quickly to his knees well that's proved to be very wrong we're now in the second week of july the campaign has been going on since march and we can see tensions are rising we can see that ministers are speaking out of turn and as you said in your report we can see that other members of the alliance notably in italy are saying that the bombing should be should come to an end so basically the campaign is unraveling for france and i'm pulling in you're saying they don't. excuse me for interrupting their enthusiasm is waning by some of the players in this intervention but france and shown is not averse to removing gadhafi by force but now paris admits that it had contact with her tripoli but denies full scale negotiations is a sign that france is is reconsidering its position. no i when i say i didn't mean to say that enthusiasm was waning i just meant to say that they are realizing that they're running out of options they have realized that the campaign has not been as

quick as was expected there were indications by government ministers back in march that this bombing campaign would last a couple of weeks well we're now into the third or fourth month so it's not that enthusiasm is waning it's that they're desperately looking for a way out and these remarks. which you referred to in your question where he said that perhaps gadhafi could occupy a different room in the presidential palace but not have the same function as he has now this is this shows that paris is desperately seeking all possible options above all they are seeking an outcome which would save their face that's really all it's about now they are they have to save their face they have to save nato face and they have to say france's face because obviously they went into this with the stated aim of overthrowing him i know when you when you mention about what options are left on the table to try and achieve some some form of success here even the french weapons drops or fail to break the deadlock what happens if a ground operation comes into the equation do you think that france would ever go that far. i must admit it seems very unlikely i think the

remark by long game is more revealing of the real thinking that's going on now inside the palace than inside the french government i think they desperately want to find some kind of solution some kind of outcome whether it's a negotiation with the rebels or some face saving measure which would allow gadhafi to go. it's not entirely impossible that they would vote for a ground campaign but on the basis of the fact that the afghan campaign which of course france is also involved in is going badly it doesn't seem to me to be very likely instead these kinds of strange remarks that are coming out of the defense ministry i think they are showing the way forward let's let me address the financial side of this operation is officially cost france well over two hundred million dollars at least how why do you think it was surprised to get in on the operation with the financial crisis in europe greece portugal italy all on the brink of a of euro collapse a smart decision do you think. i think it was an absolutely stupid decision but

you're very right in your question to draw attention to the overall background i mean here we see a european union which very obviously cannot manage its own affairs which is falling apart at the seams whose founding member states and the members of his single currency cannot afford to pay their own debts setting off on a military escapade which seems doomed to failure and which is going to cost them and has already cost them a huge amount of money it's absolutely ridiculous but then you know in a perverse way that's what makes their determination only the more dog get to continue just as their determination to shore up the euro the euro is completely doget they have invested infinite amounts of political capital in these ventures in nato and in the european union and if they fail then these men's careers and reputation are completely on the line and that's why they're determined to find some way out of this mess john laughland director of the institute of democracy and

cooperation in paris many thanks. well our nato is lying when it says its aim in libya is to protect civilians now that's the claim of independent journalist. you can see the full interview in just over an hour's time here on r t but for now here's a brief preview. starting from the moment it was decided to launch this operation the lives of civilians were not taken into account and this is just the beginning it is rather a question of the rearrangement of this region and we are yet to see a series a war in this case nato keeps line at every stage during the war in khosla want a nato would normally ally only to conceal its mistakes and this time it's being done not to consume mistakes but to conceal the strategy. quarter past the hour now here in moscow you without the wiki leaks founder julian

assange is back in a london court where he's appealing against an earlier ruling to extradite him to sweden the world's most famous whistleblowers wanted for questioning over sexual assault allegations but his supporters fear that if sent to stockholm he'll just end up in the hands of the u.s. government we can all live to all these laura and i think outside the court building for us and laura so as to what has been happening in the courtroom so far bring us up to date. well not so much has hired an entirely new legal team for this appeal he's got the old old lot and he's got people who are much more have much more experience in criminal law and what they've done is taken a more conciliatory towards the courts and towards the charges that have been have been made and they're much more concerned with the ins and outs of lauren specifically the european arrest warrant which allows people to be extradited within the european union they are arguing that the european arrest warrant enough

case is invalid because it essentially discrepancies between. the allegations made and the testimonies of the two alleged victims there are four charges and they range between on lawful coercion to sexual assaults right down to rape and what the legal taint team is saying is that there is nothing in the alleged victim's statements that amounts to that there is no evidence of a lack of consent in the sexual relations that took place between them they say that three out of pull of the allegations wouldn't amount to a crime in the u.k. and that the arrest warrant has been issued misrepresents all of that they're also saying it's important to remember that no charges have been brought against our phones he's wanted for questioning in sweden and so far no more and they're saying has he been accused of anything is the prosecution will this case under way which of course it's not and they're saying if it's not then the word it is the warrant is inherently not valid now this case is slated to go through wednesday if based

appeal is with jetted by the high courts then julian i saw says vowed to take the extradition case right to the supremes courts and even on words to the european court of human rights but it should be noted that permission to go to the supreme court has to be granted it's not automatic and it will only be granted if this case is deemed to be in the public interest now of course he was last in court in february when the judge ruled against him and said there was no reason that he shouldn't be extradited to sweden where he would according to the judge there face a fair trial but our sons and his supporters have always been worried that one section had to sweeten they would he would be sent to the u.s. that this case was politically motivated and of course have noted that a grand jury in the u.s. is investigating wiki leaks and that some people in america would love to get their hands on ourselves and they all are indeed significant links between the u.s. and sweden as detailed in my reports. seven months since today in our souls

was released on bail. he returns to the high court to appeal his extradition if he fails will be sent to sweden within ten days but many believe his feet won't touch the ground next stop america i think. the worry is that sweeney which in the past has extradited people to america with a minimum of fuss when they were asked was seen as a possible. dog to. water awaits him in the us is this. a notorious neo conservative group help the swedish prime minister friedrich reinfeldt when re-election last year and there's another glaring link in the shape of lawyer thomas bloodstream his firm's representing the two women bringing the sex charges against him in two thousand and one he was minister of justice and is

alleged to have helped turned over to asylum seekers suspected by the cia of terror they were sent to egypt and allegedly tortured he might well want to stop wiki leaks from functioning. and some politicians. the united states. sweden one on sex crime charges the u.s. is reportedly preparing an espionage case and it suits no nato member sweden just fine to be a conduit in this case and in others. all the benefits of being an intelligence partner of the united states without the baggage of being in nato sweden seen as an easier way for the u.s. to get their hands on ourselves particularly after it requested the extradition of hacker gary mckinnon from britain which so far hasn't been granted but critics say the u.k. is just as much in cahoots with the u.s.

as sweet and as today that sells goes back to. course in london he'll have an eye on the british justice system which could save him from being extradited but the other eye will be firmly fixed on this we did a country that insists on is a new trial or seawalls turning asylum seekers david to the u.s. to allegedly to be tortured only our soldiers and his staff that wiki leaks know what else we did is going to highlight your enemy's ability to. you with our to your life from moscow our business bulletin is right around the corner but for now you can always find more stories on our website of course dot com along with the latest news blogs and videos histories to tell used what you can find there right now check out this this is amazing the latest video footage of the plane a rescue operation just hours after a burning aircraft crash landed on a lake in eastern siberia. while i have a look for you cross the road as always pushes his sportscar to the max right here in central moscow but his need for speed ends in carnage.

the half brother of afghan president hamid karzai has been assassinated in his own home initial reports suggest a cause i was shot dead by one of his own bodyguards the taliban has claimed responsibility and described it as one of its biggest achievements because i headed the kandahar province a volatile region on the border with pakistan he was often accused in media reports of having links to afghanistan's massive illegal drugs trade talk to me a political analyst from kabul says the killing is a blow to the u.s. . the past couple of years he confirmed that he had a good relationship with an american troops and american off because of this i think that americans lost one of their important members of the earth drops out at the same time he was accused of being involved in corruption and drug trafficking and then because of this many believe that american well seek for for

another person to replace him. two years ago we spoke to karzai about how he sees the allegations against him. it is a drug. but. community and everyone. want to be free video section of our website that's what you can tell you and of course a huge archive of other news footage what is the. time now to check out some other wild headlines for you this hour a protestant rape has again turned violent in northern ireland's capital belfast as bonfires were lit to mark the annual twelfth of july celebrations protesters threw stones and viable means of protestant police security services attempted to separate the opposing factions and at least seven police officers were injured in the youths next july marks the end of the annual marching season and it

commemorates a seventeenth century victory over catholic. groups britain with allegations that reporters would be shut down news of the world tabloid secret information about the queen and private telephones. spreads as other newspapers also belonging to rupert murdoch have been accused by former prime minister gordon brown of using criminals to obtain private information about him meanwhile senior police officers are being questioned over allegations that they obstructed be original investigation into the journalists conduct of the news of the world. son james to be called before parliament as part of an investigation into the news groups. all right so well do stay with us for more here on our. business update with.

thanks very much rory hello and welcome to business r t the tally in stock market is under pressure after a heavy selloff pushed the regulator to ban short selling fears announcing the euro zone's furred largest economy may request the bailout and the say in italian the fault could prove fatal to a weakened euro zone we asked chief economist at saxo bank steen jacobsen how soon it lee will be in a crisis. to some extent it already is because you see the c.d.s. prizes the insurance premium on italy's already going through the roof but insurers are saying they italy's and they greece is an extension of the truth to be honest if he has a different starting point italy does need per se to go to the capital markets and they have a much higher savings rate but i think it's more a reflection of the fact that the politicians in brussels and across europe have continued to trying to buy time and now they're getting hurt by the fact that compounding of errors policy errors is now coming back to haunt them because the market needs some sort of resole they need some sort of or sturdy package put into

place for some debt relief for greece being the point number one. some of the markets now crude is mixed as of entries in the u.s. fall from peak levels fears of a softening demand a dominating the market with investors concerned about u.s. economic recovery and the possibility of further monitoring tightening in china never what we're seeing right now is brant declining sixty one cents hundred sixteen and a half dollars per barrel light sweet just below ninety six that was put. to stock markets now u.s. markets are showing the fire and soon the seas opened flat to negative with worries about the fate of the debt crisis in europe still chilling investor interest down by just not that point three percent european stocks are also seeing a heavy sell off over a sharp drop in the previous session investors are continuing to dump financial and insurance stocks on persisting sovereign debt fears and the statement by dutch finance ministers said the selective default on greek debt is possible is also not helping and while the market is nervous about people's ability of the crisis

spreading to the in spain the cost of insuring spanish and italian government bonds as jumped to record levels will see and dax down by a percent. there in russia his the closing picture for tuesday's session the indices met ended mixed down point one percent my six point three percent take a look at some of the individual movers on the my sex burbank. here's a lot unlike other financial stocks around the world the stock even managed to gain their point six percent gazprom is down point three as energy prices continue to east throughout most of the session but a major gain on tuesday was a spot scare the coal mine is running on reports russia's state development bank could buy eighty percent of the mines fly billion dollars. to currencies that was in the euro zone have the best appetite for risk pushing the russian currency over twenty eight rubles per dollar and the ruble has lost a third of a percent against the greenback which is considered to be a safe haven asset and again pretty much the same amount as the euro on the session

so its biggest decline in seven weeks. from business for now we will be back in fifteen minutes time with. stay with.

it's.

it's. stories now. of the victims of sunday's sinking of a pleasure. many of them children meanwhile the search for dozens of bodies trapped under. extradite him to sweden. but a supporter say the case is just a pretext to the united states. president has been assassinated in his. allegedly drug trafficking.

to leave a stable country behind troops with. headlines here. but for now. those who are behind that. continues to grip europe. is now. max kaiser this is the cause or report let's get all the details from stacey or pax europe declares war on rating agencies a chorus of policymakers from europe and across the world have denounced moody's drastic downgrade of portuguese debt as an act of financial vandalism accusing the anglo-saxon rating agencies of driving states into bankruptcy and destabilizing the

global system yeah that's right they call it financial vandalism or upping the rhetoric and we we've been talking about financial terrorism for months and months and months now they're upping their rhetoric they're going to get to the point now where they realize that this is in fact not vandalism which is a quaint way of saying terrorism they didn't accuse the sullivan law of vandalism on nine eleven who never did that and it's it was an act of terrorism moody's s. and p. has tricked our financial terrace and they are purposefully targeting these countries for destruction because they want their assets for nothing well portugal's new premier pedro passos coelho said moody's downgraded was a punch in the stomach at a time when the new government has done everything demanded by the e.u. and i.m.f. inspectors well that's part of the rocket motors is a publicly traded company warren buffett's one the biggest shareholder they manipulate that stock price they manipulate their ratings they telegraph what the regs are going to be before they make them so inside.