hold on to his son in the strong current oil slick had to watch him drown in front of him yuri was the deejay for the disco on the bottom deck he only just managed to escape. and i remember clearly that water was rising very quickly it was a matter of seconds i survived because we saw a broken window in the cellar started pushing people out through it at that moment we've pushed me up on the surface and then i saw that the board was already underwater. over half the bulgaria's two hundred eight passengers and crew including the captain his wife and child never made it out meanwhile as the arabella another pleasure boat arrived at the scene she was surrounded by people screaming and drowning unable to reach the banks of the vast river three kilometers away. as we approached it was hard to distinguish in the dark water people who were alive from the rubble that was floating around people were in panic when we rescued

them in a state of shock some suffering from other traumas they were all covered in oil fuel that was leaking from a sunken ship it was a terrifying picture i have to say despite a huge search and rescue operation after the initial survivors were picked up a few others were found. the divers and cranes working in this water have been trying to recover just something of the lives lost and families destroyed in those few terrible minutes but they've also been working on the question the cost so much why did the bulgaria sink and sink so fast. as the list of bodies recovered from the ship grew so did the number of revelations about an aging dangerous and badly managed vessel eyewitnesses and people connected with the ship came forward with damning accounts of its poor condition and the stingy management who forced it to keep sailing. i became captain of the vessel in two thousand and seven ship had been renovated for a while before that there were big problems with the engines and power generators

repeatedly mention that to the management and even had an argument with them port authorities say they were lied to the ship was only supposed to carry one hundred forty people but was loaded with over two hundred they were told it was carrying twenty more tales of bound including a broken engine electricity generators failing so that no s.o.s. signal or tunnel instructions could be issued and blocked emergency exits criminal cases have been opened and arrests being made into the bulgaria sinking and more controversially into why two ships which reached the scene before the arabella didn't pick up a single person reports the crew members instead took pictures on their mobile phones and. passengers were shocked there were about seventeen people on a raft many had cuts and injuries that were bleeding we yelled for help i saw the

board passers by in a different direction towards. the slow process of raising the bulgaria has now started up with it will come the potential for answers but also terrible memories in particular associated with the ship's place or a group of children were gathered when the ship sank. just some of the young victims in what will go down as one of russia's worst and most of voidable shipping disasters tom bottom. i will bring you our full interview with a captain of a ship that saved seventy seven people from drowning in the volga river and that's in around twenty minutes time here on our team. and it's also online on our dot com where we've got updates on all the news we're covering as well as video reports and analysis and you can also follow us on our own you tube channel as well as facebook and twitter.

is. britain's government is denying it was too close to or murdoch's media empire as it scrambles to distance itself from the firm that's mired in phone hacking claims a records show prime minister david cameron held more than twenty meetings with murdoch executives in the past year murdoch has spanned the past forty eight hours apologizing the full page ads in british newspapers and meeting the family of a young murder victim whose voicemail was intercepted the media mogul's now deployed p.r. growers to rescue news sports reputation before facing scrutiny from m.p.'s about

his papers on ethical methods there's a gap on britain's new shelves the sunday after murdoch hastily axed the best selling news of the world as claimed swirled of illegally tapping the phones of crime victims and dead soldiers' families as laura emmett reports it's a watershed moment for the easy relationship between britain's won't asians and press. but every media outlet in town t.v. even the sky writers when it's a myth. hate's life the long running simpsons takes a shot at its owner rupert murdoch aka montgomery burns in an episode broadcast apparently coincidentally this week. but it's not the only old piece of timing in the extraordinary phone hacking case that seems to get more scandalous every day the list of something like four thousand names

which the police have have since about two thousand and four two thousand and five and yet they promise facie evidence of criminal activity by these individuals and boy by the murdoch empire and yet they have not acted on it so why now just as the murdoch deal to take control of satellite t.v. giant b. sky b. look sure to go ahead his arch rival the guardian newspaper releases catastrophic allegations of amoral journalists and their shady practices that when the deal collapses the times for example which currently loses money you could have transferred some of the profits from. investing in the times and if you are for example the guardian or the daily telegraph you would welcome it it's not just rival newspapers who stand to gain from murdoch's empire crumbling the b.b.c. could retake t.v. territory lost to b. sky b.

and the labor party which was wounded by years of relentless attacks by murdoch papers can finally take revenge but where will all this lead we should be. producing. you know good. that would suit the government just fine the british press is famous for its sharp teeth and no holds barred doggedness particularly where it's. government is concerned prime minister david cameron has all but shut down the press complaints commission and already talks of statutory controls to govern print journalists back in springfield mr burns is to watch it as the townspeople put up their own newspaper and he's almost right we. can truly the media as of rupert murdoch he is really beautiful murdoch found as did mr perkins that

you just can't buy all the newspapers those outside his control have been gunning for him think it is and this time they may have succeeded just as he looks set to consolidate control over a lot section of the case media markets the drugs being pulled out from under him and it's all over the hidden scandal now revealed that the police have known about it for a year is nor of its own it sweet young to. many more ahead including a story of injustice and survival are two reports from an ancient arab community that's being lined up as it was your us is really a resort almost half a century after palestinians were forced out. libya's rebels became the legitimate power holders in the country in the eyes of more nations after the u.s. and more than thirty other countries recognize them on friday at a diplomatic meeting in a stamp of the alliance of western arab nations working on the crisis an ounce it

would deal with the opposition until interim authorities in place the recognition by the contact group also gives the rebels access to billions of dollars of khadafi is frozen assets in u.s. banks but political commentator ted rall says the money and status won't change the situation on the ground. this is really a radical shift from an international student the united states usually doesn't extend diplomatic mission to regime that is not in the counting all the. and doesn't even seem likely to be able to achieve power any time soon but you can look at the situation in afghanistan during the one nine hundred ninety six to two thousand and one civil conflict there between the taleban in the northern alliance the northern alliance were the former regime that had power in kabul and they enjoyed diplomatic relations with the west even though the taleban controlled ninety five percent of the country it's almost just wishful thinking and frankly if

i were a diplomat i would find it disturbing it's a bizarre situation if the u.s. knows who these people are they're not seeing and certainly there's no doubt that traditionally there's always been a very high component of jihadi didn't around benghazi so it's realistic to assume that that is not still the case the u.s. has an amazing how it should be a skids full of hundred dollar bills to third world countries and expecting them to end up in the right hands and really going to have the high level recognition of the rabble may bolster their spirit but it's a different story in combat fierce fighting for a keystone oil town has and that with heavy casualties among the opposition and stop france is now trying talking tactic with libyan regime because force is failing to shift gadhafi as daniel bushell reports from paris. i think you can not tell that with such. books is like bragging they'll destroy their opponents they're

often wrong and gets a nasty surprise i was with french foreign minister alan should pay both did france would win libya encroached days or weeks the war's into a fourth month no final round inside nicolas 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. when should they be up for training within the last two or three years. 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 we are effectively arming al-qaeda. it's all making

a mockery of the un vote on foreign intervention in the country now relating it in their good person. giving. none of. this. witnesses may to libya's causing widespread atrocities for every one military personnel that was supposedly a casualty there were ten civilians for all it's categorically ruled out sending troops but experience predict is the only way to break the libyan deadlock the moves the splitting the nato coalition silvio berlusconi head of keep italy admits invading libya was a mistake russia abstained did the us vote warning bombs would bring havoc in libya which would you play said the latest counterpart sergey lavrov will quote lloyd lead diplomat speak. with elections just annoying months away sako

advisers said a successful war could resurrect his chances instead one paper writes libya's becoming a slow motion crash for france's deeply unpopular president. so because these a jogging for excessive sweating is understandable this is libyan spring is turning into a marathon the new bush will see paris. and a few minutes we ask if one death can do americans afghan mission after how many times i was half brothers killed by his own guard r.t. reports on how putting us on. bath food tackling talent on. the clock is ticking for america's rival politicians to agree on the next move in sorting out its soaring debt congress needs to raise the current fourteen point three trillion dollar debt ceiling to avoid the folding and president obama once parties to ignore their differences to avert armageddon credit rating agencies are

already threatening to downgrade america's credit score for the first time in over ten years they say there is a risk the u.s. could fail to resolve the deadlock quickly or effectively investment analyst maxwell believes america's dad addiction means there won't be any quick cure. the america's been running on debt for years this is a disaster in the making and i would like in this situation here to a cancerous tumor inside a body there's no better time to cut the cancerous tumor out as quickly as you possibly can that said the u.s. government has been running on debt for many many years and we've been raising the budget the total debt ceiling for many many years as a budget issue and we've successfully had deals struck that has become the political norm in the united states that whatever party is in the white house has to ask to raise the debt ceiling it's always been raised in the past the party that's not in the white house that's out of power screams and yells for three or four days most usually about how the government spending too much and should live

within its means the debt ceiling debate gets raised and it's business as usual that's been the case for thirty years so we have one side in the congress right now that's the cited no increase in revenue is acceptable other side decided that not raising revenue is unacceptable and so we've reached an embarrassing impasse that has dragged on for weeks longer than it should and is the reason that we're going to see the growing chorus of foreign and domestic voices urging congress and the white house to stop riling already strained global markets with a political impasse. things are a little better in europe with italy now the focus of stopping the eurozone heading into oblivion rose approved a tough seventy billion euro cuts package to avoid a debt wipeout it's the euro zone's third largest economy and could prove too big for its neighbors to bail out eight out of ninety european banks have failed stress test to see if they could survive another financial crisis british people now tell

told us the latest developments prove the single currency union is simply not working. this was always about politics it was not about economics the idea that you could have a column in the mediterranean in line with economies like germany fast growing economies like germany was never going to work the only way to get on to this mess is for those countries to go back home to the international court and see the value growth moving. into exports going in at the moment because if you think that because they couldn't see these are controlled by frankfurt they're controlled by the european central bank they're not controlled by athens or lisbon or even top of the people out on the streets and i just wonder how long it will be before the people i will speak to in rome and in lisbon and talk about this thing is contagious this thing will move right across the continent specifically in the mediterranean and the bigger issue you know facing your opinion is this really is the third largest economy in the eurozone this place largest economy in the world i think the eurozone can actually cope with greece and portugal the smaller economies

if italy goes the whole thing could cave in because if italy goes it's all these economy is intertwined with spain's and of spain and we go then we are in serious trouble. let's not take a look at some other stories from around the world in tunisian police used tear gas shot brown into the air to disperse a crowd who torched epa least station in the capital the clash followed an incident on friday when security forces fired tear gas to break up a demonstration at a mosque in the city managed to nations remain unhappy with the way interim leaders are ruling the country since generous revolution that ousted president ben ali. egypt's foreign minister has resigned ahead of a massive reshuffle spurred by a renewed public protests he'd only been in the job for months but the interim prime minister has been forced to make changes after widespread anger over the government's record street crowds returned to cairo as many believe little change have a top says president mubarak was ousted. the u.s.

first humanitarian delivery for somalia's drought victims has arrived just over a week since the aid ban was lifted islamist insurgents which ruled large parts of somalia imposed restrictions on foreign aid two years ago calling them anti muslim that changed after more than ten million people became affected by the food crisis as a result of these from africa's worst drought in decades. russia's foreign minister was in the u.s. capital this week to get clarification on washington's missile defense janda america's steaming ahead was deploying its anti-missile shield in europe despite objections from moscow russia feels the system could compromise its own nuclear arsenal and a joint missile defense program but that's being brushed aside by washington and nato the us is also refusing to provide legally binding guarantees that its system is not aimed against russia so you lavrov stressed to voice of russia radio in

washington of the need to prevent a new arms race. fix on the grown that being great at the on the basis of a myriad design of missile defense which was not accepted by us as a reason. the way to respond to what is your sieved as being the purpose of the system we want at this particular moment to stick to the original agreement that when there would be no parts of the system which would. compromise which would. create three six for this strategic stability and for the but then short in the strategic stability area namely strategic arsenals of the participants of the system the taliban is calling this escalation of the afghan president's half brother its biggest achievement in a decade the kind of our province chief was gunned down by one of his bodyguards on tuesday journalist jerry van dyke who survived taliban captivity says the death is

a blow to the u.s. led war effort. well the cars it was not just the governor or the shadow governor of kandahar he was the most powerful and the most popular person throughout all of southern afghanistan this shows that right now with the canadian troops pulling out and with the u.s. trying to now focus on eastern afghanistan feeling that they have controlled the south there is now a vacuum who is in power who can the west rely upon no one and i've also heard and others have reported that he was responsible for perhaps starting to bring the taliban together with the united states to negotiate they killed the person who had all the information we do know that there's a power vacuum throughout all of southern afghanistan he who holds kandahar holds that country because in the one nine hundred eighty s. when i worked as a newspaper reporter in afghanistan there were negotiations between the mujahideen

the united states the soviet union pakistan pakistan does not want to watch from the sidelines when pakistan says that there should be direct negotiations between the united states and the taliban what it is also saying is that pakistan wants to be at the table also because don't forget most of your viewers know this the leadership of the taliban is not enough gana stand like al-qaeda it is in pakistan it cannot operate there independently it has to have institutional backing and a struggle for a land rights in israel there is one place that still are now go area fifty years ago it was a thriving palestinian community but they were driven out and now israel's i knit up as a luxury and away i suppose we are has a story. this old in the mountains of jerusalem are the remains of a once bustling arab community only the memories of those who once lived here have survived intact i feel this having to come back and to bring.

my village. to sing the hobson's this rain. also to remind. my car that. day grew up among the cacti and fit trees but in one nine hundred forty eight just before the state of israel was declared his family evacuated unlike the hundreds of arab villages that disappeared in forty eight and sixty seven most of the original houses of lifter are still here so they only were heard of sure thing. they really should do they do with the whole the whole deal with the whole they were. our mother took us inside the room in a corner and then the table so as to protect us here cook was one of seven hundred thousand palestinians who became a refugee in one nine hundred forty eight his childhood home was quickly absorbed

by the newly established jewish state almost lived his house in london for nevertheless if he was forced to do just because he was three it and he is considered as absentee and he lost the property in the early one nine hundred fifty s. jews moved into the abandoned homes like you or your husband's parents they were also refugees fleeing arab countries with life had become dangerous after israel was created these really government sent them to live in lifter the only says to prevent arab owners from returning or in the came here on me for the live here years without water without electricity that came here. for the memory here as a very important most of the original two hundred jewish families lived because life in the mountains was difficult and the government was slow to develop the area no one has lived in these houses for forty six years all that remains are stone walls where wild flowers and grass now go live is empty. and it's into that

emptiness that the israeli government now plans to build more than two hundred luxury homes a chicago tel shops and a museum insisting they'll preserve the area's history we will find ourselves with a neighborhood where history has been conserved there will also be documentation and the story will be told of who lived there as we do in all the neighborhoods of jerusalem but many like your could say it's palestinian land and a double injustice why you want to destroy our house and. yeah me. for that there are three words came from anywhere in this thread why i can move in my village and come back. return back to my privilege and live. this new me. and.

so i'm going for palestinians lifting is a physical the mind of injustice and survival but for a fair number of israelis it's an eyesore and they'd rather not be reminded of what happened here every time they drive into jerusalem policy r.t. lifter. and i'll be back with a recap our top stories in just a few moments stay with us.

we'll. bring you the latest in science and technology from the ground. we've got the future covered.

welcome back you're watching r.t. live from moscow let's take a look at today's news and the week's top stories we're covering the stars the sohmer task of lifting the ship the gravelly went down in a ball the river last sunday taking nearly one hundred thirty lives. tycoon publicly. to save his stricken empire is loyal allies leave the police and the police close in on both sides of the atlantic. losing battles but winning the war the libyan rebels are in for in recognition and axis to get out the essence by their fires struggled to get to grips on the ground. plus the west wall of

america and the euro zone race to save their own lab so you're caught in these in the face of soaring debt and plummeting credit scores. hears from the captain of a vessel who screwed left to the rescue of survivors in the volga river tragedy last weekend. capitalism thank you very much for this interview was the first to come to the rescue of the sinking cruise ship bulgaria how did you get to know about the tragedy. yes we were the first to help we were sailing in the same direction as the bulgaria and we picked up on the radio just bits of conversations between some ships we couldn't make out what the ships were but we heard them talk of seeing people overboard and speculating that it looked like a boat or a small ship had capsized once we heard that we put on more speed to get there faster when we did arrive at the tragedy site we saw terrible things and only when

we realize that it was the pleasure boat boat garia that it sunk to the true scope of the disaster strike us. how long did it take you to get to the scene. of a particular i mean i would say about five to ten minutes fifteen at most from the moment we heard the radio talk but it all happened very quickly as we were nearing the site we began to figure out how many people there were in the water although that was hard to do because there was a lot of rubble floating around as well it was very hard to pick out individual people from among the floating debris and it was truly a tragic picture that we saw what condition where these people where they panic stricken where the sound. when we got them on board we had so much to deal with that it of course they were kind of stricken they were in deep shock well what happened was quite horrible my crew members who were involved in rescue works they got deeply involved too some people were in a dreadful condition many were injured they had all.