welcome it's midnight here in moscow you're watching r t with me kevin and the breaking news rebels have reportedly entered tripoli from the west as fighting in libya appears to be intensifying some estimates put the death toll from this weekend alone in the hundreds with around a thousand injured it's also believed that major clashes have seen the rebels capture the capital's me to get base opposition forces also claim two of three prisoners a lot of during the uprising against colonel gadhafi his regime it's got more reaction on the ground now across to mother is in tripoli and she's from the center for research on globalization marty thanks for being on the line with us and how would you describe what's happening in tripoli at the moment. there are targeted attacks kevin specifically targeting the areas where international journalists are

to feed their need or have gone all the heavy work this is a nato war make nor mistake there's a need a war the heavily bombed cities west of here they bomb all night out even ten seconds of stopping they bombed the entire city needle landed the insurgents on to the coast of tripoli they have no respect for international trade i was putting up a sign on the hotel on how about we took the initiative you and rape and snipers shot at me. i implore i beg. beg the international community the real international community international community of the people not the government in the nato alliance to stop this bloodshed and to get new stuff already or if it back in tripoli it can make big part of. being engaged in afghanistan in iraq and in iraq. in other parts of the world this is part of the city and.

mercilessly in this country and massacred insists the viewing. things are speedball to take up arms to defend tripoli from the rebels how likely is that do you think to bring about a strong response are people prepared to lay down their lives to save his regime what is the strength of feeling behind them let me tell you kevin quite frankly that i was told right now i can't confirm it but i was told in a letter that living into a puppy that people are acting in green square in other parts of the city not arms and ready to fight to defend this nation i don't know how it was a shooting tear psychological war here did it hurt the war effort be needed or has been brilliant here and since i'm on the topic of the media one of my friends colleagues was told by a producer by c.n.n. because we're waiting for to be rescued was told by a producer or c.n.n. that now you are going to suffer the consequences of your actions could you pause

if the war in the need a war is with us threat this is the access. to c.n.n. should answer for this type of behavior ok well we can call in to what's happening on a nother channel but we're taking what you say there as a situation of libyan capital is obviously intensifying tonight the details are still sketchy coming in a lot of this has to be verified a number of war leaders meantime have again demanded the gadhafi steps and what other international reaction coming expect do you think do you think he will step down at the last moment at the eleventh hour that's who you know he's not going to step down why is this what this war is not about colonel gadhafi colonel gadhafi is just the pretext for this war this war has nothing to do with colonel gadhafi has to do with stealing money from would be people that's already taxed colonel gadhafi it could be the prophet mohammed the prophet jesus or the pope which are you. going to. tell you they have no. specter of the media has to stop this war nato has.

broken the arms embargo. to liberate me that what the french are why is this going on where is the real international community the people listen what can your the united states turkey chatter not the international community governments around the world to intervene and get this stuff that is going to be a bloodbath here and this is what exactly would need to what the briefly just listening in while you were talking there are going to gunshot the gunshot was coming from close to you was it that was coming from nearby if they're attacking a hotel they're attacking with the international media they try to shoot at me earlier today sniper fire i was great i was on the greeted by sniper fire when i was on the roof putting i had to take catch up and write on a handkerchief a bed sheet press and i had them on the roof this is this is obviously a terribly frightening time for the for the residents of tripoli the people you've spoken to the people you've seen around you there. what are their feelings i guess

the terribly afraid. it's mixed feelings you know there's a psychological process we go through the shock there's going to be fear and then there is resistance and many of them children ironically kevin i'm really sorry to say that i've seen young men thinking of going to defend this country you know this is not about colonel gadhafi the world should realize it's not about the fact that because the people on the other stright been saying going you know far worse than colonel gadhafi a lot of our cities committed in libya when when they were government members by the way can the united nations in geneva when the accusations were meeting about the murders in the east here the libyan human rights league there directly directly involved in life if you documented the documents will be out and could be directly lied and by a member of the transitional council were part of the libyan human rights week they subsequently became members of the transitional council right actually. issues

worry and fears norgate be encouraged but rights council needs to be examined in the board members of these organizations need to be granted because the united states israel and several of the allied have a big monopoly in geneva and it using the same tactics against the syrian arab republic in the eastern mediterranean right now very briefly because we want to let you get on with your own plans and only going to do next what what is ahead for you for the next twelve hours you'll be leaving the country i've contacted the cuban embassy i've talked to. to the cuban you see that immediately right here too. there's a chinese press t.v. every man and the journalists and. those who are in the cubans on one side it was myself and the others are on the other side so you can see you could do it here in the national polls there's an roi tripoli from the center for research on globalization thank you for talking to assert live on r.t.

international we wish you well and hope you continue to be safe let's get some more reaction now shall we talk to freelance journalist chandan he's recently come back from libya and he's now safely in london very good to see you tonight as well and based on your recent experiences and how much you heard of that interview there with marty just now based on your recent experiences in tripoli or would you assess what's happening in libya right now good evening kevin we've heard this several times before that we're on the verge of gadhafi and regime change is just about to take place in libya where more than five months into a nato bombing campaign six months into this libyan crisis and gadhafi is still there let's try to see you know what does seem to be ratcheting up greatly tonight doesn't it. but to actually the thing is i don't want to deny for a second that there is some kind there's some level of clashes taking place in tripoli which they obviously are but there's mixed reports about the about the airport that's been taken or hasn't been taken but so far no strategic positions

have been taken by the rebels in tripoli so it remains to be seen really how this plays out and already even in the western mainstream press we're having voices that are saying don't expect this to be over in days days or weeks even they expect this to last some many months yet this is a city of two million people that generally is loyal to the regime but it's an armed people so as you get to remain to be seen how this battle will evolve from here on in what do you think will transpire over the next twelve hours or so do you think the it was very difficult to know but do you think the rebels will make more games will get into this city or you think they'll be pushed but we're hearing there are thousands of quote thousands upon thousands of troops ready to defend the city ready to defend gadhafi what do you think is going to happen. i think what we're seeing right now given is obviously a concerted media campaign to really ratchet up and high apart the so-called

accomplishments of the rebels in tripoli at the moment this has to be put into relation to what's happening with syria and with palestine it doesn't surprise me to hear your headlines just a just a few minutes ago but egypt has brokered a cease fire between the palestinian resistance and the zionist state of israel one thing is for sure the palestinian resistance will continue to fight against israel because they know that the arab spring is the progress the arabs are exploring clean up for the west and the palestinian resistance want to turn the arab spring the pro-west arab spring into an arab spring clean of zionism and an empire of politics in the region so really what the west is trying to do the trying to make libya a quote unquote success so they can roll on syria next so as you see it this is maybe not good duffy's last stand tonight. no no no not no not not by far this guy has been at war with the west before and in a way i'm sure that you know really he revels in it so what we're seeing now is nato trying to make a success of libya so they can focus on syria but they've got problems in

afghanistan and we saw what the taliban contribution to this debate was in the blowing up of the british council in kabul so they have many headaches on their hands right now so it's completely not sure what the outcome of this and gadhafi and his forces no doubt will put up very stiff resistance in tripoli is going to be very messy thanks ever so much independent freelance journalist as you are forgiven is your thoughts on the line from london tonight to international. situation in libya of course being closely monitored in the us a key player in the military campaign against gadhafi has ruled it also remains in contact with rebel leaders r.t. is going to teach it can is now on the line to give us a washington view and it are there has there been any statement yet from the white house on this latest round of fighting which as we've been saying does appear to be ratcheting up tonight presumably the rebel advance is what they would have wanted yeah. well catherine we haven't heard any official statements yet but as the rebels

are closing in on tripoli we might be well seeing the end of khadafi regime the whole of the international community has been united in saying that gadhafi has no future in a libya and that including all of the members of the u.n. security council they all shared their view that khadafi moscow including russia as well but the means by which nato has been accomplishing the goal of al sting khadafi have seen many violations of the u.n. resolution that authorized the military intervention six months ago the resolution was designed to protect civilians but many innocent civilians have been killed by nato strikes during those six months and the funneling of weapons to leave you unravels has been done in here a violation of the arms embargo that was imposed on libya western powers clearly took sides in the civil war basically disregarding the whole part of the population that never wanted an intervention in the first place in light of all those violations it was very on likely that the u.n. security council would have adopted and the resolution only via come september and

september is when the previous resolution runs out so it's very it was very crucial for the rebels and nato to carry out the operation before the resolution expires from what we see on the ground the rebels might be meeting the deadline there so despite the violations as it often happens in history the winner takes it all as for who the winners are although the rebels are far from being a homogenous group their official leadership and that is the transitional national council has been recognized by all allied forces there who have been helping them oust gadhafi the rebels have seen some heavy backing they've been have really backed by western powers including the united states the head of the council mustafa jolie who has traveled to washington a number of times he has received overwhelming support from politicians here so he's definitely seen as their man in. tripoli but one of the stumbling points here is that he hasn't been chosen as the leader by the league and people themselves and

many leaders libyans are outraged by the fact that those very important choices are being made for them also going back to the point that the rebels are not a homogenous group there has been some infighting going on among the rebels as well at the end of july a top rebel military commander was killed and a very suspicious circumstances circumstances which led to believe that the head of the transitional national council might have had a hand in that murder but again that infighting has been very murky and definitely has not received enough coverage but many experts are saying the fight for being in charge of levy is no surprising considering what is at stake and let's not forget it is a nation that has. richest oil reserves in africa and they got a chicano walsh washington d.c. correspondent thanks for giving us your thoughts on that as well tonight now

a bit earlier on i spoke to independent journalist lizzie fail and she's in tripoli she's been reporting about the last couple of days for she says as far as she could see where she was the rebels how he had established any sort of control within the city. i'm not battles going on i am outside of our hotel where i currently am in a beneficial area of tripoli but it does appear that what it's a very small group of rebels or insurgents or whatever you want to call them and not have the impression that some kind of treat the opposition have moved into the capital so the question is really how long they have not found them. against the libyan army which of course is a conventional army and the poor here. is in tripoli has been on by the libyan government is the beginning of the crisis that so really we're just waiting hour and being how long the last legs and you say it's. about that. they don't

have any kind of popular support and they say. any kind of they don't think have any large not. it doesn't look very well for very long i mean very much ready they haven't been using anywhere near that military capability there are court or firm as i said many volunteers ordinary people who are very good taken up on to other pending their areas but. this is not the opposition haven't taken any heat part of that. we'll bring you as much information as we can as we get it from correspondents and reporters that stay tuned to see for the latest news get some european reaction to it president sarkozy of france as well as the german government again calling on gadhafi to step down in the face of recent gains by the rebels but he's done a bushel produce up to date from paris with the latest. president nicolas sarkozy had that he called the rebels in the moment the. libyan people and he

reiterated backing a. provisional council he will look cool get out immediately get what he had to lead at the outcome of rebel bigotry is no longer in doubt because the idea to get out and should immediately order his fall is peaceful and to give way to the legitimate as he called it individuals or at least now that he has really. in the last twenty four hours he got to the libyan people will never allow all of that goes across the globe and be a major exporter of energy that he will never allow the collaborators of the french to rule. libya of the crossing in tripoli as rebel troops are closing in on the capital he warns of what they will really help the rebels. water and electricity to the capital there even given the order when it comes to their very worrying. really and i think you're a hero here and you're going to feel as local people the international criminal

court in going played in order to justify military intervention in the capital because that's in the ivory coast to depose the former leaders there they claim that it will be over already i'm going to say you can go out in fact if you think that there's been generally no chorus more than pulling the strings militarily. warning people in the capital could be extremely low the street to street warfare also usually support. and they're all a little bit of the rebel of. small and too badly organized to actually handle the fighting. but if you're a correspondent daniel bushell well for north africa to cover the middle east cross border violence sold there this week with israel launching airstrikes in gaza with full back with dozens of rocket attacks latest reports tonight however suggest that egypt does manage to broker a cease fire between the two sides which could come into effect within the next few hours to update us on that i spoke to our teams paula slayer in jerusalem across

the latest. the reports we are receiving indicate that her master officials say that cairo has brokered this truce which goes into effect this evening we understand there tell of the of was hesitant about making any kind of agreement with the guards operatives and the militants put down fire first we also understand that it will be the responsibility of her master security personnel to enforce the cease fire not only this is good news but the reality on the ground is that no one here really believes that a cease fire between the two sides will rast and will survive the test of time this latest violence started on thursday in a three pronged attack there cliff eighty's rabies did not it's all responded almost immediately with a strikes and those air strikes have been continuous since tuesday there have been more than a dozen palestinians killed they have been more than eighty grad and some rockets that have rained down on southern israeli towns killing one israeli and injuring

many more so certainly the the since on the ground is that both sides are incredibly angry both sides are incredibly distrustful of the other and one of the sentiments being expressed here in israeli circles today is that the israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu has been preparing for a war with gaza for some time and every day what happened on thursday was just the opportunity to carry out the assault that we've seen this ties in with the current domestic problems. of israel this very weekend we saw the marches on the streets you have more people protesting about the way that it was a lot of the government's domestic policy right now there is some cynicism isn't there about the timing of these. assaults that across the weekend at the same time as they were demonstrating about the problems within israel but they certainly have some cynicism here in israeli circles when you talk to demonstrators they say that they're not surprised by the latest spate of violence many believe that netanyahu

was just hoping for something like this to happen because he has a prime minister that is very strong. security issues on issues of like what is called terrorism here in israel rather than on addressing socio economic internal problems so for more than a month now you've had tens of thousands of protesters in all the major cities in israel they marched again last night and was before the slogan was a call for social justice they added a new slogan yesterday saying a call for a cease fire now the protesters that i've been speaking to are adamant that they will not let this latest spate of violence detract the netanyahu government from addressing their concerns they plan that by the first weekend in september they'll have a million man march they believe they'll get a million israeli citizens to the streets so that's almost one sixth of the population here so he certainly is a lot of disgruntled israelis about domestic issues and if anything ironically this latest spate of violence that they say has made him even more determined to make

sure that netanyahu and his government addresses be concerns. to. tough jail sentences for using facebook to encourage violent riots the jail terms were praised by problems to david cameron by human rights groups is over the top of his over bennett has more on how the policy of zero tolerance is taken hold in the u k. four years behind bars for the riot that didn't even happen jordan black sure and perry sutcliffe kenan were banged up for inciting disorder on facebook no one turned up after their invitation to riot which they later said was a drunken joke but now they face sentences even tougher than most looters and i worry is that it is an imbalance a four year sentence for example would normally be given to somebody for a previous bodily harm for holding someone up with a naive or even for. some form of sexual assault so it seems to me that that

there is a danger that the courts are moving into disproportionate territory and that actually devalues our response to more serious crimes that governments encourage courts to dish out harsh sentences by using the public disturbance as an aggravating factor it's meant this man anderson fernandez could even be sent to jail for thing of just two scoops of ice cream because like this one denying bail to most offenders and ignoring any claims of previous good character of the one thousand two hundred seventy seven people charged so far two thirds have been reminded in custody that's way up on last year's rate for serious crimes is just ten percent some offenders even being made homeless as their punishment with local governments taking away their houses but many say this will simply cause more harm than good i think this is very unwise the move to remove people from housing intern move benefits because actually if we are seeing that some of the crime that we saw

on the streets was an expression of people not feeling part to society not feeling part of our communities then these measures are actually going to push people further away from society further away from our communities and far more likely to commit crime the facebook case is the first sign of the government's desire to crack down on social media sites like twitter were applauded by the west for mobilizing the masses in the arab world but they were also instrumental in the u.k. riots so now the prime minister wants it to stop. we are working with the police the intelligence services and industry to look at whether it would be right to stop people communicating via these websites or services when we know they are plotting violence disorder and criminality when social media fueled revolutions in egypt and she needs britain called it democracy but now the shoe's on the other foot when troubles closer to home i'm very conscious we knew you know the. movement we would be the force the. country's.

prime minister says this is where britain fights back but its speed this fighting fire with fire could only fan the flames of civil disorder after bennett artsy london. a collective economic government that's the latest measure proposed by top e.u. leaders in the bid the whole market turmoil and reverse the stagnation across the continent but the latest ideas are found little support among investors who say it's too little too late and let merkel and nicolas sarkozy rejected the idea of euro bonds favored by the markets and seen by many as the best way of emerging from the debt crisis that it will analysts north of william angle's told us there's little real substance to these latest measures. is that ly think the collective economic government that merkel and sarkozy are talking about is really a desperate political ploy to try to create the illusion of stability where the underlined stability doesn't yet exist there is no political will not in germany

nor in the rest of the eurozone countries for as surrendering national sovereignty to a collective entity that has any decision power so it's simply a shimmer that's been thrown out there to try to calm the markets the alternative really is is to get a stable export market relations i think above all with with russia the central asian republics china and the rest of asia in the middle east and if that is created then you can have a growth vector that leads you out of this debt impasse that the eurozone countries are in without that and so long as as the dollar system dominates international financial relations that moody's standard and poor's do the rating on sovereign debt for european union countries and that there is no independent european credit rating agency and there isn't is no. growth perspective not only austerity

and there is no up to this crisis. but news from the middle east know syria's president assad's giving a live t.v. interview saying the regime is not in danger of falling that the government is able to deal with the current unrest in the country syrian state media condemned u.s. and european calls for president assad to step down saying the moves part of conspiracy russia for its parts also refused to back the calls saying assad should be given more time to implement promised reforms this comes in the wake of a crackdown on anti regime protesters but as artists refresh their reports next while the west sees the government's action is oppression some in syria see it. job is done the city liberated there is or in the east of the country has become the last syrian city the army left after clearing off extremists that have been terrorizing his citizens for weeks the military claim is that these bandits block their weights put up barricades it became a city we were hiding we were just like hostages. soldiers of the syrian army i

live in the city of the or near the iraqi border. officials are saying operation is now over that the city has been freed from armed groups as you can see people are welcome in the soldiers as the way there is between tanks have been trying to make their way through jubilant crowds thousands of kilometers away in the white house a decision has already matured president bashar al assad is the one who's terrorizing the syrian people and that should and the transition to democracy in syria has begun and it's time for assad to get out of the way not everybody has agreed though moscow has insisted that assad should be given time to implement promised changes his recent decisions to release political prisoners repeal emergency law and allow peaceful demonstrations have indicated the right direction but external pressure could still bury fragile transitional which are sort of

a sort of cobbler. forms will give forces to syria it will make the country stronger but syria's enemies don't want syria to be strong america for instance they're sick and tired of a strong syria and they want to weaken its they don't want reforms they need instability and chaos across the country is a long list for civil and they're pressure works for it with contradictory reports about policemen and security officers killed across the country and the army is continuing crackdown on protesters despite president assad's pledges to the un to stop military operations the syrian people no longer know who to trust and what to believe. with a country at the crossroad again the on themselves with patience raef notion r.t. syria. you're watching r.t. live from moscow with me kevin when the time is now coming up to exactly midnight thirty this early monday morning the twenty second of august let me take you

through our top stories on the breaking news battle raging tonight in libya multiple reports of fierce clashes around tripoli as colonel gadhafi are citizens to take up arms against the rebels the country's major military base is now thought to be in rebel hands strengthening. out right victory. also in the headlines suggestions of a ceasefire egypt has reportedly managed to convince both gaza and israel from a down arms after days of heavy shelling. and also tonight the crackdown against english rioters gains momentum with harsh sentences handed to those who played only minor parts of the chaos as human rights groups say judges and politicians gone too far. and in other news from us made the headlines of the week the leader's promise of a single ignore.