after thousands of regime supporters crowded the streets of the capital activists say fresh clashes between government troops and armed men across the country left nineteen dead president to send promise to establish a special committee to drop a new constitution while international pressure builds on him to step down. syria has the latest from damascus. that's voices of support. and continuing dissent some and in deadly clashes polar opposites in their demands but in some way united by a newfound zeal to take a stand for here the fact that the fear and kept it was gathered to show their support for the government that is going is a far cry from images we've been seeing in other cities in the country where there have been reporting watches with the kurdish north haven't had a government protests an issue however one would think it's going to matter where in this country because of course in hindsight the intensity of that was very basic you know that everybody was. allowed her husband and young children were one of

many families who braved the heat and joy the crowds in downtown damascus for god it's true that we knew nothing about politics before but now we take a stand even if i'm a sunni muslim i'm pro this president. ever since most people started revealing their political stance openly some people would mock me and say since when do you know about politics what do you know there are divisions among family members some are pro assad some are anti but that's how it is. it appears that apathy is becoming a less of an option for citizens of a nation now under intense international scrutiny i never watch news i never cared you know i never never had any interest in politics but. i think most of us read books we watch the news media articles you know we want to know want to know people and then you have the right background and other issues about your country where

you can think of them are. you there are those like you i who sing who are no strangers to picking a side and making it known he's long been voicing his discontent of what he calls a repressive regime and today facebook is one of his main tools in coordinating dissent. activism has evolved in syria for me i feel that my voice goes further now back then it started with stating an opinion going to jail that hitting dead and no one would even know about it that has changed now that people are more politically aware hussein has been thrown in jail says he was tortured and finds himself constantly looking over his shoulder. i was detained for spreading the word on the violent crackdown in daraa but i'd feel like a coward if i didn't risk my life while those on the streets are doing so asking for the regime to fall a call staunchly opposed by those on the other side yet. to. meet.

with. you. while political curiosity and activism among syrians are growing whatever side of the divide they're on people here see the future of their country is at stake but all are adamant that future is firmly in their own hands. that's our cilia r.t. damascus. and there were also asking you on our website president assad is still in power while gadhafi is not. on screen we can see the majority of you believe it's because china and russia have opposed. action against syria but if you say that bashar al assad has more popularity and national support than colonel gadhafi and nine percent think the syrian opposition movement is clueless the rest believe assad. is down to his reputation and have your say right now to call. while they've been pepper

sprayed and arrested but the determination of the occupy wall street protesters is growing along with the numbers what started with a small group of activists camping outside the new york stock exchange in mid september quickly spread nationwide report not responding the rallies in new york. the occupy wall street protesters are taking part in our massive cleanup effort today on wall street all the demonstrators hundreds of them that have been camping out there and sleeping there for weeks are pulling out their brooms their mops even toothbrushes to clean every square inch of zuccotti park the park that they've been camped out in the reason why the demonstrators are doing this is because new york city mayor michael bloomberg paid a visit to the park personally on wednesday evening walk through and told all the protesters that they would have to temporarily leave the park on friday so that it

could be cleaned up now the protesters believe that this is an effort city officials are making to remove them from the grounds that they have been camping out so they decided to take the initiative and clean the park on their own now of course the occupy wall street movement has been referring to themselves and the majority of americans as the ninety nine percent they believe that one percent of americans the richest that live in the u.s. basically hold the vast amount of money and that the disparity between rich and poor is growing deeper and deeper some facts were compiled by a variety of different organizations and those statistics include the fact that the top one percent. forty percent of america's wealth this disparity according to reports is worse than it's been in the past twenty five

years at its worst level a second point is of the top one percent take home twenty five percent of america's national income and the third point is that the top one percent owns half of the country's stocks bonds and mutual funds this is joe. a little relief synopsis of the what the occupy movement has been were burnt and when they talk about corporate greed possibly or when they talk about. economic disparities within the united states. thousands out in the streets of american cities are fed up with breaking their backs wall street corporations growth in the profits and however the the call to end the big bang mentality seems to be falling on deaf ears in the white house and is going to occur and explains washington isn't ready to turn its back on old friends. investing in politics has proved to be good business in america just a few million dollars in contributions and some lobbying can bring your company

billions in bailout loan guarantees tax refunds another stimulus all of the expense of the every american taxpayer both in the election system it's in the ongoing lobbying in service to influence industry these are powerful powerful businesses there are whole business model is around using influence to break the rules of the game in their favor so far u.s. corporations have been successful in ensuring that the loss introduced to regulate wall street after the financial meltdown of two thousand and eight don't function those measures were effectively scuppered by u.s. lawmakers the corporations were also successful in keeping their tax cuts intact and finding loopholes for getting billions of dollars in refunds the government over one percent for the one percent by the one percent picture wakes and self passes rules that allows the banks to get deregulated it restricts our democracy three years after washington gave almost

a trillion dollars of taxpayers' money to bail out corporate giants unemployment in the country is over nine percent the national debt is well past the tipping point and the congress is looking to cut essential social programs with her thousands of americans took to the streets to ask where is their bailout and how ok mary modern country that arrests a hundred nonviolent people and doesn't arrest a single one of these bankers or the people would cause this question just boggles the mind in the meantime goldman sachs one of the main architects of the current crisis is richer than ever it is a now seventeen billion dollars in bonuses alone for its staff when asked about the impunity enjoyed by the corporations president obama said a lot of that stuff wasn't necessarily illegal it was just. immoral and many agree it pretty much stays that way but not only do the lawmakers come

under fire for accepting generous contributions from corporations and then acting to return the favor but the president himself was accused of bias and prone is munna number of occasions one of the most recent scandals involves a solar energy company celebrity which went bankrupt and cost taxpayers almost six hundred million dollars that's the amount that the government approved in loan guarantees despite receiving persistent warnings about the company's financial stability the deal was pushed through by a foundation which in turn was a major donor to president obama's election campaign since last year corporations have been allowed to funnel as much money as they want into political campaigns now they don't even have to disclose the amounts they spend their time trying to buy elections is very serious the new law effectively gives the corporations even more influence in washington leaving many americans in fear that their voice might no longer count or draw all these people onto the streets of washington and other cities in the us is the understanding that their government and their legislators

represent the interests of the top one percent as they call them the very wealthy corporations that can afford influence in washington to skew the system in their favor. on our team washington d.c. . still ahead for you this year and digging deep to be your rescue fund gets the green light for more money a cash strapped greece sees no noise at the end of the austerity tunnel. system to come to the ultimate light snack check out what's being served up in space the process of cosmic catering that's coming your way very shortly here on. a new criminal cases being launched against ukraine's former prime minister yulia tymoshenko she's been charged with leaving the burden of debts from energy corp she headed on to the ukrainian budget this comes just two days after to michelle who was sentenced to seven years behind bars over her gas contracts with russia here's

our correspondent in. this story is very complicated and pretty dark because this case in fact refers to fifteen years ago when he was a was the head of the united energy systems of ukraine company she signed several contracts with the russian defense ministry and according to prosecutors and key of she owes four hundred million u.s. dollars to the russian defense ministry and the essence of this new criminal case is that she tried to put this debt on to the ukrainian side didn't this violates the ukrainian law this is of course a very interesting new twist in this saga with the trial of you look so much and go two days ago she was sentenced to seven years in prison who are abusing the power during the signing of contracts of gas deals with russia back in two thousand and nine this new case may only add fuel to the fire off a very tense and very furious ak is a very furious reactions from all over the world we've heard reactions from the united states which condemned the prison in the view too much ankle we shall we

heard reactions from the european union which said that a possible agreement on association between the european union and ukraine could be canceled and even an invitation for mystery on a coach to visit a meeting in brussels in a short few show may also be cancelled we also heard very harsh reactions from moscow which claimed that all those gas deal signed in two thousand and were completely legitimate we've already heard very interesting statements from president unocal which has said that in fact this particular law under which he was too ashamed to was present could be a bullish in ukraine decriminalised by the kray of parliament and thus. could be set free but according to many experts she will still be unable to run for president or run for parliament and will still have to repay almost two hundred million u.s. dollars in damages which she inflicted to the korean budget. expended eurozone bailout fund has been given the final go ahead slovakia's parliament has approved the four hundred forty billion euro facility after tuesday's vote against it saw

the country's ruling coalition collapse the increased cash would go to struggling nations such as greece to their friends growing stronger forty eight hour strike against the government's policies demonstrators marched away flags during the latest in a series of rallies and protests to hit the cash strapped country along with the fund e.u. leaders are seeking to prop up the banking sector the financial abyss is saying more rescue cash is not a panacea. if you stop promising any one four hundred forty billion euros it will cheer them up for a while now expects that we'll see over the next few days a certain amount of probably fairly short lived before you're over this but it doesn't address any of the fundamentals the f.s.f. itself is quite a flimsy mechanism you've got to bear in mind that most of this money is in cold hard cash it's promises to pay and the promise is to pay as you can make the promise but then when somebody actually expects the money to turn out you can see the promise evaporate very rapidly essentially since the start of twenty ten is that as long ago as it's been pretty clear to all and sundry apart from it turns

out most of the leadership greece's debt is unsustainable you're talking out of control now that has one hundred eighty nine percent of its national income owed his debt to these forecasts to be sending fifteen percent of that national income on interest payments next year this is unsustainable greece at some point has to default the real question here is whether when that default happens it will be big enough to break the very bad cycle that greece is now locked into why did it fall in growth this is a crisis of regulation this is a failure to climb down and what banks are doing it failure to clamp down on the ways and they were trying to pass risk amongst themselves the way they thought they could carry on simply printing credit and making loans to each other forever more with no real consequences we're seeing the end of that process i think and the banks themselves are very happy about it they don't want to suffer the losses from the. they took some time ago and he defaults that might happen let's say in greece that affect french and german banks start to they're not going to do k. based banks over here it's pretty much like dominoes rattling out across the

continent. james me way toward him a little earlier here in r.t. will plenty more stories for you on our website r.t. dot com you can see that interview in full and here is what else is online at the moment the consequences of the so-called war on terror a human rights groups called on the canadian government to arrest of all the u.s. president george w. bush when he visits the country later this month. and one of saddam hussein's buttocks is going under the hammer that's part of his famous statue of course what i what happened after it was torn down those stories and plenty of other pictures and stories at r.t. dot com. other world news in brief fifteen people are dead and forty eight more wounded after twin explosions rocked the iraqi capital baghdad a powerful car bomb was detonated near crowds of people who had gathered at the site of the initial blast all of the reported casualties were caused by the second blast that the bombings and shootouts continue to play the embattled country amid u.s.

preparations to withdraw troops by the end of the year. french officials have dropped their inquiry into sexual assault claims against former i.m.f. chief dominique strauss kahn prosecutor's office says though he had admitted to sexual advances toward writer christo. there isn't sufficient evidence to support really kind of notions that is here the french politician resigned as head of the international monetary fund after facing similar charges which were later dropped in new york. troops claiming to be in control of most of gadhafi stronghold city of sirte are still facing pockets of heavy resistance from the colonel's loyalists libyan leaders have denied earlier reports that one of gadhafi sons would touch them a senior army officer and security advisor has been captured in the proceed city meanwhile human rights group amnesty international has accused the country's interim leadership of torturing fails of detainees and called for the abuse to stop

. four cosmonauts enjoying a long stay aboard the international space station food is one of the few distractions from their day to day routine that preparing a meal is no easy task for scientific chefs at home in a stair up a space safe many of us both nutritional and tasty arty sent peter oliver for lunch that's out of this world. after traveling at phenomenal speed for two days cramped in the small space of a soyuz rocket cosmonauts arriving at the international space station going to be packing but how do you eat in zero gravity. put it well you have to be a bit more careful than down here on earth every little piece of food that gets out of your group will float away and you will not be able to keep track of it to make sure cosmonauts enjoy their lunch without worrying that the rogue morsel will disappear into the inner workings of some potentially life saving computer equipment the russian space agency designed this special table. that's what the

deal is you know there are two heating compartments here in this eerie and in between is a trap for crumbs it works like a regular vacuum cleaner this is important because choking on a crumb is very risky in zero gravity you can have grieve consequences. all the food eaten in space has to be specially prepared here on earth that preparation doesn't come cheap cosmonauts need three thousand calories a day that's the same as an olympic sprinter and providing that cost over six hundred dollars a day with most missions lasting for six months each cosmonauts grocery bill comes in at a hefty one hundred ten thousand dollars per mission and at those prices it's no wonder that the people behind cosmic catering a proud of their product. as the chief designer of space food with twenty three years of experience in the space food industry i can probably say that russia's

space food provides the healthiest the city first and the most nutrition rich diet for a cause when. even the most simple food requires special care and attention this factory in moscow produces space spirit and the work which goes into making it ready for all but it is almost as high tech as the i assess itself that. there is no mold and there's bread no mold spores we've developed the recipe which stops mold growth the bread doesn't go bad for fifteen months thanks to the special recipe and technologies we use when baking it. even when it comes to something simple like bread there's still plenty of choice for your hungry cosmonaut who will be all in all we make five types of bread and gingerbread white bread that's what i have here on the table now ride bread with caraway bread moscow style and it of bread. those currently around one hundred sixty called options because of the international space station including all of the taste from home from soups to main courses and

desserts and even the basics from salt and pepper the bread. that alters pretty good after a hard day's work on board the i assess it's nice to see that some of humanity's finest minds still have time to play with their food the book ok i've got a yellow one for you good color nice and bright you ready ready good job yeah me here one more a couple more this make it three keep them coming. these are all over arty. well that's how the news looks and there's an r t and next we'll be talking to a new york hip hop artist who's been with the wall street protesters since they first took to the streets over four weeks ago. on t.v. disappointment and frustration behind the outcry that indeed is next.

occupy wall street has now entered its fourth week of demonstrations and this movement has now been stuff off the nation in forty five feet two hundred cities and over the past few weeks many well known names have thrown their support behind the movement in getting my current get proper after this and revolutionary immortal technique thank you for joining me thank you for having me on a program within the first few weeks you came down here to speak to the crowd from

what i understand you were very bothered by the fact this movement was being marginalized right now for fourth week into a mainstream media is down here we see all these satellite trucks around why do you think they have gone to report about what is taking place here and throughout the country you know there's an old phrase in the media if it bleeds it leads you know the more shocking the more outrageous it is the more that they want coverage because they know that all the stations the smaller media outlets the blogging sites those sites that may not be necessarily mainstream media but have the attention of millions of viewers are starting to actually pay attention to what's going on here which ones which is one of the biggest expressions of democracy in the past few decades here in america i think the tipping point might have been the arrests the mass arrests here in the eight hundred people peaceful protesters on the brooklyn bridge it took place i know you've been very outspoken about it and of the police brutality i think that very much the police brutality when it hit the

when it hit the internet became fire all because you saw a bunch of defenseless people that were simply expressing their freedom. to speak their mind in a public place then they were penned of then they were sprayed down they were obviously not in danger of harming any police officers and then all of a sudden you see white shirts coming out war often and seemingly unable. to be held responsible for anything that they do almost as if they're above the law i want to ask you about something that new york city mayor michael michael bloomberg said about this demonstration he said that these protesters are trying to destroy the jobs of working people in new york city mayor michael bloomberg said that his step instruction is not productive do you think that this is. an illustration of disconnect what do you think about no i think that's a perfect illustration of a connect his connect to wall street bloomberg is what seventy five percent are

about owner of bloomberg l.l.c. he has a sixteen billion dollars stake or so down the wall street this is business course he feels threatened and he's going to do whatever he can including making the police more and more confrontational to elicit the type of negative response that he wants from these protesters he wants to goad them into violence he wants to make them argue amongst one another he wants to foreign issues of race religion sexual orientation whatever he possibly can him and people like him to exploit people that are coming here simply want to express themselves how is this anything but a democratic expression of freedom of speech what makes the momentum nationally that the u.s. to step aside from the occupation side from the visual what do you do when we start forcing the money when we start bleeding them down that's when they get the mess that's when they get it through their heads oh my god when people look at this

nation they see republicans completely in the hands of corporations democrats pandering to them nonstop we see them also involved now to the president as part of expanding war was expanding occupations not standing up for human rights you know being blind about several global issues that are important to people here because they reflect on our democracy what we do outside of america defines our democracy here there was a there was a sign out here that said you know. police offices you one bounced check away from being out here with the rest of us to look at a lot of people think they're angry they're screaming at cops but you're going to stand there just working class individuals whose their boss the mayor the mayor is getting money with wall street he's literally. he's closer to wall street than america is this you know me. that's that's his homie those are his people when they die you pours out a little liquor for them so when he says something to the police commissioner the police commissioner says something to the white shirts and the white shirts kicked

down to the soldiers this is a certain amount of cynicism that i have when people say oh they're all evil they're all we can know they're not evil then we can the people that are innocently following orders if they don't follow orders they lose their job like the sign says they're one bounced check for being right here with the rest of us to at some point everybody has to question what they're doing and why they're even here what they're doing at their job if there be expressive their democracy and a greater question what do they ever really do to be considered an american. if you fall out of a pool in new york or new jersey or kansas that's why you're an american if you have a stand up for you kumin rights in your civil rights that you have a question of government and trying to infringe on your civil liberties would you ever try to reform a government that's done nothing but this country dry stealing from people constantly. if people come here from the opposition people of consistently been a part of taking advantage of the people that are here that are upset at what we're

doing because it exposes what they've been doing this whole time which exposes the corruption behind closed doors then we know we're on the right path and i'm telling people right now that i'm going to continue to come back down here to this movement i was here when it started i won't be here when it finishes because it's never going to finish because we can never stop reforming our democracy the moment that we stop reforming our democracy it ceases to be a democracy the moment that the revolution stops that means the revolution has been betrayed we're here to stay and we're not going anywhere. the longest big game hunting history. she was trying to stall and. what sprung the traps they laid for him. we have the surge blocks around

the. always always missing. one shot trying to take. out the drug industry's godfather became the most want to trophy the world to hunters. on our team. culture is that so much of me is going to make a lot of people a hero not look at zero prices it is a high noon moment for a euro zone looking for to stave off another recession while juggling indebted sovereigns flew.

with you twenty four hours a day this is all t.v. here in moscow top stories now and not in the russian capital syrian activists have a new crackdowns despite lawless crowds in the capital president assad battles global pressure on his role. in the u.s. anti wall street protesters take up brooms to promote their goals as they say they'll clean up the lower manhattan paulk but won't be evicted and the street is accusing big business of trying to buy elections. the new cranes former prime minister faces new chair. just two days after he got seven years behind bars for abusing power gas contracts with moscow. but with more of those stories in less than half an hour from now in the meantime our special report for you from southern russia and a place of stunning natural beauty so precious that only scientists are given access to parts of it.