opening up a can of worms g. twenty leaders are gathered in france right now hoping to solve the world's problems but with tensions running high from protesters and the greek debt crisis so can leaders a really solve the global economic drama. and are the drums of war beating some say western allies are gearing up for a military action against iran so just how likely is that. was striking scenes out of oakland and yet another police crackdown this after protesters shut down the entire city in a general strike so is o'flynn becoming

a symbol of occupy wall street and the different approaches from coast to coast will the cause see a split in the movement. and this vote was not made for walking as u.s. courts and russian businessman victor boot guilty of arms dealing so was this case decided in the court of public opinion before the verdict was ever read. it's thursday november third five pm in washington d.c. i'm liz wall and you're watching r t new this hour we had to greet this where prime minister has now backtracked and scrapped plans for a national referendum on whether to accept another you hand out this to save the country from debt george papa dr decision to hold a public vote over the bailout has drawn criticism from abroad and around the

opposition putting his government on the verge of collapse my colleagues there for of has the latest on this decision from greece. it's been a very confusing day all round to be honest we saw a huge turn on mistake of lee on the plans to hold a referendum oh they didn't specifically say in his address that was off the table certainly the noises were being made that that was the direction we were going in and also that we heard from the greek finance minister he did categorically say that the referendum is off the table now when that was announced a little while ago that we saw. just years in countries and their leaders but the financial markets as well and indeed within the greek government there was a lot of concern over those schools by the prime minister for a referendum we've seen him backtracking out a lot of people saying that he's caved to that pressure from berlin from paris from within his own government now what he was saying was that they face at eleven a

decision was always between whether they get to consensus or whether they have a referendum say today the message is very much that actually in the smooth friends of the decision to now say they be holding a referendum was always the fact that if they could reach consensus about the bailout plans with the opposition in government then a referendum wouldn't be necessary. tools a lot of cynicism again here on the ground from the people of the case you know you we heard the prime minister make these very strong statements a couple of days ago talking about the mochas in how does that salute you write that this decision has now lie with the people and now of course he's seeing this u. turn happening and he was saying here right from the beginning to feel that they were expecting the decision to be put in their hands they really feel like ross was is the driving force behind a lot of what they're hearing at the moment we seen this time and again with the public movements hung out on the streets we saw again some people outside the hall in the building today a lot of just inside here in

a country. that was already correspondent sara firth from athens now on the after waiting a drama in greece. is the focal point that is the focal point of the g twenty summit today and cannes france european leaders talking about getting the country off and your out as an attempt to rescue the currency the possibility of a looming greek the fall that hangs over the world's twenty most powerful leaders here is that a crisis in greece will have a ripple effect on the global economy sending countries spiraling into recession the g twenty now scrambling to make the euro crisis their enemy now to talk more about that as gerald for one thing a publisher of the transit journal and director of the trends that research. thanks for joining us gerald how much in danger is the euro when right now but some great danger the whole european union is in great danger of listen to the words of silvio berlusconi that he said on saturday that will hardly repeated he said it was

a strange currency that has not convinced anyone that's what he said and then of course he backtracked right away but all you have to do is look what's going on over there in in france as the g. twenty meeting if you want to see the levels of this connect all you have to do is look at the gala that they're throwing it looks like an academy awards ceremony with the red carpets rolled out and the paparazzi shooting all of their flags there's a total disconnect what's going on between the world leaders and what's going on out in the streets the systems are collapsing and you know right now they're talking about booting graze off of the euro i mean do you think that this isn't the best interest of the euro zone. out of their. it's in the best interest of everyone the what we wrote when the euro came online back in one nine hundred ninety nine

that this was done being done with the euphoria of globalization remember before that you know in the late eighty's there was no china in the markets you know east the berlijn was behind the iron curtain so those this whole euphoria about a a a european union and it was also something that looked upon by the older generations as a way to stop future wars but in reality all it was was a scheme for the bankers to be able to do big deals easier and again that's all these or sterry he measures are about it's paying off the banks of the belgium the dutch the french and the germans that have made bad bets. let's talk about the consequences of. grief does the fall bear and that's fair that it's going to. fend off this global recession. what what would be the consequences

if greece does it. it's bigger than greece and that's what you see there using greece as the excuse for the whole family or it's the one of the smallest countries in the end you do it's peanuts compared to italy which is in much greater danger with much worse g.d.p. to debt ratio and then you have ireland in you have spain this is it is what are they going to do give greece another couple of billion dollars when they're half a trillion in debt so no it's much worse than that look at the problems in the united states it's a way to focus the problem on greece but in fact the whole economic system is collapsing from printing all of this digital money that's not worth the paper it's not printed on so weathered. greece defaults on this or not a crisis is not going to be solved. well i mean the focus

now at the g. twenty is to resolve this complex i mean how important is it for them to come up with a solution are i mean things like and you think it's not even going to make much of a difference it's not going to come up with another convoy they come up with look let's go back to you know just a week ago last thursday remember all the euphoria that they came up with a plan to solve this merkel and saw a cozy congratulating each other the markets boomed up six percent on average by monday the game was over all it is is a calm on they come up with a new line of bull loney on how they're going to save the day and the great minds are being brought together to solve these problems that they cause so no they're not going to solve the problem by printing more money that's the only solution they

have look why the u.s. markets went up today because the news came out the federal reserve was highly disappointed that the economy's not turning around as quickly as they had hoped so now there's hope for more q e three so no they're not going to solve it ok. the new development here the prime minister of greece he drop this referendum on and it seems that there is one democracy in telling another not to listen to their own people this obviously won't go well with the people of greece what are your thoughts on on the us the how how how how ironic that the cradle of democracy has been rogge by the bankers and the politicians and the bureaucrats there are these are not democracies i've said this over and over again for all those little children out there that think their lives. in democracies the merger of state and

corporate powers like definition is called fascism and that's all this is it's fascism pure and simple let's stop this the saw of democracy ok jerald well the g twenty yeah it seems like you don't think that they're going to come up with a solution and they don't have the answer is what is the thing lucia now or the solution is to build a mystique markets this whole big wind about globalization and unions has been nothing but a failure and there's no such thing as you know sustainable perpetual growth it's an inorganic process but these guys don't want to lose money look when you want i make a big bet we have to eat our losses when the bankers make a bad bet they come out with this right shoe boy language they don't want to take a haircut they have to take their losses the big wide with is is that we have to

save the banks they don't have to be saved the banks could fail we need a contraction and growth has to become more moderate than the expected continual growth that they keep wanting for promise and harold we've been covering the protests that are going on over there in france it is that with anti-globalization protests and there we have been drawing a lot of comparisons between the protests that are going on in france and a lot of the occupy wall street protests that are happening here in the u.s. do you think that people are now finally realizing that you know the system is corrupt or robots here response to the protests that we're seeing kind of in solidarity with the occupy wall street protests that are now rising in france it's a trend that began a while ago and we've been writing about it it's whether it was tunisia egypt florida. a and in whether it's syria the riots in greece the protests in

it wholly the ones that happened in the u.k. over and over again it's the same story it was. far too few have much too much and way too many have much to it all these are this is class warfare it's as old as history and it's happening again so that's what we're really looking at over the year so it's all connected this isn't orthe with their heads moments particularly when you look at what's going on in the g. twenty with this grandiose gala as they're telling everybody else pay more taxes are going to lose their pensions and benefits we're going to raise retirement age to lay off the a dog i mean we're going to cut your services so it's all connected it's it's class warfare it's beginning and it's really we're looking at the first great war of the twenty first century carol thank you so much for your thoughts on this i was publisher of the transit journal and director of the transit research institute

gerald salon today. the drums of war against iran are beating loud at the country comes under suspicion of growing their nuclear enrichment program that's after a report released by un's nuclear watchdog which supposedly shows evidence of iran iranian nuclear activity is now the u.k. as it prepares prepping its military for action and it's believed the u.s. of gearing up for the possibility of war against iran as well so as an attack is an attack on iran on the horizon the answer to that is the former reagan administration official and columnist paul crag robert. paul we talk of military action and libya now like a doctor he is dad is iran the next target most likely u.s. . i think that's indicated by the fake plot to bomb announced the brand wanted to hire a used car salesman and much control again to kill the saudi arabian in first. and

what do you make of this new report coming out from the international atomic energy agency which apparently shows evidence of iran expanding its nuclear weapon nuclear enrichment program oh i didn't think the report was out yet and that may be one of the speculation about three or leave the new head of the international atomic energy agency is a more compliant version and interest in his predecessor who. was very rigorous about issuing only financial reports and it may well be this this new report will. washington. in the situation in a way to generate more hysteria. and paula. president obama had initially promised that he would and terms of foreign policy

he would take a different direction from president bush how would you compare president obama's policy to president bush well he's actually started more wars and he seems to be he seems to be even more dangerous war longer than bush cheney which i think is a surprise to everyone and if this does transpire we're seeing signs of the u.s. . the u.k. gearing up our site to go to war will occur i will of the will is send off a lot of our countries back each other and all this turned out to be you know allies coming together and followed heritage and war against iraq. well the british clearly are gearing up the. israeli prime minister is trying to convince his cabinet to support an israeli attack on iran and we know that it is

a principle objective of the american neoconservatives they've been arguing this for years and years and they're influential in the government and so i think there is. certainly a high probability that some sort of attack will be made on a rant i don't know if if all of the rest of the nato public states will go along with it or not i don't really know what the position of russia and china will be one would think that it's not in their interest and that they should find some way to effect impose it but it remains to be seen what will happen and paul with the new developments that we're seeing now at this point do you think war with iran is inevitable. i think that that is a definite goal of washington and the israelis. go ahead but whether or not it's inevitable depends on. instruments for separation

by the rest of the world and if there's enough to set forcibly expressed then i think it could be blocked rightish people fall in line as they did with libya and then the war is who's most likely going to happen and what about what's your prediction in terms of a timeline president obama's kind of under pressure it's not being launching and the other wars you know it's a one year now and still has a lection i mean if if military action was to be taken against iran when do you think that would happen i don't i don't know. you know a president war has has good chances of being reelected. normally americans don't like to. defeat a president when the country is a war so it may serve his purpose his electoral purpose as well but

i really think the outcome will do care and the only world's reception to what clearly looks like. a move to attack iran militarily actually we have the sanctions that the the house foreign affairs committee just pass and clearly the purpose of the sanctions is to stop any diplomatic contact between the united states and iran that's what the sanctions will do and so that would prove vet any sort of loophole missy any mitigating a war in fact is sort of stampedes the government toward war because if you don't permit any diplomatic contact with a country this in the crosshairs there's no way of resolving the difference so it looks like the entire. effort is to push toward war with iran.

thank you paul for your thoughts on that was former reagan administration official and columnist paul krugman probably. and we will continue to follow this story as the grounds began to be allowed or one more question we would like to ask why the united states involved in selling many interventionist policy. there is war propaganda coming out of our ears in this town and it's those institutions like the heritage foundation that are the force behind it and it's those institutions pushing for war abroad so why are political leaders fighting for the agendas of these pro-abortion lobbying groups will have in-depth coverage of these neo con powerhouses so stay tuned as we continue to report on the story. of the occupy wall street protests are heating up in oakland when protesters have successfully shut down the city's port the demonstrations turning chaotic.

police clad in riot gear use tear gas and fire pellet that the crowd then arresting demonstrators by the dozens at least four protesters reportedly injured and hospitalized among those injured a man and women hit by a mercedes take a look at the scene last night angry protesters swarmed the car conflicting accounts as to what exactly happened some say the driver plowed the car into the protesters others say the driver was provoked by the activists pounding on the car amid the strikes the violence the chaos oakland is shaping up to be a major hub for the occupy wall street movement with outsiders flocking to the california city are the producer lucy cavanagh is right there in the middle of the action. well actually the status fairly calm i took a walk around the perimeter this morning but testers were still sort of milling

about a lot of folks leaving and we did see a lot of the city workers dropping off graffiti picking up pieces of trash from the massive band that erupted yesterday evening for the most at the moment nothing really serious happening i think people are still trying to process what really went on yesterday and the huge contrast between a b. largely peaceful march that brought thousands of people out to the port of oakland to shut down the port of oakland contrast thing that the president forced by the police department in the late hours of the evening early hours this morning ok and it sounds like this is the come after the storm a what happened last night and what led to believe cracking down and resorting to violence. well you know that the strangest thing for me is that i mean we spent literally the entire day yesterday holding the precious years around in the different marches they went on culminating of course the big big march in the port of oakland and the one thing that really struck me is that we did not see any

police officers i probably count into two police officers on scooters escorting this giant march. which which i guess it was a response to of course the heavy handed tactics but if you can tell the police officers arrested one hundred people and injured iraq war veteran scott olsen in the evening after everyone came back from the march there was a sort of jubilant atmosphere people were celebrating and out partying drinking smoking dancing in the streets most of the protesters were in fact calm but there was a certain sense of education you know they felt they were howard they felt like they succeeded in this task and perhaps there was an on channel of energy that they didn't know where to queue well what ended up happening is a group of protesters actually took over a proposed help they want to employ a sort of employee to retake reclaim foreclosed property as several of those protesters decide it's a pull out pieces of furniture out of this so far postpone to barricade the street for a party. it was all going very well people were just celebrating it didn't really

seem like it was getting out of hand until all of a sudden about eighteen i counted under its white vans suddenly pulled up about a block away inside were riot police officers in full gear they all got out and sort of blockaded the street and stood information and very intimidating sight and i think what happened was the sight of that really sort of provoke a lot of outrage by the protesters who are very very curious that the police up an act out last week and some protesters lit pieces of furniture and garbage cans on fire and that is when we started marching started shooting down tear gas they say that they didn't use rubber bullets one protester actually showed us for. over a feedback beanbag and lost a child just shooting that was pretty hefty to hold it looked a little bit. and that is essentially what went out there was a major flash any of the protesters did run away about sixty people were arrested

and what was this bizarre four hour long standoff with police officers the most out of their ground as the protesters as it should be a very tense situation that eventually ended up teetering it out but doesn't a lot of distance which were destroyed protesters injured many rocks. and that was our theses your producer lucy capital from the occupy wall street protests the occupy oakland police crackdown loosely has been traveling around the country tracking this growing movement for the very latest on glass going on you can follow her footsteps on twitter at least the captain of well demands of the merchant of death now faces a sentence of life behind bars after a jury found him guilty of dealing blackens to terrorist organizations but there is a lot of controversy surrounding the trial questions about whether or not the russian businessman had had a fair trial and whether it was legal for him to be extradited from thailand to the us the correspondent understands the inter can

a look at the greater implications of the verdict in this case. here is spent by the us to hunt down one russian man tens of millions of dollars of taxpayer cash poured into risking operation snatched up from a third country for a month of solitary confinement before a three week trial in the us allegedly arms dealer viktor boot was found guilty on all four charges one conspiring to kill united states nationals two conspiring to kill united states officers and employees three conspiring to use an acquire anti-aircraft missiles and for conspiring to provide material support to the for the forty four year old russian air cargo business and fascinated hollywood wanted are everywhere people. going to court. and only army other alleged. booed lost his case in the court of u.s.

public opinion long before his trial kicked off raising concerns of the fairness of his trial this is the lord of war. the merchant of death right and you've got him in your hands spread he's in custody it's a great feeling u.s. officials were relentless in their efforts to get behind bars the so-called merchant of death is now a federal inmate american agents posing as fart members a colombian group team terrorist in the u.s. but not by many other countries and the un met with and then arrested in thailand in two thousand and eight after twice being found not guilty by thai courts the u.s. reportedly played dirty by arm twisting thailand into extraditing him to america they're willing to flaunt every international law to get what they want and that means doing all these illegal things in the case of the to extradite him or kidnap them boots family also calls us actions entrapment and kidnapping the police guy i

can accept the possibility that they might have some information that might be of interest to someone or why is it that other countries don't just think of themselves that there is someone who has some interesting information and why don't those government has tried those people out of their territory moscow's request to send him to russia were brushed aside there was no official decision of an extradition russia called boots extradition illegal and question the validity of his conviction one of the main arguments of the difference that the u.s. lacked jurisdiction was ignored by the court would stiffen says the russian was aware that he was not in touch with real four members and all he was trying to do was sell to all cargo planes we can appeal to this judge. that the verdict was rendered i can see the weight of the evidence that we could also proceed to the united states court of appeals but with the vigor with which which was brought to the u.s. experts like george map who has attended every hearing say a successful appeal is unlikely we're the magic crimes manufactured jurisdiction

and manufactured evidence gratian relentless was you know the cats were bringing to america. right. means necessary the journalist says boot is one of many victims of u.s. judicial power play that i feel that victor and it's and in particular charges that were brought against him that he's innocent so you know i don't i don't want any innocent man whether it be a russian citizen with a bullet or troy davis to be you know a sentence of life or because we're trying to fit in commit the troops right in the u.s. that is a criminal in this case some of the the actions currently carried out by the u.s. special services are an organized probably cation organized crime towards a russian citizen or any other citizens of the world when nations have deemed them allegedly dangerous it doesn't even have to be specific action moscow has vowed to continue to push for votes return to russia with your boot has always maintained his innocence and will keep fighting for justice but would you want small cells

flex tight to keep him in an american prison who is facing from twenty five years to life behind bars the sentencing will come in february and says you're going to archie new york. allowed as a for now for more of the stories we covered but r.t. dot com slash usa and check out our user page it's your dot com slash our to america you can also follow me on twitter at was all stare right here on our t.v. alone a shout out next and thirty minutes. we are. going to well. we have a. safe getting ready because their freedom.