vote counting is almost over and russia's parliamentary election the united russia party is in the lead winning the majority of seats in the lower house but still be using a big share of its previous popular support. as global players meet to decide the future of afghanistan falcon sun his role is just ability in the region the boycott the event over the eighty's recent deadly air raid on one of its border posts. downgrade diplomatic ties with qatar all to the back of this of the countries assaulted by airport security with plane the incident could be linked to moscow's position on syria.

a very warm welcome to you this is our c.n.n. live from moscow with malice had that. russians have had their say and who they want to see in parliament with almost all ballots counted after sunday's election for policies have made it into the country's lower house the state duma the ruling united russia party remains by far the largest group that has been dealt a significant setback for the shop for all in support. of a is in central moscow.

united russia taking the majority of the vote the communists coming in second and third place i fear russia with the liberal democrats for now the rest of the parties that i haven't named there they failed to get the required percent of the vote in order to take a place in the duma united russia currently around forty nine percent of the vote they don't have and cost the whole important fifty percent mark that's a psychological barrier to say that hof of the country is on side with them now even though they haven't passed the us mark due to the seats from the parties that fail to meet the threshold they were distributed between those four parties united russia actually have over fifty percent of the seats what this means is they can pass just about any law which they want to skits to me without having to form a coalition with one of the other parties so they don't need to form a coalition before we're hearing from united russia party leadership is that they are willing to form coalitions during this duma though they've said that it will

depend on the individual issue at hand as well as the political party all parties are making accusations of vote rigging and electoral fraud in this poll these range from people voting more than once to the use of invisible ink on some ballot papers but what we're hearing from international observers is that i think it pardon me what we have seen as well as we've seen protests and rallies on election day around the country though they were in cities like moscow and st petersburg we saw the biggest of these these rallies were. they were to kill a political party or another others not just against political parties but also against the election as a whole know during these rallies in st petersburg and moscow what we we saw well around several several hundreds of arrests now the international observers who are looking at the election of some have suggested that they were. violations when it

comes to the fairness of the election other international observers have said that those accusations aren't particularly well founded the o.e.c.d. has a long record of highly politicized election observations and of making politically inflammatory statements it would be very interesting to ask you and see when the two of the draft report of the election did it to sit usually goes drop a drop or two before the election even took place because that is the usual practice in other words that these this statement that we have now on monday morning may not therefore be based on actual observations by its observers president dmitri medvedev has said that any allegations in all our locations of electoral fraud will be investigated by russian law enforcement and anybody found guilty of infringements will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. more international analysis all of this we're joined live by alexander around director of the router eurasia program at the german council on foreign relations

many thanks for joining us. so we pretty much know now the look of the new parliament would it be easier do you think the european countries to work with russia knowing that the ruling party doesn't have a constitutional majority. well over. here the business community is. in the west so the good somehow and use of the which you may be difficult. things have been positively done was said about them has been pressed over the us their wishes to think of going. in the direction so. from other from one side of course people who believe that everybody is everything will stay in russia which is stability will be there and that we can have a cookie for the next five and opposites allege and see if he has to deal with russia which we know all the other had before this local criticism of the west

concerned an election assistance that they are also some opposition so flawless and just said in russian people have hope that this election will be even more four years unfair than they have happened but that. it's not being in the transformational places that we see going through because we're going to the national right now which is saying that russia's dependence on energy exports was a coma in the campaigning so they got a call for one of the parties how do you think that playing out. well i think that the reaction of the west of course it's you know that one holds that russia will remain there and that support group of course not on the two or the other kinds of energy good dialogue that you know it was a shock for the european union. getting more attendant on the experts on imports of gas from outside but also of the recent developments of interesting china

for the year or as the world and some help some assistance and overcoming the crisis and the issue of the european union this now so we have to take a fresh look at the national economy of the possibility of the essence of pressure which russia can go for the european union to so it's ok for us that this will be of interest in a few minutes the subject of the bits of color the corporation in the car or the car that was one of the experts been talking to us here at all t. said this to despite a minority liberal policies having not made it into the parliament united russia is still likely to go ahead with the kinds of economic reforms that they would have advocated do you agree that the liberal base is should not be disappointed with the outcome was. i think that the west doesn't understand russia properly it's very difficult to understand the shell the one hand but the second hand we have to get more information about what is going on the russia this is missing in the west and

the west so we're here a lot of pick the criticism of the liberal parties that make it to the politicos it to them who might be both thing leaving the west and their feel good for and even saw for a score of one of the two hour. t.v. time every day and then this additional russian will be the madly changing and it will be like a like like life and in your opinion that's not the case much of the problem just. as for the course you christmas ever written and said that putin is more liberal than eighty percent of the national society of the present russian society that means there's a real alternative to work here that i see you know or to united russia it doesn't come from the liberal camp but from the nationalist from the from the looks on the action so in a way one has cooled see the results of the movement of action in the circle the circle realistic way across

a little bit of that make it because of people not supporting them. and if a united russia who took the lead russia the opposition which is not there in the parliament is less capitalistic less able are coming or it that the ruling party goes i don't expect the communists or the to moscow party to be a pro best alternative to the ruling party and so in the west that they go that's my understanding here wants it but i want to rush that you get my pragmatics on the hard director of the russian eurasia program at the german council on foreign relations and i have. now i have been you to keep your finger on the pulse of developments as counting continues in the russian parliament she election later in the day we expect that of official preliminary results on comment from international observers and you can of course track the latest figures on our website yourself that's dot com.

now russia's foreign ministry has downgraded relations with qatar following an incident in which the russian ambassador to the country was assaulted by border security guards the envoy is to leave the country seem. pretty tells. down graded relations with qatar this comes after an incident in the doha airport on the twenty ninth of november when the ambassador with two of his colleagues were trying to pass through security with a parcel of diplomatic mail now that parcel is expected to go through without any problems but they tried to x. rated which is against diplomatic normalcy the security forces tried to take this package away from the diplomats which caused harm to the diplomats the ambassador

and two of the people traveling with him now the ambassador is in hospital and is expected to make it back to here and as soon as he has recovered from the attack it is no secret moscow is not happy with what they believe are actions in instigating and in antagonizing efforts in the arab spring in fact if you go back. it is a long been the position of sergey lavrov the foreign minister here in russia saying that his responsible in helping to arm the rebels in libya which is antagonize that situation further currently in syria it's a long been the position of russia that if there are going to be diplomatic sanctions they have to be across the board to both the government and the rebels so there's been a long tension between russia and qatar the latest development is just furthering those tensions. the independent.

maybe in ten. there is no way that something something like that could not have taken place without the people involved having known exactly what they were doing and it really is an egregious affront to all diplomatic relations so one has to imagine that this is a major diplomatic incident and not one that will be smoothed over very easily one seeds in the recent recent events especially over the last several months as qatar has become the head the rotational head of the arab league one has seen them taking on a much more prominent role in the region they were instrumental apparently in getting syria. kicked out of the arab league just as they were instrumental in getting libya kicked out shortly before the arab league decided that humanitarian intervention was in order for libya so it is it seems like. qatar has been coming into its own recently and taking on more of an aggressive stance in general and i think we can see this is an extension of general policy. and gyptian having

a bag to the polls for the second round of the post revolution parliamentary election is a method taken and overwhelmingly the opening round with the muslim brotherhood freedom and justice party reportedly winning some forty percent of the vote looking huge of egypt depends on who the problem who chooses to align with according to dr jonathan spyer for the center for global research in international affairs as. the muslim brothers even if they control the parliament together with the salafist perhaps or whoever they choose to ally with won't be able to impact on foreign policy for a while yet we'll have to wait till the presidential elections which of course do in the summer of next year into two thousand and twelve at that point should the islamists the muslim brothers win those elections too should an islamist president come to power in egypt there are we could be looking at a very new situation with regard to this vote it does depend very much on who the muslim brothers who will have the controlling presence in the parliament choose to align if they choose to ally with the. party which of course did unexpectedly well

winning around twenty percent of the if they choose to ally with them then i think we secular egyptians that is to say will have a great deal to be concerned about. celeb this hour here on r.t. british m.p.'s teaming up to make extradition policy within us a level playing field. we need to make sure that we are being equal and we are being fair to our citizens and that is not the case of the both. the controversial provision that allows washington to bomb the u.k. hand over any citizen bill maher the british public and politicians. and also watch the business program about ten minutes time to find out how roughest commentor election results may affect the country's economy. the future of afghanistan is the stake out a conference in germany with delegates from key countries attending except one crucial one pakistan's boycotting it and the latest sign of

a deepening crisis in its relations with the us it follows the recent deadly nato air raid on pakistani border pace which killed twenty four of its soldiers cannot report. some of the key political figures like u.s. secretary of state hillary clinton and russia's foreign minister said you know after all are taking part this is the second such conference being held in germany the first one happened exactly ten years ago back then the delegates were working on the rebuilding of the honest and we storing peace in the country building democratic institutions and so on and so on fortunately ten years later some of these issues still remain and probably one of the most troubling ones is still security especially in light of the alliance its plans to start pulling its forces out in twenty fourteen it's widely believed that afghanistan on its own can't provide security the street and ganesan in general is still very complicated

there's the taliban threat their drug trafficking very poor living conditions for the walls who are also increasingly tired and often even angered by foreign presence pakistan is a very important country in the region is the key port of washington or at least it used to be it's also right there next to afghanistan and it's not taking part in this conference after an attack by the allied forces on its military post all know the pakistani afghani border for more on the situation here's a report by my colleague. on the. supplies are would keep a war running nato actions have put all operations in afghanistan in danger even after the attack that killed twenty four pakistani soldiers islamic law cut off one of the alliances major supply routes to get his staff. i would like to extend my most sincere condolences. to pakistan washington's condolences were not enough

to repeated incursions by the u.s. military in pakistan really left no choice and also the humiliation that the pakistani military faced in front of its own soldiers and the pakistani people left no choice. before the government this time but you cut off the supply line good relations between the u.s. and pakistan as unstable as ever in order to keep the war in afghanistan running mate who relies more on its other major supply route coming from the north. here it is the northern distribution network you see all these blue lines and here is the route that pakistan shut down now the northern supply network was started when russia agreed to provide his territory and air space for transit if not only thought supplies to nato troops in afghanistan it proved to be a very reliable route more reliable than pakistan now it accounts for half of nato as non-lethal supplies on trucks railroads and by air supplies travel through russian territory from europe and from russia's far east all the way to afghanistan

and the reliance on this route is set to expand in the last three years russia's cooperation on of denison is being made to operations. i sat down with professor michael to stress he was speaking in a personal capacity of the us has a very tenuous kind of placement. and it is highly vulnerable it's highly vulnerable. pakistanis but it's more vulnerable to russia if i mean if russia were to withdraw its permission for us to use its rewards we would be the very difficult position of the northern supply now work could now be in danger because of a failure in diplomacy moscow says because washington turned down all of its proposals on the missile defense issue russia might have to resort to are their arguments including its cooperation with nato on afghanistan. their processes which

are critically important for russia which are about russia's national security one of them is nato expansion into russian borders and the fact that washington goes ahead with a robust missile shield program in europe without taking into consideration russia's concerns gives moscow the refuse any leverage it has to be heard by its partner but even the mere possibility that russia could cut off the northern supply route threatens the viability of all western operations in afghanistan nato risks leaving almost one hundred forty thousand of its troops in afghanistan without vital supplies if diplomacy doesn't win the day with pakistan it's about people there being fed up with russia it's about their national security if washington does not seriously address the concerns of its partners even the best partnerships can fade i'm going to check our reporting from washington our take. we're doing forget our website is the place to go for many more stories that will find a few rights and now

a stadium full of thousands of sports fans in the us wrong some of the pitch to celebrate fiction could end up trampling crowds tearing down. the world war two more than six decades and did find out about the forty five thousand people evacuated from the german city as a as words defused. a massive wall with a ton. british explosive and the smaller. british m.p.'s the staging a debate seeking the renegotiation of what they see as a biased extradition treaty with the us agreed in the chaotic aftermath of nine eleven it allows washington to demolish the extradition of any u.k. citizen without evidence of any crime and britain is bound to comply because he's either bennett's reports from london patience is running away. all take and no give that's the growing feeling in britain's parliament against america's controversial

extradition treaty it was signed in two thousand and three in the post nine eleven panic and makes it far easier for the u.s. to take people from the u.k. than the other way around now forty five m.p.'s from the three main parties have crossed the political divide and joined forces they finally forced a debate and parliamentary vote on what they call an injustice was a mistake in the first place despite history i think it was a mistake it's not a level playing field even with a partner like america we need to make sure that we of being equal and we are being fair to our citizens and that is not the case of the moment britain must present evidence for any extradition but america doesn't need to a long awaited independent inquiry recently ruled this relationship was balanced but the numbers suggest otherwise one hundred twenty three people have been surrendered to america under the treaty since two thousand and four only fifty four

have gone the other way america's ambassador to the u.k. has branded these figures myths and in accuracies where they were figures he's embassy refused to reveal he's even accused m.p.'s of willfully distorting the facts in the run up to this crunch vote in parliament that could shift the balance but m.p.'s aren't backing down joining a battle some have fought since the treaty was signed i think the seeing how many injustices have been caused because of it it was meant to be for terrorists the fences it wasn't meant to be for the ken things they're using janice's is gary mckinnon a mainstay on america's extradition wish list he was arrested ten years ago after hacking into pentagon files he says he was merely searching for u.f.o.'s gary has asperger's syndrome and according to his mother. should be tried in the u.k. on medical grounds but america's not giving up on one of their most wanted is so

vengeful. you think uses some of the widen it is saw over the top they left him one has internet for three and a half years after the arrest if guy was the slightest threat that wouldn't have been done but it's very much i think he embarrassed them and because of that they were very angry at him there are nine cases currently fighting extradition to america richard o'dwyer is the latest he's wanted on copyright charges for creating a search engine for pirated content it's not even considered a crime in the u.k. but at the moment that doesn't matter the us can still get their man the coalition government promised to change this while in opposition now's the chance to deliver either bennett r.t. london. well take a look now what else is making news around the world this hour we he found a junior college in the world the right to have his case against a traditional to sweden heard by the u.k.

supreme court he lost the high court battle last month to hold three will for questioning over alleged sex offenses as long as this case is politically motivated and is linked with the release of thousands of classified u.s. diplomatic cables the whistleblower now has a fortnight in which to formally lodge an appeal in his stay in britain is certain to stretch into twenty twelve. or so in japan it must be one of the most expensive car crashes in history take a look at these pictures of the routine crumple supercars including ferrari's would say these and a lamborghini strewn across a busy highway it amounts to. damage and happened after a group of enthusiasm for a ride to harass were witnesses say the cars were reaching speeds close to one hundred miles an hour when the crash occurred ten drivers one lives to although the injuries on the believed to be seen. coming out shortly be lavelle and i guess this f.

the results of russia's parliamentary elections and cross talk but first will be latest news from the world of business with you via. poland a very warm welcome to the program and as we've been reporting on the channel united russia party will face a bit of top opposition in the new parliament this may lead to changes in economic policy as charles robertson from renesas capital explains. that depends on how they interpret these results you had the big shift coming to support around twenty percent on the near doubling there's two ways to interpret that one it's a protest vote vote for an opposition party that's always been against the kremlin through the ninety's and the two thousand. if they interpret it that way then the government should continue reform should be trying to do its best to boost growth and money we best spend then by putting it into infrastructure projects for example

and reining back some of the huge increases they've already done on pensions and social spending if however they see this is a positive vote for the communist party opposed to vote for more social spending then the threat. from the markets perception of a threat will be higher spending by the government will start to raise interest rates for what the government has to pay. let's have a look at the markets now oil is trading high on speculation that tensions in the middle east will curb supplies iran says all could reach two hundred fifty dollars a barrel if it sees more pressure on its nuclear program and european markets are on the rise as the italian government to create a new package of budgetary measures and the french and german leaders are set to meet later this week for debt crisis talks. and finally the russian markets finished monday's trading high of both in my state some of the r.t.s. gained about point eight percent at the close let's now have a look at some of the individual share moves in the mindsets most oil may just war

on the rise supported by stronger crude oil gained one point three percent gas from finished high of more than half a percent the company has finalized a position of the russian gas pipeline right about trance gas and the rules to make all rows two percent power from their own capital looks like some of the other highlights of the day straight. i think the one that was most unexpected for us was that no it was down about three and a half percent. tech is really a play on the oil price and the fact that we're prices up would seem to know tech was down substantially it was surprising for us. i think another thing that's interesting just to keep in mind is in the banking system in russia you know the banking system is actually quite well insulated from the european crisis and today you've seen a good performance from the two big banks spring can be tb and i think that's driven by the fact that people realize you know russia and europe are kind of.

separate and not really there's no contagion into russia from europe. and finally in economic news the services sector in russia is growing at the foster space for five months h.s.b.c. is for just let me just index came in at fifty four point eight in the expansion is mainly being driven by new orders. that's it so no york today it's but you can find more stories so online at archie dot com slash business or join me for another business update on less than fifteen minutes.