live from moscow this saturday night you're watching a very warm welcome to it's eight pm here now one is kevin aware that our top story it is exactly a year since the first flashpoint and subsequent street protests which led to the overthrow of president ben ali in tunisia they provided the spark for the spread of the arab spring across north africa the middle east with regimes falling and talk of democracy rising but even after elections in chile as the calls for change remain strong there is a teaser when it has been finding out. a year ago mohamed bouazizi set himself a tyo to protest against the authorities in tunisia unleashing public ferry over corruption and poverty which led to the hour syria's president ben ali a wave of revolt spread to other countries and the arab spring was boring.

today a monument stands to his sacrifice in his hometown a city there's a widespread belief however that the changes in tunisia and there. we've asked for a very few things to upgrade the school to meet families with disabled children and some jobs but no one wants to listen to the people haven't got money thing those who came from abroad and reaped all the benefits they're all in the new government put the simple folk are left with nothing. but the litany genre evolution was led by young people demanding freedom of speech and greater presentation but the voice of news according to sun has been silenced mr comet chocolate the new government is comprised of the elderly that shows what kind of need tunisia we're talking about the main problem is the political parties which haven't given a chance to the young people who gave their lives in blood for the revolution but. the western media has hailed that there is an evolution as the beginning of a new democrat. in the history of the country and the entire northern africa region

a year has passed and people who live here is the very few of the soldiers they have asked for help absolutely can place they're going to everything is still as it used to be the actions have come and gone and the town hasn't seen any changes unemployment is still the same it's not war the only things that changed you can now express our opinion but the rouge is main goals haven't been accomplished. the fervor which sparked a revolution may be on the slow burn for now on but if the grievances which inspired it for mean so with the people's inspiration to revolt again in those call r.t. city was in tunisia. one of the countries to follow in choosing is what steps was of course egypt and discontent rumbles on the two was more clashes between protesters and police at least eight people were killed and hundreds injured egyptians want the military council to step down immediately despite parliamentary elections being under way journalist khaled dyer believes that that could lead to

more protests. i think it's very likely will see more than instructions to come because the cause is to attribute the demonstrations that will be resolved. with very likely come friday to you to see more demonstrations and in the weeks to come and probably in the months to come to the army's performance to. that encouraging they've shown every sign of progress to mission and they're showing every sign of clinging desperately on to power so. they will for a new ruses to to remain in the control of the country and as for the immediate step down as a lot of protesters have been demanding for the last few weeks probably highly unlikely but my reading of the situation room is that the army is probably the greatest obstacle to freedom democracy in egypt and i know the debate has focused a lot on islam but i think the army is probably the biggest obstacle that we have to date. the arab league says it will give syria until wednesday to let in

observers or it will consider turning to the un security council for action it comes as moscow speaking up for its un resolution on syria in the face of attempts by the u.s. and its allies to see the text changed but moscow insists it's drawn up a balanced approach to solving the crisis the draft condemns all sides in the ongoing conflict calling for the violence to stop while ruling out foreign intervention and sanctions washington wants the blame for the bloodshed put on the damascus authorities alone and also world acknowledge that the opposition is armed despite thousands of army defectors claiming to be fighting to bring down the regime asia time scholar west pepe escobar thinks western countries are looking to soften up the country before making their move. but since her state is what the u.s. and nato countries consider and accept an acceptable is that the syrian government cannot fight an armed insurgency in their own territory the free syrian army

they're getting weapons smuggled from the middle east through the borders in turkey ending jordan as well this has been already proved then about the un figures lot of people are seriously questioned this number saying that five thousand people were killed over these past few months it makes like almost no one hundred that the effect so there is the fog of three war is already there so the russian move is an intelligent move because it's a preemptive i would say resolution it condemns both sides and asks for a u.n. peacekeeping mission in fact to solve the problem what nato wants is simmering civil war let's put it this way as a friend you for something much tougher probably after the american election in one year. you without a and coming up in the program a real battle for the way we look at how it bill debated in the u.s. congress could tell the whole world of media and shake the fundamental principles

of free speech on the internet that's to come also this. there goes as a russian built rocket successfully launches from the european space port in french guyana we look at what this journey to the stars means for the world. authorities in kazakhstan say they've restored peace in a western oil town where riots on friday left at least eleven people dead the unrest began during celebrations marking twenty years of its independence by a group of all workers on strike local journalists in china told r.t. what happened. oh workers in generalising have been striking for fairly long already for several months if this race were even out but the reemerged in full force yesterday the senate was deliberating its twentieth anniversary so there was a big date and instead of a concert and a celebration there was a riot and people killed the people who were on the video those people the old

dressed in clothes and the guns uniforms this is fairly strange for a strike and there were two uniformed you know and they were you moving into organized packs but it looks like it's all workers are there anyway whether they're demanding wages or they're being led by somebody they're taking part. but. since they were just rushing things around. and they were behaving too organized and they were attacking authorities and at least until the police came in so it looked like you know prosecution said this is all just hooligans who started and led the crowd and the crowd was sort of further hit out it looks like chris this is being led from down so this could be external forces like other countries intelligence or this could be. sort of local forces who are interested in or through him to go in and changing the regime and this is totally there is said to be very calm and

stable now where this square nobody is raging in more so the internet connection and all years and years and everything it is it falls under curfew restriction that has been implemented and your court has ruled that iran did support the hijackers behind the nine eleven terror attacks the lawsuit was filed by some a victim's families but the hearing was settled by default because the accused including around supreme leader did not appear in court so moctar president of the u.k. based arab lawyers association told us u.s. courts are politicized and playing a part in a smear campaign against iran. the usa courts if it accepts to hold a trial in the absence of the accused it would be violating all norms of justice anywhere including well the us law requires the usa is trying to extricate itself from iraq and afghanistan i don't think it is in a position to go into another country and iran is three times as big as iraq well i

think there are plans in into that direction but i don't think the usa at the present moment is capable of doing that i don't think it has the force to do that for the economy i think the the western powers at the present moment using a number of issues as the policy thing so they would talk about nuclear power in iran but they wouldn't talk about the nuclear power in israel and when it comes to the war on terror the war on terror depends on who is the friend of the west the country which is friendly to the western countries it doesn't support terrorism according to their countries which opposed to western policies are always accused of supporting terrorism so it depends on which side of the fence one stands to decide the u.s. military courts open pretrial hearings into the case of alleged whistleblower

bradley manning by rejecting a defense request that the presiding officer should step down they claim is another role investigating the founder of wiki leaks makes him biased private manning who's an intelligence analyst in baghdad is accused of leaking classified military diplomatic data to the whistleblower web site he's already been held in detention for nineteen months and could face life in prison or even a death sentence if found guilty former cia officer mcgovern told me the american people did need to know about alleged abuses carried out by the u.s. army. these charges are greatly overwrought. gates's term so there has been no indication of serious damage to u.s. personnel or those who cooperate with the united states what's the damages is the revelation of things that the american people should know about and that's what bradley manning was doing by his own players own e-mails see indicated that he wanted this to lead to a discussion and

a debate and some reconsideration are the kinds of policies that he witnessed the effect so there are gradations of values here there is the promise of the written promise that i and others signed before we became employed and got access to classified information they will not release information that would endangered the national security with the supreme value there is what ethicists call a supervening value and that's what bradley manning saw he saw the torture he saw the other abuses he saw the feckless war and he said i can go back and keep my mouth shut like my superiors say or i can follow my conscience at great peril to myself and this is very clear in his e-mails a great peril to myself the american people need to know what's going on so that they can make more enlightened decisions. descript mind if you can always keep your finger on the pulse of the news with r.t. dot com our web site on there right now on line in the chart the supreme court in

london agrees to hear the wiki leaks founder does appeal against his extradition to sweden to face questioning over the rape allegations that story drags on we've got the latest for you of course online keeping up to date and a regular security check at a moscow airport revealed radioactive substances in a suitcase with reports suggesting it was no rainy and citizen involved again if you want to find out more about that big story yesterday it's r.t. dot com. russia's own national interests will guide its actions on the global arena president medvedev spelled out the country's priorities in view of the recent rift with the u.s. of its missile defense shield in europe which moscow says poses a threat to its security when washington failed to give written assurances that the shield is not a russia moscow deployed a radar system on its west most border. we must not let ourselves be intimidated or confused we must clearly understand the goals we are heading for politics is

a concrete think whatever friendly relations we have if we are not being heard we will answer that's what i had to do it wasn't against obama but against the policy that the us has adopted if they continue to be rude we will respond if they hear our concerns we will work together. in the wake of protests against this month's election results should be held across russia the president said he saw and heard the people's concerns but he said political changes in the country should be started from within and never be a result of outside pressure one such rally wrapped up in moscow on saturday with a turnout of some one and a half thousand supporters of the party which didn't make it past the seven percent threshold needed to win seats in the state duma bloc maya square where they gathered became the focal point you may recall of the protests last week when tens of thousands converged to voice their dissatisfaction over a poll results on our web site r.t. dot com we've got full analysis of all the post-election events for you logon for exclusive videos photo gallery galleries and much much more. to eight fifteen pm

moscow time world news in brief for you flash floods triggered by the expected tropical storm of killed over four hundred people in the southern philippines with scores more missing twelve hours of pounding rain caused rivers to burst their banks but it was sleep when the floodwaters swept through towns overnight tens of thousands of now have sought refuge in evacuation centers across several provinces . israeli soldiers have killed one palestinian civilian and injured two others on the border with gaza a military patrol reportedly opened fire after hearing a large explosion aiming for what they thought was an area known for terrorist activity has retaliated by launching rockets into israel though no casualties have been reported. united nations has released the assets of two libyan banks in an effort to ease the country's financial troubles that will then allow the libyan government access to billions of dollars of funds from abroad sanctions were

imposed earlier on this year on banks formally controlled by the ousted leader colonel moammar gadhafi the libyan economy suffered significantly after the uprising that toppled gadhafi regime we put a hold of you wanting to hold. a new zealand aircraft has come to the aid of a russian fishing vessel that's been stranded in antarctic ice for two days now the flight delivered fuel and other equipment to help the crew thirty two pump water which should be leaking into the hole the ship called spotter has been holding one of the half meters below the water line and now crew members of a deep chicago to try to reduce the ship's weight rescuers say if they do succeed the vessel should be repairable enabling the trawler to sail out of trouble we'll keep you posted on. it's been a bedrock of free speech throughout the world but now those principles which help define the internet could be under threat with a bill aimed at cutting online piracy is being debated by u.s. congress i spoke to internet activist orange shorts who told me the move could go

though and that with the web falling into government this is what he had to say. the government doesn't just take down the infringing material it takes on the site entirely and it does it without even a trial the find out whether it's illegal or not and as you know copyright laws are extremely complicated there are lots of things that look like copyright infringement that turn out to be licensed in one way or another part of this is a larger crackdown on freedom of speech there's pretty much no other law that would give the government the power to censor the internet there wouldn't be laughed out of congress you know if you said the government needed to censor the internet to protect national security it would be widely seen in america is totally unacceptable and beyond the pale but by using copyright as a wedge issue suddenly we're able to put this power in the hands of the government and then once they have it it can be expanded and expanded to deal with a whole range of other things one of the interesting provisions in this law is it doesn't just shut down websites it also increases the penalties for people caught in gauging and copyright infringement so for example if you make

a video on you tube of yourself singing and copyrighted song this bill would increase the penalty to that to ten years in jail so there's all sorts of people who do these things that would just be considered part of natural life as a teenager that now are facing huge felony charges as a result of this law where freedom of speech often means that much of the mainstream media there's a lack of fidelity to the facts from a store a resident in new york asked people there whether they're tired of a one sided view of the news. are you sick of the media being biased this week let's talk about that do you feel like the media's biased sure they are just going to pick the right one that you want to listen to is the right one around one no. you're going to listen to them all and make up your own why are we in the u.k. is that a political party is it government is in power but i can't. see things on the media i absolutely do think it's important for the new sitra to be on bias but

unfortunately everybody brings their own slant to their reporting i don't think it's avoidable even though it's desirable obvious puzzle for anybody beyond bias so why would we expect a news organization to be unbiased because they're professionals who journalists this is a job but they're still human well the best they can a lot of stuff you either read or the news is untrue and a lot of the television isn't that a shame that the news would be untrue. but the thing is it sells papers and it sells news and people watch it people watch the channels that bother you no not at all just the way the world. believe what you want to believe do you think it would help people be more informed if news organizations admitted their bias. i think sober people wouldn't believe them and then they'd turn whoever was biased anyway because a lot of people that think the some channels are fair and balanced other channels

aren't leaning in any direction well i mean i think we all know that's not true right we all this into the news every single day and we all hear the ridiculousness on both sides yeah but i think fox particularly will report both sides in both views and they have people of opposing views on very frequently so you don't think they're biased that i think they themselves there may be a slant but i think it's a moniker that people have put on them. i don't there's no good service. they are but that's ok they should just admit it and they do i think now i think somehow they're fair and balanced they say orders and each person keeping these experts they come in every individual has his own personal bias you can't get away from that maybe instead of demanding our media be less biased we just don't demanding the admitting they're biased and maybe that they'll at least be accountable for the opinion they report.

but a space news for you one of russia's soyuz rockets to successfully blasted off from less familiar soil as it carried french and chilean spy satellites into orbit from a launch pad in french guiana french observation stations will be gathering military intelligence providing three d. images of targets on earth while the chilian are in the sky will mainly be used for mapping farmland it's only the second time russian rockets were launched from outside the former soviet union following a similar successful mission last month also in french guyana after america's space shuttle program was shut down so those remains the only means of taking people in satellites into space. next we head to one of russia's most restive republics to find out about the battle there to stop young people from falling prey to terrorists.

dug a stone often makes headlines for the wrong reasons with frequent reports of insurgency and instability high unemployment and low living standards are sometimes blamed as root causes which helped feed militancy parties we didn't report. the caucasian republic of dagestan in russia is one of the most volatile areas in the country groups of militants operating in this part of the caucasus are reported to have strong links with al qaida look to draw people in when they're young and to tell rays are constantly carried out in a time to eradicate the problem although militants usually target police and government officials tourism has often go into the lives of many innocent families across the region because of that a number of organisations have sprung up fighting for victims' rights and helping is also fronted piece their lives back together i had a turns to spend the day with. after losing her son three years ago has dedicated

her life battling for her people's future. it's a called mr winter morning in the speed line a sign of as always is first in the office the telephone starts to ring right as she enters the room it is the usual start of the day for the mothers of dagestan a human rights organization created four years ago and now known across the region today's headline is heading to the outskirts of the capital a single mother of four lives that her husband was killed by robbers and she was left with nothing but her children should learn that brings food clothes and talks to her talking as soon as the most important part offering reassurance to victims that they have not been forgotten your bible should not be unusual our organization mostly helps women it doesn't matter what situation they're in if they're in need to come to help most of these women don't know their rights or who to ask who help three years ago with lana was in the same position when one day her son failed to

return home she didn't know what to do and lost a valuable time that could have been used to rescue him. with that he won't even knew then what i know today my rights the right people i could have saved him i could have found out where he was a good have done something. son was accused of helping terrorists in dagestan she fears he was killed but where she still doesn't know these accusations are common in this region young and immature people often become the victims of terrorist brainwashing high unemployment also boast this quite often people that fall under the influence of those with no financial or social prospects and see going into the forest use them as them for joining terrorist as the only way out for them that's what happened with mariam and it cost her her life she had a difficult childhood was raised without a father and her mother couldn't provide for the family her mother honeymoon

remembers how when her daughter started working at the market she met very religious people then. at a truce i thought there was nothing bad in that but then my little girl started to change she talked a lot about being a real new so i'm going to paradise i tried to talk her out of it but she never listened she only listened to her new friends. her new friends turned out to be extremists and the last year of her life she disappeared for several months the next time her mother saw her face was on t.v. in a report on the latest special forces raid against suspected terrorists these dog least skirmishes are part of a bigger conflict being played out across the north caucasus region the terrorist led by dog who is russia's most wanted militant and on the list of america's most wanted terrorists wants to establish a panic occasion islamist state. in the last decade parts of pakistan have become really just theoretical ice this region is now the heart of precious islamic

terrorist problem and almost every day the authorities are engaged and she was with terrorists and very often that happens even in the capital city of the region. locals say it's hardly surprising muslims are turning to radical islam as the. we see it as an alternative to the hard life in the region the older members of the community believe a large proportion of those who went to the fore is a simply bandits from an dissatisfied younger generation yet if anyone told me thirty years ago that life in dagestan would be like what we see now i would never believe that. the locals want the rule of law enforced and respected again every turn to a time before terror played such a dominant part in the lives of so many minds in the question r.t. close up in the republic of dagestan. to me she's going to be out about twenty minutes time tonight with all the latest small fuse got details about that biathlon

world cup in austria where russia claimed yet another gold of the well and the a weekend edition of moscow out is darting out to before that in a few minutes to tickle your tastebuds my name's kevin o. and that is how the next half hour looks here on r t from moscow thanks for being with us.

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this was the plant that was responsible for causing the world's worst industrial disaster and now it had been abandoned in a condition where it had become a source of pollution or the most recent study that was done shows that this water pollution and spreading. will continue to be in the more than hundred thousand people in. groups working in effect the children see the children to be ten times more likely to be born with birth defects in children in the rest of the country. in the sea as little as five hundred dollars for lifelong injuries and. unpunished. twenty years ago largest country. to some degree to.

what had been trying. to teach began the journey. where did it take to. take thirty pm here in moscow saturday december the seventeenth thanks for being with us these are all top stories about it's a year almost seems to misuse revolt that ousted president ben ali it gave birth to the arab spring across north africa or the middle east but people complain that even after elections real change in their own country is yet to be city. doesn't stop and says its western oil town is back over control now of the riots that left at least eleven people dead and rest began during celebrations marking twenty years since the central a.