it's nine pm in moscow i'm at treasurer good to have you with us here at r.t. our top story it's time for a change in a rush this from president dmitry medvedev outlining a plan for widespread democratic reforms with the country's political system first to lie or to carry a grouch over was listening in to the annual state of the union address. first and foremost make sure that it promised that people's voices will become louder things just sweeping reforms of the country's political system or political status meant was listening carefully to his address to the parliament as he sketched out the first steps which need to be taken he plans to bring those initiatives to the newly elected duma in the very near future in the last months of his presidency should. my proposals are to introduce direct elections for russia's regional heads to simplify the registration of political parties to remove the need to gather

signatures to take passing federal and regional parliamentary elections to cut the number of signatures needed to take part in the presidential election i also suggest changing the system for the parliamentary election i suggest introducing proportional representation in two hundred twenty five constituencies this will allow each territory to have the director representative in the parliament. well this wasn't as comfortable as usual for the nation at that have to deliver these annual address mostly because he had to respond to the most recent events in the country protests and allegations which followed the december for parliamentary elections and claims that the elections had been had been raked early admission and that if they had ordered a thorough investigation as a result of that criminal cases had been filed for alleged violations during the elections the results of twenty one polling stations cancelled. but the president

stressed today that elections in any country are part of domestic affairs of that country and the russian leadership would not allow any foreign interference but our . people's right to express their opinion by all means is guaranteed attempts to manipulate the people of russia deceive them to instigate social to school aren't acceptable but we won't allow extremists to prove a case is to draw society into the shady enterprises we won't allow interference from outside in our internal affairs russia needs democracy not chaos. goals but this address looked more like a long to do list. should he become the country's next prime minister rather than a farewell address from him as a president he again emphasize the role of the enlarged open government as an instrument to get feedback from the people this government consists of precious prominent figures from different areas of society it was my idea he described it

today as and social elevator for the most creative and active ones and he also quoted eisenhower when he was talking about a model of democracy table for russia it's not let the government do it for us he said but let us do it ourselves. another key focus of his address was economic reform for more on this we turn to our teams business desk. despite acknowledging the fact that russia's economy needs more integration competition and contribution from small business dmitri medvedev said that russia's economy is in good health and is back to pre-crisis levels more of this business report and fifteen. but first a team of arab league peace monitors arrived in syria as part of an ambitious plan to bring peace to the conflict torn nation there are four comes as the violence is reaching a peak with hundreds reportedly killed in recent days is the latest round of violence strong strong international reaction with turkey accusing president assad . turning the country into a bloodbath the u.s.

has also renewed calls for him to step down in order of the military off the streets or face more international measures syria is already suffering under a slew of economic and regional sideshows but as often the case is the ordinary people who are feeling the pain as r.t. sarraf earth reports from damascus. it's been nearly ten months since syria's uprising began the capital of damascus is remaining as he sells it from the conflict the fight in the bustling sand say it seems like it's business as usual as one says sets in the winds of change have begun supply a little stronger the arab league's impose tough economic sanctions the effects of weight have been felt even heading in a poor area of damascus interests and family struggling to make ends meet the new has learning difficulties for the beans for a living but he barely makes one hundred fifty syrian pounds a day and three dollars to support him and his wife. now the fuel for his vending

cart has become harder to get hold of with shortages the economic sanctions driving the price up. their last products available and the prices are pushed higher there have been fights over gas we've been trying to manage by cutting back as much as we can sometimes when we can't afford it which is don't eat the economic situation in syria was one of the areas president had been seen to be making some progress be it slowly the for a population that it started seeing the results of economic opportunity block financial transactions fuel shortages and blackouts become the norm. that there could be even darker financial times ahead. because of the economic sanctions people rushed to stockpile fuel and gas just in case people are a little bit afraid of the fact that water or gas might run out and this is why you see these queues this in place by the arab league it was hate the sanctions would

force the government hand when it came to ending the violence in the country because inside syria at the moment many feel is every day people who are being punished economic sanctions still. taking the lead that he she is the one here they. have become part of the daily life that many people here in syria. ping from the arab league will be paving the way for an observer mission to at the end of the month much opposition they remain skeptical about whether that too will bring about any change. in the west of the conflict areas change can come a moment to seeing some parity of teeth families like. finding life under the sanctions increasingly desperate search r.t. damascus. commenting on the situation in syria a new york based author and political analyst eva golinger says she thinks the true

situation in the country is not being told by the mainstream media. most of the international media with the exception of a few stations have ignored the fact that. government is fighting armed groups internally and it's country groups that have been armed again by outside forces and they've instead tried to portray it as civilians peaceful civilians protesting for change in their country who are being massacred by the government this is an incredibly dangerous manipulation of fact that's occurring and and that we've seen in other countries like the case of libya that's been used to justify outside aggression military action and war and and political assassination of a head of state again this is an attempt to try to alter the perception of what's taking place in the country and also to get the support from other countries on board for those countries and their governments to be out to justify their actions to overthrow a government to implement another that would be subordinate to a foreign agenda later in the program we would turn to where the first sparks about

to rest ignited in the north africa and the middle east giving birth to be arab spring. i was very very frightened and it was moments like that when you realize that the mood in a place like toughness from one second to another in change financial. correspondent about what it was like at the epicenter of events that are three entire region this year the latest episode of artes special series testimony twenty eleven coming your way with a few minutes. with this is. to history in the making. testimony. ten stories that shaped two thousand and eleven on r.t. . the european union has restricted sales of drugs used in the u.s. to execute death row convicts more than forty inmates have been killed by lethal injection in the u.s. this year alone and supporters of the move to disrupt supplies hope will cut that number but artie's iver better reports restrictions could make the situation worse

. they've tried hanging electrocution and most recently had drug used to euthanize animals but now american jails will find it much harder to kill prisoners on death row the main supply line for its lethal injections has been cut off after the e.u. slaps new restrictions on drug exports i really think this will make a difference and we will see the effects of this this control order in the coming months that the in the u.s. allies on european drugs for use of executions and without them they're going to be stuck and lives will be saved specific execution drugs aren't made in the e.u. but several american states have been importing sedatives instead drugs designed to help being used to hurt. exports of drugs like sodium thiopental will now be controlled to stop the use in a three part lethal cocktail the n a static was being used to put the condemned

inmate to sleep as another drug paralyzed before the final heart stopper was administered without that initial numbing stage lethal injections are unconstitutional under u.s. law the usual supply for these drugs has been dwindling since the only u.s. manufacturer ceased production last year american prisons though found an alternative source right here in west london at this fairly unassuming driving school the buildings also shared by dream farmer a british firm exporting british drugs to u.s. prisons to kill people the u.k. government soon found out and banned its use so american prisons searched elsewhere r.t. reported in may how some states have begun using pen to bottle a drug normally used to put pets to sleep it's never been tested for human executions its primary use for humans is to treat epilepsy but it has no pain killing properties many feel its use on death throes tantamount to torture this can

cause excruciating pain if something goes wrong and because we have no test we cannot guarantee that nothing will get around to people at risk of not just being killed being tortured to death following a report danish manufacturer impose their own restrictions to prevent printed barber tools misuse the new e.u. embargo covers eight barbiturates in total including painted barber told us stockpiles will eventually run dry but many fear it's only a matter of time before prisons try again with something else unfortunately the death merchants in the us can sometimes be creative in terms of what they put to use in order to put people to death and so i think what we need is a clause which said if other drugs should appear on the market and we discover the u.s. is is. misusing that does we can quickly have a quick procedure to at those to the left with that in a way to have a year aside from lethal injection other methods like hanging in firing squads and

still sanctioned in the us but in now rarely used these new restrictions may not choke off the drug supply completely but it will certainly tighten the noose on america's controversial death penalty. by the bennetts see london wave of synchronized bombings has torn view of iraq e capital killing at least sixty three people and wounding almost two hundred ambulances could be heard racing back and forth as massive plumes of smoke rose above baghdad authorities say at least fourteen bombs went off throughout the city ranging from car bombs to hidden explosives well no one has taken responsibility the bombings come as tensions between shia and sunni muslims are reaching a boiling point it's also been less than a week since u.s. forces withdrew from the country leaving behind in the air of uncertainty middle east blogger karl shohreh thinks dirty politics and broken promises could be at the root of iraq's predicament. although we've been told in the past few years that

american success in restoring security and starvation a stable political order there leave before the last american soldier has actually left there are both kind of in the process of completely and revealing so what we see now is due to a kind of course we'll cross that it's either a short bout of violence that hopefully common sense will prevail and there will be a return for a political solution or a complete breakdown which are the moment. sounds more and more implausible in which those who don't have the political power and authority left to them by the kind of previous american at age meant in their will have to utilize their sectarian card for political gain to kind of just sit for a space but that crosses by far isn't over determined that this moment the iraqi people can still play their part and we've seen examples all across the middle east in order to kind of stop this cynical conflict for power and kind of contain iraq from descending further into chaos. time to continue our look back at the past

twelve months with artie's ten reports on the events that shaped the year to date egypt a country where a million met uprising became a springboard for a tide of riots and protests are paulus leader shares what she went through reporting at the center of the arab spring. i think my biggest impression from covering the egyptian story this year is the sense of betrayal and anger that people in egypt still have there are hundreds of thousands of people who are still not right now in times square as you can see many of them heeding what. occupation it was dangerous covering the egypt stories of journalists and i think it was even more dangerous to cover that as a foreign journalist i remember when we have a better time so if you read we kept

a very low profile we tried not to go too much into the crowd in tahrir square we took all kinds of signage that we had on us that said we were journalists i mean of course a con tied to camera the by and large you don't want to do the attention to them is necessarily the officers from which we were forecasting who took us all the signs that say that we the media because this was also was inciting anger and frustration among the people. people often ask me if being a woman is an advantage or disadvantage to going to dangerous areas as a journalist most of the time that is an advantage because we find that people have to shake things mode with you i'm talking to men and women because you're a woman and you laced with me perhaps in a male colleague but i did feel frightened being a woman in tough experience that people are angry they believe in they can't be replaced with one dictator hosni mubarak i can tell me that anything i'd look for toughness square i want to female colleague whether it was an egyptian camera man

away russian cameramen and always felt much safer putting my arm through his but people would still walk past me brush up squeeze a part of my body and look at me with this kind of leering that leaves you feel very frightened and very vulnerable as a woman. back in february when the police were taken off the streets there was a real. since i was completely honest most in cairo and i remember doing a lot of reports of my talks. i am not now not in. practice i am certain that night i had to move back to the hotel because there was a curfew and there were no cars on the street and it was the most suitable walking past apartment buildings and seeing people coming in front of the apartment buildings that had formed a kind of nightwatch group and you had people in their eighty's and their ninety's standing there with literally a kitchen knife or a kitchen broom and with that they were going to protect their apartments following

these gangs that were patrolling the streets of cairo they were trying to steal what they could because as i say there were no police around this is your friend. there is one minister there too i was very frightened we were standing on the outskirts of toughness square i was talking to a group of people and as always have to just speak to one person and then everybody comes to see what's happening and and people who mean really really angry so it's not that they are listening to what's being said often they just want to get a voice was exposed on the telegraph and in the moment and that's and that's the scary part is that these things happen in a moment in a moment the entire move changed when people started yelling and shouting not that they just wanted their voices to be heard but that the actually wanted to hear to us as journalists and of egypt to come in and i was working with understood immediately what was happening he started screaming for me to get into the cockpit i remember the drive that because we had a driver that had been allocated to us came screeching down the road i mean looking pushed the crowd and the journalist david cameron was pushing me into the common

they getting into the car he kind of flung himself in off to me in the car was banging on the cot as we sped away. and i don't even know if the word revolution is the right word but i don't think the revolution in egypt is over we've. just to say this is of perhaps the same with additional to the nuisance but again the anger the frustration the disappointment the scenes of hopes of not being realized is poll people on the streets of cairo if you will be when there is a scene that this country is no way near where people had hoped and dreamed it would be back in february and i think this is the general uncertainty that is sweeping the middle east there is a sense that things are changing but another sense of no one not knowing exactly when and how and what ultimately these changes will bring. warrantees got eight more reports coming your way every day until the new year

that's more memories of two thousand and eleven for you to experience so stay with us here on r.t. turkey is recalling its embassador from france in response to the solution of lawmakers in paris to pass a bill outlawing genocide denial including the mass killing of armenians by ottoman turks in one thousand nine hundred fifteen if approved by the senate the punishment for offenders could result in a year in prison and a fine of forty five thousand euros for more on this i'm joined live by pierre gere lane a professor of political science at paris west university. thanks for being with us so all has been clear in its response to this bill how do you expect the situation to escalate politically after all this. well first of all you have to realize that it's a build good thing through the lower house that are meant and then it has to go to the senate most probably it would not go to the senate before the presidential election and maybe it would die out before this so little political gain least

played here by various political parties. there is that historical debate genocide is not in down there was a genocide and there's also the political games being played by various parties to get the armenian vote in the french elections so you know two different phenomena but my guess is that it would probably not be adopted the law would not be adopted before the presidential election and it would probably die after the election the way it happened already in two thousand and six now with turkey seeking e.u. membership and president sarkozy not exactly a cheerleader for their inclusion in the union how do you assess the timing of the decision well you know from the point of view frank good relations it's a disaster of course. i mean it's a political disaster konami disaster but the key issue now for the president who is in a tight corner is his lead in the polls is to ensure there he looks the armenian vote

so the rest is second before him now but of course if you focus on politics and economics and the relationship in france and it's extremely bad timing. though we are of the armenia has the support of many parliaments and historians over the genocide turkey is arguing that lives were lost on both sides during world war one do you think past atrocities which are viewed with conflicting historical accounts can be accurately represented by law. actually there's quite a divide between scholars on the one hand and people who are pushing for a law scholars many scholars in france historians the loss of this and so on disagree with the necessity of the law they. argue that there was a genocide but it should not be something which is imposed by law historical truth should not be the result of the law and it should be no punishments for people all the challenge is so-called truth so two different phenomena from

a historical point of view you can argue there's no doubt a genocide took place not massacres and i think that tanks have to examine what they did but this is also true for the french they have to examine what they did in nigeria this is also true for the americans and what they did in hiroshima and nagasaki when the japanese what they did in china. for the russians every nation has to investigate its crimes in the past but establishing historical truth is the work of the story and it is not something that should be done and established by law with freedom of speech and this is all political and trying to get the vote but segment of population there are very few turkish voters in france many more armenian voters and the law and is not going to improve the lot of armenians living today although historians have recognized there was a genocide there is no need for

a law for this so we have seen protests on the streets of paris from the turkish community in the year of on arrest across the arab world do you think the situation can trigger an even larger backlash in frats. well not on this particular issue there are other issues like you know stereotype programs economic issues unsolved and the turkish community doesn't have much political clout so it's very different than what's in a place like tunisia for example. all right pierre gurley in perfessor political science of paris west university thanks for your perspective. well in just a few moments we have the business news coming your way here on our t.v. stay with us.

from dallas to. downtown don't come. to you in a warm welcome to business economic achievements ohio president head of the gender and in the spotlight of his address to the federal assembly on thursday with his time as president is coming to an end he pointed out that the russian economy has

managed to grow faster than its peers despite the global slowdown. we have the lead in the russia has successfully overcome the most difficult period of global economic instability and has returned to pre-crisis growth levels our economy is growing by around four percent which is faster than most developed countries we keep government debt at a very low level and meet all our liabilities russia has become the world's sixth largest economy. now the rest of president advent of speech centered around top economic priorities for the coming years these include integration boosting competition and encreasing the role of small business economists jacob nell from morgan stanley russia believes medvedev speech echoes recent statements from prime minister jim. what i see is a combined effort by both of them to articulate a economic and political reform program you i think that if we think back to

earlier in the year when you had a debate between medvedev who was talking about a program of reform and modernization and putin who is putting more stress on stability i think that we can now see what the choice of the leadership is and that is to go for a program of modernization short the impact of these reforms may be somewhat negative because we may see acceleration capital outflows in companies who may have an increase in uncertainty but in the medium term if these reforms are implemented i think that they. should improve russia's growth prospects and make the realization of the top line objectives of the reform program which are twenty five percent of g.d.p. in investment and six to seven percent growth rate that much more realizable. a quick look at the stock markets in russia now and as jobless claims came in on a decline in the us and oil prices remain high russia's markets posted gains on thursday the r.t.s.

putting on one percent almost in my socks off by just enough to take a look at the main movers on the markets energy shares were up gas prom point six percent d.t.b. continued his decline down point six percent for the bank and after of ours was up most of the day but ended on a negative note despite releasing its new model larger ground. the podium of global oil majors is witness to reshuffle as russia's rosneft became the biggest oil producer among public companies during the first nine months of the year it has produced one point six million tons more oil than its previous leader exxon mobil and say the output of the u.s. firm was hit by revolutions which that to an eighteen percent loss of its production region the wildrose nafta raised its output by two and a half percent in twenty eleven and hopes to increase it by another one point two percent next year it's also planning to boost in vestment by thirty five percent in order to upgrade its refined. so from business desk for now coming up next i'll see

the headlines to stay with us.

so i'm thirty pm in moscow easier r.t. headline russia needs democracy but not chaos president medvedev outlines the primary challenges facing russia saying the country is on the brink of a new political era where every voice will be heard. arab league observers arrive in syria as the conflict there reaches a bloody peak and international sanctions cause living conditions to deteriorate. and tightening the noose on america's controversial death penalty plugs the flow of drugs designed to.