in the russian capital a second mass protest took place on saturday against the parliamentary poll results . moscow's biggest rally in recent history has come and gone without incident as thousands came onto the streets of the capital to protest against what they call a rigged vote and they want a rerun join me now and he's now away for more details in central moscow. and syria the festive holiday spirit is broken by a new round of violence in damascus that leaves thousands dead. and a dubious resolution to david cameron receiver deals plans for involvement in oil rich somalia calling the country a threat to british security. very

warm welcome to you seven o'clock here in moscow thank you for joining us thousands gathered in central moscow to protest against this month's parliamentary election results the rally was organized by opposition groups who say the poll was right and he said now i was at the scene. it's certainly fair to say that the head count of this saturday's rally beats that we saw two weeks ago at but last night as square official figures we're hearing from the interior ministry is that thirty thousand opposition is saying some hundred thousands but certainly tens of thousands of people came onto the streets of moscow to call for free and fair elections you have lots of different political groups here people that just came out and say they're not part of any political group that in fact they don't want this to be politicized they want to just come out and have their demands made and what they're demanding is a rerun of december as part of the mentoring vote we saw several different faces of the opposition but also some celebrities it's fair to say will procure of who of

course is a relatively new politician who's running for president in march showed up he didn't speak to the crowd like was expected but he did go around and really talk to people it looked a little bit from afar like some kind of campaigning really and what he did say was that if he becomes president he would dissolve this this state duma and call for new elections we also saw former finance minister alexis accouterments speak to the crowd he spoke officially on stage and he called for people who were involved in the so-called vote rigging to be brought to justice and calls for a snap elections in terms of the parliament well as soon as we saw protests which happened in almost immediately after the vote some of them sanctions others unsanctioned we heard reaction from both president medvedev and prime minister putin saying that protests are encouraged in terms of people coming out and voicing their demands and that's important for russia's political development and important that people are politically active as long as it stays within the law but we also just two days before this rally heard from president medvedev

a proposal about some mass reforms to russia's political system disease centralized power from moscow but also to create more of a representative proportional system in the russian parliament there are a lot of different political parties and organizations that have been coming out to the xp. rochester's not really leaders there are faces of the opposition some of them more well known than others one of the most well known as pretty snug solve he is supported by washington's national endowment for democracy he wasn't as well received as two weeks ago of course that might have something to do with the recent phone recording scandal in which conversations he had on his phone were leaked to life news and there you could blatantly hear him rudely speaking about other opposition leaders in fact he was booed a bit by some of the people standing in the crowds perhaps because he called some of the protestors hamsters probably the biggest speaker of the day was next in the garden and he's really the rising star of the opposition he's an anti-corruption

activist and well known for his russian blogging very well known here in russia and becoming more and more well known in the west you certainly become a star of the media i think it's fair to say he was detained at one of the earlier protests after the elections and stayed in detention for fifteen days so this was the first time he spoke publicly after being released and he was very well received well you don't hear a lot about nirvana is nationalist trends if you ever go and read his want you can read about some of his movements and his words what he's calling for is for more and more people to come out to these next protests that are being planned he called for a million people to come out onto the streets certainly there is a feeling that crowds will continue to come out until their demands are met and we have more from the russian capital for you online log on to our you tube channel for video from the heart of saturday's rally and you can get all the background on moscow's protest by having a child website that's our dot com. news

today violence has once again flared up. and these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada. trying to corporations rule the day. seven l five here in moscow thanks for being with us syria mourns the victims of friday's a twenty four attacks where forty four people were killed and more than one hundred fifty wounded syria's muslim brotherhood has claimed responsibility while the arab league works to put a peace plan into action sara first looks at how the tragedy has dampened the people's holiday spirit. chaos and confusion in damascus as the capital which until now has remained largely spared from the violence starts to feel the effects of an escalating conflict. on. the first day of the league's

war it was a bloody tragic day the people of syria will never forget these terrorists this time of year the capsule is usually brightly lit as christians here can for ten percent of the population get ready to celebrate christmas but these scenes of devastation are a harsh contrast and a stark reminder of just how much the country has changed in the past nine months. last year to christmas we used to wish and pray for people in other countries that were going through hard times with war we never thought that this year it would be . this year is totally different because of the situation in our country. the priests here planning their own mark of respect for the. we all. of. our people to avoid the external signs of

history beauties but to go. no one really feels like celebrating anyway when the country's hospitals are full of casualties the government claims it's fighting armed militant groups sponsored from abroad meanwhile the opposition originally marked by its insistence on peaceful protest. it's now been joined by growing numbers of army defectors and has become increasingly armed after months of quite downs by the government and this violence spreads it's prevailing extremely hard to know exactly who is responsible for what. you have for instance. from somebody who is not. clean. position the. government. taxing killings have been met repeatedly with claim counter-claim an accusation.

you know we have. two different views. we don't. see. from the truth the arab league team will be attempting to cut through the rhetoric and discover his version of events is most accurate they many remain skeptical about how much they'll be able to achieve but there's one thing that everyone here is heaping food and that's for the violence to be stopped. the christmas celebration being down this religious services will be happening people. are going to be with their country. and tense situation in syria has made world headlines for over nine months now we've been one of the few foreign media channels allowed to cover the unrest and homes damascus and other parts of the country in fact it's one of the top ten events that shaped nearly

a whole year of news on our team our correspondents are silly i was in syria for much of the crisis and these are her firsthand recollections. when we went to syria it was sometime in october and the situation was getting very tense there so our flight arrived around three in the morning so you can imagine the surprise and the shock of security forces when three foreign journalists arrive at a time when there was a media bad international journalist there but we're here in the center of the syrian capital you can see behind me because just about started to flow again going into the city damascus was rather peaceful it was quiet although very tense still because everybody knows what was going on in the country. and what's interesting mostly for us. is that we saw

a kind of. diverse opinions on what was going on there was no clear. there were more than two sides it was not i want the regime or i don't want the regime. and there was one time you were interviewing a young man and he was rather critical of the government gave his point of view and what you didn't see on the camera is that there was a group of men around him and listening to what he was saying. and afterwards after the interview was finished they all came up to us and said get us on camera we want to see what we feel. and then we also spoke to those people who are protesting specifically those who were on the streets in stock that's about twenty minutes outside of damascus one of the guys that we interviewed he actually disappeared for two days and he said he was held by security forces he was beaten

up after forty eight hours of detention and torture they took all of my money and belongings and threw me out into the streets. we also spoke at soldiers' families those who had been killed and you can't haul so feel that they are angry at the protesters because their sons have been lost or fathers have been lost husbands have been lost and you can understand the point of view that they're coming from how console gers killed their soldiers this is impossible whatever media says this is plainly lawyer. speaking about fear tell you one incident we were supposed to interview one of the leaders of the national coordination council the local opposition. the interview with sets and he when we called him he said i might have to cancel because. there were security forces we think who were at the office and they wrote some threats on the wall. we had to our

fixer who translated what it meant. it said you're working for the us we're going to kill you. and so they were threats at the members of the f.c.c. particularly the leader. that was a scary time because we were just outside we didn't know whether they would come in and we asked their our interview are you scared he said you only die once. so the syrians are very i felt hospitable people but when when it comes to political talk when it comes to expressing a political view in a crowd it can really get heated they would. jostle at the rally that we went to we've got pretty rough. around the place pro kids and so forth. everywhere do you know but that is your job you go in there she try to get up and

leave you try to do what you can to try to film as much as you can try to put it in as much context and we had to tell sometimes to tell people please calm down otherwise you can't get anything on film where you're in this apparatus here and after it was there to show their support for the government how did they get up far cry from the images we've been seeing in all those cities that a country where there have been reporting opposite the great force i don't see a government protesters however what they. are where in this country whenever they'd be use about syria whenever we see every you suppose syria i would really pay attention although everybody here say they gots correct i don't think that's or got stopped as precise as i think it was so i'd like to think that because of my trip there and my experience there. that when i see something about syria i don't take it at face value i remember everything that i had gathered. and to get

through it through back perspective rather than just what i see. and every day right up to the new year will bring you more personal reflections from the correspondents who cover the biggest stories of two thousand and eleven so to come on the program a controversial goodbye just days after u.s. troops withdrew from iraq r t takes a look at the legacy that some say they have left behind. and still glowing from the success of its intervention in libya britain now turns its on to another oil rich african state somalia it's seen as a training ground for terrorists with the potential to incite extremism among young british muslims its fate is going to be decided at a summit in london in february here's our tease laura smith for more. in the words of prime minister david cameron somalia is a failed state that directly threatens british interests his solution options ranging from humanitarian aid right through to military intervention and reports

suggest that in the new year following the perceived success of the libyan campaign in government circles somalia could be the next target for u.k. forces newspapers as saying that the royal air force could be sent to help african union troops to support the weak u.s. backed transitional government's equipment and money other main donations despite a tough economic situation. there around one hundred thousand somalis living in the u.k. making up one of the largest muslim groups according to m i five somalia is the native terrorists training ground where british residents from a variety of backgrounds pakistan baghdad dash and yemen go to study jihad the risk is that they then come back to the u.k. and carry out terrorist attacks there's also the threats of piracy and the kidnapping of aid workers and tourists but crucially somalia also has boston

gas reserves and other natural resources including the rainier which the u.s. and other countries have had their eye on for years many points all say to somalia is to teach it position presiding over a large parts of oil transport routes through the gulf of aden and usually following military strategist to planning long term intervention somewhere. or. one of the biggest is a huge somali community round here. most of whom are from the north pole and saying to me. have support to get a functioning system of government and. so you see this as a direct result of the perceived success by the government of the campaign in libya operation to oust gadhafi successful next stop.

and if you feel like catching up on more news this christmas eve r.t. dot com is exactly what you need here's what else is waiting for you online social networking is reaching some pretty obvious here places you wouldn't believe it but now the christmas tree in central crane has its own twitter account why you'll find the answer on line plus. during the holidays norad the north american aerospace defense command is on a mission to make sure all those christmas gifts reach their hopeful destinations by keeping santa under close surveillance. violence comes just days after u.s. troops said goodbye to iraq nine years after the invasion began over one hundred thousand iraqi civilians and thousands of american soldiers lost their lives and

the war that cost america trillion dollars now many iraqis say the war was a mistake and they're sending that message very clearly to u.s. leaders our correspondent sean thomas reports. packing up to head home it may be easy to overlook the total costs of war at least one hundred fourteen thousand iraqi civilians killed as well as a half thousand american soldiers millions displaced from their homes not to mention a one trillion dollars financial burden still the former occupiers leave behind a some words of encouragement i can say with confidence in the next twenty or fifty years iraq will be all we do here in the gulf region that rivals a country. i think. now it's a safe and secure environment it's not a safe and secure is as it should be or it will be but it's it's progressing very well the american occupation of iraq saw the fall of the baathist regime the

capture and execution of deposed leader saddam hussein and the implementation of a democratic government but now nearly nine years later is of the country better off a little that they below and also the u.s. troop invasion of iraq in two thousand and three and the grave mistake he committed made the situation here worse there are so many mistakes committed by the u.s. military leadership especially in managing civilian us banks here this had a negative effect because. in fact many here say it was the american mismanagement of iraq and that led to the rise of sectarian violence in the country all people if you us then who brings the threat of us to iraq he said usa. who will bring the damage to the infrastructure of iraq he said. so i think. we on american must cooperate in order to. but this. culture. hates. between

two peoples the timeline for u.s. troop withdrawal was set in two thousand and eight and while the obama administration initially tried to extend the deadline the official transfer of power came sixteen days ahead of schedule on december sixteenth two thousand and eleven right now the u.s. and iraqi governments are working on a new type of diplomatic relations building a new type of trust if you will but now the next step is in the hands of the iraqi government to move the country forward as america's influence waned political infighting and sectarian divisions in the iraqi parliament have diminished as well giving iraqis hope for a strong future but as iraq prepares to move past this dark chapter they have a message for their former occupiers to our friends american. police another mistake and because you want to stick is a great mistake it affects you. but is teach also your

future relations and friends are few right now in a region in which america's reputation lies and friends in the eyes of many in iraq sean thomas r t. now let's take a look at some other news making headlines around the globe first in nigeria where at least sixty one people have been killed in days of unrest in the northeastern part of the country members of the radical muslim group boko haram clashed with security forces in a fair scottish battle people living near the city's central mosque were asked to leave before armed soldiers moved tanks into the neighborhood the recent string of clashes began on thursday with boko haram campaigning to implement strict sharia law across. country. yemen has been shaken by unrest as security forces fire on mass trials killing ten then injuring dozens officers used guns tear gas and water cannons against demonstrators in the capital sanaa they were demanding that former president ali abdullah saleh be tried for his long and violent

crackdowns on anti-government protests when he was in power for thirty three year rule ended last month when he handed over power to his vice president in exchange for immunity from prosecution. also believers around the world are celebrating christmas in the biblical town of bethlehem a over one hundred twenty thousand visitors have gathered for a midnight mass at the church of the need to view the place where jesus is believed to have been born festivities are underway in the u.s. u.k. and europe but also in iran where the holidays very important to the christian minority in taiwan thousands gathered in the capital to take part in the city's christmas eve parade with city officials in santa suits and makes no helping to spread the holiday spirit. and in the vatican city pope benedict the sixteen pounds led the celebrations with the traditional christmas service in st peter's basilica after mass the eighty four year old pontiff delivered his annual

speech reflecting on the hardships facing the world ending with greetings delivered in dozens of languages. two thousand and twelve is set to be the year of the presidential election as people in the u.s. russia france and south korea will be going to the polls and with millions yet to make their choice the question is what makes a good modern day leader laurie harvest ask the people on the streets of the big apple. important elections will be held in many countries in two thousand and twelve what's it going to take to be a good leader in today's world this week let's talk about that what do you think is the most important quality for a world leader to have right now just empathy for what's going on right now just an ability be able to be flexible just with the american people the people the world and a lot of patience i equate intelligence with humor. i mean say

oh yeah a quick mind do you think this sense of humor would be appealing in a world leader think it's an international way of speaking you know everybody gets it and everybody likes it circumstances or control and all the countries. take the reins you know would you follow someone that was strong like that even if you didn't necessarily believe. their true leader and were honest with people is having the ability to lead people more important than having the intelligence or the right kind of policy. yeah i would say it is because you have to have a whole team of people that are actually implementing your work so you have to be able to provide that process for them though is it important for them to have money so that they understand how it works or is it important for them to not have so much money that they're in touch with people i think it's probably important for them to have come up having. i mean. i mean you look from.

i mean he understood what it was what it was like to have nothing else probably what made him such a good leader of course for me it was a new a positive. kennedy was the leader of my mind because you had to really man. my vision was and what he was a man who really wants to lead nations to. future do you think it's possible in today's world or is it too different a time now than it was in the path of sort of this totally different because of global war it is a totally very complex the no these are the management has been quoted by of a so shows so show. it's totally change your mind over how to be the people no matter what qualities we'd like to see in the new world leaders of two thousand and twelve let's just hope we aren't too disappointed in who they turn out to be.

coming out join our team on a trip through russia's north towards the architect that's in our documentary about first a recap of our top headlines and just a few minutes. here in bygone days sleds were fighting to get around. but

today they're more leisure than lifeline. one drives people to quit their modern lives and settle in remote woods. one finds them up to survive in the freezing cold. a new beginning in russia's new discover the arctic circle on r.t.e. . to the future new year's wishes on technology updates next generation playthings made from super strong building materials good. things to the revolutionary ways to get rid of or growing landfills and a long list of russian innovators.

that was responsible for causing the world's worst industrial disaster. had been in a condition where it had become a source of pollution the most recent study that was done shows that this water pollution spread to. more than hundred thousand. people in the sea. five hundred dollars. unpunished.