time. seven pm in moscow i'm matt trezise good to have you with us here on r t our top story activists say tens of thousands have taken to the streets of syria's third largest city homes apparently emboldened by the arab league observers visit to the country the city which has seen some of the fiercest battles between state and opposition was the monitors first destination is reported government ties were drawn from the area after about thirty people were killed in the latest violence a fact finding team plans to assess the situation on the ground and ensure president assad's compliance with the regional plan to end the bloodshed but there are doubts over the mission's impartiality i think that discomfort he is not. objective it will not be objective it will be subjective it will be pressured by

the united nations and the united states and especially the dude who done the commanded is already. accused by the international justice over genocide on would crimes so i think it would be his opportunity to present something to the united nations and to the united states which is a manipulated. the state of affairs in order to be. heavy pressure from outside is being applied as piled solely on the assad regime in though there are those who are in no doubt that armed insurgents are operating in syria the director of the beirut based center for middle east studies says observers in his opinion can tell the difference between armed rebels and peaceful civilians. no one can deny the presence of dancer vera and syria even hillary clinton did recognize this and said they are well equipped and well trained exactly like that many.

as they mix between civilians and children because when they talk about thousand of people killed in syria they don't mention that this is civilians and also we cannot deny that. about two thousand and. also were killed this year though the those observers are going to see the to see them there and was going on and really the syrian authorities and the syrian government would give all the facilities. completed their mission. the claim that the syrian opposition is being backed by extremist fighters is shared by foreign journalists on the ground there and the next hour are to hear from a french reporter who exposed the on the rescue eyewitnesses. i think that would be the action to destabilize the country. we see

a lot of people killed but this is not the civil war quite told us. to throwing troops inside like. using proxy. can see the problem because base country is ready to. flood near prudent pledges the government will do everything possible to ensure transparency during the upcoming presidential race the prime minister said it's actually in his best interest as a candidate artie's italian overcover has more on the announcement while the other developments in the world of top level russian politics so this is one of the prime minister who was the last public sessions before the new year what did he have to say. well prime minister putin today suggested that rules the dukes should be held on the transparency of the upcoming presidential elections in the country his idea was to move the talks on the internets where people can freely express their ideas

if they have anyone how to improve the electoral process in the that's comes out through a growing dissatisfaction. over russian people but the outcome of the parliamentary elections which took place on the fourth of december looked nothing. because they go to you and you're going to misstate the species but as it is who i want to stress that we're the first to lead the transparency because we need to be sure that people support us of course there are forces to which it's not the development of the computer and all of the turmoil of course they have the right but the problem is that they have neither a united programs no means of reaching their goals for them so that they just want to deal legitimize the election that's the problem today when the new was in motion well speaking of suggestions and ideas premise it wouldn't also sat that's the current opposition in the country and its leaders don't seem to have any ideas old

david schools that they're searching for the same they're not introducing any programs on how they see this country should be changed and not doing much else but simply protesting and opposing to the newly formed government is that you which right is what you once again stressed that the results of the parliamentary elections are not going to be announced just as the opposition is demanding. its. to happen if only it could happen through at poor decision also to the just nuts to pull we see you be the chief strategist told but internal policies was made says the country's deputy prime minister and as he said himself he now will be responsible for wouldn't i say shouldn't innovations in the country now will that's comes together with the. sets of three for the senate's the present we gave a start to you. last week most of them have to do. with the

parliamentary and presidential elections as well as pulling the number of opposition protests that gathered tens of thousands of people on the streets of moscow the people who were demanding the council of the results hold their parliamentary elections or tell you know the lot live for us in the central moscow without update thanks very much. and still to come in a few minutes here on our team we take a look at some of the most significant political events in twenty eleven's russia you can see a nice and nowadays first hand impressions as part of our pre new year series of reports. with this is. just history in the making. testimony. ten stories that shapes two thousand and eleven on our t.v. but before we get to that palestinians in besieged gaza are marking three years since israel sent tanks and fighter jets to attack them the operation lasted twenty

two days and cost almost fifteen hundred lives and tire families were wiped out for some the battle still rages only now in the courtroom as artie's paulse leader explains. a judge is unusual not because he laid a claim against the israelis but because he won victory though is bittersweet with the years i'm a broken man the israelis say their army has morals what morals are they talking about it. it was december two thousand and eight for three weeks israeli soldiers bombed the gaza strip killing nearly one and a half thousand palestinians four out of five were civilians at the same time hundreds of rockets fell on southern israel killing three israeli civilians and the government but i couldn't get to my home for sixteen days because the israeli soldiers were firing all the time so as they left i went down inside on the walls the soldiers had written you'll find the bodies fifty meters away i found the body

of my brother buried in the sand and the body of my sister marched it covered with some bricks. took his case to the palestinian center for human rights in a president sitting moves they secured and out of court settlement with the israeli military it took so let's see weeks to achieve the bodies of his mother and sister because of continued fighting in the area these women military says this made the case itself and they feel justified with the way said sally was saved just under one hundred fifty thousand dollars compensation. if someone loses his leg or his hands up or risk killing or injuring all the money in the world in the hour now but what we're fighting for here is a financial going to see if it will offer some relief. the palestinian center for human rights has more than two hundred cases on its books but the heavy paperwork iraq received and expenses discourages many others from coming forward this man however is a rare exception he filed a claim three years ago and is still awaiting

a response today. and saw him it was early morning there was showing in the apartment above was on fire i want out side with my hands up in the the soldiers told me to pull off my shirt and trousers i did with a suit but they find iraq i would behind me my mother had been blown apart i recognized her by the ears of my two year old daughter my father my aunts my cousin my entire family was killed at that moment but convincing israeli authorities that compensation is due can be a major obstacle before. any operation for. a flow. for. then the state will be exempt from the. way the judges case will help other palestinians is not yet clear these radio army has also said it's opened an investigation into what happened but

so far no indictment against any israeli soldier has been filed police fear r t. stay with us here on our t.v. still to come memories of him the school days our correspondent looks at the secret of the new mad at the helm of north korea by meeting a former classmate. but first a newly released report on the fukushima nuclear crisis says it was down to the plaza operators bill it being ill prepared and not responding properly to the quake and tsunami disaster a major government inquiry said some engineers abandoned the plant as the trouble started and other staff delayed reporting significant radiation leaks to discuss more on this i'm joined by professor christopher busting the scientific secretary of the european committee on the radiation risks thanks for joining us so the report claims operators failed to respond properly and you said before that the authorities had been lax and slow in handling the situation to what extent do you feel the assessments been confirmed by these findings well i think my assessment

has been confirmed one hundred percent but i do have to say that i don't think that this inquiry has gone far enough because there are lots of questions that they haven't asked and the lots of questions that still have been on what are some of those well the main the most important one is it has to do with the health effects of the contamination that it's kind of assumed that everybody knows that they use health effects so i'm not going to be serious but i just like i said before that this was a much more serious incident than anyone. was suggesting that the time i'm not saying it would have been saying all along that the health effects would be very much more serious than anyone is saying now and i can tell you that they will probably be in some years time another story which will show that i'm right and this is really sad because actually if they did concede that there was a big problem then people could be could be moved out and other other activities could take place which would ensure that fewer people got sick than going. why do

you think it's taken japan so long to admit that its response was inadequate. i think that there's an enormous of pressure from the nuclear industry and from the people who stand to lose a lot of money with regard to the general nuclear expansion scenario that we've been seeing in the last year or two i mean for the for the nuclear industry this was an absolute disaster and it does seem to me from not only the way in which the japanese have been constrained to handle this this this event but also the way in which people all over the world are handing this event through the media i have to say not russia today and i'm very pleased about that the does seem to be and enormous iron grip on the media with regard to the effects of this of this terrifying accident this this catastrophe the report also said the government published a understated thing here is on the spread of the radiation can that be justified when many of the lives are at risk well of course that really is a is a criminal event as i said before you know that this is criminal responsibility

because if people had known the extent of the radioactivity had had the government and also i have to say the international atomic energy agency come clean with the extent of the contamination people would have left people who would have got hurt in these people who didn't get or will have been seriously contaminated in this will affect their health so so really this is quite a criminal affair and i would hope that eventually somebody would be brought to justice or at least there should be some court case about it japanese officials claim the plant is now under control but there have been reports that many folk ashame evacuees remain reluctant to return to their homes do you think those concerns are valid i think that those people should not insert return to their homes and i think that it's extremely unlikely that the that these reactors are in what they call cold shutdown i mean i think this is discourse manipulation. very recently isotopes are being released from those those plants and the xenon isotopes have sufficiently short off lives for us to know that fissioning is still taking

place in those reactors right and very fleet what do you think should be done with the japanese nuclear network now. well you know the japanese nuclear network was always dangerous it was always built on the coast in areas where there were tsunamis it was always built in areas where there were possibly going to be. earthquakes and so really i thought were the japanese people i would demand that the government close down the entire nuclear operation in japan and revert to some other form of generating energy what with that being a thing well there have been studies made that show that japanese in japan is very very rich in wind and there are lots of ways in which you can get generation of electricity but the main problem of course is that there's too much electricity being used we are burning up the planet in order to continue with our lifestyle which is really not sustainable and i think that is the real answer to all of these questions about nuclear and fossil fuel and the rest of it we just just burning too

much fuel all right we have to leave it there professor pressed her basket of european committee on a radiation arrest thanks for your time. north koreans finally allay their late leader to arrest wednesday but the world still wants to know what lies ahead in a post camera showing in all north korea has annoyed and successor and youngest son is now control but there is little known about him or his wary of an ocean away back to score to uncover more about the man who has an intense act to follow. can the death of the north korean dictator has raised questions and hopes over whether the dictatorship one of the last in the world will follow or will this extremely close to society remain isolated and it's new leader to so little is known about the lately to his great successor his third and youngest son kim turning is a bit of a dark horse even his age remains a subject of speculation his thought to be twenty seven all twenty eight years of

his new ascension to power increases the media hunger for information about him so his expensive education in switzerland suddenly tracked it's a lot more interest an entrepreneur in moscow with russian origins alys on a hug and she believes he could have been one of keams classmates when news spread that kim trannie may have gone to an elite school in this week's margins in late ninety's the businessman brought out his all the book to refresh his memory there were quite a few koreans some quieter than others. a lot with with the last name came. as kim is the most common name in korea alexander remembers that koreans always differed from other students they were very disciplined they were very disciplined as a group of students. very serious for their interaction.

they wouldn't always take part in. fun and games at the other students were very hard studying to be top class they didn't like to do that although some think the deceased leaders son may be a figurehead overshadowed by his recently promoted uncle who is thought to wield the real power alexander says the three years china has apparently spent in europe may change the country's future forever i think. it will make him realize that he has to do something good for his people for his country and make a change in terms of. past experience his knowledge of foreign languages and the skills that he managed to retain being about the outside world used to get most of the news from behind north korea's iron curtain through the country's strictly censored state run media covering the live of the secrets of society from the inside has been an almost impossible task for international journalists but the

details now emerging about the new leader is exposure to the liberal west offer a glimmer of hope that he may ease bag the rigid control over the terri regime and begin to open north korea to the world and maybe their war old to north korea. r.t. moscow. remember if you miss any of our stories you can always look at our team dot com the best place to get updated any time and there you'll find some heartwarming holiday treats check this out. no need to where this little bear the cute little cubs already captured millions of hearts including mine easy to see like look at his little and thinks there don't you just want to give him a hug tell you why he's being and reared in denmark instead of getting the usual arctic ice bringing us. a toast in space therapist and he's aboard the international space station as the crew prepare repairs to c.n.n.

not one new year but sixteen as the earth spin. you. time to focus now on the most significant news making events in the build up to this year's duma election as part of our series on twenty eleven key moments are he's a nice and now a cover the development shares her experience of the outgoing year in russian politics. well i think that day it became clear that russian politics are changing lots of people say that russian modern politics are stagnant that they're predicting bold but nobody that day expected that announcement to be made yes people expected and

there was speculation that putin would run for president in twenty two but no one expected it as early as september. the first ten that this congress of the united russia wasn't going to be as simple as just the platform for the do being announced was glazier putin and to meet the demands made to entering the hall on time exactly when it was supposed to start together and that's when the atmosphere inside the hall kind of changed everyone thousands of people at the same time you could feel the energy going something's going to happen today. first to come up on stage was lead singer putin and he made the big announcement which no one expected but he believes that the top of the list for the duma lections in december. after that everyone thought ok that's it this is the big news we felt something in the air that something was going to happen and now it's been announced to me three minutes of age of will be part of united russia if you believe the list

that was in it. and then of course you have to meet three men to do saying that he believes that putin should run for president in twenty twelve and there was just this uproar explosion of applause at least certainly in united russia people there i think were genuinely surprised like i said no one expected this to come today they thought they were coming to hear what their plans for the dumas elections were . the elections this year. were a big deal first of all because. clearly united russia has lost popularity and the ironic thing is you have people who referred to the vote to demonstrate how much they popularity but then also refer to the same exact vote saying that it was falsified so how can you refer to a vote that you don't think was real to demonstrate this kind of popularity think this was an interesting to thing to me as a journalist covering the elections. so we have

a lot of western publications and networks referring to this popularity fall for united russia which certainly you can feel it happened a lot of people i think went out to vote against united russia it's not a secret that the opposition in russia for twenty years hasn't really been able to get it together you have these figures like journal. who are very well known and and they are part of that whole stagnation because they've been around for years but you don't have any real opposition and i think that's what this young generation these so-called hipsters that that are part of social networking and are on twitter and facebook and trying to be part of politics that's what they came out to vote they really came out to vote to send a message to united russia and that became very clear they lost. you know two thousand and seven it was some sixty four percent and it's just under fifty percent this time around so clearly united russia has

a lot of work to do in this became very visible in these elections also course in the protests that we're seeing straight after the elections on monday we saw people come out to choose to prove to you which is not very far from the from the kremlin thousands of people opposition members were arrested the interesting part about being in moscow at this time is to see how many different networks cover it differently you have. russian state television only covering it when it gets really big you have western media covering any little meeting that happens in the center of moscow many times exaggerating the situation. and then the saturday after the election you really had it's fair to say a historic day in russia you had tens of thousands of people who came out to my square just around the corner from the kremlin it was the same some protest some fifty thousand people is the most common number we have all the figures do vary depending on who you ask peacefully protesting for fair elections and you had the

riot police and officials just letting them do their thing and their symbol really i think a really strong example of this where these white flowers or these white ribbons and there's pictures of actual riot police holding these flowers and it was certainly a feeling that day for me that it's such an interesting time to be in russia and i'm glad to be someone that they can they can work on all of these stories and cover elections and cover protests and and kind of be really in the thick of it here in moscow not a far telling the story about russia from outside of russia but being in the center of it all. well every day right up to the new year will bring you a new personal view from our team of correspondents who reported the biggest news stories throughout two thousand and eleven and if you missed any you can always catch it again at r.t.e. . time for the business update with katie stay with us.

welcome to business head on our say while a number of western economies are drowning in debt russia is on course to post a one percent budget surplus this year at a pretty new year holiday meeting of the government prime minister putin emphasize the improvements that have been away from the energy sector and those. new figures we. narrowed which is a very positive factor in improving your economy it shows that the effort to diversify is bearing fruit but it will be around nine point eight percent of g.d.p. which is almost two percentage points lower than the initial phone calls made at the beginning of the year. until the economic news russia's economy expanded more than five percent in november compared to the same period last year ministry says mining and electricity sectors mainly contributed to the crisis but it was a slowdown in construction and investment let's see what's happening in the markets

and oil best crude prices are flat to positive but swayed is that setting value no one hundred dollars per barrel while brant is trading at one hundred and eight of us about an hour into the act is u.s. stocks are gaining up to consumer confidence index the highest level and i doubt jazz and the nasdaq are both up around a quarter of a percent this hour european stocks are higher as most traders returned from their christmas holidays but in london the footsie is still closed today while down is dices gaining around point three percent the russian markets closed yes over a percent one of the my sex finished a quarter of a percent in the red a little let's see what happens as far as the individual shares a compound of my sex lost almost two percent just monopoly gas pump also finished in the red the company says profit this year will be in line. the full cost of for three million dollars and new called a third of

a cent it's created to do adventure with another company pass nafta to develop brussels promising to utah football fields evil we all know the dark gives his allies. big positions won't be opened or closed till the end of this year i think everyone already kind of done what the wanted to do in this year but i wouldn't exclude some speculative trading and maybe someone to trashing before the end of the year usually the last week of the year it's drawing week so i would expect say ten or fifteen percent growth but i won't be surprised to see about five maybe six percent growth till the end of the year a muscle from a finale back in about fifty five minutes with all.

he. says.

seven thirty pm in moscow these are your r.t. headlines observers arrive the arab league's team reaches syria's most troubled city amid reports that government tanks are pulling out. prayers as it is real wages a deadly assault on gaza palestinians still struggling with its legacy turn to the courts to make amends. north koreans bracing themselves ahead of a state funeral for the late leader kim jong il scheduled for tomorrow are to his correspondences youngest son's former school.