they don't call it a one percent budget surplus this year more details in the business but it's an interesting time. ten pm right now here in moscow you're watching live from the capital my name is kevin owen and our top story activists say tens of thousands of people have taken to the streets of syria's third largest city of homs apparently emboldened by the arab league observers visit to the country the city which is seeing some of the fiercest battles between state and opposition was the monitors first destination it support of the government tanks are withdrawn from the area after thirty people were killed in the latest violence there a fact finding team plans to assess the real situation and ensure president assad's compliance with a regional plan put forward to try to end the bloodshed let's talk about these latest developments i'm joined now from new york by columnist and correspondent for

the asia times pepe escobar pay good evening to you now the observers then as i'm saying finally on the ground do you expect them to get to the truth of what's really happening in syria. yes but they have to investigate so it's ok to do it right they have to investigate the activities of the free syrian army these are mercenaries in defectors all are armed by outside powers and these outside powers are basically from qatar and the emirates and we all the arab league which is now called drop by d.g. see the gulf cooperation council interest to get themselves in this case we still don't know are they going to investigate the need to call truly call in center set out in the book near the border between turkey and syria in the skin the room which is very across the border basically from aleppo. let's see two hours are we going

to investigate that are they going to test against shipment smuggling of weapons via the jordanian syrian border we still don't know but it's a tall order for the arab league considering that these are not exactly democracies they are investigating one of their all but they're also implicated in the whole big picture you mention of the free syrian syrian army has been a big crux of argument on both sides of who these people are where they're from what they're doing how they do supporting them but a big issue isn't it. absolutely because. it's super wrong strategy from the part of the syrian opposition there's the syrian national council with diplomatic arm meeting in istanbul in paris the leader is a terrorist exile. and he's been talking basically to international media you know too long merican interlocutors this is the brave face diplomatic phase of the

opposition and then that's the free syrian army who are doing the actual fighting my sources in the home still the fear is even more the term in goal the have like a rag tag and species if you cannot fight the syrian army they cannot fight trains saw the tanks have to be gated of course the police the crackdown by this year to go for sixteen and it has to be investigated but these armed gangs have to be reversed it as well the free syrian army and it's basically defectors but there are a lot of mercenaries it's how much transparency will there be we just ahead of the observers arrival in homs and the army then only but just a couple of hours before reportedly withdrew its tanks and heavy weapons on the streets but i stress only a couple of hours before was an attempt to cover a its tracks or was it on the other flipside of the coin the first. real steps

towards complying with the arab peace plan although they may have left they late i wonder if this is going to be a cat and mouse game absolutely dansby pull out two hours before the you know this tells you what's going to happen within the next week or so shifty observers is not along they will have to deploy at least two hundred or three hundred from all countries in the arab league countries that sympathize with the assad regime or of the g.c.c. countries who want to actually go in they have been saying this for the past month or two months and even with their own sanctions they want to bring down assad housed down so there won't have to be. more. inclusive mix of observers fifty people in homes itself it's not enough because you have to all those neighborhoods are not inside there now they're not in downtown home so you have to investigate what's happening around and you have to make investigate

how much as well if you have seen this the gate pulls borders with turkey and with jordan as well and what it's going to be a prolonged get and miles going what sure understanding of how much freedom these fifty or so observers have got to go where they want to go without being told to go that is exactly because that it just reminds me of when no we used to visit iraq during saddam hussein's and apparently we were watching what was happening but we had mine there is with us journalists all the time we couldn't go to certain places we couldn't visit. says it did installations and i'm sure the syrian regime this is a second what they're going to do with the arab services and the fact that they speak the same language they can even apply a little bit of suboxone i said well we're going to go here today maybe a little tomorrow you know very with because of greed see volved you can be very polite but it can be very ruthless as well i'm not sure they're going to get the big push at least. in despair in this next hour we see thanks for your

thoughts pepe escobar asia times correspondent much appreciated thank you. looking ahead a little later this mistakes can never be forgiven japanese authorities now released a new study this blaming the fukushima plant operators for a lack of preparedness and response failure is the latest on that coming up more details shortly also the u.k. is working on a contingency plan we're now doing show the country again is being dragged down by the financial aftermath of the euro's potential clubs to explore that too. but in a putin pledges the government will do everything possible to ensure transparency in the upcoming presidential election the prime minister said it's actually in his best interest as a candid it. was more about that announcement as well as other developments in the russian world of top level politics. russian prime minister said that the upcoming elections for the country's dob job should be transparent in order to achieve that

i didn't want to suggest that the talks should be held with the country's opposition to hear out their suggestions on how to achieve that transparency but it was suggested that the internet should be used as a platform for such talks were people can freely express their opinions about it and of course this comes after opposition protests which took place after sunday's parliamentary elections when tens of thousands of people gathered on the streets of moscow demanding to know there is also all the actions you can they do on your question mr president 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 that is important of the turmoil of course they have their rights but the problem is that they have neither a united programs nor means of reaching their goals for them so that they just want to deal legitimize the election so that's the problem today was more than. in both

service and presidents and the country's prime minister say that they're happy to see the faces of the opposition and to hear them out however according to reports and opposition members are not doing much for now but protesting against the newly formed why women they're not suggesting any programs or setting any vivid schools for themselves so stinking of the consolation over the results of the parliamentary elections which the opposition is moans in prime minister britain said that that decision can only me be made by a coup or meanwhile the architecture of the country's political system is already changing presents me to be disappointed with the sloughs too cool to be the country's deputy prime minister so the man is now out of the kremlin and he is known to be earth the chief strategist although the current insurance policies over russia that is just one of the ideas suggested by president be different how to

change the country's political system you're suggesting the number of reforms which would make it easier for political parties to take part in the elections and who are the presidential candidates to also place a great in the elections for the country's top job and all that of course is the response of the countries authorities to the protests that have been gathering tens of thousands of people out on the streets over moscow demanding the cancellation of the results of the parliamentary elections. telling overcover reporting there not a few minutes here on our to look back at some of the most significant events in russian politics of twenty eleven you can stay with us to see our correspondents first time the impressions as part of our preen you your series of reports coming up. this is. just history in the making of. testimony. ten stories that shapes two thousand and eleven on r.t.

. but before that iran has threatened to block oil shipments through one of the world's busiest waterways if the west applies fresh sanctions against it state television reported the announcement by the country's vice president as its navy held war games near the crucial straits of hormuz now we're joined by dr randy from the university of tehran to talk about the implications of what's been said here dr good to see you thanks for being with us now for running does make good its threat the implications that would be huge would there how much damage could it do considering how much oil saudi arabia exports to the united states for example. why i think any act of hostility against iran and that's basically what an oil embargo would be. would force iran to take retaliatory measures and that would indeed create a very. difficult situation globally because that would mean the heart of oil

exports from the middle east. that would have a devastating effect on the global economy the iranians of course hope that the americans don't. act foolishly but they're american do seem to be having a very irrational manner and dragging the region towards a very dangerous situation where there are american warships right now in the persian gulf and this isn't the first time that iran's issued this kind of threat did so back in two thousand and eight. the u.s. had a blockade like that would be considered an act of war there i just mentioned that american warships are right there in the persian gulf now does this bring the west attention with iran closer to military conflict. well it basically depends on the west and. countries like saudi arabia if they wish to try to prevent iranians from living. like ordinary people in other countries if they want to make you run and suffer and then they too will have to face the

consequences the iranians are quite capable of closing the strait of hormuz and i think that the americans know that quite well iran's defense capabilities are are very different from what they were ten fifteen twenty years ago and i think that. israel's defeat in lebanon as well as the recent. capture of the highly sophisticated american drone by the iranians shows the limits of american capabilities so the best way forward really would be for the united states to see. to quit threatening iran and trying to punish ordinary iranians and try to behave more reasonably and in a more. respectable manner and the situation in in the region tensions in the region would decrease doctors an aside to this president also said that rarely thinks is going to become a major exporter of refined fuels by twenty thirty eight despite any further

sanctions that might be imposed on his country why is he so confident how can he be so confident. well iran is putting an extraordinarily lot of money into the oil sector and if you recall just a couple of years ago when the united states and its allies were trying thinking of imposing sanctions preventing iran from receiving gasoline the iranians decided to build their own refineries or increase their own production for gasoline now you see that iran in the very near future is going to become an export of gas and so the potential in iran is there. the wealth is there the oil is there an incentive is there basically what the americans have done is that they force the iranians to think locally and try to solve their own problems without relying on foreign partners but the most important thing really is that. for the iranians

the american behavior is is creating a dangerous situation not for iran but for the whole world iran can deal with the united states iran is strong enough to stand up against the united states but the united states is basically pushing things in a direction in which everyone is going to pay a heavy price unless they're forced to change direction. from the university of to round but joining us tonight from beirut thank you very much thank you. palestinians are besieged gaza are marking three years since israel's and tanks and fighter jets to attack them the operation then lasted twenty two days and cost almost fifteen hundred lives did it wiped out entire families well for some the battle still rages on only now it's in the courtroom as artie's paullus 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 the government i work with 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 much to cover with some bricks. took his case to the palestinian center for human rights in a person sitting move they secured and out of court settlement with the israeli military it took salad sandwiches to the to the bodies of his mother and sister because of continued fighting in the area these women military said this made the

case since you know they feel justified the way some solid received just under one hundred fifty thousand dollars compensation. if someone loses his leg or his hand up or is killed or injured and all the money in the world you know now but what we're fighting for here is a financial compensation it will offer some relief the palestinian center for human rights has more than two hundred cases on its books but the heavy paperwork bureaucracy 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. with some thought it was it was an early morning there was showing in the apartment above was on fire i want out so i want my hands up in the year the soldiers told me to pull off my shirt and trousers i did with a suit but they find a rock 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 do can be a major obstacle if it's an act of war usually military operation far according to the israeli case low. if leave their sector for. then the state will be exempt from. whether saddle up will have judges case will help other palestinians is not yet clear what these really are me is also said it's opened an investigation into what happened but so far no indictment against any israeli soldier has been filed policy r.t. as eurozone nations sink ever deeper into crisis the u.k. treasury is working on a contingency plan for the single currency is collapse it includes capital control measures while brick there's prepared to close its borders even to maybe even evacuate experts in all of the americas countries i spoke to robert oulds he's

president of the brewers group of campaigners against excess unification in europe he told me that many nations would actually benefit if the eurozone was to collapse . well the european leaders are trying to shore up the eurozone by having greater degree of centralization and more having countries like france and germany have the final say in a sense over the budgets of those e.u. member states that have excessive bitit deficit but that really isn't the answer to the problems built really needed either a massive injection of cash into countries like greece and italy to shore up their economies to be talking in the trillions of euros that's what one option of course another option would have cost to recognize that the single currency has hurt competitiveness in many women nations of the eurozone and has damaged economic growth meaning that the economies can't grow their way out of the debt crisis that they're in and they're just in this debt spiral and having deeper austerity

measures forced upon them rubbles a newly released report about the fukushima nuclear crisis says it was down to the plan's operators being ill prepared and not responding properly to the earthquake following tsunami disaster a major government inquiry said some engineers abandoned the plant as the trouble started another staff delayed reporting significant radiation leaks professor christopher busby's scientific secretary to the european committee on radiation risks he believes the report left many questions unanswered. i don't think. that this inquiry has gone far enough because there are lots of questions that they haven't asked and there are lots of questions that still haven't been answered 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 these health effects are not going to be serious but just like i said before 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 inquiry 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 are going to 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 it's extremely unlikely that the that these reactors are in what they call cold shutdown i mean i think this is discoursed manipulation the very recently isotopes are being released from those those plants and the xenon isotopes have sufficiently short half life for us to know that fissioning is still taking place in those reactors. that's a focus of the most significant events in the buildup to this year's dinner election is part of our series revisiting the key events of twenty eleven and this and now we cover those developments and she 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 they would run for president in twenty two but no one expected it as early as september. the first ten that this congress and united russia wasn't going to be as simple as just the platform for the duma lections being announced was glazier putin and. 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 meet the demands 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 refer to the vote to demonstrate how much they lose 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 of course in the protests that we're seeing straight after the elections on monday we saw people come out to choose to prove 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 buy a lot in a square just around the corner from the kremlin it was a sanction 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 are 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 afar telling the story about russia from outside of russia but being in the center of it all. parties in this and

every day right up to new year we'll bring you a personal view from more of our team of international correspondents who brought you some of the biggest news stories and what's so the be very big news year twenty eleven if you missed any as well they're available to watch right now at our team dot com twenty seven is posted exactly business from moscow next. hello welcome to the business program while a number of western economies are drowning in debt russia is on a course to post a one percent budget surpluses share how to pray new year holiday meeting of the gulf prime minister putin emphasized the improvements that have been made away from the energy sector in those. oil and gas deficit narrowed which is a very positive factor in improving our economy it shows that the effort to

diversify is bearing fruit 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. let's have a look a quick look at the markets now all prices are on the rise as the u.s. economy continues to surprise analysts by growing more than they anticipated a ball from the news from around that they will stop the flow through from the crucial strait of hormuz abortive way in the persian gulf of foreign sanctions are imposed on it is all that spalls is keeping the old market on edge announced that it is all starts wall street is finding its first thing after last week's gains with both adult and down the nasdaq trading plus a positive we were all the closely watched consumer confidence index associates highest level in eight months the russian markets closed yes also over a percent while the my six finished over a quarter of a percent in the red. that's all the business now about there in fifty five minutes

from all. you are. with or you die from high or to the depths. catch the power of the wind or drift in the beauty of the currents.

being well prepared is a must and if you're lucky enough. you'll never forget your experience we only need a screen that's going to be heaven. in the white see up close and below the ice on our t.v. . ten thirty pm trees alive twenty seventh of december here in moscow these are all top stories that are taking the observers arrive the arab league team which is syria's most troubled city have made reports the government tanks are pulling out. fair and square prime minister putin promises transparency in the upcoming presidential election after a series of mass protests against him and for injuring a parliamentary vote. and for years since israel weighs the deadly assault on gaza the palace to.