the abuses and policies of his predecessor george w. bush four years later many civil rights advocates who once cheered yes we can are finding themselves saying no you can't not only has the obama administration blocked torture accountability and refused to investigate and prosecute. these he's basically maintained indefinite detention he's revived military commissions. and as we've seen as well he has expanded targeted killings so they've increased under the obama administration many fold and he's even authorized the killing of a u.s. citizen so you know i think yeah you are in a you know there is a bad state of civil liberties under the obama administration we're now an author and scholar noam chomsky believes the obama administration has changed gears and accelerated illegal practice into overdrive. between bush's policies and

obama's. push bush's policy was to kidnap people. whatever you thought about them. put them to guantanamo or some other torture to number. of information obama supporters just kill. killing them all over the world. another is the targeting drone killing of and were a lock and american born cleric u.s. drone strikes during obama's first two years in office exceeded the total carried out during bush's tenure president obama described a walky as the leader of external operations for all qaeda in the arabian peninsula human rights groups which voiced international opposition against bush counterterrorism policies quickly condemned the killing journalist jeremy scahill says obama's policies have drifted far from his political roots

a president mccain doing the exact same thing that a president obama is doing would have been denounced by a lot of liberals and so we're at one of those dangerous moments in u.s. history and we saw it a bit with clinton in the ninety's where a democrat who campaigned on a pledge to change you know the country in the world has actually pushed a right wing agenda further forward than a republican rip up republican could have if they remained in power or they took power or expanded power as obama gears up for his reelection campaign civil liberty groups that believed his words the first time around are now left to judge the commander in chief on his actions america's democracy is represented by a president who studied and taught the rule of law and is now armed with a duty to carry it out but critics say as long as obama raised by his own rules the constitution and his promise of change both remain compromise or not artsy new york . when i george w.

bush was criticized for america's on two terror policies but president obama has now taken them one step further that's according to the former chief military prosecutor of guantanamo bay you can watch speaking to us here on our next hour. he took office the first thing he did was sign an order. closing guantanamo within one year of his order which was signed in january of two thousand and nine and we're sitting here today and want on the most still open the military commissions have resumed and in my view the president just didn't have the balls to follow through with the doing the right thing candidate obama has said all the right things about justice and american values and closing guantanamo and doing away with military commissions and upholding the rule of law and then once he gets in office you know he didn't just embrace the bush policies he kissed him on the lips and ran with them and his advanced them further than president bush ever did.

this is ott's he iran has successfully test fired several long range missiles on the last day of major naval exercises in the international waters of the persian gulf this comes amid mounting western pressure on the country over its nuclear ambitions so ron says it's ready to counter any attack by enemies like israel of the united states iran has also angrily reacted to new u.s. sanctions targeting its central bank cannot financial sector has also been threatening to close the strait of hormuz so the world's most important oil export route linking the gulf to the indian ocean meanwhile the e.u. is mulling over an embargo on the purchase of iranian oil and the decision on that is expected before the end of the month the director of the beirut based center for middle east studies talked to his sharma job believes the west's actions are only fueling the fire. united states is doing its best.

in every day. a day i didn't get into sanctions against iran and i think iran is going. way. out of a problem. and it will not stop exploitation of the oil of iran it will be threatening in my opinion even though maybe iran will not close the strait of but it may disturb the navigation and in this case with the presence of pensive military but the ship from both sides we leased to have more conflict and this more contacts can increase and to be bigger and bigger and may lead to a war and a region. a showdown in the gulf brews we're asking what you think the united states wants to get from a conflict with iran if you're going to r.t. dot com right now you can actually let us know your opinion in our live

a world wide hole. if you believe america is. in the middle east over of course. china. if you think a conflict with iran would be. always. called . they can't bring themselves to admit that it was a mistake and so i'm afraid we risk the very thing they fear which is the breakup of the euro cools by having tried to keep it together for too long the mood is far from millions of european. currency that's failed to live up to expectations and which prospects. of

opportunity during the last days of the soviet union secrets. to some other world news for you. let's turn our attention first to syria where the arab league chief says the regime has withdrawn heavy weapons including tanks from cities and freed about three thousand five hundred presidents but the head of. still pose a danger and called for an end to the shooting of protesters two civilians have reportedly been killed in the latest wave of violence continues despite the president's. month long mission to the clashes between the military government protesters more than five thousand people have been killed. the un has advised villagers in south sudan to flee from advancing fighters of a rival troy the town of people that was the center of into ethnic clashes on

saturday many were forced from their homes as a local hospital and several other buildings were set on fire the government says it is deploying police officers and troops to the town to try and bring about some a thousand people have died in clashes over the past few months with. cattle. riot police in bahrain have clashed with hundreds of demonstrators after the funeral of a fifteen year old protester killed. the opposition claims the teenager was hit by a tear gas canister at close range. raised questions about the circumstances of the death and said it would be investigated at least thirty five dead and the rest during two thousand and eleven including police officers killed as protesters attacked. south korea's president is offering the north's new leader kim jong un new talks if he agrees to suspend nuclear activities the leaders said in

a new year's speech to the korean peninsula is at a turning point but warned against future provocation by the north north korea walked out of nuclear talks in two thousand and eight after objecting to south korea's requests to inspect its atomic facilities the comments come just after kim jong un was named a ruling party leader following the death of his father in december. well new year's celebrations for many people in the eurozone were reined in due to the tough economic climate with many predicting further financial misery two thousand and twelve will see a severe test for the euro as it fights for survival the single currency has now been in circulation for a decade but it leaves millions of europeans anything but optimistic. reports. the birth of an ambitious project a common currency celebrated with no less than

a big bang. the new reason to give the older stronger of their year young. barrister their war the barracks the war. yet ten years down the road the euro is not in the best of shape. a spiralling sovereign debt crisis credit downgrades rising interest rates tens of millions unemployed budget cuts and violent protests. the euro's going undergoing the worst crisis it has ever been and obviously the founders of the of the euro did not hope that this would happen for what began as a step towards a united europe has become a race against time with leaders scrambling to keep it together euro skeptics have long argued that the euro was flawed from the start pursuing

a political dream above all else well they say lumping together polar opposite economies like that of greece and germany into a monetary union could never work. he has been thrown out of the window in the pursuit of this goal and we're now reaping the consequences of a couple that with internal squabbles and deadlocks there has to be from somewhere that some economic entity that is credible is going to back every euro zone and the only two or three entities that can do that what is european central bank. the other is basically the german government and neither of them right now are willing to do it but this exhibit shows the journey of the european union and the creation of the single currency with documented events in history that explain why it would have been appealing to decision makers at the time so much so the crux of the fundamentals may have been overlooked or ignored which brings us to discordant ten years after the creation of the euro its appeal has waned and despite last

ditch efforts to save it its future is still uncertain in the spirit of the new year we asked for some predictions but one can be sure of is that this crisis is going to be a long and bumpy road however if you would ask me do you think that the euro would still exist in ten years time lads who would be yes they can't bring themselves to admit that it was a mistake and so i'm afraid we risk the very thing they purport to fear which is a disorderly breakup of the euro caused by having tried to keep it together for too long downgrades almost certainly i think you'll see a french downgrade i still think this is solvable if the political will is shown in certain member states to allow for what is called solidarity in europe and if not if not we are in for a huge huge recession in europe sitting my prediction that at least greece will leave the euro in the next year and what happens beyond lent is unpredictable euro

watchers may have divergent views of the single currencies future but it seems whichever way the euro goes it won't be painless does or cilia r.t. brussels. right now a lot. more about the leading light of the bolshoi theatre also known as the. eighteenth birthday. printed in russia. three centuries ago. is eve.

to. see. the mission. critical three times for churches free arrangements free. three stooges free. floating videos. free media. dot com.

from fans to. come. right to clean. squandered money. more than sixty square kilometers. and those who are still surprisingly. i'm finding are just. it's getting bad out here. not saying hardly any birds squirrels you know. darts here i don't know what's going on here. on screen on our teeth.

welcome back you're watching artsy of the modern world of satellite imaging it usually gives us a glimpse into the most into most parts of the globe simply from our computers until now though israel has been protected from close up images but a new turkish satellite will soon put an end to the country's zoom in bad as the jewish state's former ally prepares to launch its high tech satellite israel fears being watched as worried about its security. investigates. israel's leaders are worried and they've good reason to be in just a matter of months still be nothing stopping satellite companies from getting up close and personal. with. security through. war not to enable enemy to very high resolution imagery. until now only the americans had the technology capable of

taking images created in tunisia's pixel resolution and american law stopped us companies from distributing the pictures the americans very sensitive to security demands it. scrutiny that plays along with it which means even with google earth one can zoom into israel but only so far if you try to look at specific parts of israel many of them will come out blurry than any other place in the world that i've checked but that's about to change turkey's putting the finishing touches to a military satellite it plans to launch within the next two years the gawked took satellite will be capable of taking the very pictures tel aviv doesn't want distributed and there are no american star legal qualms in turkey about upsetting its photosensitive neighbor turkey could be sold directly or indirectly some of these injury to his office. and that's the fear here especially because tensions between tel aviv and co are at an all time low and aid for to the attempt on gaza two years ago that left nine two x.

did and was expulsion of the israeli ambassador has tel aviv nervously weighing its options the irony is that it was not so long ago that the gawked took satellite would have spelled good news for israel the two countries cooperated extensively often sharing military intelligence but whereas turkey was once israel's a closest ally in the muslim world today it is ankara that is asserting itself without a television as a powerful player in the region turkey is trying to say that he isn't really not to be granted the special. services. to have a saying in. the playground of. different countries everyone should abide to the same laws or to have the same standards one satellite is barely enough to put israel's picture shy world in a spin but this is not a country that wants its neighbors knowing its business especially with an arab world in flux and israel fast losing former friends policy r.t. the veil on israel. to pakistan now where america has suspended as the political

in the two countries deepens islamabad a shutdown as border to nato five weeks ago hampering the alliances war effort in afghanistan artie's military contributor says the u.s. and its allies should rethink their strategy if indeed they want to defeat the taliban. now when the new year has just clicked in let's take a look at what to expect for the united states and there are nato allies of ghana's stand and pakistan the white house has to realize that the only way to improve their relationship would be to minimize its political and military affairs in pakistan and afghanistan and if there is any excuse for the u.s. military presence in afghanistan it has nothing to do we have the terrorist threat

it is the threat that is the only justifiable reason for the u.s. military forces to deal directly affected and officially just after twenty past the hour here at moscow just what does it take to become a successful entrepreneur in russia in our new pathfinder series we hear from the foreigners who have explored the vast potential in the world's biggest country. and today we hear from an entrepreneur and a restaurant whose appetite for adventure helped him carve a new career in russia but during the dying days of the soviet union heinrich winter spotted an opportunity to build a restaurant empire all across the country and now reveals his special recipe for success running a business in russia. is challenging for different reasons. in the west

the risk in the reward. equation applies to russia all there's a great opportunity in the market your return on investment here is higher than you would expect in in the west but that is justified by the relatively high risk all that one has to face in the market it was nine hundred ninety one when i came in september and the collapse of the soviet union was six months later i was new in the country i didn't speak the language but what was interesting and challenging at the same time was that things were changing but really what was changing and how things were going changed was totally unpredictable so opening up a restaurant in russia. was something truly unique back then there were no restaurants in russia there was

a total of two restaurants and this was basically the third restaurant told mum in the soviet union and the country of three hundred eighty million people that we chose to open up a swiss restaurant. with fondue one steak and seasonal solvent and things like that it's funny in the story about the caesar salad the situation in russia is quite unique because the season salad is on literally every menu in the whole country why is that is so in my opinion is that when we lay the key dish it was a caesar salad it was prepared in front of the guests by the waitresses had a lot of people have to learn how to make decisions that well as the years went on and new restaurants opened up one of the things that everybody knew was to make a caesar salad so it was a recipe that was kind of passed out among the few professionals in the restaurant business in those days the influence of the pioneers yes you felt it but really

it was later on. one realized the profound impact. that one had in those days at the time it wasn't that it was just surviving it was just trying to do things right and get the business going in the beginning and in the first couple of years it was very much this pioneer work opening up a new concept by the late ninety's it was very much starting to become a more competitive market you had to be good you had to offer something special because in the beginning you open up a restaurant it was for the next day you didn't have to try very hard so i set out really to make a strategic shift away from just opening up restaurants to really implementing it. customer service and guest i distraction and that started with training programs because the restaurant business has a relatively weak turnover of staff we would teaching bringing knowledge to

a huge number of people all of that work for us for a while and many of them left all the restaurant and so forth so we were the professional kind of growth model for a professional knowledge in the restaurant business how do you pizza and they go to become ill patio was hugely successful likewise the planet sushi as general manager of raw same tour throughout these many years. and the breast runs three years ago i started opening all of my own restaurants now the same restaurants but as a franchisee have today twelve restaurants it's a business that requires a lot of perfection in every kind of execution that's a personal touch. it's the small things that count but that's not special for russia it's everywhere but surely it's a requirement for russia because here again the competitive environment has been become so tight that you need to be really really good to be successful.

eighty six pts. we will be meeting more business. in our special. showing over the next two weeks. will bring you the best of. all of this just a few of the pictures to be seen from the. twelve . thousand and twelve. of today's stories.

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the closer she has been to new stuff. plays to the most. if. the community loses its way in the modern world. and where the country. starts. the official. from the. video. and.

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the world. of security. for the very first time the country has been protected from close up photos. so what can we expect in the world of politics and economics in two thousand and twelve a look at what's ahead. next. thank you.