our top stories this hour. international news and comment live from moscow this is r.t. pulling out of iraq washington express pride of what had been achieved and confidence in a democratic future but just weeks on violence is rampant and sectarian tension boiling point well the prime minister pursues a seemingly personal vendetta against the vice president and caught in the middle of it all is journalism where the press is yet to discover its freedom sebastian has more on this. this spring iraqis inspired by neighboring arab countries began protesting against their government in a square in baghdad one which shares its name with the better known counterpart in cairo. but iraqi journalists trying to cover these protests

silenced by the government security forces in today's iraqi journalists who speak out are routinely imprisoned beaten or just simply killed it seems to be a high level of intolerance for dissent or for public criticism of either government policies or particular leaders use it felt to me a freelance journalist showed r.t. some shocking youtube footage from the protests this february that explicitly show iraqi security forces targeting him because he's a journalist. he shouts which is arabic for journalist over and over again but it makes the police more violent three or four maybe five right police were around me one of them slapped me in the head other one kicked me in the and they grabbed me fast yousif managed to escape arrest thanks to two foreign journalists who intervened but since the arrest of one of his colleagues he

stopped covering protests altogether became hard for for example to go to tahrir square i myself i don't go there i stopped there a long time ago not because. i'm not that scared to be arrested. you know i'm worried to be mistreated we tried to speak to journalists who've been arrested in baghdad but everyone was too afraid to appear on camera so we came up here to the more peaceful kurdish region to see if the situation was any different here i met a young photographer who was arrested while covering similar protests in the kurdish region but after the interview he called to tell me he was scared of reprisals from the government and asked to blur his face and change his name after his arrest in april it was imprisoned for four days and tortured. six men came to the room and started to shout at me and beat me with cables then they gave me electric shocks they wanted me to admit that i hadn't been at the protest. when he

was finally released after four days a friend took pictures of his wounds and published them in a local magazine immediately ahmed was rearrested as a punishment for publicizing his initial arrest. came and they held me for three days and made me sign a document declaring that i would not talk to the press again back in baghdad the government spokesman admitted to r.t. that individuals in the iraqi government were indeed using their powers to silence the press that is not just that people been. using there but this is again is not protected by the government the government is there. and you can see that there are people in the minister of interior for example they have misusing their power against the citizen and it is this building that is the keeper culpable and some of them has been fired almost nine years after the invasion u.s. troops are home but what of the country they're leaving behind with politicians using the security forces to silence journalists it appears that iraq lacks any

credible press freedom or freedom that is essential to any democratic country sebastian meyer r t iraq. if you'd like to see more of sebastian reports you can find them on our web site is hearty dot com iraq also there we're running a poll asking you where you think post u.s. iraq is now heading and we can look at the results on the screen so far you can see that the prevailing opinion is the country is slowly slipping into chaos while a third say iraqis will overthrow the current u.s. backed government to make their own way forward into the future just over a quarter of you believe iraq's already hit rock bottom and things can't get any worse just five percent harbor hope that it will develop into a western style democracy but the result so far the response is a blogger dot com and add your voice be good to hear from. the u.s. and u.k. of course for syria to be expelled from two unesco human rights committees

a british foreign office representative says the country's presence in itself is the u.n. bodies reputation meanwhile a former high ranking military chief who defected to the opposition has claimed syria won't be capable of confronting any international military action against the country he says that the assessment is based on confirmed information from sources within the syrian army and his own experience it comes as tension in the country reaches boiling point after a suicide blast killed twenty six in central damascus the arab league observers that observers that have been working in syria since the end of december to present their initial report on the situation in the country on sunday julie and the lists from the canada based center for research on globalization thinks that calls by the u.s. and u.k. for the exclusion of syria from unesco committees are absurd as their leaders have blood on their hands and souls. this is going to affect the credibility of the assad regime and it's quite absurd when you think the u.k.

and the us happened. markram it was running free i mean george bush and tony blair there is ample evidence. they have committed crimes of the sort of the run free. absurd that they want to explore are serious and that if you have the syrian government that is being. thrown one could put someone in place to further the western interest and then we would lose and russia is an ally and then of course the next there would be regime change in iraq. today it's president omar al bashir who's wanted for genocide charges by the international criminal court as arrived on a state visit to libya was a bitter opponent of gadhafi who are civilians in darfur to defend themselves against bashir as armies or human rights groups have voiced outrage at this visit and question the n.t. sees priorities patrick a's reporter for the online magazine spiked told me earlier

that he sees double standards here. gordon brown shaking hands with muhammad get their feet in two thousand and nine at the g eight summit in italy or for example tony blair shaking hands with gadhafi in two thousand and seven just outside of his hometown where he was killed in certain two thousand and seven so i mean i think yes there are double standards here but at the same time western leaders are very open to doing this and do this themselves as well did support the libyan rebels who were fighting against gadhafi and had good material reasons to do so for a long time sit down in libya get out these libya. heads and you can understand why bashir wanted gadhafi out and why now having supported speedy the rebel uprising there would be some attempt to kind of welcome him. into libya no i must say that so many found of the national transitional council most of the time they weren't even in libya to the people on the council themselves so off cozying up and getting

the approval of western governments to lead libya rather than orienting themselves towards the libyan people and actually fighting for democracy there i find it very striking that you have no question. criticizing the libyans for engaging with their neighbors and sorting out diplomatic relations always just i'm staggered by the fact that these human rights groups basically wield a human right as missionaries in the nineteenth century wilted the bible in the ten commandments to basically civilized countries seem to be inferior and incapable of governing their own countries and people. talking a little earlier knowledge he will still ahead we continue to meet the trailblazers of post business in our part of the series. my first trip was very impressionable i couldn't understand how so many young people i was meeting were making tens of millions of dollars a year and some of them billionaires before they were thirty. the american

bringing stalls in studios to russia who explains how his business is succeeding in developing moscow's movie magic plus. we don't just keep printing money we don't keep inflating governments so that's why most of the european countries are having trouble it's because the government is sixty percent larger than it should be so why do you and i think it is and government leaders can't because we don't get paid by the people that are behind the scenes. what's wrong with the global economy and how would you fix it and the president asked the question on the streets of new york those stories still to come. first today the orthodox well the celebrating christmas commemorating the birth of jesus christ thirteen days after west and according to the julian calendar a total of about two hundred million people celebrate christmas today on the seventh of january and in one of the oldest christian countries georgian worshippers began the holy day with midnight mass in bosnia believers cut branches

from oak trees to burn them later in huge fires as part of an ancient tradition. gerunds plunged into icy waters to recover crucifixes cast by priests in an old ritual marking the feast of a pity. parties peter all of the christ the savior cathedral in the sky. christmas day here in russia. in with a traditional service here at the christ the savior cathedral in the center of the russian capital that service presided over by. the patriarch of moscow and all russia kirill heads of the russian orthodox church and attended by well the great and the good the dignitaries old russian society president dmitri made to get it in there as well as other see me a pig is attending this church service around five thousand people in total crammed into the christ the savior cathedral more of them in fact actually taking places

around the outskirts of the cathedral to just try and get a view of the church hopefully to hear something what was going on inside it of course to hear the bells that had been a ringing out to celebrate the birth of jesus christ now. question it always comes up is why is christmas being celebrated in january now this is due to the fact that the russian orthodox church as well as some other branches of all the docs christianity use the julian calendar as opposed to the calendar used by western christianity which means that in russia as well as out some other countries christmas falls on the seventh of january huge day in the old calendar and something that has become a real tradition here in russia it's opening in one thousand nine hundred seven the traditional christmas. christ the savior. porting there from moscow and we've been covering the service on our website dot com and to see the vigil and

. once again by the way on the web site you can find the address by the head of the russian church called on the nation to find peace and love for the whole. and. that. heading due. to film of the failed russian. just days before back down to one. r.t. live here in moscow next we continue our pathfinder series bringing you the stories of foreigners who are successfully pioneering business in russia and today we meet the man who brings scores of world renowned actors and bands to the country bob van

roekel used to be a restaurateur in los angeles until deciding one day to try his luck here in russia something he's never regretted. i basically ended up moving to russia all by accident in one thousand and ninety eight i was asked by a russian friend in los angeles if i could bring a hollywood studio to moscow because mayor luzhkov was interested in building multiplex cinemas and wanted a hollywood studio partner i had friends that were running warner brothers they sent head of international theatres with me gosh my my first trip was very impressionable i couldn't understand how so many young people i was meeting were making tens of millions of dollars a year and some of them millionaires before they were thirty and these were some of the things that made me realize there's a lot of opportunity here there's not

a lot of people who are doing hollywood business there hasn't been a lot of contact and interaction with celebrities i love a challenge what could be more challenging than moving to russia and trying to develop and create a business here in the us with them. i didn't know any actors but i started meeting them just to bring them to russia or working on that project the russian comedy that's going to shoot in america steven seagal is already told me they'll do it a couple days for two hundred fifty thousand dollars well kilmer's interested in helping out. then wealthy russians started asking for other people and i just started calling everybody i knew in l.a. who knew a producer a new a director and i called them from russia after eight years i brought over eighty actors and bands to russia i think it's very important for you to go to los angeles with me in the next few months we should meet with you hopefully make the roar releasing a different actors you would like to do cameos in this film the biggest challenge

to overcome is gaining people's trust and performing one example is recently i was asked to bring john claude van damme to chechnya for the president's birthday and day. the city and. elude me for that but the other one i go to only in my heart. it's a place most people are very afraid to go to of course john clyde you know his expenses need to be paid then others for him to go there and it's very frightening dealing and working with chechnyan friends knowing that if something went wrong didn't come and money is paid. who are people going to come calling and looking for asking for the money back and it took a long time for me to win people's confidence that they would send money to an actor or a band in advance russia costs more than a lot of other parts of the world because russians have been willing to pay more

you know if russians weren't willing to pay more celebrities would be coming for less but when they have people making such big offers just to get them how can you refuse so russia's been great to help push up their prices jennifer lopez gets two million dollars to go and perform you know in russia and kazakhstan and some other places if you're american in the u.s. we understand our system how to set up a business we can easily research any product or any idea we have to find out if it's been saturated or not in russia it's really different because it's so hard to get to the important people that make the decisions when i have to work with a person who works for someone here i get nowhere i can't do a deal because they need to see so much because their jobs on the line their names on the line they're so afraid that just drags on and drags on whatever i'm talking to them about when you can pick up the phone and call the head of the company or

someone on the board of directors i know in a week if i can do this deal or not with them rush is just much more individual life you really need to know some important people here to have success you know i was thinking your. from here which is part of the reason i never learned russian is i just thought ok one year from now i'm sure something will come up back in the l a the us all go back i'll start doing movies but it is so exciting here every day so many new things and new deals and new opportunities and that i haven't been able to leave. so while individual careers may be flourishing the whole countries are drowning in debt next we head to new york where the president asked people in the streets for tips on what should be done to rescue the global economy.

today everyone's upset with how the world leaders are handling the economy so how would you fix that this week let's talk about that whole country do you think is doing a good job. let me say. you know now. what would you do to fix the problem in greece. and dreams wow. i do you know how did that. because i know i say no no no maybe that's why it's going all around a good word to fix is each of our problems personally so if we're all out there working hard and spending money to local communities then that's you know a way of part of building up each local community eventually the whole country gets stronger right yeah isn't it time maybe for the government to stop trying to fix it and let people and companies fix their own wallets i think that's a good answer yes to fix the economy what should they be doing they should be pumping more money into it pumping more money they've been pumping millions and

billions and trillions and done a good so why is that the solution that we keep going back to the only thing we can do so we can also see just do nothing and let people sort it out themselves. people can sort of themselves not a matter of not throwing money into the economy it's a matter of living within our means if you don't have enough revenue then you have to cut spending yes so governments are trillions of dollars in debt so it sounds like they have no money right well they have to they obviously you can't stop everything all at once but you do have to you do have to pull back and you have to come up with a reasonable plan stop the hemorrhaging we don't just keep printing money and then we don't keep inflating government so that's and most of the european countries are having trouble because the government is sixty percent larger than it should be so why why did you and i see business and government leaders. can't because we don't get paid by the people that are behind the scenes and since i'm not ready for

campaign contributions by people that he might help american politicians are just. really so what should they be doing better. other probably trying to change its economy from an oil economy to something else we've got heaps of people with lots of brains and we need to be doing something about the environment. people with brains are in positions of power. so it seems like with the system that's currently in place for how world leaders get elected it might be time for solutions to come from someplace else. one out of some more international stories this hour in our world update a wave of attacks by radical muslim sect is continuing to claim multiple lives in northeastern nigeria eight people were gunned down during a service at a church while twenty were killed during a town hall meeting islamist group boko haram which has claimed responsibility for

the attacks issued a three day ultimatum for christians to leave the mostly muslim north of the country. three freight trains collided in a rural part of the us state of indiana starting a fire in interest two of the six crew members involved one of the trains carrying mostly empty ethanol tanks was stationary and was hit in the back by another. run into the rail carriages on the parallel track fishel said there was no spill of any hazardous material from the wreck nevertheless they ordered the evacuation of several dozen houses in the crash site as a precaution. when the time for a close up series as we continue to delve deeper into the country's far east. the hub of screeching is russia's main gateway to the pacific and one of its most

rapidly developing industrial centers and as a tease tom has discovered feeding the fuel hungry asian economies does not have to be at the expense of tradition. the bar ask region in russia's far east is becoming a growing center for export to the hungry economies in the south china south korea and japan increasing material exports of ward and coal are going out to the pacific and south and is that they were looking at in my report this monster called coal stacker is the new face of russia's far east coast it can load over four thousand tons of coal an hour into ships at this rapidly expanding sea terminal this year they exported ten million tons of the stuff almost exclusively south asian markets but also board we've noticed there's a coal boom of coal consumption worldwide has increased so this port covers almost

all of asia from the cold comes from some of russia's largest deposits five hundred monitors in there and he joins the oil and timber flowing out of the region in ever greater quantities tugboats maneuver the ships into place through storms and the winter cold and even the most modern tankers once on their way to helped along by a much older technology. down this coast vast new ship internationals are springing up to supply overseas markets will all see very foundations presented by this life pass which long before help makes a russia's gateway to the pacific hundreds of lighthouses dot the coast all the way from the border with north korea up to the arctic. victor has been manning his lighthouse for over thirty years but he's glad he's not too far out into the wilderness. we're close enough to the nearest town other lighthouse keepers are

stuck out in the tiger without even roads sometimes a ship or helicopter deliver supplies but there's no other way to come or go big has not had a ship run aground. since the early one nine hundred ninety s. he's seen bears moose and tigers visit his white house and say as he never grows bored of the ever changing seascape far from feeling lonely he talks of the remand to system of being such a secluded spot on the coastline you know i used to go down to the bay of four am catching crabs and start a fire then my wife and kids would join me and we'd have breakfast on the shore and watch the sunrise in the summer this whole field would be bright orange and blue if you could think to retire next year he says he's come to love the spotlight robinson crusoe xylem and and while he can remember the pristine beauty of his coastline others are seeing it sail on into the future with his talk a little bit more about the bar often the experience of moving here from abroad is

the main aholic that came here from britain a basket self is trying to upgrade itself trying to move into the out of the soviet times and into the modern modern age where industry with the also working on a new cosmodrome what do you know about the new developments here i know that is very very important to the local area and you know that it's improving transport links all the time people are finally investing in the far east which is obviously going to be very good for the economy i mean i'm here because my fiance is working for an oil refinery in the same or investment there and this cousin jane is going to i think any improve putin said it was one of the biggest and most important projects that's happening in russia at the moment so yes i think it's up and coming this this region someone who's come from a different culture from outside what would you say to what the people who are thinking. there is possibly business which changes but should i come here what

would you say to them. i mean it's worth a try to how did during a russian look at this important and very few restaurants or cafes where they have an english menu and things like that i think when i was. don't speak russian people find it frustrating rather than think so i bear that in mind prices ok so if prices are extortionate. you can go check it in adventure well there you go that's an insight from someone who has made the leap out to the far east so. it's not going to get any warmer here but it seems that with future with the development of the region it is going to get more connected to the outside world. that and in a few minutes here and i'll tell you the story oh of an american who says he's at the front line in saving his country by patrolling its border with mexico that special report on this where shortly before that update you on this headline stay with us now from here in moscow naughty.

i had a family i lived in a fairly nice community wasn't which was an upscale it was just like you know archie bunker society ok then they started showing up here what happened was my company decided i could get cheap labor and they got rid of us sure those are.

the rules of the eaglets line legally we have to get up every morning we have to go to work and you know we have to pay our bills and we have to do it and that's just the american dream and if you want the american dream you have to go by the laws i figure it's here's one of the major trails in the united states and. i watch and they run run down my property and something about this noise. book is illegal the net coach is from coming over the wire is protecting the country i'm the kind of guy who doesn't mind it is pants dirty so i come out here you know we're all immigrants as well know that we all do something.

the russians would be soo much brighter if you knew all about song from phones to crash into these. food stocks on t.v. dot com. if you just joined us in for a warm welcome to news stories this hour in our t.v. from blood of journalism dissent with us away in iraq as the government intensifies its crackdown on protests and the press will against the backdrop of an increasingly earlier security situation in the country. the u.s. and u.k. call for syria to be expelled from unesco human rights committees tension in the country reaches a peak call for a suicide blast kills twenty six in the cup.