it's wanted by the international criminal court for crimes against humanity. six o'clock in the morning here in moscow russia's capital this is r.t. certainly glad to have you with us freedom of speech is considered to be one of the basic principles of democracy but just weeks after the u.s. troop withdrawal from iraq we find that that basic right is being violated and while iraq is learning to manage its own affairs consequences are proving brutal for some in a report now from our sebastian meyer we speak to some of the journalists that have faced imprisonment and even torture. 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 iraq journalists who speak out are routinely imprisoned beaten or just simply killed seems to be a high level of intolerance or dissent or for public criticism of the government policies or particular leaders use it felt to me a freelance journalist showed some shocking you tube 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 a 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 slap 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 it became hard for for example to go to. myself i don't go there i stop 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 and was in prison 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. and you could see that there are people in the midst of it for example they have misusing their power against the citizen and there is this juror 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 or to iraq and if you'd like to see more of sebastian's reports you can find them on our web site r t v dot com under iraq also there were running a poll asking you where you think the post us iraq is headed. as of now most of you think the country is slowly slipping into chaos while a third say iraqis will overthrow the current us backed government and make their own way forward into the future just over a quarter of you believe iraq has already hit rock bottom and that things there can't really get any worse and only three percent hope that it will develop into a western style democracy log on to our tea dot com and add your voice into the mix . the u.s. and u.k. have called for syria to be expelled from two unesco human rights committees

a british foreign office representative said the country's president isn't conducive to the work of the body or its reputation the move comes as tensions in the country reaches boiling point after a suicide blast killed twenty six people in central damascus meanwhile the arab league observers that have been working in syria since the end of december are expected to present their initial report on the situation in the country on sunday truly love that an analyst from the center for research on globalization says the west has no right to exclude syria from unesco committees as its leaders have blood on their hands themselves. it's just a thing to credit the assad regime and it's quite absurd when you think that the u.k. and the u.s. have. more criminals running free i mean george bush and tony blair. there's ample evidence that they have committed war crimes and some of the unfree it's the only

absurd. they want takes on a serious from that if you have the syrian government that is being. thrown then you're going to put someone in place that's going to further the western interests and on whose and i want russia as an ally and then of course the next step would be regime change in iran. sudan's president omar al bashir wanted on genocide charges by the international criminal court is in libya for a two day state visit it is his first trip to tripoli after the fall of his bitter opponent colonel gadhafi human rights groups have condemned a visit and questioned of the priorities of libya's new government but patrick ace from spike magazine believes it is the west that is set the example for libya when it comes to strengthening ties with controversial regimes in the face of human rights concerns. gordon brown's shaking hands with 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 bashir did support the libyan rebels who are fighting against gadhafi and have good material reasons to do so for a long time sit down in libya gadhafi libya. loga heads and you can understand why bashir wanted gadhafi out and why now having supported speech 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 i always just i'm staggered by the fact that these human rights groups basically we human rights as missionaries in the nineteenth century will did the bible in the ten commandments to basically civilized countries seem to be inferior and incapable of governing their own countries and people egypt's parliamentary election has drawn to a close with the muslim brotherhood claiming nearly forty percent of the vote is closely followed by the radical islamist nor party meanwhile secular parties have acquired only about a third of the seats middle east blogger karl charles says and islamised led government there is doomed to fail. look at egypt i mean to be honest everybody anticipated a big big win for the muslim brotherhood and youth but having said that the results that the north party in specific achieved in egypt were a bit of a surprise and i think where we need to look at there is specifically this is an

ability of the more secular elements in the egyptian uprising of talking to the people and kind of galvanizing them and raising their support in the elections now what it does about the arab world if you like for the future i think it will be a combination of conservative socially conservative politics this is in the in the short term. the broad support that islamists have kind of more. if you like liberal economic policies but i have my doubts about the ability of islamist parties across the board to govern and i think it's a position shared by them as well and they will try as much as possible to form alliances with other groups and bring in more people and you're likely to see why their coalition is taking power both in egypt and in other countries. and coming up

ahead for you this hour delving deeper into russia's industrial heartland. artie's close up crew takes a look at the amazing a fusion of ancient traditions and thriving business that's setting the region on a path to success. if we don't just keep printing money and that we don't keep inflating government 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 why do you and i see this and government leaders can't because we don't get paid by the people that are behind the seats what's wrong with the global economy and how would you fix it the resident asks the question on the streets of new york . next we continue our pathfinders series bringing you the stories of foreigners who are successfully pioneering business here in russia this time we meet the man who brings scores of world renowned actors and music groups to the country bob van ronk used to be

a restaurant tour and los angeles until deciding one day to try his luck in russia something he has 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 roswitha how real 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 and we should meet with you hopefully make your 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 or. the city and. you know oblivious to that but the other one i know you're 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 and 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 it 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 where 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 it 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 us i'll go back i'll start doing movies but it is so exciting here every day and so many new things and new deals and new opportunities and that i haven't been able to leave. the world economy is heading into another year i'm in the dark predictions from. the mists about the breakup of the euro and a looming recession up next the resident takes to the streets of new york to find out what people think should be done to save countries that are mired in debt.

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. injuries wow. i don't 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 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. 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 . not a matter of not throwing money into the economy it's a matter of living within 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 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 we don't keep inflating government so that's why most of the european countries are having trouble because the government is sixty percent larger than it should be so why why do you and i see this and governor. leaders can't because we don't get paid

by the people that are behind the scenes and since i'm not ready for a campaign i don't get current campaign contributions by people that need my help to american politicians are just. really so what should they be doing better. other probably trying to change the economy from an oil economy to something else with we've got heaps of people with lots of brains and we need to be doing something about the environment being those people with brains are in positions of power. and 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. and one of us our r t's financial guru max keiser and his co-host stacey herbert delve into greece's finances and find the i.m.f. is among the culprits responsible for the country's dire situation. they would not

be allowed to escape their current situation the greek people because as long as they're being held down by the financial rapist as i call them or the paper bugs they're having their wealth confiscated and looted their having their gold sucked out of their teeth they're going to give up the countries under eleven tongue gold position in the bank in greece they're going to be nice all of their assets income producing assets the ports the tourist attractions anything that can throw off a nickel of income is going to be stolen and taken from the people and they would be benefited of course if they could get out of this prison but they will not be allowed to get out of prison no way of course is the right should happen but it won't happen because the greek people are being gangbanged by the i.m.f. christine lagarde with a strap on and all these other central bankers. and

in transition now a russian tanker carrying an emergency fuel delivery is making its way through thick ice towards the alaskan city of nome a severe storm has left the community of about thirty five hundred people cut off with not enough fuel to last through the harsh winter the renda set out in december and is now less than two hundred nautical miles from its destination accompanied by coast guard icebreaker it is carrying more than three point eight million the leaders of petroleum the unprecedented mission is due to reach no by monday morning . and if you like our news coverage make sure you visit our website you'll love it there as well dot com waiting for you there right now. dinosaur life russia is to get its very own version of a drastic part where fossils may get a new lease on life plus. we find out the consequences if the

u.s. freezes millions of dollars in aid to palestine months after it's a session to the u.n. cultural body. take a look at some other stories making headlines around the world for you this hour. three freight trains collided in a rural part of the u.s. state of indiana starting a fire and injuring two of the six crew members involved one of the trains carrying mostly empty ethanol tanks was stationary when it was hit in the rear by another a third then ran into the rail carriages on the parallel track local officials said there was no spill of any hazardous material from the wreck nevertheless they ordered the evacuation of several dozen houses near the crash site as a precaution. a ship grounded off the coast of new zealand since october has broken

into after being pounded by winter storms the greek renna ran aground on an infamous reef spewing highly toxic fuels into the ocean more than twenty thousand sea birds are thought to have died after the ship foundered in what is being called new zealand's worst environmental disaster ever the ship's captain and navigator face criminal charges well now it's time for our russia close up series as we continue to explore the country's far east. a good. lead. news. me. is russia's main gateway to the pacific and a center of coal and wood exports to the fuel hungry asian economies and as artie's dumbarton discovered ancient traditions are important when it comes to keeping an

industry on track. to have our street 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 the coal stack or 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 to asian markets but we've noticed there's a coal boom of coal consumption worldwide has increased so this part covers almost all of asia. become comes from some of russia's largest deposits five hundred kilometers inland 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 oh and this vast new ship internals are springing up to supply overseas markets for the old see very foundations represented by this like house which along with four 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 look at it 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 seen bears moose and tigers visit his lighthouse and say's 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 at 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 pick to retires next year he says he's come to love the spotlight robinson crusoe on his island 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 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 and in a more 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. as someone who's come from a different culture from outside what would you say to what the people who are thinking . there's possibly business which indies but should i come here what would you say to them. i mean it's worth a try how did during your russian with this important and very few restaurants ok

so they have an english menu and and things like that i think when i don't speak russian people find it frustrating rather than think so i'd bet that in mind prices . so high prices are extortionate. and you can go. of intervention well there we go that's an insight from someone who has made the leap out to the far east so borrow 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 which is tom burton for us there now still ahead the kaiser report here to expose some of the scandals behind of the global financial headlines but first a recap of our main stories that's after a short break. i

am. just so. sick.

and welcome back you're watching thomas quite the. battle for the truth are to investigate the iraqi government's continued crackdown on freedom of speech and the journalists who need some of the reporters in the claim to have been jailed and even tortured. the u.s. and u.k. call for the exclusion of syria from unesco's human rights committees the move comes as tension that runs high in syria following a suicide attack twenty six people incensed at the masks. libya.