thanks for being with us four o'clock here in moscow and characterize fresh clashes have broken out across syria with at least eleven people reported killed and violence rages on the as the arab league gathers to discuss the progress of its observer mission to the country critics say the league is failing to oversee a peace plan under which the syrian regime agreed to end its crackdown on protesters more than one hundred civilians have allegedly been killed by government troops since the first observers arrived last month on friday dozens died in a suicide bombing in the capital damascus which the regime's blaming on terrorists middle east expert tariq ali thinks that the attack could be an attempt to provoke foreign intervention. some of the opposition are saying there be said regime organized this last themselves but i think it's unlikely the fact is that the national coordination committee in the stumble we treat is being coordinated

itself to a certain extent by nato. is not in control of all the forces on the ground so i think it's quite likely that the suicide bombing was carried out by an opposition force and western governments like france saying that even if they did it the conditions had been created for them to do it something they never say about suicide bombs in. israel or countries which they are supported so i think the indications are that the bombing was carried out by the opposition to create havoc and to create reprisals and a response we trooped make foreign intervention more possible i think they're going any calls for nato in under whatever disk i hope you're buying syrian air space i don't really young justified in shouldn't be supported by anyone we've seen what the six month bombing of the libya has done on the ground the figures being touted

now between twenty five and thirty thousand libyan people died in both bombing raids we do not want the same thing to happen in syria. around says it's planning new military exercises near the strategic strait of hormuz following its ten day maneuvers in the persian gulf teheran also renewed its threat to close the strait that's one of the world's most important oil routes in response to u.s. and european sanctions last week new washington sanctions began targeting around financial and oil sectors to hamper its nuclear program france is calling for even tougher measures meanwhile according to an iranian newspaper rand has begun a uranium enrichment for peaceful purposes at a well protected underground facility near the city of calm the u.s. and its allies continue to accuse iran of seeking to develop nuclear weapons a chargeback front denies john grease from the stop the war coalition believes that pressure on iran is an excuse to weaken its regional influence. this isn't just the

by nuclear weapons if it were about nuclear weapons in the middle east then the united states would have a bone to pick with israel which is the only power in the middle east which actually possesses nuclear weapons it's not about that that's the cause it's bad but the reason for this continued conflict is because the american administration simply can't live with an iran which has as much regional power as it has at the moment you see the americans when they look at the iranian regime they see its links with syria they see links with hamas they see links with hezbollah and this is a challenge to american power in an absolutely critical economically critical geopolitically critical area of the globe and it's that which is the sticking point for the american administration in my view there are some people hawks in israel hawks in the united states who want to settle this militarily and it does seem to me that once we begin on the process of implementing sanctions over iran responding to the sanctions that there will be calls further down the road for direct military

conflict i'm not in this case is even more dangerous than it was in the case of iraq. still ahead this hour the fate of a dictator as prosecutors in egypt call for the death penalty for president mubarak we hear why his execution could result in more violence for the whole region. plus europe is in for a rough ride this year as recession and economic instability creep closer towards the e.u.'s heavyweights. and america the race for the presidency is in full swing with six republican hopefuls competing for the chance to challenge barack obama in november's vote front runner mitt romney's taking flak from his co republican rivals who dismissed him as a mere business manager but romney has a comfortable lead after the iowa caucus this week ahead of the first primary vote for new hampshire and just two days time voting will take place across the u.s. in the coming months before a single presidential candidate is chosen at the republican party convention in

august seasoned politician and fierce anti-war advocate ron paul is trailing far behind in the poll former congressional aide children ruben things like that's because paul's agenda is appealing but not to the members of his party as he took so much money from in his foreign policy is very distinct from the other candidates in that he has a more isolationist viewpoint he wants the united states to retreat from international conflicts of eventual fares in some areas that can be good he's opposed to military action with the run he was opposed to the iraq war but the other candidates are all extremely hawkish on foreign policy very neo conservative and ron paul does stand out amongst them he makes voters want to support him but he spars leading the party in getting other republicans on board to really choose the agenda though he hasn't done that he's someone who says i am a free american and i can make it on my own and that's what ron paul really embodies but republicans also understand that kind of positioning will not win the

general election against president obama. as the republicans slug it out for the right to take on obama the president himself is ratcheting up support for his reelection bid but with his approval rating down and the economy still on the ropes some of those who voted for the yes we can man in two thousand and eight say they made a mistake artie's marina has more than. four years ago one historic campaign turned u.s. politics into a pop culture phenomenon. because the world the democratic candidate achieved unprecedented support international fame and a record breaking six hundred fifty million dollars in donations. thousands of new yorkers celebrated the victory clutching an enormous american flag hand sewn by obama supporters but the winds have changed and the very same

democratic symbol waved in honor of the president elect you know weight each straight from interest rate has been donated to the movement that became a phenomenon in two thousand and eleven there are twenty people holding out david moved organize the flag project after being inspired by obama rhetoric a dream shattered by the subsequent years of politics as usual curly what's inspiring me is up is over to us like that that's the thing that's inspiring you know like that's why i brought the fight so ws and the thing that inspired me about it is the fact that it's a grassroots movement. that had a like a very clear and transparent process artist shepard fairey seems similarly just in chanted releasing an updated version of his iconic hope poster replacing obama with his now clear support for occupy wall street with an economy still in crisis wall street largely unregulated social programs slashed and over forty five million

citizens on food stamps and all. as with you making a decision to get involved obama's familiar prose may not be enough to win back his familiar fan base he didn't produce what people wanted him to produce in two thousand and eight professor and author dr cornel west was one of obama's biggest supporters i think he's got to because you've got the newness he's got the freshness taking part in more than one hundred campaign events but last april the prominent intellectual told see that obama has failed he's the friendly face of the american empire abroad he's in the process actually of becoming very sadly a pawn of big finance and a puppet of big business and any politician here knows they are in trouble when the hollywood a listers start turning their backs are you happy with the way that obama has been running the country. you know. and i think i

really think he misinterpreted his. yet the approval ratings show voters are even more turned off with the alternatives leaving obama seemingly the lesser of two evils america's president clearly enters the twenty twelve race amid a growing band of disillusioned democrats most will still back barack obama over his republican rivals arguably with heavy hearts in two thousand and eight he was the unassailable candidate of choice this time mr obama is likely to stay in by default. new york coming up on the program turning a blind eye some of london's poorest areas already rampant with gang culture face more crime israel with the government pressing ahead with its plans for police cuts . and gyptian prosecutors this week demanded outside president hosni mubarak be

hanged for allegedly ordering the killing of protesters during last year's uprising they're also seeking the death sentence for the country's former interior minister and six other security chiefs moscow has expressed concern over the possible death penalty and calls for a more humane verdict more than eight hundred people died during the violence which forced mubarak out in february last year since his trial began all this the eighty three year old has appeared on a stretcher due to poor health u.s. based a talk show host and author stephen leatherman believes the military rulers are using mubarak as a scapegoat as discontent with the current regime is running high. this is a distraction this is to divert the public a who are on the streets legitimately danger believing the state for several days and then trying to absolve themselves in the process seems a worse no wonder the military junta and note also the people running the

country the same ones closely allied with mozart when he was there he was seeing people who caused all agreements it was the people who are objecting to but i think the protests will go on and the people won't be fooled the violence will continue to struggle there is a woman way to go calls for mubarak's execution are being seen as part of a wider battle by egypt's military rulers to curb the ongoing public anger on the other front are the country's non-governmental organizations suspected that fueling the protests with foreign help as a renewed reports from cairo. the revolution may have toppled hosni mubarak the manager accused of corruption and suffocating freedom but now it's the ruling supreme council of armed forces which finds itself in hot water with the west following raids on human rights organizations last week i feel this is a very dangerous situation because you have to elections on the one hand producing

prose. but the people on the streets pushing for change of secularists who have links with these groups so that the big tension really between washington and kyra . lived up cell phones and more than twenty boxes of documents were reportedly seized during raids by the police authorities promised all will be returned yet several questions remain what prompted the raids and what could possibly be so suspicious about it and your peroration post-revolutionary egypt. and the members of the arabic center for an independent judiciary never did get an official explanation for the confiscation of their documents or the eviction from their office that followed. we don't know what they were searching for we told them we could give them anything they wanted but they came in search everything and didn't give a simple answer whether they wanted bank statements or anything else from mccann sitting on a sidewalk by their former office the vix it angio workers point out

a certain irony this never happened when mubarak was in charge says i would surprise. the police like the. ticket system just. can't take a position. against so he moderates the activity of the human race we believe they should. see. this is a. human rights activists in egypt believe the rays are attempts to punish them for accusing military rulers of failing to carry through democratic reforms but. observers say the authorities are becoming increasingly wary of the ever watchful eye from washington and the true purpose of raids is to prove foreign funding over again is ations which authorities accuse of destabilizing egypt the seems to be a strand of opinion inside the military inside the state machine that. is

very disillusioned with the old friendship with the west and may be trying to find evidence to prove that some of the trouble on the streets some of the trouble in tahrir square has been in some way forced by these and jews washington tirelessly repeats the old adagio of the importance of its relations with egypt as a key player in the middle east but polite talk may hide a very different agenda washington doesn't want stabilization they want to be permanent arnie's so that they can you know use that as a lever in the entire region egyptian activists aren't too happy with western help which they say can do more harm than good gentlemen even though i don't like the way foreign countries put pressure on egyptian authorities that the pressure has to come from the egyptians and we as a human rights organization should provided all of them up in my time and money from us whatever the real reasons for the raids of n.g.o.s says the increasing

internal strife in the country could portend a shipwreck not just for egypt's relations with the west but for the country's revolution in cairo it him and r.t. to russia's republic of chechnya now where five security service officers have been wounded in a shootout with militants the head of the republic says the suspect have also taken casualties special forces are now closing in on their hideout additional troops have been dispatched to the area russia's caucasus region saw a rise of militant attacks over the last twelve months but the republic of chechnya have remained relatively peaceful. some moral news in briefly this hour first to nigeria where days of sectarian violence have killed at least forty four people the latest attack occurred when the radical muslim sect boko haram targeted a church service in the country's northeast killing at least fifteen the violence comes after the group promised to kill christians living in nigeria's largely

muslim north clashes continue despite the country's president declaring a state of emergency for areas hit by the sect. grounded in new zealand cargo ship has been split into after being battered by fierce waves in a storm that craft has released a timber and floating containers into the sea and cleanup teams are on standby in case of an oil leak that ship has been struck a step off the coast since october when it hit a reef and spewed hundreds of tons of oil into the ocean in what's been described as the country's worst environmental disaster. an afghan investigative commission says the american military abused detainees at the country's largest detents detention center in mates ad by ground prison say they were tortured and held without evidence at the u.s. run facility president hamid karzai has demanded the u.s. hand over control of the prison to afghan authorities within a month the u.s. says it will investigate the claims. prisoners in

libya are facing difficulties of their own as thousands throughout the country are held behind bars with little hope of a fair trial the government has released hundreds from a makeshift detention center in tripoli painting the gesture as an act of goodwill but as our correspondent oksana boyko reports most of those jailed never committed any crimes. it was one of the first amnesty of the new libya hundreds of men and women many of them sub-saharan immigrants released from a makeshift prison most of them spent several months in captivity for the crime of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. you know as we are releasing those who didn't commit serious crimes there's been no one on their hands will be waiting for the prosecutor's decision when you have the riches were eager to pain the release as a goodwill gesture the determination and the parole seemed internally arbitrary some

of the dictators supporters as these people to be just work for government agencies and others happened to be domestic helpers or government workers and now equal before the law or rather before the absence of it they obviously in prison was triple his top a detention facility under gadhafi the tories for its mistreatment and arbitrary killings of the inmates but while all of its prisoners were sat free in late august as the rebels over in the capital dozens possibly even hundreds of makeshift prisons sprang out around the country according to u.n. estimates up to seven thousand allowed to get off the loyalists that being held there a flip all chance for justice a fair trial just a year ago these police used to be a school today demain last i'm being told here is that during the transition to democracy quick reactions are a must while many in the new libyan government held positions of power under

gadhafi those who failed to jump on the band. by going early enough and now finding themselves tog behind bars. now in libya there are about a thousand people in detention and the problem is they haven't had any legal review they haven't had access to a lawyer they haven't been brought before any independent judicial panel or judges so that's what we're calling for now was a quick and promptly legal review and rebuilding the justice system the treatment is even more brutal outside tripoli the tell not to run a good the gadhafi forces used to launch attacks against misrata is still a ghost town many of its former residents live in refugee camps and even their extraordinary renditions by militia are common this man says he was tortured for several days before finally being released. to you until you confess to things you haven't committed like entering homes or looting it's a grueling dilemma many of these mothers and wives have to confront to pray for

their loved ones to be rotting in a prison with torture being officially acknowledged ditto for their deaths children need their fathers and women need their husbands the government isn't doing anything to find them if they're dead that we want to know where they are more than a month since his capture the most prisoners still doesn't have access to a lawyer and while many dollars the full islams ability to have a fair trial he still appears to be better off than many of his countrymen at least thanks to the limelight he's not running a risk of being executed like his father while many still are. artsy tripoli. it has been a rough start to the year for the eurozone with some of its country's believed to be in or heading into another wave of recession two of europe's larger economies italy and spain are facing a crucial investor confidence test next week as they race to raise public funding and time prime minister mario monti met french president nicolas sarkozy in paris

on friday to discuss this. barreling debt turmoil which threatens to engulf their economies they called on other member states to show more confidence in a single currency the meeting comes amid fears of the crisis now king at the door of the heavyweights meanwhile greece has warned of a disorderly default in march if it can't secure more bailout cash economic analyst johan van overtveldt says that greece's exit from the euro zone is inevitable. the greek economy is going down like a storm. g.d.p. contracted by four percent in two thousand and ten by six percent in two thousand and eleven and there is probably worse to come in two thousand and twelve and i think we are now at the point where everybody agrees realizes that we cannot go on lying list and unrest and even in the country is becoming so much of a threat that some drastic things need to be done and my reading of what the greek

government is doing is that they are trying to they are looking for an alibi to offer to their public by which they can say well it's not our fault it's the international community that pushes us towards the exit of the euro zone and i think also here in europe brussels that quarters of the european commission people start to realize they really are at the end of the road there is no other option left for them they're in a deadlock they cannot rewind the greek economy and so they are facing in a big black hole. for more on the eurozone struggle with its debt and what may be in store this year stay with r.t. for an interview with a prominent dutch economist coming up in just about ten minutes time. to deal with its own dire economic outlook britain house to make further public sector cuts as a part of the government's austerity measures that will mean thousands of police officers will disappear from the streets affecting some of london's most impoverished areas where gang culture is rife and as our correspondent laura smith

reports the timing for these cuts couldn't have come at a worse time as london gears up for the two thousand and twelve olympics. for it is twenty six years old. and often most of. the dark underbelly of life in britain is in a city's gang culture dramatized here for a television series for gavin it was real life he got into a gang to escape a feeling of powerlessness an abusive home life where money was a constant struggle see in the freezer stores a young. more disposed to. start. to. be angry over the top. name for the discos crazy. people started to be.

at his lowest ebb gavin admits to having stabbed a girl and his story isn't unusual in deprived areas nowhere is the question of how to solve the gang problem in london more relevant than here in new and it lies in the shadow of london's two thousand and twelve olympic park but it's also got more guying than almost anywhere else in london round here young people say you start just by hanging out with your friends on the streets and you end up in a spiral of gang violence and fear. in you are more than half of the kids are living below the poverty line and they don't feel the government's doing anything to help them how can you hold me she don't understand. you have to have a. i don't think they know it looks like. you were around no in a bar of the house in london and the neighbor. and the neighbor. in london. i was there if the government really knew and understood would be

happening. when gavin met sheldon thomas an ex gangster himself he turned a corner and they're now working in a team to get young people out of gangs the government claims it wants the same thing and having laid the blame for august's riots firmly at the door of gangs their solution the carrot and stick method are as you found some excellent police work to identify and manage the highest risk on members through a combination of targeted surveillance enforcement and arrest running a fence however minor and positive offers of training employment and drugs treatment for those who want a different life but for those not prepared to break away from violence they will face harsher and tougher punishments but this isn't going to work according to sheldon thomas who feels the government is forcing him at every turn what they do. the manifestation of gangs for

a. gang rape. that's just a manifestation. of it. and from family breakdown moles on the window from society as a whole while the government rhetoric sounds encouraging other policies will undermine both carrot and stick economical sterett he cuts will mean sixteen thousand fewer police officers on the streets and services that deal directly with gangs now will have their funding cut by between twenty and ninety percent in some areas that means young people like gavin in the future who have nowhere to go but the street nora smith r.t. london. they have more news for you online just log on to our website r t dot com here's what we have for you there right now north korea's newly declared supreme leader kim jong il is marking his birthday on january eighth but his exact age still remains something of a mystery plus. the. members

of the orthodox church all across russia and abroad celebrate the birth of jesus that and much much more on our t.v. dot com. coming up shortly the storm's ahead as we are one of the financial forecasts for the eurozone lots just after our headlines stay with us.

world's. sunny's technology innovation all the moves developments from around russia we've gone to the huge earth covered. in wind stream cascading from my. view is miss mirage. this beauty brings down the speed of more than two hundred kilometers per. step in the long.

run thanks for being with us latest news on the week's top stories there is no halt to the killings in syria as the arab league gathers to debate the future of its observer mission aimed at overseeing a peace plan critics say the lead separates are failing to end the syrian regime's crackdown on the opposition. around promises to hold more navy drills in the persian gulf and friends to block a key oil route in the region as the west tighten sanctions targeting top process or oil and financial sector. plus get obama mitt romney is in the.