tackle poverty as he begins his pursuit of the presidency. i. fly from our headquarters in central moscow you're watching r t with me and he said now it's six pm here in the russian capital our top story the arab league is divided over a qatari proposal to send troops into syria as president has warned it could see violence flare up across the whole region but the emir of qatar is leading the calls for arab action in syria to put a stop to the ten month long fighting there he was also a key player in the arab league's role in opposing colonel gadhafi is rule in libya meanwhile syria has announced a release for prisoners jail during the uprising the move complies with the arab league peace plan which syria accepted in november our chiefs are further reports now from damascus. brings the people leave the

syrian prison. family and friends. who have been. prisoners. to their freedom here this prison on the outskirts of damascus these are the prisoners they've been selected for at least. you can see the signing on this is being overseen by the arab league. this is part of the amnesty president but of course for everyone he's not being released from detention questions being asked about actually why they were detained in the first place. i've been in prison for four months i was accused of weakening national security i didn't protest they brought me here by mistake. is a good step i just hope it includes everyone. i had some weapons i had inherited from my grandfather and was accused of bearing illegal

weapons i've been here three months when people heard about the amnesty they were ecstatic they never thought this could happen. here in the stay in the. military intervention in syria if the violence doesn't stop when general secretary . president assad to end the bloodshed the age of dynasty rule in the arab world. some critics however feel these statements risk inflaming in a way the highly volatile situation the amnesty shows that syria is trying to find a political solution rather than a security solution and that the country is succeeding in implementing the plan agreed by the arab league the. opposition groups as being little more than a gesture. when all political prisoners are number one the rest since the beginning of the crisis have been released then the amnesty will have been. but the answer is

c. does not consider this the start of dialogue but for a united family just is welcome hundreds it's hoped will be freed over the coming days but outside the prison walls people in the country remain trapped in a situation of escalating violence in which the father seems. so. damascus. but for more on those with asia times correspondent pepe escobar who joins us live via broadband from bangkok thanks for being with us. political prisoners are leaving their cells in syria but the arab league still wants to discuss intervention how realistic a scenario is that as you see it. you know it's very complicated because when we talk about the arab league nowadays this means the g.c.c. the gulf cooperation council six countries the person gulf monarchies led by saudi arabia we also got dark away to the emirates the problem is inside the g.c.c.

there is a consensus this is a total clash between the persian gulf monarchies against arab secular republicans it was the keys with libya it's the case with syria as well older members of the arab league i'm not so sure even to nea's you saying that if there is and it and the arab league corded needed intervention in syria this could be a horrible business because they know about the possible repercussions in egypt is not say anything about it as well so the coffee inside the arab league is not a conflict at all it's a sort of agenda i did g.c.c. and don't forget the g.c.c. schools the allied with the u.s. and with nato so one side we have u.s. need to g.c.c. the persian gulf monarchies on the other side we have russia china iran and a great deal of the developing world for that matter who don't want the north or

all war in the middle east started in syria so the battle lines on were less strong so we going to see from now won't this is a game of positioning on. this is very dangerous because it could lead to an escalation another point that i think is very important what the emir of qatar said about a possible intervention in syria was an interview he gave to c.b.s. the november so if everybody had saskin why release the contents of the interview only now almost two months later let's focus specifically on the content of that interview the emir of qatar mike you said itself a monarchy pushing for intervention in syria it was a major sponsor of the intervention in libya what do you then it for qatar here. well it's the whole reorganize the nation of the arab world more or less scored the make it by the first and go smaller and it's absolutely in congress with the idea

of pro democracy arab spring don't forget that all these rejean sorrow dr sees that the local populations have ignored possibility of political expression some of them their own populations like in the case of the rate seventy percent shiite population they're treated as second rate citizens and now we have the persian gulf monarchies trying to teach the world lessons on democracy but the whole sink the whole scheme is sampson look the upsurge starts with so can we imagine the if we had what we seen in syria inside eastern saudi arabia for it's. all because no calls for democracy no calls for deposing the government like qatar is saying now if things imagine not not only imagine look at what happened sobering since the beginning of the pro-democracy protests in manama almost a year ago there were oppression was total would help from saudi arabia and the

emirates so the same persian gulf wanted kids were saying now to the world we must intervene on the behalf of people in syria they would smash their own people in any possibility of an arab spring in any of the six person don't mark just briefly pavé some are saying that the west is not interested in making syria's president asad actually put an end to the bloodshed and that the real agenda is pushing him for being an ally of iran how do you think that is. it's absolutely true in fact iran has been saying so different officials of these special days that that if syria is disturbing right they will support syria and of course russia will support syria as well not only because of the russian naval base at the heart of sports intimate detail randi and i saw so in the whole what's happening in syria is a microcosm of everything that is happening around the middle east like i said before it's washington nato and the g.c.c.

the persian gulf monarchies and most of the developing world on the other side so it's a game of shadows and syria is a pawn in this game even though of course people in syria are suffering people are being killed and their repression by the regime is heavy handed because it is a hard core political repressive police state in fact the only solution would be more or less what the assad government is trying to do amnesty let's try to sit down we don't deal with terrorists as they say because they are some sunni al-qaeda just had this to sort of terrorists infiltrated into the protests as well but it's also there are legitimate protests by the young generations in syria so the only solution would be from the part of the assad government a little bit of political acumen here let's sit down let's talk to some legitimate opposition and not of course the people who are killing syrian soldiers and syrian

political offices bascom are live with us on the line from bangkok thank you very much for your analysis. well to get more news and perspective from syria you convinced of the blog of our international correspondent sara firth who's in damascus at r t v dot com here's what else you can find on our website right now a twenty first century titanic gets the latest information on the rescue operation that's taking place off the italian coast where a cruise ship capsized with over four thousand people on board also online. lashing out over a thousand demonstrators cause mayhem in bucharest angry up the government for the latest wave of austerity caught you can watch the latest videos along with many other on our you tube channel.

four news today. these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada. showing corporations rule today. well as iran in the west step up their war of words over the islam extend its nuclear program the u.k. is refusing to rule out taking military action foreign secretary william hague also spoke of his confidence that anyone bargo on iranian oil will be in place by the end of the month bennett reports from london. response to iran's refusal to halt its nuclear program and continue to enrich uranium which has mentioned as labeled as increasingly dangerous so now it's just a threat to. the u.k. says it will continue to pursue a diplomatic it increasing sanctions with the hope of bringing iran to the negotiating table after talks over its nuclear program stalled

a year ago but that tactic has been tried for the last year hasn't seemed to work tactics have actually seemed to encourage this dangerous game of brinkmanship each side countering the other with one of its own mistakes getting higher and escalating each time so this mention of military action still being on the table is really the latest play in that game the u.k. has also said that along with other european governments it plans to block iran oil exports by the end of the month in other escalating step in this game of threat and counter threat iran's oil exports only make up one percent of britain's oil imports the most in europe is italy with seven percent of it's all coming from iran so there's a lot to play with there in that respect which will severely damage iran's economy however iran has taken steps itself threatening to block the straits of hormuz which is a crucial oil shipping lane which in itself could severely damage already very

fragile western economies through the increase of oil pricing if that occurs now that the u.s. has already said that any such move from iran will be considered an act of war and the question is though how far is each side willing to go here. and while europe considers its next step in a standoff with iran the us media is already deep in a conflict of its own. really two options bomb iran or let iran get the bomb american journalists are accused of once again hyping up tension between washington and its next anime to win public support. russia's prime minister a set out his campaign plans for a third presidential term this year writing in one of the country's leading newspapers and voiced his vision for russia's future and address issues raised by the opposition parties are g.'s arena reports. well in a lot of ways this was a statement which was directed there's

a response to the accusations of statements made by the opposition leaders during the protest has been president has pointed out that russia has already gone through an abrupt and very drastic change a very similar to the revolution during the collapse of the soviet union and that brought the country down into decline essentially into shambles and it took a very long time to get out of the dire situation but russia has succeeded in doing that as with which and in fact the education levels went up employment has also risen over the past fifteen years the whole is standards of living for eighty percent of russians have increased there's also the emergence of the middle class says it's dull comprises up to thirty percent off the population in russia where is during the soviet times that number was significant the smaller so it was it has born essentially people in his statement to be wary of that of the statements and slogans of which sound very lucrative may sound very lucrative by the opposition leaders but he did mention that as such a such an abrupt change in the governmental system may have diarrhea effect on the

country and he did talk at length about the situation be very much improved situation which the country finds itself right now but of course he also mentioned that some some problems do remain on the table there is the very well known problem of corruption there's also a lack of civil society overall in the mindset of people also unfortunately from ten to eleven percent of russian population still live below the poverty line that is also something that needs to be taken care of and of course of the country's dependence on natural resources oil and gas something which needs to be taken step away from there's of course the progress into the high tech world and creating more jobs in that sphere also talks more about creating civil society and contributing more to charity and of course he'll see talked about russia a becoming a major as being a major player on the global political arena. a russia has served as a bridge between the east and the west for centuries russia has

a lot of experience in that area and of course also is a major contributor to g. eight g. twenty and the united nations and the role of these organizations is something which also should be taken into account and he also basically underline this statement by saying that the country has to come out of the post. that that period is over and not just for russia but for the world as a whole so more global and a new approach to the situation not just in the country but also in the entire world should be taken well the article by vladimir putin is available for you in full on our website or to dot com. european markets have remained stable on monday despite the wave of credit downgrades across the euro zone by the ratings giant standard and poor's slashed the credit scores of nine countries on friday including france which lost its aaa status and austria another ratings agency

moody's says it will maintain france's top rating but will continue to review this position despite all this there was no panic among leaders at least not publicly germany's foreign minister has even proposed europe got its own credit agencies financial commentator jim brodeur says that faith in u.s. space training companies is fast running out. you shouldn't but bother to pay any attention to the rating agencies everything they've done in the past fifteen or twenty years has been wrong the fact is you do need somebody competent and somebody who can examine and decide who is who is solvent and who is not so you know it's only until a few months ago that they had the united states is a aaa credit i would say this is the largest debtor nation in the history of the world it's absurd that it's true as was aaa so you just need somebody competent who can go in there it doesn't matter whether it's russian or australian america or european just so you have somebody competent and these guys s. and p. and moody's have had

a semi monopoly for decades they have gotten corroded and lazy and sloppy and they're no longer competent. was iran and the u.s. engaged in a political standoff america's mainstream media are being accused of fueling the fire sanctions over to iran's nuclear program and uncertainty in the gulf have provided news outlets in the states a platform to speculate over the likelihood of war and is going to judge a camera ports it's not the first time american viewers have been led to believe that conflict is inevitable. try to options bomb iran or let iran get the bomb with tension between iran and the west as high as ever a host of hardline speakers on us mainstream media seem to be pushing the audience to believe that war is inevitable the better way to prevent iran from getting nuclear weapons is to attack its nuclear weapons program directly although experts say war with iran is far from being inevitable i don't think that we are very get that is to say at the precipice of the media are already preparing the grounds for

it some by misinforming the public the new york times wrote that the international atomic energy agency said iran's nuclear program has a military objective but that's not what the i.a.e.a. reported the watchdog said iran might have the technology to develop a nuclear weapon if it wants to or here's another public misconception due to a lack of information it would be saying to the iranians you to open up those facilities you begin to dismantle them and make them available to the inspectors or we will degrade those facilities through air strikes in fact i e-s. specters have already been in the country monitoring iran's nuclear facilities when you american people here information over and over again and sometimes it is often these subtle subtleties you are not providing the context of the i report or not putting in some of the doubts back in two thousand to two thousand and three about the iraqi w m d programs that kind of slanting of the news does have the

effect of altering how the american public use an issue the u.s. mainstream media have proved to be cheerleaders for war jeff cohen was a senior producer of a popular t.v. show before the iraq invasion he says they were under pressure from their bosses to root for war because their owners benefited from it it was a constant pressure campaign. to make sure that the pro invasion voice was dominant jeff cohen says not much has changed in u.s. mainstream journalism since the iraq invasion there is no doubt that mainstream media are crucial in this idea of settling this idea that the u.s. is going to be on a per actual war media analysts say says the intervention in libya u.s. media have been instrumental in making americans get used to the idea that washington will continue to intervene militarily in foreign affairs i worked at

newsweek and as goes a.p. and other major u.s. news organizations and the and what i saw especially in places like newsweek was this idea that the media was actually part of the establishment that it was what it was it was that the american people were to be guided more than even informed it seems most american media are so used to talking wars that when after a decade of the inconclusive war in afghanistan the white house announced the necessity to negotiate with the taliban you have to have a political solution at some point the message and the words political solution came out as somewhat alien peace talks with the taliban it's come to this tell us more about these proposed peace talks and that may sound a little weird to some of our viewers it seems that warrants a political solution don't belong in the u.s. media they can be larry two main reasons one moring and second some very powerful people are behind a kind of trigger happy pro-war journalism too many times in history the media did

the bidding of war profiteers we can go back more than a hundred years and look at how the american public was primed for war with spain over cuba media tycoon william randolph hearst falsely hyped up the story that the spanish sunk on american ships when in fact it's something because of a coal bunker explosion it was then that hearst told his illustrator in havana. you furnish the pictures and all furnished the war more than one hundred years on the phrase still sounds relevant but it doesn't have to be that way and some argue political solution although not popular words in the media vocabulary is better than war and death i'm going to check our reporting from washington r.t. . now a look at some other news making headlines around the world first to pakistan where the supreme court has charged the country's prime minister use of giuliani with contempt raising the possibility of prosecution proceedings were initiated for failing to carry out the court's order to open

a corruption probe probe against president off the ids the dari johnny has been told to appear in court on tuesday. violence has erupted between rival militia groups in the libyan city of gori leaving at least three people dead and around fifty injured in clashes began when the local military council demanded to try and hand over members accused of aiding colonel gadhafi the fighting has included use of rockets and machine guns sporadic violence in libya continues even after the eight month long civil war which resulted in the deaths of some three thirty thousand people as well as the street killing of moammar gadhafi . a car bomb in the iraqi city of mosul has killed at least eight people and wounded six others the blast occurred outside a residential complex which houses displaced shia muslims this is the latest in a string of bombings against the country's shia majority which is left one hundred forty people dead since last month. and the jury in labor unions have announced

they'll suspend their nationwide strike against rising through fuel costs this comes after the country's president announced a thirty percent cut in gas prices and sent soldiers to barricade the streets firing tear gas and ammunition at protesters the demonstrations began last week after the government council the popular fuel subsidy leading to a rise in gas and transport costs throughout the country up next screen is here with the latest business stay with us. thank you and you say hello and welcome to our business here in our european equities are mixed following a slide early in the day the downturn came on fears that your credit downgrade could have worsened the region's debt crisis like friday ratings agency standard and poor's downgraded nine countries with france and all still losing their prized aaa grades and portugal plummeting to junk steps. to the numbers european stock

markets are swinging in and out of positive territory rate traders mall and the impact of rating downgrades. actions and also weight of french debt sales in germany the dax is supported by two point nine percent gain for com make a dime or a two percent rise for rival going w. the u.s. markets are closed monday for martin luther king jr day and it's a choppy trade for the russian markets as well with watty s. gaining over half a percent from isaacs is in the black as well and now the main movers on my six the sour chips are mixed energy majors are supported by strong or prices the largest private all company to call is up half a percent preferred shares of oil pipeline operator transacted down struggling to keep up last week's momentum and banking stocks are on the rise bank is almost zero point four percent in the black. and oil is gaining some experts view continue

tensions with iran as a so-called permanent premium but world builds onto the world price and at the moment as more than ninety nine dollars a barrel brant is topping one hundred dollars a barrel. there was a stock market lost twenty percent last year that's in defiance of its longstanding correlation with the price of oil which gained twenty five percent chris weaker from troika dogs says that russia's equity markets this year will closely monitor the european debt crisis while then falling crude. the equity market is moving much more with the global trend rather than the oil price but that's only the case so long as your price remains above an acceptable limit for the budget which is proximately ninety dollars in terms of deficit and below about one twenty five dollars which would then start to affect global growth so it's a background issue and we spend a lot of time talking about a but the reality is that it's much less important than

how the stock market performs and what happens in europe how china's growth holds up and what the government actually does in terms of you know trying to improve the investment in the business climate wants to new government takes shape in may. there's a new twist in the ongoing gas dispute between russia and ukraine according to commerce son to ukraine according to local energy ministry sources kiev is now ready to sew one third of its national pipeline operator to russia and return for gas discounts but moscow is reportedly insisting on at least half of nafta gas give says it can't afford the price specified in the current contract and insists on cutting imports of russian gas by half but russia's gas paul says the crane could have reduced its order but by no more than twenty percent and only with six months about its notice late on friday the european union joined in saying it's ready to play a part in the talks. expected to restart negotiations on tuesday at

a let's say ukraine's economy might not cope with reduced gas prices. well that's all for now but you can always find wall stories don't forget to log on to our website or to dot com slash business thanks for. all of you are.

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of nigeria. on r.t. . at six thirty pm mosque on time these other top stories on our t.v. arab league i want to have talk out our call. as for intervention in syria other members warn it could lead to region wide open routes to be involved masochists have announced a general amnesty for political prisoners in accordance with the peace plan. the u.k. ops the entity against iran pushing for a tough e.u. oil embargo which tehran's promise to counter by blocking a vital transit route london says it will take military action in the persian gulf if the islamic state.