what's going on in syria right now. well peter let me just to get back to what was discussed previously before the interruption i mean there are two dimensions to the to the situation in syria now there is on the one hand a very legitimate powerful movement of civilians who are claiming in fact change in the country and access to democracy to social justice to economic and political rights and this should not be undermined this this is a powerful and legitimate movement which started peacefully it's been only since a month or a few weeks that it has become militarized which is in fact leading to the internationalization of the conflict but so far it has been in majority a peaceful movement now these movements are claiming change and access to power and the end of the over the country there is another side to the debate which is now the involvement of the international community and in fact the fact that syria is in a web of strategic alliances which is in fact trying to gain the momentum to take advantage of the political instability within syria to try to shape the geopolitical game in

the middle east and we have calls made by neo conservative think tanks in america calling for military intervention regime change etc to build on this momentum and this is problematic highly problematic because the movement in syria has been very powerful and legitimate and has gained momentum inside and in the region if there are calls for military intervention if there are links made to syria's choice of partners in the region or syria stance in the arab israeli conflict that would bring that would deliver demise what has been so far a very powerful movement and a call for liberty and democracy i agree max i tend to agree with that area if we do get a military intervention which i still think is likely they each though it's the outsiders that will determine the political outcome the eventual outcome on the ground in syria and it may have a whole lot to do with what i mentioned earlier when mentioning. yes. first of all one has to avoid. really be critical about some of the kind

of. sorts of simplistic narratives that are recycled continually by the media and this from what i'm hearing now also by experts as well you know about democracy about human rights the syrian people as a whole rising up because there are thousands in the streets but you know there are millions in the country. and i think the same problem applies to our conception of intervention is being narrowly reduced to direct military intervention you know either invasions or bombings and so forth there has been intervention in syria by the united states and by others but i'm going to focus on the u.s. for several years at least and now even if you knew nothing else what you will see described in the embassy cables that were published by wiki leaks is a pattern of the united states. providing funding to opposition groups

that are tied to ultimately with the muslim brotherhood in syria and so forth this is not a secret what's also not a secret is that obama spokesman stated very clearly that the united states is pursuing a range of policy options what is known is special in intelligence circles and other circles as a continuum of force which involves sanctions dissin from ation campaigns psychological pressure attempts to isolate the regime and so forth and this is a kind of measure that's being put forth between put forth in front of the security council right now so there are all sorts of forms of intervention intervention has been happening and it's mean happening since before these protests even began ok if i go back to you david what do you think the outcome will be what. kind of syria i mean i mean everyone i don't think anyone will shed

a tear on this program to see the assad family go no one ok it's more about a process what do you think the end game is i mean and i said facetiously you know what kind of jeffersonian democracy what kind of country do you think is going to be there is a going to be hostile to the west it's going to be and will continue a serious can traditional foreign policy what kind of relationship would have with israel with the around with hezbollah there's a lot of people you know are focused on the here and now but those are the questions going to be asked whatever whenever we get to this endgame. yes i know there's a good questions but nobody knows the answer to those questions. outcome in terms of. syria's foreign policy is a question mark and i don't think actually any of the players involved has much of a clue about that. because you i want you want regime change you're asking for

really demanding regime change without understanding what the unintended consequences could be that's interesting yes we are because many thousands of innocent lives are at stake that's the key and anyone who insists on maintaining the regime is condemning thousands more innocent people in syria to death and that's why what matters is not what the foreign policy of the new syrian government would be but the removal of this vicious dictatorship as soon as part of a well ok i want to think that russia's own interests can be preserved in that situation if it is willing to negotiate seriously with syria and i'm pretty sure we all agree that they're talking to them and my well what do you think about that the the law of unintended consequences here is again i can bring up libya when i mean obviously mass and it's getting worse. right but i mean without even comparing i

would say the choice of foreign policy would be in the hands of the syrian people and any democratically elected government which will. represent the majority of the syrian population i find it a bit difficult that syria's future foreign policy would be decided externally or by whoever is not from from syria this will depend on the choice of the people and if the question relating to military intervention is about to daming syria and shaping its foreign policy this is highly problematic and this is the really i mean it's but it's very interesting that you have countries like qatar and saudi arabia and other members of the arab league very much wanting to determine outcomes in syria so that they have an interest in it i don't sorry i don't think they're just thinking about the people they're thinking about their geopolitical interests that's what states do there is no there is a geopolitical game which is being played between a broader coalition of the gulf states i would say the u.s.

see israel versus what is perceived as the syria hezbollah iran axis and the instability now that is lived within syria is an opportunity for a power politics and for you know is somehow severity in the links between syria and iran and hezbollah and weakening this axis and this is highly problematic because the syrian people still despite the fact that we have instability within syria there's been a choice made by the syrian people and there i would like to address the points raised by max there is a powerful movement there is a claim for a change within syria nothing should that should not be undermined and that is not fair to the young people who are dying on a daily basis and continue to go to the streets now how would that be instrumental eyes this is the issue it should remain an indulgent us move meant it should remain and indulge in as revolution and whatever comes out of the revolution the transition to democracy but you're saying same at the same time using this. it's getting internationalize and it absolutely is max if i can go to you again when we

look at outcomes here i mean it's saudi arabia qatar qatar united states israel to one degree or another and it's very ambiguous which way it would go for them because they prefer the know the deal with the devil they know but this is a major change in the region no matter what the outcome is because what i think we'll all agree that assad and his family are not going to be there for much longer . well i want to predict the future. he could very well be there for much longer i'm not certain how things could work out. early on in the. early years of the cuban revolution a lot of people would say that you know the constable wouldn't be there much longer and he certainly was so that's not an area in which i'm going to venture. i am kind of put off by the idea that foreign policies and democratic states whatever that means i think

a lot of people understand democracy in the west i mean multiple parties and elections i would have hoped that the idea was a bit more complex and meaningful than that but the idea that in democrat that democratic states established their own foreign policies to reflect the will of the people as far as i know that's not the case and we could go on we've run out of time here a interesting program many thanks to my guest today in princeton washington and in montreal and thanks to our viewers for watching us here are to see an x. time and remember crosstalk.

the official. from the.

video. says it was a weapons embargo on damascus because guns would still find their way to opposition groups which some u.n. members refuse even to acknowledge. a diplomatic. resolution on syria calling for the president assad to step down russia says no to regime change and pushes for talks instead all the details from new york just ahead of the program. u.k.'s high court considers the fate of. the geishas of sexual assault. cases. just sweet and.

more coming up. israel's campaign in june is based in the u.s. already feeling alienated by the spiritual policies our top stories this hour. international news and comment live from moscow this is. russia will not agree to an embargo on weapons to syria moscow says doing so would not prevent the continued arming of opposition groups in the country there's deadlock at the u.n. security council where russia is refusing to back any military intervention or the resolution that could aggravate the conflict. has the latest from new york. russia says it won't accept even a hint of an embargo on arms embargo when it comes to syria and its reasoning for this is pretty simple it says firstly that the weapons and arms are that russia

provides to syria cannot be used against demonstrators thus don't influence anything that goes on inside syria and when it comes to this conflict now secondly russia says that it is only following its legal obligations its following its international contracts with syria and it's not breaching any international laws at all and most importantly it says that the lessons of libya need to be large because when an arms embargo was put in place on libya what ended up happening was government forces were embargoed but the opposition groups continued to receive openly arms from abroad and this is something that they don't want to see in syria and russia says it's time for the west to stop pretending like armed groups don't exist over there. it would seem logical that if there is a conflict let's not supply arms and we saw what happened in libya in an imperfect world this would have meant the following no weapons with the government much opposition pointis could get them from anyone that's what that would mean especially in our security council colleagues refuse even to admit the presence of

armed groups they will not condemn them. being supplied with weapons and we will break the law contracts a longstanding relations with syria but they will start supplying even more to the position groups just like they did in libya. there's no sign of a break in deadlock just yet the arab and western backed regime change resolution calls for the. syrian president to step down if this does not happen within fifteen days further measures could take place and russia says no thanks we've seen this similar scenario in libya in this particular case moscow says what's important is for talks for syria to exercise its sovereignty for the opposition and the government to sit down together moscow has offered russia as the center stage for these negotiations but it's important to say that russia still believes that a consensus can be found within the united nations security council it says that broad resolutions that are dangerous should not be put on the table that can split

the council and really aggravate any sort of conflict and it continues to call for the importance of arab observers to remain working on the ground and started checking in that well for more on this i can now talk to dr benjamin barber from the think tank demos joining me now from new york well mostly refuses to back a weapons embargo on syria saying that opposition groups anyway despite some security council members refusing to admit these groups even exist but what do you make of russia's. well russia is reading history with some accuracy if we look back at what happened in libya because of a u.n. and arab league resolution led to what was supposed to be a mission to protect civilians but ended up as a mission that actually took the lives of civilians inadvertently on the way the way to supporting the insurgents and in time became an armed intervention on behalf

of insurgents and the attempt to overthrow the government the background issue here that is a very real issues the issue of sovereignty and unfortunately it was probably applies to russia in other cases most nations seem to think when they talk about sovereignty sovereignty is good for our friends compliance is good for our enemies so enemies should be willing people we don't like should be willing to surrender their sovereign deal and let us intervene whereas the people like you don't do that for right now russia is defending calm properly so the sovereignty of syria whether it will defend the sovereignty of other nations less friendly to its interests is unclear but in the meantime the united states and the west generally and many are countries like qatar are in effect saying that syria has no right to sovereignty it's the role of united nations to force compliance with their directives this without regard to the talent of the repression internally that's a separate issue but the problem is and this is the problem the resolution it's not

just as they call for the sation of violence that we're pression against protesters they are now calling for regime change and that does exceed any reasonable standard of the sovereign rights of the country to make its own decisions about syria syrian it's a syrian problem is moscow saying and it needs to be sorted out by the syrians therefore that's why it's almost for negotiations to take place between the syrian government and the opposition why is it that the opposition all not keen to take place with those moscow initiated talks. well i mean let's be realistic i mean i think russia is right to say that syria has a right to its sovereignty but to pretend that talks are going to make a difference i think is delusional it's been clear whenever there's been a supposed cease fire whenever syria and the government has said they will not any longer act the more civilians are murdered more people are killed quite clearly in

this was to the role of the assad government is to repress and put down the insurgency by any means possible and they've used talks discussions simply as an excuse to continue with the repression and i have no doubt that if there were talks you would find that the syrian army would go on shooting protesters and repressing insurgents even while those talks happen so honest while i think the russians have a case to make in defending period sovereignty and saying the u.n. has no right to call for regime change the stepping down of president assad to pretend that descriptions of talk going to do anything what the syrian army murdering insurgents is on the list what if the sound what a step down if you will to be deposed or indeed lead to a demise that's being threatened in the way that gadhafi met his demise by some of the opposition yesterday saying that they want to kill him. what would be the implication for the country after all the opposition itself is mixed up isn't it in

terms of fragments of various elements with interests in syria so what if that does happen if the west pushes for regime changes had force who takes his place. well you're quite right and again the case of libya the case of yemen and a number of other countries egypt also suggests that you have to be careful what you wish for the west is rather uncritical recent insurgency is a good thing only to find that insurgency often means anarchy fractionalization splintering various groups up against one another and the triumph over time of forces that are no more welcome to the west than the ones that were displaced in egypt we see that the not just the conservative muslim brotherhood but the ultra conservative salafi just conservatives are in a very strong position in libya we see a country that is unable to create any kind of real unity where militias are fighting one another where recently you see towns like bondo while he's back in the

hands of broken off the forces and the danger of libya beginning to look not so much like egypt as like somalia with live on militias and tribes at war so nobody i think did what will happen if assad is overthrown or killed or steps down and that's one of the problems you know that small minority of ten or twelve percent you know christians support him because they feel protected we know there is a much larger. sunni. groups there and no one who really knows what the outcome is likely to be the west is hoping it will be less supportive husband a lot less supportive of iran and less support of hamas and that could be the case no one really knows what it's going to look like so the fact is when you support insurgencies you're basically taking a very difficult bet on a certainty complicated situation very interesting to hear what you have to say dr benjamin bought from the think tank the most talk to me not that in new york thanks

for telling thank you. iran which is committed to resolving the issues over its nuclear program so says a u.n. delegation. three day visit to the country. also plans to make another trip later this month that follows claims by u.s. intelligence officials that iran is as dangerous as al qaeda and is planning terror attacks on u.s. soil well let's discuss this now with robert parry he's an investigative journalist with the consortium news website he's joining me now from virginia so both iran and the agency inspectors they seem pretty optimistic with the latest nuclear watchdog mission could we hope for some kind of resolution now well possibly i think the iranians have long said that they are not building a nuclear weapon so there was always the basis for some kind of agreement if people came to believe that they were not building a nuclear weapon and one of the interesting developments we've seen over the past few weeks is that there's been almost

a consensus not just in the united states in the intelligence community but even in some degree in israel that the arena's have not made the decision to move ahead to build a nuclear weapon obviously there's belief that they are developing expertise that can be used in the future for such a decision if they were to make one but there has been this interesting. coming together of use both from defense secretary panetta and defense minister iraq in israel to suggest that that decision has not been made so. if iran is sincere about its lack of interest in a nuclear weapon and if the west is willing to show some more flexibility in terms of how they're willing to negotiate on this yes i think there could be some resolution and yet at the same time u.s. intelligence is being somewhat alarmist at the moment by saying in fact making out iran is a serious terror threat at the moment saying that the u.s.

is now warning that tehran could launch terror attacks against if if it actually feels threatened by the u.s. i mean why that tack now then. well i think that's been a bit overplayed the it was sort of it was mentioned in testimony yesterday by u.s. intelligence officials before congress however the freezer by the reference was really to this very dubious al a set of allegations about an alleged iranian plan to kill the saudi ambassador in you know washington next which was initially pretty much rejected by the u.s. intelligence community but there was some pressure to sort of give it some more credence and there were charges brought but many people have grave doubts that that's real but the but the other but the point if you read very carefully what. the director of national intelligence clapper said yesterday he was indicating that that if the iranians come to believe there's

a real threat the united states really gauges in attacks inside iran they might retaliate. but that really isn't that unusual sends pretty much any country if it's attacked will look for ways to retaliate just despite the apparent easing intentions over the the nuclear question do you think that as many analysts are saying that the u.s. and the west will find some other excuse to try and get some sort of regime change in iran. well clearly the israelis want that and they have a great deal of influence with europe and with the united states in terms of keeping the pressure going so i think yes there may be other ways just to try to keep the sanctions being ratcheted up maybe to bring about some hope for you the regime change or at least weakening iran substantially in terms of the role of complaining. but i think that is not as clear that that will play out as it might have been even

a month or two ago i think president obama and defense secretary panetta have not been on the side of really pushing those those buttons they'd rather have this situation calmed down rather than then accelerated but there are political forces in the united states there there are quite powerful including on the republican side in terms of the presidential race that wants to ratchet up the pressure robert perry great to hear your thoughts investigative journalist with consorting news the website there speaking to us from virginia thank you thank you the world's top whistleblower who has taken his long legal battle to stay in the u.k. to the country's supreme court where he's appealing extradition to sweden joining the songes wanted on medications of sexual assault dating back to august two thousand and ten which he denies but we can expound insists the case is politically motivated parties nor smith reports now from outside the high court in london. as often happens on the first day of these hearings you only hear one side of the

story and what's happened today is that judy nice on his team has given that evidence they've argued that point his lawyer diana ross seems to be quite convincing in front of the seven judges they would sort of not think she just a bit of hubris the proceedings which i don't know is easy for a change and she was talking mainly about judicial authority when in the swedish prosecutor had the judicial authority to issue the european arrest warrant under which. extradition has been requested she said does this person pursue this prosecutor have it as somebody who is party to the case essentially who has a vested interest in the case and her argument was that the swedish prosecutor come to me impartial and independent and say that goes against the fundamental principle of no this being in place ever since knew existed basically i thought him self notes during the hearing he listened very attentively and then he left at the end of the day looking fairly relaxed in the building the you see behind me to see if

we can go it is basically just chop suey julian i saw it as far as his british legal fight has is that he gets me going on the fall of the new year as we know he's going up through the courts most recently at the high court he's finally got this to prevent colds he may have if it doesn't go his way here he may have recourse to take this year pinnacles human rights but that by no means a given of course this this is all about the fact that he's wanted for questioning in sweden for sexual assault allegation he has always maintained that this is a case that is politically motivated in connection with his work for wiki leaks when of course he released an enormous number of files that were very embarrassing for several governments and many international businesses he's made so if there really is that he could be extradited from here to sweden and then straight to the united. state that my colleague tom parted his beat in sweden has taken

a look at what the relationship between sweden and the united states is the face that launched a thousand leaks julian a son does exposure of tens of thousands of secret documents has embarrassed governments the world over but the wiki leaks phenomenon is no longer his most pressing concern the swedish authorities want to question a songe over allegations of sexual assault dating back to august two thousand and ten prosecutors have been criticized by assigned to supporters international civil libertarians with allegations of cumbersome contradictory and slow legal process huge arguments have also broken out over the nature of some of sweden's norms on sexual offenses such as those of some of the races it's going to be closed course and leading up to the trial is going to be held. well the cipro.