really happening to the global economy. global financial headlines. welcome back to watching our t.v.'s are the top stories russia refuses to back the latest u.n. draft resolution on syria unless it's a managed to clearly military intervention and an arms embargo on damascus against regime change and. for the bloodshed in syria placed on the government and the armed opposition. german chancellor angela merkel is on a two day visit to china she's expected to urge the country to help of financially crippled e.u. by buying the debt of some european states and push for a change of heart towards the recent iran sanctions. plus the un urges

both israel and palestine to return to negotiations and warns that israeli settlements are a breach of international law which must be in the occupied palestinian lands the crisis is far from over. as we talk to the senior editor of new statesman magazine tells r.t. that finding a solution to the crisis in syria won't be easy ad won't be legitimate without a u.n. resolution. today i'm talking to mehdi has his the senior political editor for the new statesman magazine where the me talking about the violence that's going on in syria at the moment and also the developing situation in iran that he has and thank you very much for talking to me today now we've seen observers being sent into syria who seem to have done nothing to stop the violence in fact the death toll has risen from twenty to thirty people a day how good do you think the observers are implementing that mandate i do their very good given to her or one of the leaders of the mission where originally went

in was a sudanese general who's been accused of carrying out war crimes and ethnic cleansing a doll for which slightly hobbled both the legitimacy of the mission and the trust of a lot of syrian opposition groups and in the arab league mission since then the saudi arabians have complained about the mission they've pulled out their observer they're pulling out their a bus about the arab league has really been all over the place on syria on the one hand it's condemned syria was praised for the first time condemning a fellow arab nation and putting the resolution in a few months ago and since then it's a mission has been criticized for among other things the personalities deployed and its inability to stop the violence i think the real issue is the syrians need to allow in a much much more neutral a much more wide ranging a much more forceful international observer mission if they've got nothing to hide if it's if they're genuinely not killing innocent people what if they got on and what about sanctions the u.k. recently proposed tougher sanctions on syria things like travel bans asset freezes what effect if any do you think that would have it depends how targeted the sanctions are more on the fence over sanctions given the experience we have with

iraq for over a decade of sanctions which cause more suffering to the people than to the saddam regime i support sanctions targeted against regime members targeted against people who are indicted for human rights violations or war crimes fine if they squeeze the country from the people who've done but it will not i think that's a mistake i think we have to think much more creatively about syria i'm not one of those who support military action in syria isn't libya it won't be easy. be legitimate without a u.n. resolution and more and more innocent people will die than will have already died but that doesn't mean you just turn a blind eye to the violence that's going on more than five thousand people have died according to the un's own figures and our side is about it clearly is not backing down you look at some of his interviews you know he's not as bonkers as colonel gadhafi but he says some pretty crazy things about how it's nothing to do with me not my orders these are all armed rebels everyone who's dying and let's talk about the opposition for a little bit there paid to be three some distinct blocks that the free syrian army has a kind of external opposition that's being fought in the streets do you think they'll be able to form any kind of lots one of the objections of

a lot of people are having against any kind of external military action which is where is the legitimacy in libya you had a opposition movement which despite being consisting of different groups secular religious etc indigenous those outside the country they did for a you noted opposition for the purposes of getting rid of gadhafi and they controlled territory it's what prompted the intervention to begin with in syria they don't control any territory they don't control any cities or towns and there is this division between the external opposition figures like the leader of the syrian national council is based in paris and those who are on the on the streets who have said again and again to western reporters to human rights groups that we don't want military intervention we are opposed to both syrian president were opposed to the assad regime and were opposed to western intervention we saw what happened in iraq and the syrians what's interesting about the syrians is that they saw up close and personal the effects of western intervention in iraq because hundreds of thousands of iraqi refugees fled into syria they know the consequences of the ill ill timed ill thoughtout heavy handed western intervention which just

exacerbates the violence and the free syrian army as far as you can see what are they fighting for does it look like genuine democracy there's a huge debate about the f.s.a. and how much first of all how many defections there are going on because they claim to be getting dozens and dozens of the fact that every day every week from. forces and yet others independent observers not just the assad regime but it's apologists say well out. it's a trickle and they're exaggerating their own strength in order to again justify a western intervention if you look at the history of western interventions so-called humanitarian interventions you always see there's an equivalent of the f.s.a. on the ground whether in libya or if you go back to kosovo the k.l.a. which also said you know give us the guns give us the support and we'll do the fighting and in afghanistan you have the northern alliance and actually it turns out that these groups tend not to have as much legitimacy as they claim to be not to have as much military strength as they claim and the free syrian army is accused of killing people itself isn't it do we have any idea of sort of the number of casualties well again without wanting to overdo the composer delivery and syria one

of the things you see when you do support rebel groups sometimes unsavory groups you know my enemy's enemy is my friend you support people who are perhaps not the greatest defenders or advocates of human rights themselves in afghanistan we supported all sorts of unsavory warlords and still do in libya the opposition groups and the national transition council there libya was accused by human rights watch during the conflict of carrying out all sorts of killings and abuses of prisoners which still haven't been resolved republican tipple don't even want to lurch into a syrian conflict where again we are ignorant of what's going on on the ground we're not experts on who these people are what these groups are for and the f.s.a. of course if you consist of defecting soldiers from an army that's carried out human rights abuses then a lot of those defectors will have been part of those human rights abuses that's just a horrible reality of the world we live in and in terms of the actual people do you see a link between the libyan it's a myth and it stays on the ground in syria well there's been reports about as you know as with all these conflicts you know they're great and they're murky that libya does live as groups fighting in libya finished fighting in libya have

transferred over to help some of the syrian opposition groups and do you see an accidental move towards intervention since the new year my position is changing and i can imagine a scenario where we are where nato is asked or the british government of america has asked to enforce a no fly zone to enforce some kind of safety corridor or look which which would be would be ostensible they were protecting human rights all well. good but would push us into all sorts of areas of the middle east we don't want to be involved in because syria for example is a much bigger player in the israel arab conflict it's a much bigger country and tougher to overcome and beat militarily if it took us that long to beat libya and do things to syria how far do you think syria is already essentially a battlefield between iran and the west the israelis have been clear for many years that if you can pull syria out of iraq all but you will weaken iran which they consider to be the number one enemy the number one menace in the neighborhood the number one threat to israel's strategic interests so if you can get syria away from

iran either through a diplomatic deal which they tried for many years all through regime change which seems to be the direction of travel mel that would definitely weaken iran and all roads in the middle east right now or do seem to lead back to tehran and saudi arabia's relationship with iran is increasingly hostile and it is iran of supporting create this protesting shiite minority how do you think that could play out saudi arabia's own position is brazenly one sided brazenly self-serving and hypocritical here you have saudi arabia having pulled its ambassador out of damascus having complained about the arab league on the ground of its human rights observations well first of all the saudi arabians have their own human rights abuses to deal with at home their own oppressive regime but even if you take the arab spring the saudis have thrown their weight behind the syrian opposition to assad and yet have done their utmost best to stop the arab spring to stop the revolt and all of the other countries in egypt in bahrain where saudi troops went in to better are still in better a suppressing protests in bahrain and yet in syria they're supporting the

opposition if that's not one sided this i don't know what is and that shows you that saudi arabia's own interests are nothing to do with human rights or democracy of course and how could so to really be interested in such issues it's about trying to deal with iran that we know from wiki leaks that the saudi king told the american government cut the head of the snake a deal with the snake that is iran in his view and iran has been threatening recently to block the straits of hormuz which of course we have is the main export gulf oil. what do you think the political consequences of that could be are you deeply and genuinely worried about what will happen if the iranian chop the strait of hormuz as they promised i think you'll have a situation where we start sleepwalking into war on both sides where there are extremists on both sides who want a conflict who would love a conflict because it would serve their purposes in the west there are people who want to take out iran both for america's national interest so-called and of course for the israelis and in iran there are hardliners who see that the islamic revolution is failing to receive the greed of the popular who are seeing lots of people protesting at the regime and see a foreign war seeing who see the idea of being under attack as

a way of you know intimate country so they're hardliners on both sides and i think the people in the middle have to be careful that we don't allow the hardliners to kind of allow us to sleep welcome to war where they shut the straits of hormuz and the americans who i suspect don't want to go toward an election near a force to come in in order to secure the oil and to protect the israelis if israel were to attack iran as well which is the sixty four thousand dollar question you mentioned that this is of course an election year in the u.s. do you think that the u.s. is likely to wait until the election is over when in doing so it could i'm going to israel by not acting sooner well that's the interesting question i think of their own free will i don't think they do want to go to war think obama is running on a campaign of trying to energize his base saying we're the guys who ended iraq we're the guys we're going to bring troops home from afghanistan with the guys who took a backseat in libya didn't put boots on the ground the idea that you would then kick off a conflict with iran but how does one american general put it you know if you loved iraq if you liked a rock in afghanistan you love iraq i mean it would be a major conflict and i think if you listen to for example defense secretary panetta

saying recently that actually an attack on iran would have unintended consequences would be a backlash against american troops in the region clearly he's not keen on it and yet if the israelis were to strike iran and iran were to strike back then the americans would be drawn in whether they like it or not because they can't abandon israel because of an israel for strategic purposes they certainly can about israel an election we're in very shaky economic times globally it may. but what no one seems to be talking about is what the economic consequences of a war with iran would be in an age where we are facing a double dip recession possibly another great depression where oil prices are already so high we could see an attack on iran pushing oil prices above one hundred fifty dollars a barrel some analysts say even a record high of about two hundred dollars a barrel which really would tip the entire world economy not just ours but the asians the chinese back into a major major recession major. and i think people are kind of turned a blind eye to this and only recently with the radiance threatening to block the strait of hormuz we're think

a third of the world's seaboard oil passes through have people started to go away to the what the hell is going to happen to all prices and i think that's a factor the american government's reason as well perhaps less so in the israeli government's reasoning that he has and i think very much thank you. i am. were shot four times in total in the air war as a. story of the boys are still in my body. and those people should be allowed to defend themselves wherever they are guns in the hands of law abiding decent people are not a problem national rifle association was. basically retired military and. love to shoot holes and i'm sorry if you know that the bullet comes

out here and this makes it go bang and if what's in front of here is going to die and that's all the training you really really need to raise your hand if you know something. ok to what i want to philadelphia over streets. tell a lot of hopefully we will never have to use the weapons for self defense but we should be prepared for the full class including the teacher as in close. seventeen students and city and one of seven or so.

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russian. government the opposition. member states. in a national law. in the. meantime

let's get the latest from the world of sports with paul. hello welcome to the world of sport here's what's coming up over the next ten minutes. tragedy in egypt more than seventy founds are killed following a pitch invasion during a top flight much. pride maria sharapova trains ahead of a wreck. for russia as the world number three our eyes a place at the london olympics. gunning for gold all teammates one of russia's big medal hopes the sochi winter games. but first a top flight football match in egypt has ended in tragedy with more than seventy five losing their lives the game between. was mobbed with violence off to supporters with knives on to the pitch the visiting team were chased into the

changing room where a small group of riot police formed a color door to try to protect them but fans were still able to kick and punch the players as they fled there are fears the death toll could yet rise the violence of football matches in egypt is on the increase since political unrest swept across the region more than a year ago. in england newcastle have moved up to fifth in the premier league not self to eternal when a black wednesday have dropped down to seven after they could only manage a goalless draw relegation threatened bolton. side full of three one one hundred two west from us and villa from two no down to take a point to hundreds of q.p.r. an orgy six game unbeaten run came to an end with a three nil defeat to sunderland. in spain semifinal time in the cup. or will fund in the second leg. they drew one one of the mistrial on wednesday twenty four hours previously. meanwhile the russia strike

a roman pavlyuchenko is expected to finalise his move to look at the t.v. . moscow from tottenham late on thursday for a fee thought to be around thirteen million dollars probably jenkins said the move back to russia was driven by his desire to play first team football. would have some sad news from the world of boxing muhammad ali's legendary coach angelo dunn day has died at the age of ninety he was best known for working with ali and helped him to become the world underlain pick champion the corner man also worked with fifteen other world champions including sugar ray leonard and george foreman for his outstanding work done day was included in the international boxing hall of fame in one thousand nine hundred ninety two. on to tennis and maria sharapova has held her first training session in moscow added russia's fed cup quarter final with spain which gets underway at the weekend the twenty four year old has any of it played in three fed cup matches but after a couple of injury plagued is the world number three reached the australian open final last week and sharapova told richard dunne pool of late she's hoping to

continue her good early season form by helping russia reach the five cup semifinals . you know well it's always great to be in the finals of a grand slam that's when you know always want to be down to the last two and you know for me to be able to come to moscow in a few days obviously a tough transition going on in the heat to the cold but it's like that for everyone and you know i think we just have to make the quarter adjustments but i'm happy that we have a home match instead of away and then i can actually be in my home country and it's sort of last time you played fed cup the russian i can speak french to discuss well if you see more i hope she said give you no motivation this time because you know last year you know it's it's a team effort and i think that's really how it happened but it's a lawn and i didn't have a good first day and then the next day you know the whole team kind of raised their level and won you know losing zero two so it's just it's such a different environment than what we're used to or is when you know you lose a match and then you're kind of out you know a loser or not you still have a chance and that's what makes it so special here do you feel more confident because i mean you getting to be the grandson for an achievement but helping to put

what happened in two thousand and one two thousand and eight behind you and just moving forward even that you want to get into a point or hurdle going to well to get to the stage of being in a final is great and for me to to have a woman in the open where i haven't been a stage in the second week of a grand slam is a really good achievement for me and you know to be number three in the world is great as well just one final question obviously a huge year for you with the grammys so i'm trying to get on the ground sometimes will be lympics i mean this is part of a region where you're playing fed cup trying to get in the libyan team and it wouldn't be gold mean to you for the olympics has meant so much for me since i was a young kid those really what we always looked forward to and one day in tennis when i was young wasn't that big and it was always all the limpid winter sports that i watched and i hope that one day i would be an olympian so you know i missed it out and beijing with the shoulder surgery and this year i'm looking forward to going to fix everything which i'm. in basketball's euro league top sixteen only six have claimed their third successive win with a home victory over italian side seven the host took the bull by the holes right

from the start winning the earning cortex twenty twelve earnings continue to press in the second increasing their advantage to sixteen points by halftime henry da mccown top score for the knicks with sixteen including this two pointer to make it forty two twenty two midway through the third period because on tame then slowed down the firmly held on to their advantage fifty nine forty four the final school there in the mean time in group b. the n.p.r. course registered their win of the top sixteen the greeks out scored on a dual fs of turkey at home eighty three sixty five russian hispania this was the most instrumental for the hosts as he scored eighteen points. scored for the turks with fourteen. in ice hockey the k. a child's leading scorer alexander has been left out of russia squad for next week's sweetest guy ames the third stop on the four nation euro hockey tour the former natural predator and his fellow sullivan for what he could or going were

exempted from national g.t. out of the fast approaching postseason meanwhile reigning champions russia looking to maintain a three point lead over sweden with two more tolerance and six games left do overs the k. itself leading scorer and has the most assists will sell about how to play another eight games in the regular season before defending a domestic crown in good current playoffs. meanwhile this weekend moscow is due to stages first ever leg of the cross-country skiing world cup but extremely cold weather has cast a doubt over the historic event five and a half thousand tons of artificial snow has been used to construct a track niggers making stadium in central moscow but with temperatures currently below twenty degrees celsius some of the athletes have decided to skip the event however defending champions dario colonia of switzerland on poland just pavel chut will be competing well russia have a solid sprint squad and the aim for success. in the high leg for sprint standings leader alexa a touch of health. finally to women's figure skating where russia has never claimed

a single olympic gold medal however with two years to go until the so she went to games as plenty of hope that run will soon end audi's rob about danny and has more about one of the most promising russians in the sports ugliness son of a cop. ladies singles this is the only discipline in which an olympic gold medal has eluded such a big figure skating nation like russia added insult nicholas is one of the few will bring major hope for the moment anticipated ladies in the sport first of all in sochi twenty four teams at the age of fifteen feet because they're really doing the russian domestic three times heading also won the world junior championships in twenty eleven and she has already proved a strong will to win she's a fighter and this is something you cannot teach that's given by god she's one of those who can compete and can achieve top results now it's

a fact that will be given yes that's right wish i was for it when my mom took me to skating school nearby just to test my capability for skating with professional coaches all the kids around started crying when they fell down but i sued out and kept moving forward step by step and the coaches knew that my mother and sat with strongly recommend that you make her continue and that's how i started figure skating. according to the international skating union says rankings so it nicole is currently the world's number seventeen what has plenty of time to fine tune her skills with her coach wife dan used to search him down union of a there is a lot. have you seen that come on you should have completed that element every single till and is destined to face. offs and downs at the first every youth winter olympics in israel back in january so that nikka was aged out by her team and

another russian hopeful you decided to take them to the lean and be at the russian championships in innsbruck the outcome was opposite they always get compared to each other they compete against each other and that's ok it's just like they've been pollution. in rivalry which only gave a boost to russian men's figure skating as for the girls only time will tell who's better they're both still growing. we have a good relationship i would say we're friends of the usually picks an ins brooke who lived together in the same apartment but when it comes to the ice rink it gets tough which is do battle for survival there is still a lot to be done for a delay in a certain to fulfill her huge potential but one thing has always been there in her mind agenda mentality which i like to see chances and i always take the risks of doing things which are difficult for me sometimes i mean i don't do well during

a warm up and my coach tells me to leave some complicated elements out of microgram but i always dare to do them i think to myself i'm strong i'm struve that i can delete. this what nobody can teach and so to go a has a. wonderful unknown i think. well that's all this for an hour a couple of hours. today

violence is once again flared up. these are the images the world has been seeing

from the streets of canada. corp to rule the day.