russia refuses to back the latest u.n. draft resolution on syria unless it's amended to clearly rule out military intervention and an arms embargo on damascus. egypt is braced for more unrest but marches planned to protest the police failure to prevent a clash of found sort of football match the left dozens dead. german chancellor angela merkel arrives in china hoping to secure support from a strategic economic partner in times of crisis to try to get beijing on board the western policy on iran.

is now at three pm here in moscow are you watching r t with me. russia says it will veto the latest u.n. security council resolution on syria unless the draft is changed while moscow admits that progress has been made it's yet to see a text that explicitly rules out of military intervention russia is also reluctant to stop selling equipment to damascus saying that would leave syria at the mercy of on recognized rebel forces and with weapons smuggled from abroad. reports 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 for that russia provides to syria cannot be used against demonstrators thus don't influence anything that goes on inside syria when it comes to this conflict now secondly russia says that it is only following its legal level of. ations it's 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 if there's a conflict let's not supply arms but we saw what happened in libya in our imperfect world this would have meant the following no weapons were the government the opposition pointers could get them from anywhere that's what that would mean especially now our security council colleagues refuse even to admit the presence of armed groups they will not condemn them or acknowledge they are being supplied with weapons then we say ok we'll break all our contracts a longstanding relations with syria but they will start supplying even more to

opposition groups just like they did in libya. 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 see 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 i thought here chuck reporting live for one of the u.s. as well as its european and arab allies are committed to pushing president assad

out of power but a political analyst of benjamin says forcing regime change is a bad idea that's already plunged other arab countries into turmoil. the case of libya the case of yemen and a number of other countries egypt also suggest that you have to be careful what you wish for the west is rather uncritical the recent insurgency is a good thing only to find that insurgency often means anarchy fractionalization splintering various groups up against one and the triumph over time of forces that are no more welcome to the west for the one for the displaced nobody i think did what will happen if assad is overthrown were killed or steps down and no one really knows what the outcome is likely to be the west is hoping it will be less supportive of hezbollah less supportive of iran and less support of abbas and that could be the case no one really knows what it's going to look like so the fact is

would you support insurgencies you're basically taking a very difficult bet on uncertainty you're watching on t.v. and still ahead for you this hour candidates versus the critics. want to ask me who's the president of. pakistan and i'm going to say you know i don't know you know find out why the head of comments of u.s. politicians could be costing america credibility on the international stage. egypt is mourning the victims of wednesday's a tragic football game where at least seventy four fans were killed in an after match clash it's not yet clear what caused the violence which also saw hundreds of people injured when his claim of the police opened the gates dividing rival sides and stood by while the bloodbath raged some of the fans were armed with rocks glass bottles and knives egypt's military rulers have a valve to investigate the incident and to punish the perpetrators more this lessen

our cross live to cairo base to writer bel true. and i thank you for coming on our to today so what actually happened in port siad last night it's early days now but has a picture emerged as to what went wrong. well from what we can i stablished when it's accounts it's very difficult to work out exactly what happened but essentially the security forces he usually acts as a barrier between the two sides and stepped aside and actually opened the gates the pitch which allowed the two found clubs to come on to the pitch and basically fight each other and in addition i read this is saying that the exits were blocked so the actually found who were the ones targeted i actually couldn't escape and therefore in the ensuing stampede many lost their lives and this instance is as nice as well we believe the port side fans whoever they were may have been carrying knives as well so obviously there are other contributing factors to this apparent melee where

over seventy people were killed here but the seventy four deaths i should mention as an update there come against the backdrop of rising political tension in the country as we all know about are thousands of demonstrators demanding the military see power how has that played a part do you think in last night's disaster perhaps a venting of frustration on the football pitch. i didn't quite catch that actually but if you talk about the backdrop of the violence in the last few months we've definitely seen an isolation and protesters are asking for the minutes regime to step down recently there's been a vacuum of security since the twenty fifth of january anniversary celebrations you see almost no police or army on the streets which is quite unprecedented considering you had a million people in the streets on the twenty fifth in addition we've had an increase in kidnappings on a daily basis and in knife crime there's also been a lot of attacks on banks so this sort of backdrop is the backdrop to what happened

yesterday so you you mentioned the lack of police presence on the streets a lack of a military presence as well as we know that since since the ousting of mubarak though it's been this military junta or some might say in power at the time you say the very person who has disappeared from the streets and yet crime is up knife crime other types of crime is up on the streets of the egyptian capital do you think or do you think this is what a year of protest is what the people there have been asking for i'm sorry didn't catch that last question too i think was after a year of protests ousting the mubarak regime the military junta and now in power the muslim brotherhood now returning the most seats but as you say crime is up i did see was certainly of this football pitch melee is this what the people of the main central city of cairo have been asking for for the past year it might appear to some that a year's resolution has not turned out all flowery at the end. i'm sorry

it's very distorted i'm not able to actually spell true i must say thank you very much for coming on r.t. today we've got a bit of a glitch here somewhere there's a mouse chewing on a cable live from cairo a freelance journalist thank you very much belcher. you with r.t. live from moscow now a german chancellor angela merkel has called on china the biggest buyer of iranian oil to use its influence to persuade to run to renounce its possible nuclear weapons ambitions merkel is on her fifth visit to china where she's trying to change beijing stance on iran and get her to support a western resolution on syria also on the agenda seeking support for the eurozone merkel's to hold talks with chinese leaders to try to win investment in the ailing year let's talk more on the visit with professor of international politics young jr jang of the university of bristol in the u.k. thanks for coming on r.t. today merkel will obviously try to convince the chinese to support the western position on iran and not to undermine the use oil embargo do you think beijing will

listen. well i think beijing has made it very clear. he doesn't believe in this kind of you natural economic sanction in any way not only against iran but in general even in the case of north korea for example therefore i don't think she will energy biology duce kind of persuasion all aid you will be persuaded by your. arguments or is it so as you say angela merkel's angela merkel's visit to beijing will not sway china to support the west with its approach to iran let's talk about syria china has been against a resolution in the un is anything that germany can do to change china's position on syria do you think i have found it's very interesting that there are some kind of arguments so whether. germany swayed china

security council member to change its position again i can't see any possibility of although i think it's important for the leaders of china and germany to exchange views on these kind of issues and the try to see where they can agree on some where specter of it i don't think there is any possibility that. can actually change the chinese position syria as well so i can have a tough time trying to get beijing to side with the west when it comes to syria and as you said a few moments ago also about all of iran aside from foreign policy let's talk about geopolitics here and the u.s. has been enhancing its military presence in the asia pacific region and experts say it's to counter china's growing military strength is china now looking for more support perhaps with allies in europe. i don't think this particular visit.

will be invitation for and is the chinese as a counter measure against that particular move by the united states recently i do believe that china has see some strategic role that germany can play in terms of its leadership in the e.u. but not necessarily in this kind of strategic balance of power scenario china obviously has a big stake in the european economy and also partly because the e.u. is the largest trading partner of china china has been watching very closely obviously euro crisis and how the european union and italy germany leading the effort do with the euro crisis therefore there is. a huge stake over there in terms of european economy and therefore chinese very keen to try to understand what next and how you he's going to do with the euro crisis next particularly what

germany's think it's and so this is what i think the importance of merkel's visit to china is really more in this kind of scenario rather than this strategic balance of power so aside from geo politics aside from foreign policy your say that the main issues are stake here are that of economics it's very curious how you bring up the issue as we all know germany is shouldering a huge amount of the eurozone debt now or come to china to try and get some sort of support on the flailing euro it's interesting to note on the issue of economies here china is the biggest holder of u.s. debt up to one trillion dollars and yet over the past two and a half three years china has been buying up huge reserves of gold so if it's trying to move away from the dollar as it's trading currency what does this mean for europe do you think beijing would want to invest. in the euro now some are calling china already the piggy bank of the west. well i mean it depends on what you

are me europe to be quite small i mean they would do there has been argument about buying europe forms of other euro bonds are not big enough to absorb large of the chinese and quickly accumulating subplots therefore i think there is no or terje or rather than by the american cherry bombs i mean as you mentioned gold is its only the other alternative all v.c. if we have sufficient the europe i don't see why china cannot if you will not overt its. foreign currencies into europe. i'm running a rather long time here forgive me for that please but one last question here we're going to go back to iran and very briefly with these e.u. embargoes on iranian oil exports as we know that china is the number three biggest buyer of iranian oil is a massive market right there with the e.u. putting embargoed on what is essentially

a lot of china's oil could we see some sort of backlash on global markets or not and some other shape way or form from china i'm not quite sure what do you mean by a backlash from china well could china do something to retaliate as we know china is a third biggest economy in the world is certainly on the rise with india america already in place or oil of fundamental foundation to world economies this could make this could take a chunk out of china's economy if indeed the e.u. embargoes continue to restrict iranian exports of oil to china i don't see how the e.u. in bugger would china's import olds or you from your own or mr yong region enjoying the professor of international politics at the university of bristol thank you for coming on and so it's a day. well you without your life in moscow you can always log on to our website r t v dot com to give us your opinion on the possible results of chancellor merkel's

visit to china let's bring up the numbers from our web site right now or so far this hour forty three percent of you think the visit will help china access new markets almost a third of it was believed beijing will extend a helping hand to a week in europe by now sixteen percent say that china will move closer to the western position on iran a minority this hour believing the meeting will end with chinese support for a u.n. security council resolution on syria to head over to dot com cast your vote but for now let's head over to casey the business to. get coming out for you russia's prime minister has a voice. to take the russian economy from the position of one hundred and twenty eight in terms of the top of the business to the plenty. a matter of several. minutes time. in the business. so i see that for now it is the final day of peel that the british supreme court with the wiki leaks founder julian

assange against his extradition to sweden he faces allegations of rape and sexual assault dating back to august two thousand and ten and says the claims are politically motivated let's cross live now to london to talk to us lord lord good to see you so when can we expect to hear the final decision on this ongoing saga. well not today. this is the second day of a two day hearing here at the supreme court in london but according to documents that been issued by the cool we're not to expect judgement for what i think is the number of weeks which is far as i'm concerned it can mean anything between two and ten basically it gives them time to think about what they've been hearing i suppose arrived this morning about an hour before proceedings started he looks relaxed again much as he did yesterday he had a quick word with his supporters to sort of thank them for being that they prayed subzero temperatures to be out ahead two to show him that's a pool but today is going to be

a more difficult day for jadedness on yesterday much of what we heard was from his legal team and this this evidence is all about the nuts and bolts of the legal system and nothing about whether i suppose it's all isn't guilty of the allegations that have been laid at his door and his lawyer dinah rose talked about judicial authority whether this be that swedish prosecutor has the rights to issue this here you know we're stewards under which his extradition is being requested she said that as the issue of the european arrest warrant the swedish prosecutor was party to the case and so therefore didn't have the impartiality and independence that's required to issue a european arrest warrant but today we're going to hear the arguments of the swedish prosecutors team clement gomery their lawyer is going to say that it doesn't matter whether the swedish prosecutor is independent and impartial that the european u.s. wrestler and should stand anyway so today will be the end of the case but we're not just. for law and as we're talking to you here on out here we're showing

a live picture we were just a few seconds ago showing live pictures there inside the courtroom but i must ask you though it is this the last chance for a song to fight his extradition to sweden what would it mean for the wiki leaks founder if indeed the appeal is unsuccessful. well it's certainly his last chance in this country the supreme court behind me is the highest court in the land so this is as far as he can gain here in london if it does go against him in the weeks that followed the ending if this case then there is a chance that he could take it to the european court of human rights in stroudsburg that's by no means guaranteed but i can't see any reason why he would do that having gone this far. however there is a huge backlog of cases that the european court of human rights part may take seven or eight years to have your case heard so this is something that could go on for a very long time it was because julian is under very strict conditions he reports the police station happy day and there are no real that's new real reason why the

supreme court here would lift a day's bail conditions so he's still living a very strange life. and trying to battle these allegations which he has always maintained are politically motivated he says in connection with his work with wiki leaks when it goes they released that huge cache of previously secret documents which embarrassed several governments and also several international business is his main fear has always been that from sweden he would be extradited his feet wouldn't touch the ground yes right straight on to the united states where many many people hate him they talked about indicting him for treason and all sorts of things like that so that is his main fear that's a very very strange life that he's leading and one that may not come to an end anytime soon all right our he's our laura smith there are live outside the supreme court in london thank you. well the blunders of u.s. politicians have inspired joke son parodies for decades as the campaign for two

thousand and twelve election heats up candidates mistakes are again in the limelight but their critics are not laughing i thought is more important i reports some believe the comments made show nothing more than ignorance and disregard for world affairs. three four years america's top job is up for grabs. with each new election comes a new batch of candidates with compromising foreign policy credentials when i asked me who is the president of you becky becky becky becky stands banned i'm going to say you know i don't know do you know i'm afraid that it's a very hard struggle particularly given the situation on the iraq pakistan border you can actually see why russia from land here in alaska africa was a country on the brink on the brink of complete meltdown and chaos geographically illiterate us candidates have supplied comedians with endless material but all jokes aside some presidential hopefuls vying to lead the world's most powerful armed forces know very little about america's military interventions so you agree

with president obama libya. libya. forming a cohesive sentence on geopolitics can be a struggle i do not agree with the way he did it for reasons. you know that's that's a different one differentiating between friends and enemies it's also a challenge obviously got to stand with our north korean allies in the case of republican candidate mitt romney mixing up presidents and prime ministers can become and i think that president bush represents a real threat. to the. stability and peace of the world the overarching ignorance on international affairs has caused american political commentator bill maher to conclude i think anybody could be president in this country ok sort of like at this

point now where i think if you're going to be when you register to be a candidate you also have to go take a test about foreign affairs and if you fail the test we might get you one chance to take it again and then i'm saying so. ari. you know for city council in your little town in alaska if a country with the world's highest national g.d.p. is being represented by politicians with a deficit on international affairs the biggest consequence it is likely to be america's credibility around the world and even who we target and let me finish this i just get lost in a blizzard of words there this is where it gets really dangerous for united states of america it's like wait a minute how could they possibly be right about terrorism how could they be right about north korea are going to be right about iran's so-called nuclear program when their candidate doesn't even know that there's a north and south korea i think the us is why and so then the world has this very

paranoid view of the united states because of the candidates not understanding basic facts or understanding basic principles of international law which unequivocally prohibit torture if i were president i would be willing to use waterboarding i think it was very unfair to. me and the consistent streak of foreign policy blunders made by u.s. presidential hopefuls is quite humorous but it can also be considered a national tragedy if most candidates campaigning to be leader of the so-called free world simply don't know enough about the world outside of america's borders. so it's time for the outside world update here just briefly some international news american defense secretary leon panetta says washington will seek to end its combat operations in afghanistan next year speaking at a nato summit he said the country wants to switch to a role of supporting and training afghan forces a decade long presence of u.s.

troops there was called the pentagon hundreds of billions of dollars seven hundred american troops and tens of thousands of local civilians have died since the two thousand and one invasion. court says it all charged the country's prime minister with contempt for not reopening an old corruption case against the president the trial is set to start in just over a week and could see a prime minister u.s. effort outside get a line in jail for six months the court is long dead mother to reopening of the corruption case against president asif ali zardari dating back to the ninety's the government has refused it insists the president enjoys immunity from prosecution while in office. a deep freeze and heavy snow have led to over one hundred deaths across eastern europe sixty three have died in ukraine where temperatures went down to minus thirty celsius and bosnia helicopter airlifted emergency food idea evacuated dozens from snow blocked villagers the weather is set to stay for

another couple of days. are tough to katie and the business. thanks for a a radical improvement in the business climate will be the urgent task of the next administration if maybe tim wins the presidency in march the car prime minister says the country in these to jump from one hundred twentieth to twentieth place in terms of attractiveness for business speaking at the troika dialog economic forum in moscow hicks planes what's that mean in practice. in reality this would mean it would take a quarter of the amount of time to commit to a true city network it would take an accountant a third of the time to fill in the tax their collaboration a truck would find it seven times easier to get through customs in it will take a fifth of the time to give permission for construction or strategies based on

presumption of fair business practice this means there will be less control and excessive reporting requirements officials should not decide what investors need it should be businesses defining what they require. at the same forum a finance minister alexey could then has also been urging speedy reforms he says without them growth will be kept even with a high oil price. russia is not ready for a bounce in economic growth for the next three to five years we're lacking some legal stage management and market conditions if the new government decides to improve these it still means a transition period of three to five years then we could be ready for a bounce and a return to growth rates of six to seven percent. let's see what's happening in the markets for european indices after a solid performance yesterday rather disappointing today that's largely because the

greek government is still trying to come to a deal with their creditors meanwhile their creditors are putting pressure on the e.c.b. to join the bond swap being negotiated as you can see investors clearly aren't impressed the footsie is negative and so is the dax. and the russian market they are indeed down at this hour the r.t.s. has been in the red all day whereas the my sex has been pretty much full out so an unimpressive day in russia that ok let's have a look at the moves on the my six and financial stocks are among the main game burbank calif although just slipped into the red despite last year's net profits there were ten now hard billion dollars p.t.b. is gaining under two percent and energy majors are also out the gas pump point three percent. and that's all business for now is all from me my colleague dimitri medvedev back in the next hour with all your market update business news do join

him. download the official t. application on the phone the i pod touch from the camps to. watch on t.v. life on the go. video on on demand.