the. syrian people make their choice floating on a new constitution which would herald the end of fifty years of single party rule. thousands of people join hands at a massive flash mob for fair elections but try to circle moscow's city's center a week before the country chooses a president. and fountains once again march in protest against education cuts in spain as fuel prices take greater hold around the med while greece breathes a sigh of relief with a final approval but much. even

for me kevin owen here in moscow you're watching the weekly here on r.t. it's the roundup of our top stories of the last seven days the time is now ten pm moscow time and first voting is now ended in syria in the last hour where people have been having their say on a new constitution in the most significant poll for decades they thought turnout was high in the first results are expected on monday the opposition the refused to vote amid a backdrop of violence that's plagued the country since last march after reports from damascus. security has been tightened up and police officers are literally everywhere we've seen many of them today patrol industries trying to watch the situation their position has indeed been boycotting the vote but not only that they've been calling actually on all people to go to strive not to go cast ballots and to take to the streets to protest against president bashar assad and to ask for him to step down the violence is continuing in the country with reports on people

dying a literally every day we've been able to visit to polling stations here in the capital damascus and people some of them have said that yes we know that there are armed groups in the countries who are trying to make provocations who are trying to prevent us from voting but we hope that this referendum in this constitution as part of the package of democratic reforms promised by bashar al assad and his government will be able to bring peace and stability to our country so we are voting no most of what they say but of course the pressure from the opposition as well as from the international community is very high because they call this vote laughable. ballots instead of bullets mesta mr asians and violent protests have been rolling across syria for almost a year. the syrian government desire calling for the people to shape their future

together it's a completely new era it is good for everybody even opposition can take part it's for all amendments to the country's number one law have been among the key demands of the opposition since the uprising began it starts with eliminating baath party supremacy which have ruled the country for the last fifty years introduces a multi-party system and sets a two term limit on any future president however if these reforms a cause in controversy. jihad and his friend own a flower shop in damascus he says this new document draws a line between him and his muslim business partner. there is a big contradiction article thirty three says all equal or a number three says can be a president what about the other ten percent we're not here temporarily we've been living together for ages we want to be counted. now maybe ten percent of the people

they speak about this ok but maybe if i was removing this article from the new constitution the ninety percent would said well why you take this article out of public debate on the draft constitution have been organized to bring the people and the authors of the new document together they don't trust. their own sources the sailors are sophisticated you work for the fire you make the c.d.'s you can see this becoming but some say the resteal a long way to go to that new syria and they don't believe the government will follow through with their reforms i'm afraid if i work again as the constitution somebody will in the world will shoot me clashes and protests almost every day but some hope that the referendum will not only breed and you constitution it might even be able to stop the bloodshed refinishing r.t.

damascus syria. in a couple of minutes on this channel putting the smart money on nuclear intelligence while the un's atomic agency struggles to reach a conclusion about iran's nuclear programs that america's intelligence agencies have their own evidence and it's not sitting well with israel as you put. a ring of solidarity that was the hope of protesters who are calling for free and fair elections here in russia thousands of people took part in today's attempt to surround the center of moscow holding hands they wanted to complete the city's garden ring that's the road which in circles the historic center is correspondent peter oliver was there. the goal of sunday's demonstration was to form a human chain around the garden ring in moscow and i want bodies as a ring road that goes around the downtown area of the russian capital. now the activists who are organizing this event today it called on supporters to come out wear white in support of their cause which is to receive free and fair elections in

russia no they were able to complete that journey around the garden ring that human chain around sixteen kilometers from one end to the other so clearly masses of people coming out and taking part there well there were also some supporters of the blood to be a putin for president who turned out it is a week before that presidential vote and there were some heated exchanges at times between supporters of the various political factions here in russia all of them peaceful but a few raised voices at times all of this coming either say a week before russians go to the polls to elect the next president and we've seen a a space of political rallies in the last week we've seen supporters of the to me of putin for president also still supporters of the the the leaders of the liberal democratic party and the communists as well as other groups coming out and showing their support for the particular candidate that they want to see take the top job.

next sunday's presidential elections well as we heard there next sunday russians will pick the next president choosing from a number of candidates who've been hitting the campaign trail lately but the contender is keeping a relatively low profile here is touring a lot of buzz abroad as laura smith reports from london. russians a used to seeing putin in all manner of surroundings not only in top level meetings also out in the wilderness and even singing to a hollywood a list crowd. but there are always leave heights to scale and you're currently find him looming large on a london icon a double decker bus. is coming it proclaims so may find the wording of the outburst slightly sinister but it's all to do with a new book which analyzes putin the man not the politician the books the results of

a six year collaboration between a british author and russian journalist alexander. put in is probably the most interesting political in the world at the moment and yes the right people who feel and be violent towards the rebels who love him or those who do but the most important thing is that sort of. can see that they don't. although as it turned out that wasn't quite true you know it's about it might be desperate or russia you know it may. cozy probably appreciate you supposing the russian. i don't know that. the prime minister of russia. would cut it but the authors say friday's book release isn't connected to next month's election in russia but it does come hot on the heels of two separate british documentaries involving putin one a look at the controversial political youth group nationally and the other

a critically acclaimed full part counter through relations with the west during his twelve years at the top there will be the world's attention on him again and people want to know is this a man we've seen before or is he changing. can he face the new challenges and how does the recent protest movement affect his politics and his outlook having his face on double decker buses won't help you say this russert is prepared to go to the polls but love him only fair to say his reputation is russ's strong man has captured the imagination of documentary make kids and all things here in the u.k. and elsewhere whether it's fame or infamy it's an open question laura smith r.t. . coming up in the program tonight accused of aiding the enemy america's famous whistleblower gets his first call hearing after nineteen months in custody and just two weeks of the big nomination for the nobel peace prize more about bradley

manning in a few minutes. but before that spain's students are refusing to sit quietly with thousands again turning out mainly over planned education cuts but also after police kandahar their last rally officers were accused of brutality at a protest earlier this week which left several people hurt and over forty arrested r.t. sara first reports for the cost of blank. we all know the problems that face every day students lack of money a fierce competition for jobs adds to that spain has the highest unemployment in the year two t. nine percent of the sixteen to twenty four year olds unemployed in the country and factor in that they just had recent spending because that is the fact that education in fact say badly the some of these students who come to the streets say they haven't even got basic heating in the closings and well this is the result really thousands and thousands of people already out on the streets good to protest some of the that is right the way along the main high street here in the city of

blends here now some of the signs reading and now students about it enough that's in reference to the protests we saw at the beginning of the week where the police were condemned for their actions which were seen as being excessively violent scenes of them chasing and hitting some of the protesters spoke very fierce reaction from a lot of the public and a lot of anger his guilt about these actions huge number of people joining in this protest and a lot of anger and of course this part of the why did demonstrations we've seen happening in recent days as the all star team has just of being voted on by the new government to prevent this angry reaction. sarah firth our correspondent there to spain then tightens its belt in the face of more cuts the troubles reverberate across southern europe for more on the developments in the region there's talk of best revise and on the line from poland patrick good evening from moscow we'll talk about the rest of europe in

a moment i just want to stay with spain while we've got you on the line in the last twenty four hours yet again we witnessed the anger among spain's students looking at school cuts and then of course having to join massive youth jobless ques and so disheartening it must be for them this last generation's going to come back and haunt madrid i guess at some point isn't it. i mean this is a terrible situation kevin we have a lost generation in many countries but particularly stay in a century fifty percent of people are unemployed who are under the age of twenty five more or less the same percentage under the age of thirty and it's all to do with the fact that the previous governments of basically done nothing during the boom years to manage to turn round what was a slow erotic you'll for a regulated economy and ultimately the problem now is that no one can actually manage to fire anybody and spin and if you even want to employ i mean if you want to start a small business and you want to employ your own wife to work for you temporarily you end up with all manner of social charges and bureaucracy so therefore

ultimately the new government has got a great deal to do because it's got to try and find some way in which it can balance the budget a very tricky point to do it and also they've got to try and find a way to get these people into work and i'm not surprised they're angry it's absolutely disgraceful trick and then there's greece greece finally breathing a little easier this week after sealing the deal with the e.u. for that new one hundred thirty billion bailout but it's got to make eighty more cuts by the start of next month what cloth is left to cut their old look haven't i mean greece is truly a tragedy in every sense of the word and if we're not doing is they're not only cutting i mean they're cutting flesh in fact. they're possibly cutting into their own arteries the tragedy of greece is that two three years ago when it first came to light that their financial figures were a complete fiction and we finally knew the truth that we'd all suspected all along they really should have been out of the euro at that moment instead we've got this

absolutely psychotic desire by a group of frankly well economically illiterate people in western europe particularly within germany who are desperate to manage to hold this all together then we've got another group of people who are absolutely determined to try and keep greece in the euro zone which are the incredibly highly paid greek politicians and the poor greeks themselves are absolutely stranded there is no way that greece can manage to bring together all of these cuts kevin there is no possibility that greece is going to survive in the euro with the long term why we're throwing good money after bad and why we're beggaring actually the good people of greece on the ground absolutely defines logic when you talk about what they're facing there twenty one percent unemployment one hundred fifty thousand businesses busts of people sleeping rough how much will the greeks to think put up with before they're around on this government to frankly i don't think they're going to put up with

very much at all look elections are looming they're coming up probably any we already know that the far left another a sort of britons are holding up and around thirty five to forty percent at least the people are absolutely fed up they see no possibility no end to this and let's face it what does this deal actually do for greece well what it says is that essentially if you want to go another five or six years old total potential destitution in austerity you might just end up with one and a half times the debt that they basically hard at the moment in countries like germany are counted are totally unreasonable unbelievable it's not just that there's a twenty percent unemployment incidentally kevin there in my. and the fact that actually essentially two percent was added to the unemployment rate just within the course of the last six to eight weeks alone that is the travesty greece is in a death spiral unfortunately patrick while you're on the line there i want to pick

your brains about another story that's been the new story making the rounds of the last twenty four it is unconfirmed at the moment depending on who you're reading listening to but reports that iran has stopped or oil shipments to greece now athens at the moment relies on a i think is about a third of that oil because some other export as of stock trading with it because of its credit worthiness iran's denied it we must say at the moment but if that were to play out what effect would that have on in battle greece well look i mean the situation is very simply i mean no one in their right mind who's running i don't know what big pension fund like the ontario teachers' pension fund or something like that is going to run in and risk all of their good look all employees money that's been see it hard to buy greek bonds we're not too far off the point where a lot of suppliers are saying why should we do not we know already that for example in the greek public sector there's been large problems with getting supplies of medicine because many pharmaceutical companies haven't been paid and ultimately i mean realistically we are at that sort of terrible approach that is what

a death spiral means i mean when you get someone like the outgoing president of the world bank robert zoellick coming in and saying all the done in the course of the last week is bought some time for greece that does not make anybody who's a chief accountant for any business in the world whether it's a really annoying or elsewhere particularly comfortable about dealing with the greek government because they just no idea where they're going to get their money back at all for the day i've said it before or said again when you come in and you've got some good news to talk about. maybe moving out of a job there and talking to us from poland thank you very much. now in the meantime the standoff over iran's nuclear program showing no signs of reaching a resolve with you an atomic official saying to row. failed to cooperate they visited the islamic state twice this year and say iran stepped up its uranium enrichment the western allies suspect building a nuclear bomb but the rand says it has a right to a civil nuclear program the countries currently struggling under harsh sanctions

from the u.s. and e.u. while israel's threatening military action however u.s. intelligence is reportedly now said there's no evidence to support accusations that to rand is pursuing nuclear weapons i spoke to reza marashi from the national iranian american council also a former u.s. state department officer who told me that a new approach she thinks is needed to try to resolve this issue now. the american intelligence agencies and for that matter the israeli intelligence agencies and many other foreign governments intelligence agencies are saying that iran is not made the political decision to produce to weaponize station and that leaves time for diplomacy to be pursued to find a peaceful solution that's beneficial to all parties and the primary sticking point the primary truck problem that we see is that nobody trusts one another people and the people plus one don't trust each other iran doesn't trust anybody in the p five plus one so in an effort to try and move things forward and shift that paradigm from the negative to the positive you know we need to get creative and

international leaders need to find ways to take risks for peace anything from broadening the agenda to discussion issues not just focus on iran's nuclear program but things that iran is also interested in regional security energy security things of that nature just of bringing in some outside actors who the p five plus one and iran do have trust within turkey and brazil being to keep samples of the parties that are played a kind of mediating role if positive inducements are not offered to iran and if the west doesn't seriously consider whether or not offering those positive inducements to iran are in america's interests europe's interests i'm negotiations will fail because iran will not like. israel's been repeating his threat of military action in iran's nuclear sites saying that slapping sanctions on the country is not working the u.s. and britain have warned against the move saying it would be disastrous for the region but that is a really good reports now an anti iran offensive already appears to be underway. israel's leaders are actively drumming up the military rhetoric. iran is the

biggest terror exporter in the world the israeli government and its security forces will continue to act forcefully systematically and calmly against international terrorism dating from iran. a potential israeli rocket clash looks more likely than ever there is speculation a preemptive strike against iran's nuclear sites could happen as early as spring or summer although that's not causing undue concern in israel i think possibly people you know they make their plans for a vacation you know pass or a vacation summer vacation possibly people are beginning to wonder well is there going to be a war is something going to mess it up or i think they're probably going ahead with it with sort of a thought we're back home it would be nice if we could get a flight that we could cancel you know is that sort of thing israel has previous experience when it comes to putting an end to nuclear ambitions which pose a potential threat in one thousand nine hundred one is just wiped out reactors in

iraq they struck again in two thousand and seven heating sites in syria but with iran's nuclear program things may not be so simple if israel attacks iran it will not stop iran forever from getting nuclear weapons the only postpone it for a relatively brief amount of time the. installations are too diverse and far flung to destroy factor fully israel does not have u.s. poured the white house secretary advisor was in israel warning against a move on iran saying it was better to wait for tougher sanctions to take effect in the coming months but mines may already be made up i think one of the things the create this aura of inevitability is to shut them up to shut up opposition at home and of course to convince the united states and europe that this is an inevitability it's going to happen daughter pose that in fact why don't you help us out there is a question mark however over whether israel has what it takes to carry out the

mission i doubt with the we have the capability. of creating damage is to the extent of the mediating the program and even if israel's military prowess will allow it to carry out a strike on underground facilities in iran chances are it won't end there as you know saddam hussein and bashar assad by the time they knew what was happening was over and could just you know grumble without having to fight back you imagine iran sitting still you know all day day after day day after day what israel is hitting tripoli back i think any any sane person realizes that they're all almost guaranteed the missiles falling on israel and considering iran for one of the twentieth century's longest wars against iraq in the one nine hundred eighty s. the consequences could be far reaching and destructive. israel has been suffering some bad weather is of late but it's unlikely that even the strongest winds will

blow the country's foreign policy off its course and when it comes to israel's forecast for iran this storm clouds seem to be growing every darker in tel aviv r.t. . in afghanistan seven u.s. soldiers have been wounded when i agree protesters threw a grenade into the basic comes amid the sixth day of american riots across the country sparked by news that copies of the qur'an been burned at a u.s. base washington's apologized for what it called a mistake on the afghan president. hamid karzai said the sentiment in this country was a legitimate reaction and call for those who burned the qur'an to be punished dozens of people have been killed in restaurants choose the including to seeing u.s. offices. she's a think tank director in neighboring pakistan he told us the americans neither understand nor respect afghan culture. in the decade that the u.s. military has been enough but it's time for the first time even if you have smaller places in provinces and towns wherever there is a u.s.

presence ordinary afghans are laying siege to these places even after ten years it seems the americans don't know who they're dealing with they don't know the get on very well the u.s. military are increasingly treated into what i would call anti islamists and they're constantly sort of indoctrinated into into into treating islam disrespectfully i sailed to see how the u.s. military personnel and the of the east end of gun army personnel would be able to restore the level of trust that existed let's say five days or six days ago. around of some other of a today's top stories now in a car full of explosives and rammed into a church nigeria has killed at least three and wounded several others the church was packed with sunday morning worshippers when the suicide attackers struck in the city of joss radical islamist group boko haram being blamed no when she admitted carrying out the attack the sect killed over three hundred people this year in its

quest to impose sharia law. through demolishing osama bin laden's final hideout the al qaeda leader was shot dead by u.s. forces that we're about to compound last may. several b. is no official reason has been given for demolition but it's thought the authorities don't want the site to become a shrine. in yemen army shelling has killed five al qaeda linked militants officials say the strike began in the southern town the judge bar on saturday night and then continued into the early morning a yemeni soldier was also killed when he stepped on a mine in the same area government forces a failed to oust militants from the south of the country who've managed to seize control of several parts of the region now in the past year. the american soldier accused of leaking hundreds of thousands of secret military files to wiki leaks chose not to enter a plea during his first court hearing on thursday bradley manning faces twenty two charges and he also passed on deciding whether he wanted to be tried by

a military jury or a single judge if he's convicted of aiding the enemy he could be given a life jail term with no chance of parole but is considered a hero forced by many americans and has been nominated for the nobel peace prize there are doubts over whether manning can get a fair trial after president obama publicly stated that he broke the law just of tissue from the socialist equality party told us the government's using mind as a tool to bring down to expound it julian a sandwich. it's freidman demanding as are all the. brutal inhumane according to amnesty international amounting to torture according to many top u.s. legal scholars i mean there's many of the reasons behind this but i think the u.s. government certainly sees the treatment of manning from the beginning both as an example to anyone who would seek to expose the crimes of american militarism abroad as well as a fairly transparent attempt to get out of songs the founder of wiki leaks they are

you know the u.s. government is seeking to eventually extradite a song and they're certainly trying to trying to go after wiki leaks for the release of the documents you know really must be stressed that this is a really devastating explosion of the obama administration is the treatment of this young man for all the talk of democratic rights and freedom abroad this is how the united states treats opposition here it here at home. this is live from moscow the sunday evenings approaching at ten thirty pm those twenty seven and a bit minutes past ten in fact here in moscow kevin zero income i was promised shortly former presidential advisor pat buchanan with timely advice for today's u.s. leaders support to to make trade so that's how the next thirty minutes shapes up.

the world.

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