richard branson if you move from funds to. me. don't come. to define president vows to keep foreign forces out of the country as washington dismisses a military attack and other countries pull out in protest at the violence. prado griese two nuclear talks but war on green grass politicians stick to their governments calling for military action against iran and syria last. i did appeared in group of russian observers try follow the presidential election but except blood to be a putin one of a georgia is the vote join me in a few moments for more on this.

thanks for being with us five o'clock here in moscow on charon's her all she with the latest president obama has ruled out an attack against syria saying it would be a mistake after reading u.s. politician john mccain call for airstrikes syria's president assad responded by saying he's determined to continue fighting for what he calls foreign backed terrorism the pressure is piling on though spain has closed its embassy in damascus while china has withdrawn most of its workers over fears for their safety and the u.n. is considering a u.s. proposed resolution demanding that both government forces and opposition fighters and the bloodshed bear long uprisings claimed thousands of lives and forced many to seek shelter abroad but there's one corner of syria that so far been untouched by the troubles maria and also mother has been there to visit. they are mostly evil i

go along and we fought the battles in this long running conflict time feels like it has almost start even the children here speak in ancient almost forgotten language . as well all our nation out there with the why don't plan for syria is a unique place it's well known in the world has the only place on earth where people speak aramaic the language of jesus christ it has troubled neighbors and not have you and your group a front of smuggling here in syria is the point with the way home a hundred kilometers away but this place is one of you in a country that has not been any trouble a while and since the uprising began home to end of the strine and fall century catholic church and dozens of mosques these towers religious heritage is solid its residents the lettuces keepers have a specific explanation of this lark. saying just this tragedy didn't come to us because god loves the city but it seems that god is not the only one careful of the

destruction dominated community mostly because the area in home still we feel sad because the people don't respect their cover to me i love we are free to come here to try to disturb us and destroy our peaceful life as they did in the homes of many cities but we trust the army and security and state. for decades the government of president bashar al assad who is himself from the shia islam minority allow a sect has protected the interests of ten percent of the country's population who are christians by enforcing it's strictly secular program and break curbing the influence of radicalization and the cycle of the we used to live in peace muslims and christians but of course we are free people from outside the city and the country may come and destroy disunity assad became more than just the head of state he's a kind of international symbol of. this fight for our life appear personal when the

time came the temple turned good looking at mother to lay joy of the same circle and want to stray says the people here didn't join the uprising not because they were scared of the regime but because they were scared to lose this regime so that all of that there were people here they wanted to push is against the government the president the army if you hear the army enter the city and kill people believe me this is a mistake the army is here to protect people god bless our son he did the more to protect the state and make it stronger he is mounted though these efforts will not be enough with increasing calls for foreign intervention and the arming of the opposition i know we'd fight would be tragic. our country before the crisis was developing now we are all losing jesus said any kingdom that splits will die fast these people are receiving money and listening to the orders we want to rule in

this country. mother played his words a record by the tiles in mom with the fi i remember last april there were several men after friday prayers to try to persuade people to protest against the government encouraging them to go and make trouble we had a meeting with residents and the people then agreed to support the leadership the mom says they'd never seen most of those people before and never saw them again after that friday. we're not talking about normal people or people with an extremist we are thinking. in the towns charge the children continue to pray in aramaic arabic greek french but it's clear the prayers of the people of this unique town are understood in any language. brief and all she asked. syria. while intelligence expert told us that despite president obama's towards diplomacy these are the one calling results in trying to remove the

regime. e.a.a. has made a great deal in its november two thousand and eleven report about the alleged existence of a bomb containment chamber a cylinder that they were told by an unnamed member state which i am quite confident it was israel exists or did exist at some time. out the parchin military base. was constructed supposedly in two thousand but the fact is that the i.a.e.a. has no confirming evidence physical evidence of any kind that this containment chamber even exists let alone that it was ever used to test a nuclear weapons design so if in fact they go to parchin and find there's nothing there as i'm quite certain will be the case how will be i.e. a response to the situation i have a feeling that they will move on to the next piece of alleged evidence of

a covert nuclear weapons program or a previous one and that the show will continue. a group of russian election observers says the networks and clenched are dirty victory of voters except he won the majority of the vote claims there were multiple violations during the poll the details now from our correspondent peter oliver in central moscow here are thank you for illegally this is an independent body made up of public figures people like bloggers here in russia and they've basically today refused to accept the legitimacy of the presidential ballots from sunday now. one of the reasons they've they've cited for this is they received four thousand five hundred the complaints of electoral irregularities during the ballots now one hundred or both of those only one hundred out of the four thousand five hundred we've referred to the

number of ballots that are green cast. they also cited this. one hundred sixty eight votes in moscow had been added on to the eventual total for the to me of putin now it has been pointed out that's one hundred sixty eight out of the millions of voters here in moscow it is really a drop in the ocean but it does follow on from words that we heard from. the u.s. backed n.g.o.s who also cited problems with the with the election but said ultimately that. putin would was legitimately a reluctant as president that he even if they counted in the well they say that he would have received less percentage less than he actually did. even if you factor that in they still have him winning the fifty percent be all important fifty percent margin they would have seen him elected president the first hurdle now

we're waiting we should hear from the central election committee later on today they'll put forward their findings but a lot of it of putin has said that any. alec all these allegations of irregularities occurring during the election will be investigated anybody found guilty will be prosecuted but we have heard from western and for the foreign observateur referred to these elections this presidential vote resold sunday as the most free and most fair elections that we've seen in russia yet now despite the fact that more than forty five million russians voted for putin and their show of support is still being dismissed by some country's former top british diplomat david miliband didn't mince his words when it came to the election results criticism some polish political commentators describe as ironic at bats archies after bennett has more. a ruthless dictator whose days are numbered not exactly the language of international diplomacy but that's what britain's former

foreign secretary thinks of russia's president elect casting his aspersions even before russians cast their vote while david miliband is using these sort of expressions dictatorship they don't conform to reality in a dictatorship people are not allowed to protest people are not allowed to walk around publicly with placards in the face of the leader of the country with derogatory terms written across the placards we've seen this in russia we saw this last december after the parliamentary elections and we've seen this. at the moment after sunday's presidential elections david miliband comments appeared in a british tabloid the morning of russia's presidential poll long before it finished the m.p. accusing putin of reversing russian's reforms because of vested interests the sort of claim some experts say typifies the perception here of putin and russia one of the big criticisms i've had for a long time is that the coverage has been very stereotyped so that when bad things

happen in russia then they get huge coverage and then when is it with good things or progress like genuine economic progress that tends not to get reported david miliband may not be in government now but he's widely expected to feature again should labor return to power should that happen you'll face a tough job repairing relations with russia after such a venomous attack talk about getting off on the wrong foot as miliband asserts that to a vital partners when it comes to foreign policy security and economic issues david cameron's reaction to putin's elections been far more measured until now the prime minister's haven't exactly been close didn't even make it on to cameron's extensive christmas card list last year but while cameron may not have been grants. elated putin on winning he has endorsed the results it's clear the election has delivered a decisive result evenly and your polling data put putin above the fifty percent

needed to win in the first round the same can't be said of britain according to the electoral reform society two thirds of m.p.'s elected in two thousand and ten lacked a clear majority thanks to the ballot method of first past the post is russia's electoral system perfect no it's not but then let's all system in the world is perfect let's not forget in britain no british prime minister ever achieves anywhere near fifty percent of the votes if you have a look at margaret thatcher's nine hundred eighty three landslide election victory tony blair's ninety ninety seven landslide election victory the pair of them never got anywhere near fifty percent of the vote a protest movement against putin's return to the presidency is certainly loud but according to official election results it's a war by those in favor putin received almost sixty four percent of the vote miliband predicts that support won't last for long but while it does britain will

have to like it or lump it if it wants to do business i have been it r t along the . there's just a day left of greece's crucial bond swap deal with private investors for the country to reduce its massive debt load its a condition for greece's new bail out may determine if it will leave or stay with the euro let's get some perspective on this now from chris we for was the chief strategist at investment firm troika dialog mr weaver so the deadline for the greek debt swat deal is someone that's looming we can say how confident are you going to lakshmi succeed well the markets right now are remaining very relatively calm so investors generally expect that the deal will be done before the deadline which is late tomorrow night today we see a lot of the big european banks or the remaining european banks rolling in behind the deal but what remains a sight so far are the more aggressive hedge funds they're holding out for

a better deal and it's very likely to push it all the way to the wire with the words all the way right up to the last deadline tomorrow night but i'd say the market reaction right now is they believe that a deal would be done because the consequences of it not being done in other words you thought would be fairly catastrophic for the banking system and for the bond market the question of course and without writing off swathes of it that greece will lose the next bailout installment if it so desperately needs time we've been there before how close to the wire is this do you think that the default is unavoidable at this stage well you know look we get a technical default no matter how would stress but frankly this is no longer about greece greece and feel like has secured the bailout in very tough terms from the leaders see the this is now the second part of it if you get down one way or the other it's only a question of what it is because but the private bond holders will take a fifty three and a half percent haircut on their their debt so that's

a default no matter how you slice and dice that's what's at stake here is the bigger picture in europe is that there. it is a technical default if that's what it's called then they were put at risk the whole basis of the c.d.'s sparked the c.d.s. market is essentially the bond insurance scheme that banks use when they take out to invest in bonds in one country they're going to be effectively paid insurance premium reflecting the risk of default in that country so the c.d.'s read his words sure it's pretty moving up and down it's what kids is a measure of how risky one country's debt is relative to another so if there's a technical default in greece it means that the c.d.s. spreads didn't work and therefore there's no question mark over whether or not you like to see the spread of the insurance premium everywhere else is also about it and that's in most two trillion dollar business globally if that starts and if

confidence in that system is undermined then you're looking at potentially catastrophic consequences for western banks and therefore the western economy so that's really what's at stake it really is serious and now lay it all out for me is the new bailout solution or is it something like a temporary banding if it will it actually let greece finally turn a corner oh no this is another band dates where we are far from talking about i need permanent solutions to the european debt problem we're still fire fighting and putting out a little fires and they will break out again so you know frankly we'll be looking for we can see we're three months before we're into another firefight with another country so we're far from talking about permanent solution to this issue but investors are hoping for is that we might start to hear the bases of some permanent solution being presented wraps of the g. twenty meeting in june in mexico but most people believe to spend all of this year fire fighting a fairly frequently various debt issues and we might perhaps start to talk about

a more permanent solution which would be quite painful only after the u.s. presidential election and maybe after the. german chancellor's the next year so i think we've got about a year of this now terrible have to wait and see but greece and other struggling countries they certainly can't go on like this forever cutting and surely there has to be some sort of a growth strategy soon well that's why i think you know this is maybe what we hope to hear at least in muted in some draft form at the g. twenty meeting in june because you're quite right to be completely world cannot continue with this fire fighting at some point you have to put it out and start talking about growth so we're not there yet we're still very much in the firefighting mode and as the city we hope to start hearing at least prout the some plans are preliminary in june but then i think that it's going to be a very long painful process and optimistically we probably won't see any of those measures put in place until sometime in june for those. first weaver chief

strategist at the investment firm troika dialog thank you so much for being with us . as well as cautiously welcoming the newly agreed resumption of nuclear talks between iran and world powers on earlier said it would also allow nuclear inspectors to visit a secret military facility which is yet to be arranged the move follows israeli threats of a preemptive strike on player sites by western allies suspect iran may be building an atomic bomb which it's a nice saying its program is only for peaceful energy previous visits by un atomic officials could not conclude on the existence of weapons because they were denied access to facilities political analyst gareth porter is sure about earth washington are in for a disappointment. the. i.a.e.a. has made a great deal in its november two thousand and eleven report about the alleged

existence of a bomb containment chamber a cylinder. they were told by an unnamed member state which i am quite confident it was israel exists or did exist at some time. out the parchin military base. it was constructed supposedly in two thousand and but the fact is that the i.a.e.a. has no confirming evidence physical evidence of any kind that this containment chamber even exists let alone that it was ever used to test a nuclear weapons design so if in fact they go to parchin and find there's nothing there as i'm quite certain will be the case how will be i respond to the situation i have a feeling that they will move on to the next piece of alleged evidence of a covert nuclear weapons program or a previous one and that the show will continue. giving peace

a chance in tackling syria and iran may be on president obama's mind that certainly not the case for some of his senior compatriots in congress john mccain's call for air strikes against assad is not the first time the veteran senator has chosen troops over talks and as christian friends are reports he is not alone. they stick together through thick and thin from the queensland to the holy land from the ball field to the battlefield they are senators joseph lieberman and see graham and john mccain seen frequently side by side both physically and politically the call for more war a song almost on repeat for them we have a better war that they don't like they lead the charge to end up afghanistan we need more troops there are american troops by the attacks by the enemy have gone up about a thousand percent in the words of one time is not on our side and they've been

called everything from the three amigos the three blind mice and the axis of error by the website downsize d.c. dot org based in to work together as a kind of an accessible than foreign policy kind of work and back to the old axis of evil that we heard about that foreign policy is not just limited to bush's wars but here they are meeting with libyan president moammar gadhafi in august of two thousand and nine at a time when it was in the u.s. interests to call him friend mccain later tweeted this calling him interesting but a year later wanted him gone if you want gadhafi to go in one of the steps among many would be to establish a no fly zone over the world stand by a leader like today of the slaughter is on people and i'm going target for them iran will use military action against iran we should not only go after their nuclear facilities we should just roy their ability to make an additional war they should have no planes that can fly and no ships they can float we can point the gun

we haven't pulled a single trigger yet and it's about time that we did the two years on and that lack of immediate military action hasn't resulted in armageddon anything like it still the calls for action expand now across the world the iranian nuclear program is a threat to the entire world fine military intervention. is now the necessary factor to reinforce the suction. needs to know that he will not win you know we find ourselves in virtually the same identical to your leader syria what's going on in syria what's happening and so should we respond to it and once again i mean almost all the respondents he's going to come and say well we've got to go or the mood of the american people may have shifted to ending the wars but the perpetual mavi for war does have its supporters they're very popular with the military industrial complex which sees every new adventure every new invasion every

new argued patient every new major bombing campaign as an investment but an investment fewer and fewer americans are willing to make as they've already lived through the consequences of the previous military adventures in fact critics say those who continue to follow senators mccain lieberman and graham are blind themselves they may hear the drumbeat for war but they fail to see the bigger picture the very real possibility of pitfalls ahead in washington christine. r t. twenty three minutes past the hour and now a look at some other news from around the world francis president says the country has too many foreigners out of the system for integrating them is failing and the t.v. debate. defended his campaign promise to reduce the number of annual immigrants and place tighter control on welfare benefits sarkozy's a trailing behind the socialist party candidate in the elections and is competing for consumer conservative voters with the country's far right now in the name of

peace with. the man who confessed to the massacre on the norwegian island of cloying last july a hospital formally charged with terrorism but they dressed as a policeman and planted a bomb and i'll slow that killed eight before travelling to the island and shooting dead sixty nine more people at a youth camp it's trials. it's on april sixteenth whether or not he's diagnosed. american a north korean officials are meeting in beijing to discuss the resumption of food aid to the north last week. to freeze its nuclear and missile tests and recently decided to write you a nuclear inspectors back into the country the united states says it will provide two hundred forty thousand metric tons of food the last u.s. food handouts ended in two thousand and nine when north korea expelled us from. coming up in our sports bulletin royally defeated. learning britain's prince harry

being the world's fastest man to the finish line that's coming up in just about an hour here on our. time now for the business news with dimitri so a bounce back today on the markets a. true we saw a big plunge on tuesday but right now pretty much the biggest losers are some of the biggest gain as we've seen on the markets but investors russia of course still reacting to the reelection of let me know and basically the two possible scenarios that we could see are outlined by peter weston from us on capitalism well the best case scenario would obviously be that we have a very i mean and that he also gets a cabinet that is filled with sort of liberal minded individuals like who dream may be profitable have a role in the government as well and the focus of structure is just the reforms also look at the state on companies improving transparency that will be

a major path was that it would be tremendously positive for the markets but a return to a police state would be the absolute worst scenario i think that's a very unlikely scenario but that's obviously would be in that investable better stay away from russia. let's take a look at what's happening right now in the markets all looks flat to positive this sell both the r.t.s. and the my six are gaining a moderately well actually healthy r.t.s. has plunged right as i was saying it down a quarter of a percent although my sources are both pretty much the same amount and really not much of volumes we're seeing on the trading floors today because first quite complicated let me try to explain thursday and friday are days off in russia saturday is also a day off but sunday is a working day believe it or not so what's happening right now is some of the traders are actually insuring against potential risks on global markets and selling their stock so you would just you know stay in cash and of course traders will be

playing catch up on sunday this is all because of the international women's day celebrates the prosperous. little words moving beyond my sex and what we're seeing right now as energy shares gaining on the high world prices rose up six percent financial the still weaker than the market was burbank up by you were just a notch and after about this one of the biggest gainers of sell for more than three percent this hour. in europe pretty much the same picture we're seeing in london and frankfurt are both recovering after yesterday's losses of the third of a percent blacks less than that was financials and mining which would have been most in the previous session recovering most of the high stakes and in the currencies russia's ruble continues its the same against the the u.s. dollar and the euro as you can see there around half a percent versus that all that well and pretty much the same thing versus the euro whereas the euro is recovering by just i'm not sure from the losses seen in the

previous. well it turns out the market plunged so we saw in the previous session although not that big just one point six percent for the dow was quite costly and painful to the world's. people turned out the a twenty richest people in the world lost more than eleven billion dollars of value on their companies. also the first a russian company in the skolkovo innovation harvest planning to offer an i.p.o. sources close to vist group says say that it's going to list on the russian stock market in a company may raise around forty million dollars doesn't seem like much though this group is developing information systems are in the mining energy and telecommunications that's all we've got time for this hour but you can always log on to our website article concords that's business for more join me next hour for.

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