a series of explosions rocked the city of near perfect offscreen eastern ukraine more than twenty people are reported to have been seriously injured police are calling it a terror attack and panic is said to be spreading quickly throughout the city. in other news the u.s. congress passes a controversial cyber security act that could give the government access to internet users personal information a motion heavily criticised by civil liberty our kids as an infringement of privacy . france threatens to pull out of the shotgun travel zone unless tougher border powers are granted within the e.u. an initiative critics say undermines the block's principle of european unity. and the arrest of more than eighty university students rallying against wishing hikes in canada triggers warnings that harsh police tactics will only fuel discontent and national protests.

three pm here in moscow this is archie and we have breaking news this hour a series of blasts hit the city of near perfect eastern ukraine friday morning injuring some twenty seven people the latest reports put the number of total explosions at for the first blast occurred around noon at a tram stop five people were reportedly injured as a result the device said to have been planted in a trash can some forty minutes later a second explosion struck near a movie theater hurting seven people next to more blasts went off in quick succession also in the center of the city a criminal investigation has been launched into what police are classing as a target tac this is not the first time that that office has been targeted last november one person was killed in some. there are circumstances when

a bomb detonated inside a bit we'll get the latest from our correspondent on the ground in ukraine alexey or says in just a few minutes here on our city. from private e-mails to financial records u.s. internet companies could soon legally share private user information with the american government the highly controversial cyber security action known as says is now a step closer to becoming law following its approval in the house of representatives well it causes a storm of reaction among internet users accusing it of infringing on privacy and civil liberties are she's going to can reports from washington. cisco would make it legal for service providers like google microsoft facebook to funnel private communications and other user related information to u.s. authorities it would provide the government with unhindered access to private correspondence of every american and mind you it's not just the americans using

their services we're talking about your net users from all over the world so that would be done in the name of cyber security they called it cyber intelligence sharing and protection act critics argue who does protect is those providers the likes of microsoft google and others and they're strongly lobbying for the law because analysts say it's not like the companies are not sharing information with u.s. authorities already and your correspondents cannot be monitored it can but under existing laws the companies can still be liable for sharing private information of their customers so experts say the companies want legal protection for what they're already doing that's what the proposed law is about sopa was a different story for them service providers heavily lobbied against it because it would hit their businesses it would easily allow to shut down you tube for example they holds tons of copyrighted material anyway so paul was killed in congress largely because of the huge awareness campaign launched by even as service providers but from consumer's point of view whether it's sold or cispa it's seen as

a blatant encroachments on privacy and freedoms so who would have given unprecedented tools to shut down websites cisco would allow to effectively legalize the big brother on the web again it's not as if private correspondence is not being monitored already but would cispa americans would be stripped of their last legal means to protect their privacy on the web. hard from the pirate group of the berg and part of them and says the bill poses a threat not only for the u.s. but the rest of the world because it sets a dangerous precedent. very very dangerous for the citizens of the united states it's a bill that allows the government to spy on them and give the gifts big industry and their leader the legal rights to give away the danger of consumers and of the citizens it's very dangerous not even for us citizens but also for. citizens all over the world because this my give precedence it may give pressure to other

governments to act in the same way we should work for. totally missing this bill because it is not needed what we should do a centrally work in the in the opposite direction we should ask right now what information facebook twitter google and other big companies giving in to the to the government and why are they so strongly in favor of this. so we should work in the opposite direction right now. we are always keen to find out your take on our stories today we're asking how far you think sr legislation will get so far just about half of you think that can't be count legislation will be made in other countries a fourth believe the u.s. government will propose a toned down version of the bill and the rest of you are almost evenly split between these two options one that obama will veto cispa after the senate vote and

the other that the bill will be passed after a presidential election in november will log on to our tea dot com and cast your vote. france is talking tough either europe tackles illegal immigration or paris pulls out of the shotgun travel zone that's according to president nicolas sarkozy this stance has already caused a stir among some e.u. members with belgium saying french electoral concerns are now playing a bigger role there sarkozy is facing a hard fight in the presidential runoff vote a week on sunday parties tests are silly reports. they say it's better to travel than to arrive but for european unity the ride has been bumpy to say the least and where could it be headed. the eurozone will implode a considerable number of economists admit when the french of foreign that the eurozone is already dead it will collapse. oh.

so says the candidate who surprised france by securing almost a fifth of the votes in round one of their presidential race all the other candidates without exception regard the european union as part of the solution or is the main solution she has identified in the campaign the fact that it's actually the cause of the problems much of the french press but also completely wedded to the euro project they cannot conceive a foreign policy or domestic policy which is deeply. rooted in the whole european project one that finds itself an ever more shaky ground this should get agreement one of european integration sacred cows allowing border free travel across the e.u. is under fire. germany and france want member states to have the option to bring back those internal borders for thirty day period if there's

a threat to security and public order there's a danger and more and more people are also going to start attacking all the good aspects of europe and divisions within the union don't and there amnesty international's recent report documents examples of prejudice in the block against muslims in education and employment ideas that were once very much on the fringe of the sort of political support in terms of being really mainstream in the right so to me it was sort of sort of someone from the left would come and see that people are more racist so to me not to but there has been some sort of. reuther or wiser or fortunate you know for people to express to hate and to or indulge in to violent behavior so where does that leave europe even the people who are against this kind of europe another against the idea that say they want a different kind of europe the e.u. may be trying to say in the past it's to achieve its vision and version of fear of

the obstacles are getting bigger from voters rallied behind that to brussels candidates proposal supporting bad border controls some e.u. leaders have dismissed them as populist threats but the question is are they merely still threats or is this growing resistance already the tip of an iceberg tell us are still here r t brussels. still ahead for you this hour here on r.t. . russia and china concluded major joint military drills with look at their significance in the wake of similar war games conducted in the region by the u.s. . cairo's tahrir square is expected to fill with anger again on friday as a gyptian islamists vent their frustrations towards the country's current military . well there's whoever the same people who are condemning the current leaders for failing the demands of the revolution themselves stand accused of trying to

monopolize power and sarah furth reports for many egyptians the ongoing political wrangling is pushing democracy to the sidelines. protests nation after the revolution toppled president barack gyptian siv continued to use people power as a way to force change the sights the sounds of protesters on cairo's tahrir square have become a familiar one more than a guess and president back without the from power with presidential elections just around the corner and the activities here have once again taken center stage but if the last years taught us anything is a revolution alone is not a democracy make this why the upcoming elections appraising so important. as a discussion group focused on a paced arab spring egypt we met a former member of mubarak's regime now a prominent speaker here in egypt the revolution was a must be it's a great action but unfortunately after we have

a lot of problems and the challenges we have for the stairs and do we have to reach a vision for. the not everyone will say positive and ask the panel how they'd feel about the outcome if they'd been one of the young revolutionaries there's no quid pulls but he's not given a clear answer. on forces and the. administration . of to. begin. in live in february. eleventh. protection food revolution we will we will give the people what they want we'll give you. freedom we'll give you a democracy he told us of the frustration of many people who turned out to tahrir but now feel they've been left represented with a new struggle for power creating many of the regimes old guard which is

a democracy is the. source of course is a common complaint. an equally common on. the street but the revolutionary me to its homes can last indefinitely i can see a second wave of lucia but we will expect to know waves of. people who are testing against certain actions and this is the mcchrystal everywhere i'm sure. they would realize that they should groom a different way more realistic to understand that and that is this region it's a more polished logans or shoutings it's the economy the culture and the politics at the end of the thing i have us in a single thirty in underestimating people hissing regimes across the arab world full that with the announcement of the list of candidates attention turns to the policies as they see might become the next president but they'll need to be careful

not to allow power to drown out the voices if they could determine that this time they'll be heard i think here we win. big because i'd sure had it right on the right the. evolution and this is. this thing. and then well yeah and then out of revolution since i don't know. surf city kyra. well later this hour peter the valen his gas discussed oil and power driven conflict between sudan and south sudan and it seems a risky diplomatic game played by one of their leaders is threatening to trigger a hot war. i think some a kid is playing a very dangerous diplomatic strategy here i think is trying to appease to the

international community sure that he's a statesman to show that he can get a lot of support and show that he's not the aggressor as the victim and i think on the other hand who's who's been who has not really supported by the west specifically is seen as the aggressor and i think kerry is actually playing on this game plan which is why i think he went into hackley and if we must remember it was the south of twenty to the north. of course the rest that we're seeing now is history. back to our breaking news story here on r t a series of blasts in the ukrainian city of. artes alexei yourself he is in ukraine and i'll try to live with more details about what is happening there alexei what are the latest that you're hearing about these attacks. well the latest is that we have an officially

confirmed by the authorities that four explosions rocked ukraine's third largest city during this morning with about ten or fifteen minutes difference between each explosion it is interesting that all of these explosions happened on the very same line of the tramway the first one happened at about twelve. twelve midnight midday local time we understand that the number of those injured is growing every hour now the latest figure we have received from the authorities is twenty seven people have been injured in the wake of these explosions and twenty five of them have been hospitalized most of them in a very severe health conditions with very severe wounds and injuries now the city of meanwhile is gripped in panic we understand to reporters on the ground that people have locked themselves in the side their offices they're unwilling to go home where the management told them to stay there fearing that there could be more blasts happening in the city some unofficial sources also reports. on the internet

that as many as ten explosions are happening have been happening in this city and also an unofficial source reported in the morning a man called the police and said that nine explosions will happen in the city of. during the day definitely those are conflicting reports the official line is that four explosions have happened so far and twenty seven injured we are certainly following all the developments from central ukraine the city of. alexei this is not the first time this ukrainian city has been hit by blasts as it. it is not the first time that we have a new bit of cast seen such explosions last year in november one explosion happened there also the explosion just like this time the explosive device was put inside i trash bin at the tramway station though generally explosions in terrorist attacks are not typical for ukraine and we have seen just

a few incidents like that over the course of the last two decades and most of them were just basically hooliganism but now the authorities are not certainly ruling out the possibility of a terrorist attack in fact when the stand that the interior ministry has already started a criminal investigation on the terrorist attack and we are waiting for any more news from the official sources on whether this is a terrorist attack and whether anybody would claim responsibility for the for the set of explosions individuals or well like you said you course are monitoring the situation on the ground there are eastern european correspondent alexei. have followed this developing story eastern ukraine thanks for that. month of protests in canada boiled over as castro students clashed with riot police over a two wishin hike. oh oh oh oh. oh oh oh pepper spray along with other violent police tactics have resulted in many

injuries since the movement began more than two months ago the back government house proposal to wish an increase for the next five years but once it goes haitians proton on wednesday students again hit the streets to voice their frustrations one hundred and sixty demonstrations have been help since february and journalists are dishonest says heavy handed policing will only strengthen the students' cause. there were really only minor incidents our window was broken and then some very close but i realised the police is using that as a pretext to conduct massive repression and usually the ones who will break your window or another once you get caught the police those that have the run faster than the police the ones who get caught there are peaceful protesters and people are becoming infuriated by the behavior of the police were it's peaceful protest or it's always fueling the fire it definitely it will not stop this as profound around

that fixations people are very unhappy about the way their political elites are behaving and the fuel that the government is not serving the people at all it's only serving big financial interests this is all those are all very repressive and it's only going to fuel more and more and more people are going to join those eventually. a look now at some world news in brief for you this hour the u.s. has agreed to move half of its marines from the okinawa base in japan the air base situated in a crowded urban area has long angered local residents with some troops embroiled in incidents of violence break the marines will now be sent to other bases in the western pacific although some ten thousand will remain at the okinawa. medical students in the bolivian capital of the past held mock crucifixions in

a protest over a new law extending the doctor's work day by two hours others calling for the resignation of the nation's health minister carried signs written in their own blood the demonstrations follow a month long protest by doctors which is forced the closure of several public hospitals over the past few weeks. and two russian cosmonauts and a nasa astronaut are heading back to earth after spending six months on the international space station over the team didn't lose touch with events back on earth with russian cosmonauts voting in the part of the military and presidential elections the spacecraft is expected to land in kazakhstan eleven forty five g.m.t. you'll be able to watch the landing live on our web site r t v dot com. the yellow sea has become an area of international focus as russia and china stage military maneuvers becomes right after the u.s. and the philippines conducted joint war games in disputed waters not far from the

chinese coast raising tensions with beijing artie's denise has been following developments. i'm standing on board the russian destroyer god of the just completed its mission as part of joint russian chinese maneuvers in the yellow sea the whole russian convoy for a large warships and to support together with a chinese convoy of about twenty warships several thousand sailors took part in the maneuvers there is a deeper meaning of course besides the obvious advantages of performing a large scale joint naval mission these exercises have given more school in beijing and chance to fly their flags in the asia pacific where the growing presence of the u.s. navy has recently become a concern china and russia this time the drills concluded with target practice which was by far the most impressive part of the way the five hour crew was given special permission to film in detail what was happening.

before can and at least two times the guns were fired instantly up with a target detected by its own ours all these weapons have proven extremely useful in the gulf of aden where the middle been a ground up has guarded civilian convoys we're told that it usually only takes the you warning shots before the pirates in fear. doesn't get the latest in the finance world where in a joint you got some bad news for spain but good news i understand for russia yes that's right and he said all spain's credit rating was downgraded and i'll tell you more about that later but when it comes to russia we have positive news first of all we know that russians are spending more money and second of all russia's export gas export monopoly has beaten this in financial expectations with its results this year basically russia is

a gas exponentially earned forty five billion dollars in the two thousand and seven financial year and that's a gain of thirty five percent now the. bernie increased its market share in europe which has its market to twenty seven percent from twenty four percent a year before but it's not all rosy in the garden and what i mean by that is that analysts are nervous about government plans to raise taxes on gas from plus there is the prospect of greater competition as the u.s. becomes the world's top gas producer and that's of course due to the shell gas. and staying with the energy sector at russia's or oil giant ross there where are they that recently signed agreements with two major international companies now analysts have been debating ever since what impact this will have on the russian market as artie's tom barton now reports it means that it will create a completely new way of doing business here in russia. beneath the waves in the arctic of perhaps the world's last great untapped reserves of oil and gas and

russia is intent on extracting them the complexities of the project are causing a revolution in the way russia does business in the sector apart from offering substantial tax breaks to investors there's also the prospect foreign firms will be allowed to own resources under the seabed no one really knows how much energy is there but the best guess is about one hundred sixty billion barrels of oil in the entire arctic region that's enough to satisfy global demand for around six years it's also thought to hold thirty percent of the world's gas reserves russian state oil giant ross nerved has brought in two worlds the partners to help the agreements with foreign firms exxon mobil and any cover a range of projects in a number of countries will now have interests in the u.s. europe and africa serving its plans for international expansion but the real jewel in the crown is russia's far north initially expenses there will be limited to exploration three point two billion dollars with the american company exxon and one

billion with the italian company any but if resources are found which seems certain the figures will rapidly. oh total investment on the x. on projects in the arctic is projected to reach three hundred or even five hundred billion dollars while on the any side of things around seventy billion dollars the cost reflects the hostile working environment it's thought the bulk of the energy is on russia's continental shelf in water five hundred meters deep which is often covered in pack ice and scattered with massive icebergs up to four million tons this is where the foreign firms will help with expertise in offshore drilling even then the conditions will require development of completely new technology ultimately this is difficult dangerous and time consuming work the c.e.o. of exxon hopes to pump the first barrels of oil from the car a c. by the end of the decade and that would be quick. well let's take a look at the currencies now there we go as you can see it's changed this hour the

euro is now again and against the dollar when it comes to the ruble it's still losing against both major currencies it would take a look at the european markets you'll see that they have recovered the earlier losses of all the footsie has and it's now gaining just the knowledge of all of the investors i have mainly been the concerned over spain's downgrade as i mentioned earlier start on the corps and now has the credit rating open for a full week plus that it says that spain risks further downgrades in the future and that actually estimates the spanish economy will shrink by one and a half percent this year and the country may have to take on more debt to support its a banking sector here and russia and similar but more of the big picture and investors don't seem to be reacting in march to the news over spain about the arts as in the my sites are in the black with my sets off point eight percent this hour and in general they managed to recover losses that we saw on thursday due to poor economic

data mainly coming from europe and the us now in other news the russia's internet investment mail dot ru group has revealed some results that survivor news rose forty three percent in the first quarter of the year and this was a ball for expectations the company which owns a little over two percent in facebook by the way also said that it's last year's that profit jumped a siberian one hundred and fifty eight percent so. that's it for me in the sun next hour ok pilbeam we have for you all right thanks a lot for that update we're not. well next the latest edition of peter the bell before that though we're going to break i'll update you on our top stories.

to a substantial degree and one form or another socialism has spread the shadow of human regimentation over most of the nations of europe. and the shadow is approaching up on all the birds. to leave early twenty first century military bases a network of military bases all around the forms of the new empire that the united states is trying to build that's astonishing most americans have no idea there are more than a quarter of a million more than two hundred fifty thousand u.s. troops stationed on these bases all around the world. we don't have power bases in

america we don't have any british base we don't have any korean bases we don't have any french bases or you know we just all american bases in cross our bases offline or the noise is our noise and doesn't bother us at all because they're all bases but for other people it's almost like a cancer here for these people. since the end of world war two the spaces i've been . working here to provide a safe and secure environment for everybody. the questions any of thing else you get everything you needed. if.