the un's a peacekeeping convoy comes under fire in a damascus suburb we are live with the news crew following the observer mission for a firsthand account of the attack. convicted of illegal arms trafficking and facing twenty five years in a maximum security u.s. jail but russian businessman victor boot calls the case against him which in an exclusive interview with. us economic tension erupts across the e.u. as political deadlock in greece once again threatens to a rattle the fragile eurozone stability. and hopes of finding survivors from the plane crash in the indian easier as

a rescue team discovers the first victims from the demo fly by a new russian super jet. it is good to have you with us here on r.t. rule researcher with twenty four hour global news u.n. peacekeepers in damascus have been targeted by gunfire in a suburb of the syrian capital it was witnessed by artie's news crew in damascus and it's not believe that anyone has been badly hurt at this point but this comes less than a day after the city was rocked by blasts in front of the country's intelligence services that's where fifty five people were killed. now joins us on the line with the latest. sara i do believe you can hear me i have the connection is established properly here you saw this attack for yourself can you tell us exactly what happened. well when we. actually talk about the

coupons sure i've been wondering where does. it take you to a completely if you don't make a good. can't. hold it actually we. hope when dating the. one that. it was probably more likely it was wrong old saying that well i think you got it awful when mediocre. gets into one of the other wars we've all ignored because you know what you're not going to take it point away like your introduction it gave me. i don't want to be one security can't keep up with a couple of people that are caught on film and it wasn't safe to call it and it

wasn't any particular area. that they didn't want to quote that if i'm going. to be committed to putting together. a one thing it really quiet that if you like doing it because you're going to stay in. there twenty quid it's got the public out there and we think it's something that for. example it's actually going to get a ticket for it. you get. people coming out who are coming to the call and i could tell you that i think that they want. to give thought of us and you can lead to people who they were not for not the people around you and you're trying not to feel included if you're a. structural situation clearly there's a lot of people and our emotions. right how. often they're going to come and preferably thompson while you're on. i think i could have

learned that it's good morning to get. some of the qualities that you needed for you getting out who and. to tell you what they were. walking carrying on. and for you know on the current times what he thought he meant the country could be at the town i. don't think the front door american there are. only taking on the sort of a new me growing up in the pinnacle. of the world because i'm looking forward to a very serious twenty thirty minutes to fall because you don't want people to know what was going for nothing it was that if you were trying to get a couple of coffee can. you make. you know a lot with the people that american. people hearing no i don't think he would be out to get it was worth it that he thought they were at the beginning of the

conflict for until he pulled it all i could see that is frightening putting up with under the carpet i think it's not there's a good situation you can trace and anger with the people to keep them calm and kind of we will continue to work the course with. one of the wingers who are good friends will thank you for everything that you had a big. time phone with i think an easy job for them who are not going to let that it cannot be difficult for them because i'm going to i'm going to. i'm talking to all get it together mention that it's critical to keep it going to be supported by the of course looking at it that they can you can get good today to remember the incident on the hunting. cretin. well we're one hundred.

points. thank you. for the call. the sound of gunfire and heavy artillery rings out in adelaide skyline with the u.n. observers in it live and there's been some pretty heavy gunfire. throughout the night

. now we'll see government seemingly has very tight control of the century area. and the fighting is continuing this they ceasefire hair both sides we're told of violating the peace plan. the u.n. observers into had lead on the way passing through homs and hama other areas monitors it based and areas that has seen some of the base destructive fighting. three homes we have a brief an emotional conversation with the residents after. safety. fighting the. that is he tries hard not to show perfectly encapsulate the level of devastation that has been wreaks on people's lives here throughout the course of the conflict is on to it

live on a stretch of road this names are being extremely dangerous it's a journey that would have been near impossible without the u.n. presence and with the volatile situation criminal gangs thought to operate in this area. we find it live under siege like conditions a quiet and intimidated city i don't know since a year and a half ago no one knows what's happening we go to sleep and wake up with fear some say is the government and other states armed groups we don't know who's doing that last we get a chance to meet it let's governor and ask him about the situation here. even if there is a little unrest in some areas or in a few spots it's due to people who are breaking the. checkpoint after checkpoint then we enter into an area outside of government control and it's a unique chance to see the u.n. monitors in action almost a month into the peace plan and your monitors on making small steps on the ground but it's going to be

a slow process throughout the course of the conflict it's been hard to come to some of the areas where the fiercest fighting happening and get a gauge of exactly what the situation is on the ground the u.n. observers traveling to some of these areas have given them access to what we see is a frightened population and the city symbol is the olive branch the symbol of peace is right now a city at civil war sara firth. r.t. is coming to live from moscow we're still plenty more ahead for you in this hour including nazis in the nursery young children last year get a lesson from men in uniforms or in a country already notorious for its problems with glorifying narcissism. russian businessman victor boot has compared the american justice system to a medieval inquisition he gave a rare and exclusive interview to us here at r.t.

after being convicted of arms trafficking in the us is the first time you've spoken to any english speaking channel since being detained in thailand the federal bureau of prisons ruled that he will serve his twenty five year term in a super maximum security jail in colorado boots lawyer at this point has already filed an appeal and the russian is awaiting the whole decision in his new york prison for the time being. has more on this. this was victor boots first interview to an english language t.v. news outlet not only since his sentencing but also since his extradition and speaking in one in six languages he's fluent in english he seemed quite candid generally we know that victor boot is quite positive considering the circumstances with personally seen him winking at his wife inside the courtroom today too he was quite calm and really shared his personal take on his case and kind of corona.

where you know. you don't every shot trial. where you know your mom accepted. that you were. recruited marker of actually showing them to completion of american jump to. conclusion to reach an american comic as a police and nonfunctional dictatorship of course his case has been like a hollywood blockbuster picture buddhas a russian air cargo business man in his forty's he's been dubbed the merchant of death in the united states the u.s. has spent years and tens of millions of dollars in an operation to hunt this man down of course we know that u.s. agents posing as far as members met with victor boot and then arrested him in thailand in two thousand and eight two years later regardless of the fact that thai courts found him not guilty twice in what was called arm twisting by the united states victor boot was extradited into u.s. territory to face charges of international arms trafficking victim but himself has

always maintained his innocence and believes his case to be political theaetetus also asked him if he has a message for the president of the united states as well as a u.s. official in general who are behind the operation in luring in victor boot. which will use. these products. drug enforcement. i'm very we're going to grant a crime this will not only not help america really solve the problem of the drug and you were convicted of going through the real problem for the real problem the french crime for close to your program go through somebody who goes for a walk through the corridors or thirty three different people or the border patrol the real problem to boot is appealing his twenty five year sentence behind bars and

says he continues to keep on fighting until he gets a chance to return back home to russia we know that he has filed an official request for the russian state duma to file a complaint against the united states and thailand victor boot himself says because he knows he's innocent he's hoping that he will not end up serving the entire twenty five years that he's been sentenced to but whether or not that's going to be the case we're going to have to wait and see that and you can catch the entire interview the exclusive ati and if you have that will be all day on sunday. it's good to have you with us here on out to you today for a third time this week greece's deadlock parliament is desperately trying to form

a coalition government but hopes of a deal remain slim with the country now facing the possibility it may have to hold yet another round of elections polls however suggest that pro bailout party the parties would suffer even more losses this time around those groups saw their power share plummet in sunday's election and europe is getting worried cutting the latest a bailout payment to cash strapped athens by one billion euros germany though is already guarding against any possible fallout saying the euro could survive with all without greece let's get some more insight on this now and find out why berlin is so optimistic and speak to financial writer peter build now joining us live here on our. good to see you thank you for joining us on the program today first off are you are you as confident as germany seems to be that the eurozone could survive fine with a greek exit. it depends how that exit took place and i'm not so sure that germany

is really that confident i mean mr schauble is perhaps whistling in the wind or singing in the rain but above all he's daring greece to go ahead and try and reopen . the terms of the bailout deal and that is what the germans at the moment are saying no i'm sorry you can't do that and if you prefer to leave rather than to accept the terms of already been agreed then although we regret it we can't stop you and by the way we have put in place all sorts of mechanisms all sorts of fire walls to make sure that if you go under you don't drag everybody else under with you the question is really does is he really confident of that's the case or is is simply saying it in order to put more pressure on the greeks ultimately to accept the bailout terms as they are but certainly there i mean it might seem to some that there is there is room for him to be somewhat optimistic greece only comprises two

percent of the eurozone economy and what it really pose such a danger if indeed it really did exit. it's not a question of whether greece is a member of the euro zone or not it's the manner of how they would leave it and all sorts of banks that are interrelated that have outstanding debt in euro's now would all of those be canceled how much would that affect a lot of europe's banks whether german or french or indeed spanish banks would it increase the pressure hugely on spain by raising doubts as to whether spain or indeed italy could be kept within the euro that is the the danger it's not a question of the tiny percentage of of european g.d.p. that greece represents where you mentioned you mentioned countries such as spain or italy that's an interesting point you bring up here because one of the threat of contagion it's a word we haven't heard so much about in recent months but is the threat back i mean how could how would

a greek exit affect the situation in spain or italy. the fact is nobody knows that is the dangerous thing. optimistic because it seems to imply that well if you must leave and go go ahead but we're not going to train to our terms but the real problem is that nobody actually knows how much debt is if you like dependent on greece staying in the in the euro zone and therefore greek debts that are interlinked with other european counterparts. to what extent that debt is repayable nobody actually knows and that is the real danger. the problem is not as i say it's not whether greece is in or out everybody except including mr schroeder that it might have been far better of greece hadn't joined in the first place using phony figures phony figures that the rest of the eurozone exempt accepted more on political and on economic grounds but it's not it's not

a question of whether you're in or out but it's a question of getting out that is the danger and you know when it comes to this what apparently is a vicious circle of debt going around here with german shouldering a lot a lot of the burden to prop up other members of the eurozone is it germany or is it the euro kratz in brussels who really have the final say at the end of the day and as you mentioned a moment ago there's an awful lot of politicking going on behind the scenes that might often cloud what should be clear judgment. well ultimately of course the governments in that mean in germany of course means berlin ultimately have the say they do control what the commission does through the off through the european council that's leave a meeting of the heads of state or heads of government but the problem is for germany that although it can say look we've already agreed this fiscal pact we've already agreed these bailout terms of the fiscal pact is now being is now being ratified by twenty five out of the twenty seven members two countries have already

ratified and the others are on the way the fact is that with france under a new leadership a leadership that doesn't actually accept the very severe austerity terms that have been incorporated or that have been that are represented by merkel and mr scheuer with that change in politics germany might well have to listen to other voices which we have to see whether mr hollande actually argues well you know let's not for greece out too fast let's see whether perhaps the terms that we insisted on are perhaps needlessly onerous or are self-defeating as he would argue and germany is at least going to have to listen to that sort of argument whether it except of are not in the end is another question but it cannot politically afford to be seen simply dismissing the views of let's say the french government and i must apologize to mr burt i'm running very very low on time but i do want to ask you one final question before we go the fitch ratings agency has just announced that if greece

abandons the euro it will consider downgrading all eurozone nations what are your thoughts on that. well in the sense of it all it doesn't really matter because it is relative gradings that matter above all that decides the so-called spreads that is the differences between the interest rate paid by one country and another country yes it would maybe make it more difficult and more expensive to all of europe to. borrow in the international markets compared with let's say. the united states but it's not really an issue if it is. all government. cried across europe that are actually downgraded peter bell the financial writer thank you very much for joining us on r.t. today my pleasure. twenty past the hour here in moscow in indonesia a team has found at least twelve bodies on the slopes of a volcano where

a new russian airliner crashed on wednesday during a demo flight by the rescue operation has been the whole state overnight until saturday morning for now see a smell that everybody on board might be dead. from the families and friends still holding out hope. chaos to jakarta's domestic airport where hundreds gathered after russian superjet sukhoi one hundred went missing from radars early thursday their worst fears were realized as air force helicopters found the remains of the plane on a mountainside thirty miles outside indonesia's capital city. ever since the plane disappeared off the radar members of the media and family members of those who were on the plane have been gathering here at the crisis center hoping for any word as to what could have happened to their loved ones and what caused the plane to go down. did their god mad has been at the airport since he found out that his wife was on board the missing plane she has been

a flight attendant for twenty years and didn't think it was necessary to tell her husband about the quick thirty minute demo when they got to she didn't tell me she was going on the plane i had no idea. the super jet was performing that demonstration for airline executives and potential buyers as part of an asian toy or a plane billed as state of the art with cutting edge technology the multibillion dollar project involved investors from around the world and tuesday's flight was expected to show the super rich in all its glory no one including blogger sergei jolie who has been following the super during the tour could have predicted this outcome we couldn't believe because. one of the best part of this in russia so we can believe anything. into the plane because we were absolutely confident in the believe most aviation experts believe that the treacherous terrain and poor visibility probably contributed to the plane going down on wednesday details that offer devastated

relatives little comfort i'm wishing for a miracle to happen to good news about i think so far that new news means good news i still have hope to find my wife we get what you. preassure either our teach a car to indonesia. and of course i do remember dot com you can find all the details about this flight as well as more about russia's or super super jet also online there were you can see photos of some of the crew cheering before the fatal flight that's taken less than an hour before the tragedy. plus a gender politics while the russian no blogosphere fumes of a claims that police have beaten a pregnant woman latest video is revealed of the woman who was actually a man. well controversial video footage has surfaced showing men in a waffen s.s. uniforms teaching children in a lot feehan kindergarten this in

a country which holds on you will parades to on a nazi veterans which is widely seen as an attempt to twist on historical truth about the second world war correspondent in eastern europe is. we understand that this incident happened on the march the sixteenth in the lobby in kindergarten we see two men wearing s.s. uniforms waffen s.s. uniforms walking into a kindergarten or two before and what they describe as apache or to a bringing less than two three four year old kids they tell stories about the lucky an s.s. legion which was fighting back in the 1940's on the german side against the allied forces but not only they were wearing s.s. uniforms but they also brought weapons from the nine hundred forty s. the ones which were used by the s.s. legion a lot in the war those were machine guns and even grenades and they even let the kids play with these weapons this incident is not a one off for this baltic states certainly every year on march the sixteenth they

are organizing marches of the former s.s. the s.s. veterans certainly this has been causing widespread condemnation in russia and in many post soviet states because of the attempts of the baltic states to rewrite history to glorify nazis and certainly this new incident adds new more fuel to this fire and it's interesting to see whether there will be any reaction coming from the european union which a lot of a certainly a member of because just as in russia and in the post soviet space everything related to nazis is outlawed in europe interesting to see whether this incident in the kindergarten which has already outraged many critics in russia will cause some controversy across the european continent. reporting there in a moment is daniel with the business for now the r.t. world update it starts with egypt where the country's two election front runners have squared off in the first ever presidential debate former mubarak era foreign minister. and moderate islamist abdel moneim aboul fotouh both challenge each other

in a four hour debate over religion's role then democracy the two are among thirteen candidates running in the election egyptian ex-pats have already begun casting their votes with the rest of the country going to the polls on may twenty third. the former chief executive of news international has told a british inquiry into media ethics about her friendship with the country's prime minister david cameron rebecca brooks said she received messages of support from him after stepping down from rupert murdoch's company in the wake of the phone hacking scandal cameron set up the ethics inquiry last year in response to the revelations that the news of the world had hacked into the phone of a murdered british schoolgirl. and their ears as promised r.t. is it down your bush or standing by for the hourly business update i understand daniel that j.p. morgan shares opened after posting huge losses or was the latest update on the.

tree and hit every branch on the learn the eight percent after trader dubbed along the way all reportedly lost two billion dollars that's more than all the was case for new york europe is losing off to brussels the eurozone economies will spring this year. one of the e.u. parliament biggest groupings the your view conservatives and reformists have refused to sign off on the e.u. twenty ten budget of the order to billions of europe misspent impose more pressure on the e.u. bid for a thirteen percent budget rise next year. welsh markets the down of the same three hundred fifty one million dollar outflows in a week that's the biggest lot. this year let's check stocks still make a noble lympics this profit for four to one close sale of its shares to china's ching dong and utility or s.k. may be taken over by the federal grid company currencies the euro is higher to the dollar this hour the ruble is retreating to the main currencies the crude prices

are heading for a second weekly drop amid rising u.s. stockpiles for thursday the group of major oil exporting countries opec said they're producing almost ten percent more crude the necessary and russia's newly built gasoline if europe by forcing transit countries like ukraine may get a further capacity boost shareholders of north stream say they'll look at building one or even two additional lines to the project is already carrying gas through an existing line while another is complete and expected to be running by the end of the year and drop today most or is on a website. daniel thank you see you next hour. in just a moment here on the program how the battle with the headlines and then it's time for.