scaremongering over syria's chemical weapons potential get the world community fired up despite assurances from damascus that such arms used in the country's internal crisis. and terror concerns for syria grow on the back of a resurgent al qaeda which is accused of the militant onslaught that left more than a hundred people dead in iraq plus this hour no letter for the eurozone a tally of mayors now protest against austerity by the ratings agency set their sights on the e.u. economy including germany. updated the news twenty four seven hello there this is r.t. my name's kevin owen it's now eight pm here in moscow and first syria's rebel rebels claim the regime has moved its chemical arsenal to airports near the

country's borders and a move they say is to intimidate foreign powers sources in damascus though claim the lion's share of the stockpiles are stored securely in syria's less turbulent south the regime also ruled out such weapons could be used in the conflict between the rebels and the government forces reports. monday's news conference here in damascus foreign ministry spokesman did mean that syria indeed possesses chemical weapons something that nonproliferation experts have suggested all along and that the syrian authorities have a number of straight forwardly deny damascus has never signed the chemical weapons convention so technically its admitting to having those chemical stockpiles is not a while ration of any international treaty which all of that syrian officials have long suggested that they need some sort of deterrent against israel similarly non-attachment its nuclear weapons program in terms of keep abilities syria is

believed to possess nerve agents and mustard gas as well as missile capabilities to do a very enthused about those chemicals believed to be produced five facilities around the country including two locations in hundreds and home of those c.d.'s as you will have seen major fighting between the opposition forces and the army. several israeli and western officials over the past few months have raised concerns that if bashar assad's regime indeed falls those chemicals would fall into terrorist hands and while the syrian authorities house or to downplay this thread they are saying that all the weapons including chemical weapons are now under direct supervision and control of the syrian army despite those. statements it is believed to be a considerable threat and the western policy makers should consider that as one of

the negative concert of support for the opposition forces now over the past few weeks this in. speculations in western media suggesting that. the assad government may use those chemicals in its fight against armed groups. these suggestion was to goree can we do not are these press conferences and damascus and monday before in history a spokesman said that no chemical or biological weapons will ever be used during the crisis in syria no matter what developer has inside syria he also said that all of these speculations are part of a major media can be very international public opinion or military intervention in syria how did it both pretext of weapons of mass destruction similar to the one that toppled saddam hussein of course one of the examiner boyd she brings you more

updates analysis and firsthand impressions from the conflict zone twitter feed as well one of the latest tweets she's such an aleppo resident who says that despite the effort to evacuate people to safety preferring to stay indoors because it's a state gunfire that submit media reports that the commercial hub seeing fighter jets for the first time now in the conflict to talk about that next let's go live to william f. research and author of myths. oil wars he's on the line now he's in germany let's catch up with william the buzz started when syria's ambassador to iraq who defected to the opposition claims the assad regime may have already used chemical weapons do you think that's true let's talk about that first before we talk about these warplanes i think this is virtually unlikely that this happened because it would be madness to use chemical weapons inside closed urban areas you get to your supporters as well as as these al qaida mercenaries and the same these are not precise weapons these are for huge battlefield conditions if it. so our doctors for

much could it be used as an excuse to invade syria like happened in iraq almost a decade ago. well like yogi berra used to say this is deja vu all over again i smell a rerun of the old the pentagon scenario that dick cheney and friends ran to justify the war in iraq with the niger yellowcake and now they're trying to do that with the weapon of mass destruction chemical warfare weapons whatnot with syria to create this climate that this is the most pressing thing on the face of the earth and this is simply not the case do you think people are going to cotton on to that this time around though. well you know you wonder how many times it's going to take before people wise up to the fact that this is all of scenarios is scripted the rand corporation did the did the book on this in the pentagon the put it into their how to military manuals and they're just toppling one regime after another to create to create their grand designs and. you know this is this is not

a way toward democracy this is a way toward a one superpower tyranny in my book ok well the other thing that's playing out is what we mentioned just now those media reports suggesting that fighter jets to be used for the first time in a syria crisis targeting the commercial hub of aleppo all that fighting has been going on now the same military action in libya of course custom mines back spot you know un sanctioned no fly zone now if this these latest reports have proved true why would the syrian regime repeat that mistake. well i don't think where is the proof that fighter jets have been used in aleppo will recall that when those charges were made about the bombing of innocent civilians to. invoke the doctrine of responsibility to protect. the created this u.n. security council. sham to bomb libya the there was no independent proof that fighter jets had been used by gadhafi and again i don't

think it would make any sense at all for fighter jets to be used in a commercial area in aleppo what would it bring them and you know this is i think we're just watching the orchestration images are being played on the to the world opinion this is exactly what happened in libya we must do something humanitarian intervention and so forth and frankly i don't think that that's a reality look at what's in front of you know looking back at the history books and give it your best guess which scenario is more likely to play out and say do you think the libyan will the iraqi one. well a no fly zone is not feasible right now given the massive ineffective. aircraft defenses that libya has a rather syria has excuse me. i think they're going to try a combination of all of the above and probably try to keep this on a hot burner until after the u.s. election is now whether israel for reasons of its own and wanting to tilt the u.s. elections toward romney mitt romney and away from obama netanyahu just despises

personally and politically. that i can't say i just don't have i'm not privileged to have inside information on this is really intent if they're trying to hold up this. chemical weapons scenario to create the. rush toward war but i think we're going to see a huge escalation of all of this after the november elections and the january oath of office of the next u.s. president do you think it's i mean i go yeah. well i think they're going to obama doesn't want this to break into an open war before the election that's the last thing american voters want is another iraq or another afghanistan on their doorstep when in fact of. research and all sort of of myths law is an oil was thank you. so you know rocky officials put the blame for monday's terrible its which killed one hundred sixteen people squarely on. the nationwide offensive spending at least thirteen cities ended with two more bombings during the night the attacks ranged

from bombings to shootings and primarily targeted iraq's government and security forces he's going to teach you can with the details. the self-appointed leader of the iraqi branch of al qaida abu barker all baghdadi has announced the resurgence of terror in the country and clearly indicated there is more to come moreover he dedicated more than half of his online speech to the uprising in syria they happen to be staunch supporters of the rebels they are various organizations are pointing at the expansion of terrorist networks in syria which effectively fuels civil war there so this iraqi based al-qaeda leader also warned the syrian rebels not to accept a new rule or constitution but god's will and career islamic law otherwise quote you will lose your blast revolution end of quote also in his message of support to the syrian rebels he says quote we taught the world lessons of courage and jihad and proved that injustice could only be removed by force end of quote to talk a little bit more about the lessons of iraq i'm joined by michael o'brien author of

the book called america's failure in iraq sir you were based in baghdad at the height of the insurgency there so with the u.s. invasion in iraq six tarion war loss and the rampant insurgency terror which still continues to kill iraqis on a regular basis in june alone nearly two hundred people were killed in similar attacks across iraq when the u.s. decided to go in. you think they they didn't know how divided iraq was that what the consequences the regime change would lead to it was never really seriously considered. and i say this because of the very simplistic attitude the very cavalier attitude of the bush administration of which i i was in the bush administration for two years so they know about it though they knew about it they just i don't they were i really don't think they factored it in at all everything the united states did lead to where we are and where they are in iraq today it was

totally destabilized. and then you get the tension between the sunni and the shia saddam was a sunni which is a minority of the population al-qaeda all they want to do al qaida in iraq is they'll kill sunni's so that the shiites take the blame bill kill shiites so that the sunni will take the blame they really don't care all they want to do is kill people and foment unrest do you think those world powers that call for a military intervention in syria know how divided syria is i certainly hope that they take these things these factors like that into consideration here for the lessons of iraq the lessons of iraq are there for the world to see michael o'brien thank you sir. there is terrible violence going on in syria and it is now an all out civil war those who are against military intervention there remind how divided syria is between different ethnic groups religious communities it's a powder keg essentially in many war and if

a solution is forced on them from outside from out of syria the powder keg could blow into a never ending civil war in iraq is an example after the u.s. carried out regime change their civil war broke out and killed more than a hundred thousand civilians not to mention millions of refugees as the recent attacks iraq still remains a hotbed of terror in washington i'm kind of. coming up on r.t. this blockade unlocked egypt let's go to cross the border more freely ending five years of travel restrictions imposed as part of the israel gaza blockade. next the ratings agency moody's has set itself on a collision course with german chancellor angela merkel after changing the country's credit to negative the agency even hinted at possible downgrades if the eurozone gets worse but merkel immediately but that germany would remain europe's financial haven despite the euro crisis is out he's played a role of a new report from berlin. well this really isn't good news for germany you've got

one of the major credit agencies in the world saying that well they don't have faith in the german financial sector that's what this negative outlook rating means it doesn't mean however that germany's aaa credit rating will be affected however these type of negative ratings have led to in the past countries losing that aaa rating we're looking at people countries like france and italy they went the same way now this is jiu moody's is saying to a potential greek exit from the euro zone also the fact that it may be a worse crisis in spain than previously we had thought german chancellor angela merkel has said she's not worried by this negative rating she says that germany's economy will continue to be the strongest in europe but it is looking over the shoulder at what's going on in greece we're hearing from the the greek prime minister that the recession in his country could be worse than previously expected

previously they thought that the economy would shrink by around five percent this year he's now saying that could be as high as seven percent also hearing from the german vice chancellor talking about greece saying that as far as he's concerned the horror of a potential greek exit is over perhaps he's saying that we're ready and we're prepared for greece to leave the euro what is happening in greece right now though is the three main lenders in athens to try and get deficit cuts back on schedule in spain well it's coming out that they might be in far more situation than the thought it now seems that boeing is high cost more in spain now that it has in any other country since the formation of the euro so high in countries that have received bailouts in the past like portugal like greece. so it could be a far worse situation there would not be reflected in what we're seeing on the street in spain at the moment terrible scenes of violence there. people are out

protesting against deficit cutting measures that having to they're taking place in the country with things clashes with police very violent clashes at times across spain as people come out on the streets and voice their discontent at the current financial situation in their country. roll over in berlin for us for marco pierre trollies a financial adviser and wealth manager he told us the markets have already decided spain's fate and things stand the market has already priced in. that spain is are. bankrupt will need and i don't think there is anything that can can stop that i think sublimest will persist for for some time and i think the only thing that's going to really pacify the situation is when austerity finishes this once you've got unemployment around twenty five to thirty odd percent youth unemployment above fifty percent it's very very difficult to turn that want

to rant when they can see that there is a lie to the end of the tunnel when there's some sort of green shoots economy but we might be right some way way before that happens. over in italy municipal mayors have now become the latest to join and hysterically protests in rome they're upset about looming new budget cuts which they say will leave already suffering areas and or even greater strain sylvio trying who's the mayor of the town of coney says there's a consensus that rome is out of touch with the hardships faced by many outside the capital. especially in these times when we have difficulties and then when people are losing their jobs their homes people are trying to find an answer in their municipalities and the cuts proposed by government. deeply affected the finances of our municipalities so we are not able to offer these services and also general services for elderly for young for for the children so

this is the main problem we have always had to deal idea that in this state the central government doesn't know exactly what happens in our towns and so we are trying to explain to make they understand what is there really happening and so i think they will listen at least to some of our proposed. parties business to keep the european financial woes of course on close watch for you and also those will be piece russian ventured slipping from his grasp daniels got more on that a bit later. he's. told for the birth to result joint joins the be doing for the british troops troubled we'll have details in business of twenty books. for the top news stories now of the day the reports of a massive police operation of the mountains of to start the official information we've got says twelve special service officers have died while thirty armed

militants have been killed and forty others captured sean thomas reports. but this fighting is in a very remote eastern region of tajikistan and known as shon and it borders afghanistan let me paint a picture for you of just exactly how dangerous this area is it is known as a base for terrorist group operations because of its proximity to afghanistan also known as a region for arms drug trafficking and tobacco trafficking as well now this particular fighting is targeted at one person government government officials are targeting one man. back off who's a strong man who himself is a desert or from the border guard in the region his group is known for lots of illegal activity as well for trafficking robberies as well as murders including the stabbing death of an official in the area on this past saturday now this began three days of negotiation with the group to try and give up the people responsible

for the stabbing deaths that did not work out then the fighting began residents have been advised to stay at home as they're hearing explosions and gunfire very near to the city now some of the fighters that are in custody who have been captured are believed to be from afghanistan and taliban fighters themselves and. himself is believed that this point two of the fled the scene crossed the border into afghanistan. you know almost always of course on a website called reporting tonight on the rise of nationalism. financially and it's a big worry a warning for one of the stories he could play the way for a new. politics and fractured economies. plus chicago said to pay a million dollars to to. the hands of the city's x. police chief. for much.

egypt is now a low use your entry and temporary stay in the country for palestinian families the president move effectively ends the part of a blockade on gaza which israel imposed reported after hamas took control of the palestinian territory now the d.g. of tirzah president from the muslim brotherhood the move is widely seen as a gesture of support for hamas the brotherhood's independent offshoot of his policy or explain the situation a bit more. cairo is allowing palestinians a free entry into egypt effectively ending a five year blockade on the gaza strip what this means is that palestinians can now leave gaza with the same law applying to palestinians in the west bank and jerusalem this unprecedented move effectively elects travel restrictions that have been imposed on gazans for the past five years they've been penned into this tiny

mediterranean coastal city by a blockade imposed by israel but also assisted by the egyptian authorities egypt's interest was because of its fear for her mass and the spread of islamic militancy but what we see now is a change largely in part because of separate meetings that were held in the past few days between the palestinian president mahmoud abbas the new egypt president dr mohamed morsi of the muslim brotherhood as well as the leader of hamas which controls the gaza strip khaled mashal so this certainly is a gesture of support by the egyptians to the palestinians in a separate and unrelated move israel has just announced that it is demolishing eight palestinian villages in the south hebron hills now the announcement says that the land is needed for training by the israeli defense forces by exercises that they carry out what we understand is that the farmers will still have access to their land to work the land when the soldiers are not there so this would be on the

weekend and on jewish holidays but the rest of the time the land will be used by the idea of so you. are seeing this almost parallel but completely opposing effort by cairo and tell everyone on the one hand the egyptians extending a hand of friendship while the israelis further is strange in themselves and isolating themselves not only from the region but from the egyptian neighbors paullus they are to tell of is one who's a brief making headlines around the world a strong typhoon has hit hong kong under twenty one business to a standstill the highest hurrican signal for thirteen years was issued as a warning before and being downgraded subway stations became firm shelters four hundred slept in their flights were canceled cleanup crews are now working to clear fall and trees and electric cables. eight people are being charged in britain over the phone hacking scandal that ingolf rupert murdoch's newspapers among the two former news of the world editors and he calls and he became prime minister david

cameron's media spokesman and rebecca brooks who went on the run murdoch's news you describe in the u.k. the charges are over illegally accessing the voice mails of thousands of people including a missing schoolgirl who was later found murdered. dramatic pictures in the forest fires raging out of control in a tourist area northwest croatia today they've forced one thousand four hundred people to evacuate to safety a number of residential buildings in the area at risk one hundred fifty firefighters battling the blaze which is being found by strong winds keep an eye on it for you. keeping an eye on the business stories well imagine just now be paying living close to getting out of its troublesome joint venture we saw daniel just now let's hear from you again. today on that story you know the british confirm starting talks with rosneft which ones to avoid stakeout interior gave e.p. most with this fear has moved the peace position in this russian arms to hold to keep all these are going to explain. the mystery around who's going to get b.p.

shares in the t.n.t. b.p. joint venture is now becoming bigger since russia's largest oil company of course has announced that it's looking at buying it in fact both of those the afghan b.b. have confirmed that they've signed this agreement marking the start of negotiations which are going to be kept confidential for the next few months with itself says that this doesn't guarantee anything since the russian shareholders off the end of course i mean. they're already in the process of negotiations with b.p. on the same issue and they do have. right now here he has been in the spotlight for quite some time there's a lot of speculation that there are. in the joint ventures management around which side has more influence it is a very attractive project and well definitely the russian shareholders are very keen on getting their hands on the b.b.c. shares the british energy giant and were also in the spotlight some time ago and i

mean in january two thousand and eleven when they signed the deal aiming to jointly develop the arctic shelf that deal was basically blocked a again why and how flags are seen off the flame that it's why only to the national t m p p p agreement they didn't include them so that deal was basically cancelled by the stockholm court now it's estimated that b.p. shares in the t.m.t. b.p. joint venture is worth around twenty billion dollars but analysts say that this price could become much higher. as the negotiations go on. shares edged into the red in the last trade here today follows yesterday's paul show when the r.t.s. shared almost five percent and madrid were the worst major bourses in europe today spain's finance ministers holding crisis talks with germany today as a big bailout looks increasingly likely good chinese manufacturing data is being outweighed by worry on europe tech stocks down off the microsoft intel and yahoo

express caution on their outlook single currency is a losing rung spain's boring course of holding at a eurozone brickwall deploy of seven percent considered unsustainable by economists russia wants to link its european and systems which are historically separate more . to increase competition between power companies and lower prices for households but analysts warn it's a huge project that will take significant time to achieve europe today. or i don't know thanks for that thanks so much twenty six minutes past eight o'clock now moscow time just ahead a look at the security struggles of nato and the u.s. that's coming up in a few minutes after i've updated the headlines and they're next.

wolf to the from me more and more mouths to feed but where will the food come from can science provide the answers to the future of food under the microscope. we've got the future covered.

rushes would be soon which brightened if you knew about sun from phones to fresh and so. nice for instance on t.v. dot com. and one .