the latest news on the week's top stories are back obama's tough foreign policy action kicks in quick after softer rhetoric secured his control of the white house for another four years. the greek parliament approves next year's budget passing more draconian spending cuts and tax hikes to secure a fresh tranche of new bailout loans. by western powers to step down and facing death threats from the rebels the syrian president exclusively tells our state until he's voted out. and israel takes aim at its neighbors firing its first rounds at syria since nine hundred seventy three after killing six palestinians and tell you for attacks from gaza.

you're watching artie's weekly news review i'm carrie dalton. well after a grueling campaign that cost almost a billion dollars back obama secured a second term as a u.s. president he edged hard line and mitt romney setting a socially conscious domestic vision of the diplomacy based focus on foreign affairs but obama's softer campaign talks in transformed into tough action even before all about it's have been counted he's going to if you can explain. in the wake of president obama's reelection there was no sense of euphoria as in two thousand and eight but his victory did come as a relief to most americans his challenger mitt romney was widely seen as more aggressive especially his foreign policy rhetoric also a seemingly out of touch with middle class america we are an american family and we

rise or fall together as one nation. is called winning for him right after reelection is the so-called fiscal cliff a combination of automatic tax hikes and spending cuts all we need is action from the house. and i've got the pen ready to sign the bill right away. but averting the fiscal cliff is probably not the first issue addressed by the president. he also rise the drone strike targeting a group of al qaeda militants in yemen on wednesday the u.n. has raised concerns about the legality of such strikes due to reported heavy civilian casualties on lack of transparency on the u.s. part we're in uncharted waters when it comes to policy american policy related to drones this way the administration imposed financial sanctions against iranian officials so the u.s. planes were jamming satellite broadcast and blocking internet access in iran that comes on top of a whole lot of other sanctions that had been put in place by the u.s.

which proved to be crippling for the iranian economy the goal is not to change the iranian government's decision making it's actually leverage ordinary civilians against the iranian government and to threaten to topple the government by inciting you know food riots or you know people who are unhappy because they can't you know their grandparents are dying and can't get medicine and on friday despite president obama's claims the u.s. should move away from the cold war thinking in relations with russia the white house launched its first permanent military presence on polish soil the issue has been a constant sword in the side of relations between moscow and washington as the u.s. also plans to install missile interceptors in poland but the president every other democrat that i'm aware of is also made it clear that it believes russia is still the opposed to it still sees it as as if we're just going to go ahead and believe the president's actions so far have shown while he may be talking soft he's acting

tough looking at all is president obama's first moves after reelection one could say he takes the idea of america being the wall police very seriously but the question is who can hold that world police itself accountable in washington i'm going to check on what a former cia officer told r.t. that obama needs to break free of the pressure exerted by america's right wing. what i would suggest is that he call a press conference what he would say is you know the campaign is over and i found out that i've been grievously misled they told me to say that iran had threatened to wipe israel off the map and i found out that they never said that it's a matter of fact the israeli deputy prime minister sort of said ok ok they never said that and so my speechwriters are being canned i'm going to get some new speechwriters the intelligence community keeps telling me that he ryan has not yet

decided to build a nuclear weapon and so i'm going to get rid of all those folks from brookings other places who are the soft on which the speech saying well you know you still have to worry about this instead of negotiations once these troublesome people have their own agenda are dismissed then he has a square chance of saying look we're going to do a deal with the run just as i said five years ago we're going to talk directly to them and we're not going to let that be sabotaged by either israeli intelligence or israeli official or not those within the neoconservative camp in washington. greek lawmakers have approved a budget for next year to secure the next tranche of bailout funds from europe it's awful stairs and cuts mean more hardship for the greek people than the greek prime minister pleaded with them peace to be realistic and support the new cuts that which the country would run out of money by the end of the week belt tightening reforms demanded by the country's creditors

a spark violence between riot police and protesters mr this and a populist says the austerity and the cash tied to it is about external control of the greek financial policies the release of these law more wagered long delayed thirty one point five billion euro tranche that's the only thing that the government has just if you can you should put the program. at the program is unfair and probably is going to bring more recession then a recovery or leaning light year what they want to do is to have full control of budgetary situation as well as their disempowerment of and to have a say in the market itself so really the new conditions have to do with who is in control of the budgetary and new situation in greece is it the

greek government or is berlin. last seen everything. syria's president has rebuffed the western calls to step down and warned that foreign intervention will spark a global disaster this is an exclusive interview for r.t. this week it's online at r.t. dot com and that will be showing it next hour on this channel interview so fishermen answer explains what bashar assad had to say. the thing that really mark me the most is how really how much more complicated situation inside series that from what we see in the media because i talk to people yes the country is divided but even the people who didn't like us before this conflict started are now so scared that fundamentalists will come to power fundamentalists who are fighting on the side of the free syrian army and syrian people are not about that i mean this is like the only secular that had

a lot of different religious groups always living in peace with each other whether it's sunni or shia or waves or christians so they're really scared that if assad goes the army will fall apart and then you know you have this extremist muslims coming to them and asking them to basically be just like them so it's not just about assad i think people feel like whether he goes or stays. it's only can get worse if he goes because it will get i mean that the terror attacks will continue and the fundamentalists will come to power so they're very scared of that. that he's not a western puppet he also denies to fuck that civil war is taking place in this country he's saying that it's not civil war it's a conflict where he has to fight different fractions of terrorism atthis us on the fact that the financing of this terrorist fractions was unprecedented and it was coming from abroad he also said that if the west were to intervene militarily it would have a do you know if from atlantic to pacific the prize will be in vision and it's going. to be more than the whole world came before because if you have

a problem in syria and rolled with the last stronghold of. stability in the region and coexistence. between have to do mean or face. to the pacific you know because you know. with of going in but. we got but. nobody can tell what's next. or present our side says that only elections can determine his future but it seems that not everyone agrees the free syrian army is media chief says they want the president's head on a plate in his statement to your channel he said he would not leave syria we know this very well because he will not be able to leave syria he and his people not managed to leave the country the free syrian army will not let you do this you will not get out of syria long you'll be lucky if you notice the same fate as.

the leaders of the syrian opposition say they've signed an initial agreement to form a new umbrella coalition to a conference in qatar the syrian national council has lost support in syria itself after key activists there this of our the exiled officials who are u.k.'s top general says his countrymen the launch and limited military intervention as early as this winter it's call analyst frank and says that only foreign action can topple assad at this point. now third a nato type no fly zone massive massive air strikes no i don't think. the regime can be defeated because their air force is being supplied it still has a lot of reserves and i don't i don't see it in a measured got nato or a ground invasion i think what we've seen so far of this opposition which is

actually splendor and some ways they've got a very steep slope to climb the only reason we have that almost tissue quality dream out was the threats and they could jolie and the political pressure that was put on them they had to do something this weekend do you think the west is going to show up in qatar and arrange a show and no result to know how long it'll last we don't know and it's been twenty one months into libya you recall and there are factions still aren't glued together and they had the benefit of nine thousand bombing runs by nato so i i think that the other problem is not the groups themselves which are very disparate but the lack of support that they've got now among the syrian people and what they have lost in terms of respect with through a lot of crimes they've committed a lot of assassinations and massacres this is a last ditch effort in a sense to try to put together viable opposition and only time will tell if it's

going to stick together. and as a syrian opposition struggles to form a final force israel finds its first rounds that the country in decades. will strike israeli forces on gaza tell the asian from the typewriter that since. less than a month after the end of the siege of the institute. find out just how much is not being revealed the country is groomed for the tourist information. soft a short break. it sounds like a dragon crashing through the forest but it is in fact technology versus trees and would you believe it this machine can file and strip hundreds of them each day get a widget when building this facility we wanted to use advanced technology that

would increase efficiency and allow us not to use manual labor also this provides for better quality goods as a result we were able to conquer western markets the demand for corrina birchwood is high since our production line is quite efficient where i would watch for high wages to our employees the trunks and up here where that turned into planks which branch off for all manner of uses these would export and large but not all of it goes with gold. here in the museum island of traditional methods they used to build and maintain churches and dwellings dating back hundreds of years in this whole what careers use of what riches by. complexity these planks are about to become part of something which exemplifies the combination of tradition and technology. here at the valley and all viking boat makers what is fashioned into vessels new

and old they range from small private boats to replicas used in the historical t.v. series hornblower. my books are all special they're like children to me we have to design and build them from scratch it's always sad when we have to part ways every time we sail away while we remain at the dark and pavel gets much of his timber from karelia same customers pining for its high quality wood. which brings us to the first six million cubic meters of wood is cut down and. careen just forests every year that goes to make everything from farm houses to firewood and withdrawing is proximity to europe on the baltic it's big forests big business. wealthy british.

markets. come to. find out what's really happening to the global economy with mike stronger the no holds barred look at the global financial headlines comes a report. issued three couldn't take three. three. three. three stooges three. three blog video for your media project free media. dot com. this is a welcome back israel's military is engaged on the both its northern front is right

now the country has fired into syria in response to a mortar attack on the golan heights and is warning of tougher action against militants in gaza. in the palestinian territory reports. early on sunday afternoon israel fired into syrian territory for the first time since the nine hundred seventy three war as though clearly of with the israeli defense forces spokesperson unit who did confirm that these warning shots took place he said that they were in was once to a more to show for link near any israeli military post in the golan heights now these ladies do not believe that they were the target they do believe that the shell was part of the byproduct of the internal fighting taking place in syria between forces loyal to assad and rebel fighters but the army is saying that it won't tolerate more tests from syria that violates the disengagement agreement between israel and syria now there have been several such incidents over the past

two weeks just last week three syrian tanks crossed over the demilitarized zone between the two countries alarming israelis and also causing them to ways they will in the area the idea of has filed a complaint with the united nations saying that any kind of fire imitating from syria into israel will be responded to also on the southern israeli border we have seen a flare up of violence between the israelis and palestinian militants the latest we heard from the israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu is that his country is ready to strike harder against the gaza strip if it does not stop attacking israel he made these remarks today sunday at the weekly cabinet meeting in which he said and i'm quoting that the world must understand that israel cannot sit idly by while attempts are made to attack it the hostilities along the israel gaza border have it's going to choppy particularly this past weekend this follows israeli airstrikes that killed six palestinians four of whom were teenagers and two of whom belonged

to the militant group islamic jihad according to the gaza health ministry spokesperson there are a number of people who were injured the biggest stands at around thirty including children the problem though is that often in these israeli airstrikes israel lands of killing civilians and not militants as its intention. it is a must have taken responsibility for this attack they worked for israeli soldiers that were wounded in it and the response from the palestinian side was dozens of rockets that were fired into southern israel early on sunday morning the whole south of israel is in a state of high alert and this comes of palestinian militants about to take a vengeance for these deaths now flare ups along the israeli gaza border are quite common and we had seen already two flare ups this month this though is one of the highest casualty counts in gaza in a single incident in recent months. one sectarian violence between rival religious groups breaks out in neighboring lebanon three people died in a gun battle between the sunni followers of

a hardline cleric and hizbullah fighters comes at a time when shia muslims including his brother mark an annual ten day morning ritual the instance is the latest in the spillover of violence from neighboring syria which analysts say is a mirror image of lebanon's own sectarian divides. violent clashes have broken out in warsaw after around twenty thousand people marched polish independence day just as chanted anti-government slogans and threw firecrackers security forces used rubber bullets tear gas and battens to bring the situation and. two police officers were injured and several right wing nationalist with attained. at least twelve people have been killed and dozens more injured in a devastating earthquake in the six point eight magnitude quake struck near the largest city of london a collapsing a bridge and threw workers into the river is the biggest earthquake to hit the country since two thousand and eleven. and the u.n.

nuclear watchdog says iran is carrying out what could be cleanup activity at one of its key military bases which the i.a.e.a. wants to inspect for nuclear research projects the parts inside hasn't been visited by the u.n. since two thousand and five and some western countries suspect iran of using it to hide elements of a weapons program iran strongly denies trying to develop a nuclear deterrent and the i.a.e.a. says there's good reason to believe the iranians will cooperate with inspectors. libya is trying to tout its wealth of ancient ruins to tempt tourists back to the revolution visitors went away but the country's most recent history is off the map and holiday makers aren't likely to learn much about the deadly siege of bani walid less than a month ago. expects. we here at the world's travel market to trade say taking place in london or people can consulates their holiday inspiration or that scout

exotic spot for a honeymoon a one country you probably wouldn't expect to see being touted as a tourist destination and that's libya the places where the tourist interesting the site is a political sideshow it's completely safe going around today it's got to be saved more than even towns to big towns like london or new york but there's somewhere that is not mentioned in the guide burke bani walid a desert town this remain loyal to formally to colonel gadhafi it's just a few hours dry southeast of the traditional tourist destination tripoli but it's a world away from the safe environment the two guides of pitching. town's become the scene of some of the fiercest fighting since the libyan uprising last year but despite reports of indiscriminate shelling and gas attacks on the local population at the hands of the libyan army has seen an almost total media blackout in the. field on the story for more than a fortnight before anyone else picked it up back in london and despite libya being

shaikh ace it seems that bani walid has once again being conveniently left out the conversation when i saw. it was of course with surprise and i came to the feedback of the situation at the moment in libya and if we have so many people it means situations they could be coming most and we can think for next season to do something with libya and it's a wonderful country so. what about what's happening. do you mean was hacked was being happening there there's been fighting do you know about that no we went to confront the tour operator i saw you speaking some people you telling them about what's been happening in bani walid at the moment. this is. for the. reason because it was deeply disturbing is that despite a growing body of evidence about crimes against civilians and increasingly vocal

concerns from human rights organizations the same media and government remain resolutely silent i've got to sort of package this as a success it's very important for nato so we have. been liberated in inverted commas great places to go great places to invest and the reality for the everyday person in these countries is a living hell really pick up one of travel information and you'll be given reasons to visit libya and undoubtedly there are many there's a concerning silence in. the u.k. media a seeming refusal to pull. about what's been happening in places like. the reality is that the new government is struggling to control its militias and bridge the divides that remain in the country but none of that you're going to read about. sir . for five months behind closed doors is taking its toll on joining us sanjay

it's fear they whistle blowers it's here a term that mental health is pretty unique generally in the bolt on life. the flame that cost the cia boss his job is infidelity really want forced to try this out. and rolling with the stone tough times force one of the judges go friends from the sixty's auction off legends number that is the details are at dot com. all right you're watching r.t. and after the break we explore the fate of ethnic minorities in america's armed forces stay with us. if you're passing through rushes to veer region you really can walk on the wild side thousands of kilometers of unspoiled countryside make up an area where it's

still possible to live off the land and enterprising locals so the fruits of the forest by the side of nearly every road. such spectacular scenery makes it a paradise for fisherman and provides a business opportunity for hunt is. going on he has been hunting for more than thirty years and works for a company providing expeditions for tourists this season ducks are on the menu. for two things a successful duck under a blanket and a bottle silence which means that i need to be very quiet i'm not going to write in the. office. but when you've been in the business as long as he has the birds don't stand much chance. there are defined hunting seasons in russia but lax enforcement means many animals are killed out of the allotted times which can leave young animals orphaned and unable to survive but

environmentalists are fighting back the heart of just us forest provides a sanctuary for the most famous beast in russia it's home to a group who rescue often bear cubs and raise them when they're old enough to fend for themselves the cubs are tagged taken to a remote location and released back into the wild but it's not just bears who find a haven here this is wolf island here wolf pups have been captured by hunters or bought from zoos have a second chance at life and conservationists have a unique opportunity to observe them these walls are all around four months old and they'll stay in this area for up to three years then most will go back to the wild for good just viewing them from the car was an experience in itself but then after a bit of a bumpy ride came an opportunity i just couldn't pass up. and this is where i was hoping for when i heard i was coming to a place called wolf i had

a chance to get close and personal with the locals and it's these guys are going to act as foster parents for the next generation will come here. using the old awards as surrogate parents has already proved a successful technique. every year i place infant wolves with one year old wolf cubs whose parental instinct is totally shaped and they take them as their own cubs it's an important part of the world's development and a major factor in the success of a project which has seen more than twenty generations of cubs grow up here it's going to continue to take time and money to rehabilitate the wolfs reputation in russia. but the keepers here hope their research and dedication mean that wolf island remains a place where visitors can truly understand the call of the wild. they're

not made everybody every. minute we're going up to san francisco we'll welcome but fifty miles

a day for sixteen days from here to san francisco that's right will arrive on march twenty seventh the third anniversary of cases is death. things.