the latest news on the week's top stories are international journalists including an aussie news crew come under rubble fire while covering the conflict in syria. well sam americans are to foot the bill president obama signs a stop gun law or to raise their taxes as part of the deal to avoid plundering off the fiscal cliff. they have be eyes accused of failing to want american occupy activists that there was a plot against them. plus an icon of french cinema arrives in russia where he's expected to receive

a passport after quitting his upon country of attacks. latest news on the week's top stories this is the wiki on our she with me thanks for joining us now is this syrian conflict so renewed violence in the first week of the new year it also led to more counties among journalists covering the crisis as one correspondent for pro-government media was said to have died a woman sustained in a gun at times by rebels as he was returning home from work and i'll see arabic news crew and several international reporters have come under rebel sniper fire outside of the capital and one of our colleagues come out sacco was injured while trying to escape the gunfire and this is his account of what happened. we arrived

at the damascus suburb early in the morning to report on the syrian army operation we were moving from street to street and when we reached the dock my colleagues and i got caught in crossfire we tried to escape running one after another fearing that armed rebels would notice us a syrian army soldier accompanied us the entire time he constantly kept his on the situation and helped us to escape the gunfire the rebels were firing on us my colleagues and i were wearing bulletproof vests with the word press on them the firing was very intense and it was difficult to find shelter i ran and fell down i hurt my arms but the syrian army doctors gave me first aid on the scene so i could continue to do my job there were many other correspondents there with me including iranians and syrians one of the syrian cameraman was also slightly wounded like me . in a while thousands of people were killed as she was attacks on damascus petrol stations this week opposition forces accuse the government of a deadly bombing on wednesday blamed levels for

a terrorist attack last thursday middle east expert pepe escobar and willingness to end the syrian conflict must also come from outside the country if you look at the very sad to say to everybody all over the world that the top geopolitical threat of two thousand and thirteen is going to be the top geopolitical tragedy of two thousand and eleven the rape of syria the only possibility it would be that the opposition. in a syrian way this sides not to listen to the saudis the turks the americans the brits and the french and they with the assad government and they work out a transitional government or at least the provisional period leading to free and fair elections is this going to happen not likely. this is still ahead for you in the program but as well as a longtime leader who good child may be too ill after cancer surgery to attend his

own integration of the opposition demands a new election if he doesn't show up. he also looks at the legacy of the twenty eleven that could have been if sayings had turned out differently and explore some of the challenges the world might face in the coming months. barack obama has given the green light increasing taxes on wealthy americans and a move to avoid the so-called fiscal cliff it follows months of political bickering among us lawmakers are right up until the drawing room first deadline and if the deal hadn't been passed americans could have seen billions of dollars of tax hikes and spending cuts which were due to automatically come into effect and charlie mcgrath from wide awake news says not all agreements are so hard to pass through the congress you know to me when the cameras are off and it's time to pass a trillion dollar nearly trillion dollar defense bill they have no problem

whatsoever coming to coming together and holding hands with that kind of a deal together since two thousand and one namely we've been covering this nation by proxy the world by crisis and it doesn't matter who gets hurt was good who gets work by the wayside as long as a special interest is served so long as it's always under the shadow of crisis they want it was only when it has to do with acting in behalf of the people of this nation it seems like the people always take a backseat and economics but marx kaiser says that although an immediate crisis has been avoided if the main underlying problems remain unresolved. the fiscal cliff is just more theater bankers and politicians trying to distract people from the underlying root to task about is a bunch of hers and frankly who are manipulating the system day in and day out the strong economy clip is just more drama more theater and it doesn't really focus on the true underlying problems and we're going to see more of this going forward in

two thousand and thirteen anything good bye flecked attention from the mobs what they're pitchforks and torches were coming out for these people they want to just delay that day of reckoning for as many months as they can but that day's reckoning twenty eight it's comic andrew and they cannot make outlook for twenty to kaiser report oh programs are available for you. as been revealed that the f.b.i. need of a promotion assassination occupy wall street acts of it but didn't lead them to the potential danger that nero was instead spying on members of the movement branding them criminals and domestic terrorists oh he's more into details for us. well it's not clear yet why the f.b.i. would neglect to tell activists there was a potential assassination plot surrounding them what we do know is that new

documents obtained by the partnership for the civil justice fund a u.s. human human and civil rights advocacy organization have revealed that the u.s. the f.b.i. the department of homeland security the u.s. military and private corporations all cooperated together to monitor and investigate occupy wall street protesters as quote domestic terrorists and quote criminals now the more shocking revelation the headline of this story is that reportedly buried deep within the government. mentions of a plan to use snipers to assassinate occupy protesters and the movement's leaders in various cities throughout the country these alleged plans were supposed to be taking place in the fall of two thousand and eleven now the names of the groups or individuals involved in the alleged plot are redacted from the f.b.i. documents but what critics say is clear is that the f.b.i. never learned any one of the potential any of the potential victims that their

lives could possibly be in danger or that there's any threat surrounding them the partnership for civil justice fund received the f.b.i. documents on december twenty second so this is fairly new information and this was after they filed a request under the freedom of information after now many civil rights attorneys previously have accused the f.b.i. of functioning as a de facto intelligence arm for u.s. corporations during the occupy wall street movement and especially as it grew bigger however some critics say they never ever suspected that the f.b.i. would neglect to tell occupy protesters u.s. citizens about an assassination plot surrounding them. back with more news on headlines from the first week of twentieth century in one of the great. it's. something. lies beneath.

thousands of meters of ice and broke. the law. that is a loser for many. but dangerous even to those who keep it to a distance. of it. goes no. matter the end of the street because. you. are crazy. and. wish.

things obviously good but. we. just see them on the enemy. head. on on our run i'm a little. fifth. if you're watching our series good to have you with this french icon that. could become a russian citizen as early as sunday the film star has arrived in the russian black

sea resort of sultry well his thought to be about to get his new passport from president vladimir putin personally that person granted citizenship after they accept turned his back on his native problems in iraq are escalating taxes or data collection or has a details according to russian president's press secretary dmitry peskov crain sees it as a preview is on a personal interest to so much and there is a possibility of that he might attend an informal meeting with the president flies middle pugin and very few might be given his brand new russian passport meanwhile gerard depardieu has already been granted russian citizenship and before that he reno and his french two thousand shipped in move to belgium where reportedly he has some real estate now this news comes as french president francois one is trying to push forward a law that will see french citizens who earn more than one million euro piece seventy five percent of their earnings to taxes meanwhile in another french

legendary movie i can brigid bordeaux is also think of following the food stamps i'll judge a preview however firmly is backed by a can preview the reason you know she's also a veteran anymore rights campaigner and she has threatened to apply for russian citizenship if french authorities use an ice age peer office to alice bones at a zoo in new home now explaining why. she thought of russia she said that she believed that that person who was important has done more to protect and you most the current president all together and she also said the average time she had something as the animal rights to complain or he always helped her she also called him be president all her hard after he banned the hunting of young seals and indeed president vladimir putin has burned a reputation of a true anymore lover during the years of he's presidency e.-n.

when he was the prime minister and of course we'll have plenty more for you on line but not very diplomatic points out why the egyptian ambassador to cyprus got a little slap happy with security at the airport. and prison guards in brazil have busted a count which was trying to smuggle in a special case which could have held the inmates engineer a breakout came within a whisker of getting away with it find out if it's feeling guilty. and. police in bahrain have again violently suppressed a mounted government demonstration with the rest of the kingdom approaching the two

year mark protesters are calling for a transition to a democratically to whites for the country's a shiite majority in the darwish from the european bahraini organization for human rights claims that security forces from abroad are stoking the violence by firing tear gas into homes of unarmed civilians. the security forces who are working for the ministry of interior and the hey are practicing a lot of buy in ends and a lot of violations to human rights when confronting when pro-democracy protests and behaving and lot of protests and it took place in many different villages and areas around behaving and all of them all of them got a. crack they were a crackdown by that by the security forces and behaving who are most to be and not by me and they are working and and then super interior and if they they were groups from different countries foreign countries like pakistan and jordan and

syria and yesterday in the village where i live and six of us it was tear gas excessively by security forces and i could see security forces running down the streets by my white house and shooting grandin the end side the houses it movement was completely peace said but after witnessing that west that was during and position to or this this situation and behaving or that of illusion in bahrain it is unlike to what is what they are claiming like they are in kargil human rights in different countries arab countries but when it comes to behead they use double standards so the protesters here are inviting old though they are those radical protestors they are the minority and not the majority but they are using such methods to prevent that violent security forces from entering their there is the religious and attacking on our civilians and children like we witnessed and the big

you have off of the four year old child being attacked by security forces with tear gas canisters. this week a little was a rubber stamp allowing the u.s. military to detain terror suspects indefinitely including americans without charge or trial and national defense authorization act also extends the restrictions on transferring detainees out of going ton of the point i think yeah metro congressman dennis kucinich things the movie is part of a pattern that's undermines democracy right now we're much more of a garrison and garrison plus. a powerful military which keeps asserting itself globally and it doesn't make america any safer and frankly doesn't make the world safer we're spending upwards of six hundred billion dollars for an expanded pentagon presence for more war in afghanistan and for proliferation of war in in yemen and somalia and other places we have

a lot of problems here at home that we're not taking care of we have massive unemployment people are losing their homes people are losing their retirement security and i continue to say that we have to start emphasizing taking care of things here at home instead of developing a bigger footprint around the world as far as our military presence and another reason to move by critics and to democratic obama extended laughs that allows for there why a topping of americans without a warrant a u.s. national security agency whistleblower says nobody's safe from being spied on watch the full interview with william binney later today but here's a quick preview. f.b.i. access to the data collected which is basically the e-mails of virtually everybody in the country. and they have it at the f.b.i. has access to it all the congressional members are on on the surveillance too it's not no one's excluded they're all included so yes this can happen to to anyone if

they become a target for whatever reason. if they are targeted by the government the government can go in with the f.b.i. or other agencies or the government can go into their database pull all that they have collected over them on them over the years and reanalyze it also retroactively analyze everything they've done over the last ten years at least working one part well i'm sure i i i believe i've been on it for quite a few years. so i keep telling them everything i think of them in my e-mail so that they when they read it they'll understand what i think of them. but as well as president hugo chavez has currently battling cancer and may be too ill to attend his own swearing in ceremony else thursday his political rivals are demanding a new election if he doesn't show up to be inaugurated for his fourth term of office chair political analyst eric draitser believes the opposition has taken

advantage of the situation to undermine the government. what is important is the fact that the opposition is using this as a political mechanism by which they can try to deal a jew demise the government in venezuela remember that in two thousand and two when the united states and spain and other powers around the world collaborated and conspired to oust chavez in an illegal coup and we saw what the significance of chavez was that he had a base of support on the streets in that country that could not be shaken by an international force and so what they're attempting to do is to use his health situation to break apart that base of support and to convince people that chavez is unable to serve the the constitution in venezuela allows for wiggle room here it does not say that just because he can't be at the inauguration at that given moment that there has to be new elections that is what the opposition is trying to create something that is not explicit they're trying to make it explicit the constitution

it says that it can be delayed there are alternative arrangements that can be made the swearing in can take place in a different location and also it says that the new elections can only be called if and only if the elected president is permanently unable to serve there is no indication that chavez won't recover from where he is now so to say that he's permanently incapacitated is not one hundred percent true. and some other international news in brief this hour a standoff between police and gunmen in the u.s. state of colorado has claimed four lives including the gunman that tucker allegedly shot three of his hostages dead before the barricaded house or stormed by law enforcement units while the captive managed to escape it happened in or warren was last year's or twelve people killed and dozens injured in the cinema shooting during a movie premiere. five suspects in the rape and murder of a female student in new delhi have been loose to the victim by d.n.a.

evidence the man who were charged earlier this week while a six that will stand trial as a juvenile the twenty three year old woman who was brutally assaulted on a bus and later died in hospital from her injuries that are sparked a nationwide outrage and fueled a debate about sex crimes in india. and around a hundred british law it's in the northern irish capital belfast have a tux police officers who retaliated with water canon authorities are also investigating reports of shots fired during the clash the previous night saw nine officers injured in several riots that broke out across the city last anger was sparked by a move to under century old traditional flying the british you know flag over city hall permanently so watch the get. it's been a week of new year celebrations around the globe with fireworks and cheering crowds greeting twenty thirty and there were mixed emotions regarding the year that's passed with some sad to see it and but many more hopeful of better times and often

have takes a look at the world that could harm. twenty twelve was certainly full of disappointing headlines hope fueled by the arab spring turned into the turmoil of the arab autumn the war in syria claimed countless lives and the fiscal crisis all the european union torn apart at its very seams now the problems facing our world today certainly don't offer themselves up to an easy fix what if things had turned out differently what if opportunities were actually sees the pawn instead of missed well here's our look at the two thousand and twelve headlines that could have been. diplomacy succeeds in syria ending bloody conflict. instead this was the image of syria the world saw increasingly violent clashes between government forces and the opposition had claimed more than forty thousand lives efforts to negotiate

a diplomatic solution fell flat because divisions ripped apart both the country and the international community hundreds of thousands of refugees have fled to neighboring states where many have found conditions to be dismal meanwhile syria's war is threatening to spill over its borders as tensions escalate within and in the region. have told me to try and sanction slashed as iran's nuclear to accept. gunning to end gun fire the us rules to restrict foreign. mideast peace to israel league two state park with palestine. yet this was their reality israel's assault on palestinian militants in gaza israel's anti-missile shield repelled in most attacks on its territory but a strike claimed the lives of more than one hundred sixty palestinians many of them civilians just might harsh condemnation from many in the international community the war and israel's subsequent decision to construct three thousand new

settlements effectively slams the door shut to any prospect of peace go people power moment you step aside and let democracy you. get lost get most notorious kuantan the most prison permanently shot. euro zone cuts the cuts and lifts austerity. but the news of austerity only tightened as deep public sector cuts brought thousands of angry demonstrators to the streets of greece spain italy and portugal. the worst economic crisis of a generation has battered the european union's very foundations exacerbating tensions between member states with some regions now desperately wanting out i grew up in a europe that was divided from east to west but i'm now living in a europe that is divided from old to self never at any point in the history of this union has there been more discord of rank that we covered. corporate cash banned from the campaign coffers as part of the us political please. know here for u.k.

british quit the european union. we can leaks founder julian the solyndra pointed un free speech and. instead a song jermaine's a political refugee at ecuador's london embassy where he's been granted asylum he continues to fight extradition to sweden over alleged sex crimes charges that he says are politically motivated and tied to his work in leaking international government secrets. the power of people speaking up and resisting together terrifies corrupt democratic power so much so that only people here in the west and the enemy of governments an enemy to be watched and intimate to be controlled and to be impoverished true democracy is not the white house true democracy is not camera true democracy is the resistance of people with the

truth against flies from right here in london every day ordinary people teach us that democracy is free speech and dissent. from heretics to hero american whistleblower bradley manning finally free. droning on no more nations agree to end iraq of remote controlled war. egypt's arab spring sees democracy defeated hardline islamist. the reality on the ground was anything but egyptian president mohamed morsi is fouled like power grab unleashed fury and frenzied street battles and a fast track to constitutional overhaul referendum left a bitter opposition eager for change for them two thousand and twelve saw the arab spring transformed into an egyptian nightmare had that evolution to get rid of a tyrant the dictator. in the order to that we made

elections that evolution and elections to choose someone to the present us turned out that this guy is also tired of themselves and these headlines may have been the stuff of imagination but that sea of twenty thirteen can bring any of them to life with the coffin of our team moscow i wonder for scientists and for tourists also he heads off to discover russia's amazing cave next. choose your language. call if we can we know if the materials are going to stay still some of. china's good it's the consensus you. choose to get the news that you think great to. choose the stories that impact your

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the official r.t. applications to your cell phone choose your language stream quality and enjoy your favorite. if you're away from your television or it just doesn't matter about what your mobile device says you can watch r.t. anytime anywhere. you get a small and ancient russian merchant city sits at the confluence of three rivers. it's not quite europe but it's not a nation either. constantine's a native of congo or he heads off to work each day of the same time. constant and has been conducting independent research for ten years now his professional news out of the ordinary for most people but it's quite natural for those living in the urals it mixes danger with excitement.