coming in this week. as a very important issue. the president. is also. of course i think really going to play a big thing this. doesn't look like it's going away as david cameron loses popularity at home some analysts say the new debate over the falkland islands could be used to distract attention from issues the government is failing to address but david cameron it's

a great issue because the economy here isn't. austerity is really fighting people are very unhappy with what he's doing. very much. and people's attention here from the popular thing. is very trying to because. the government is really unpopular i can't recall it becoming so popular so quickly. to keep this in the news headlines this is why he's read it in such. a strong way. orthodox christians have been celebrating christmas the world over and you can catch more than a glimpse of all the color and sparkle as millions gathered to celebrate and get a website for a closer look at that. also a lot of the moment there's something fishy about this auction lot in japan it's

the most expensive in the world sold for a record one point eight million dollars discover who bag the precious catch at all . it's. two well known americans the former governor of new mexico bill richardson and google chief eric schmidt have flown in to north korea the visit has drawn criticism from washington which is looking to penalize people for its recent rocket tests meanwhile a german newspaper claims north korea's been inviting german economists to the secretive country to pave the way for foreign investment over the west's own

sanctions on pyongyang are the main stumbling block in front of economic development so says dr frank from the university of vienna. the big problem is actually not north korean willingness to receive it is the reluctance of western investors to actually go to north korea the north korean investment environment is not very secure although the state has been trying a lot still be do have reports of investors who have difficulties with the red tape and also changing attitude of the government you know about investors especially chinese investors who have left the country and frustration the biggest problem i think for us the worst of all over western sanctions and it's very easy actually it's almost impossible not to while it in your section if you do not clear because almost anything is dual use and the procedures of checking whether you are not while living sanctions are very complicated very costly and there's also

a great deal of unknown to insecurity about what the actual rules are and my freshman is that this is keeping away western investors in particular big ones. british prime minister david cameron and his chief coalition and i have presented a list of their achievements in the half term mark of the current government's ten year education reforms a pension overhaul and banking regulations were part of the milestone accomplishment touted by the to the leader of the opposition however was derisive calling the conference a cosmetic relaunch it was full of empty promises. in iraq for protestors have been wounded by security forces as they took part in a rally against the ship prime minister nouri al maliki troops fired into the air to disperse the crowd several thousand people have demonstrated a number of sunni strongholds in recent weeks threatening the fragile balance between religious groups in the country. for fighters in northern china have managed to put out a massive fire that engulfed the shopping mall took three and

a half hours for the blaze to sweep through an area of almost ten thousand square meters and it's still unclear what started the fire some officials appointed. the welding work being carried out at the site. was on a world update thousands of people taking to the streets of sri lanka protesting against the government's attempt to impeach the country's first female chief justice well it again appeals court quashed a conviction. for days decisions by the court which ruled the process against her as constitutional it was a move which sparked accusations parliament was using unlawful procedures last month the government said the chief was guilty of unexplained wealth and abusing her power. and the u.s. president barack obama has put forward his current counterterrorism adviser john brennan as the new head of the cia he's also announced maverick conservative chuck hagel as his choice for defense secretary the nominations need to pass through the senate it's where they're likely to run into strong opposition from the republican

party vietnam veteran haydel was against war in afghanistan and iraq and has a history of breaking with his conservative colleagues. well if approved one of the biggest tasks the two men will face is afghanistan of course and with the u.s. now saying it will complete its withdrawal in twenty fourteen forty speaks to jere van dyk about why it's going and what it's managed to achieve that's coming up after this break. it's. you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so for like you think you understand it and then you glimpse

something else and you hear or see some other part of it and realize everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm tom hartman welcome to the big picture. government no longer represents the beam. the people are going to take the term. we. believe in the traditional believe in the law. the way our economic system. is not going to.

wait. two weeks speak your language or not i am. for music programs and documentaries and spanish more matter. do you. use a little tuna to bangalore story or. are you here to. try to alter the spanish find out more visit. eleven years ago america began its war on terror today in afghanistan

a us war continues to be waged by current guest has a very unique perspective on what has happened and continues to take place there joining me now to talk more about this topic is journalist and author jerry van dyke mr van dyke wrote a book called captive my time as a prisoner of the taliban thank you for joining our team thank you mr van dyck as i mentioned the war on terror began some eleven years ago and u.s. troops according to president barack obama are expected to fully withdraw by the end of twenty fourteen is that a sign of victory or defeat in the so-called war on terror i don't think it's a sign of either one i think it's a sign that the u.s. public is tired of this we initially went in for one specific reason and that was to dismantle the government of the taliban and to destroy al qaeda now people ask why are we still there how many are there under president bush in the early part of

the obama administration we heard the numbers fifty there may be fifty al qaeda left in afghanistan are we there because a fifty fifty al qaeda members know it is morphed into something far larger than that is it because. the former soviet union the former what we'll call the stands it was because ten tajikistan because it could stand you could stand to have the largest untapped oil and natural gas reserves in the world if you talk to the afghans you talk to the taliban you'll say oh that's why the united states wants to stay here people say it's because we want to surround iran bases in the gulf we have bases once before in iraq we certainly have them in afghanistan do we want afghanistan and pakistan not to go to war with one another neither the bush administration nor the obama administration has been straight with the american public about that and finally we are responsible long with other nations for creating the very people against whom we are now fighting these were all allies of

the united states and its allies during the one nine hundred eighty s. we haven't been straight with the american public why what we have created which evolved in some cases into parts of which evolved into al qaeda and which are we trying to dismantle that can you tell me what the war on terror looks like through the eyes of the taliban. no one's ever asked me that very good question very interesting question when i was a newspaper reporter in afghanistan in the one nine hundred eighty s. new york times when we were tied with some of the members of the taliban today we called them the mujahideen which means holy warriors the taliban told me that we are the sons and the grandsons of the mujahideen when i was captured by the taliban and when i was in prison i had to listen for hours and hours and hours to taliban recruitment tapes and suicide recruitment tapes they talk of or they sing or chant

of pashtoon history pashtoon geography pashtoon poetry this is a nationalist movement in their view they are simply trying to free themselves of foreign infidel invaders exactly like their fathers and grandfathers in order to have what they feel is a proper islamic government the taliban have become somewhat different. and that is it's a result of their ties to al qaeda. which is comprised of foreigners primarily. gyptian zx. chechens respects those from western china and even some from europe so al-qaeda is a different entity entirely it is strictly an interested in international jihad but the taliban have become because of their ties to al qaeda and because of the twenty four seven news cycle they have become far more international but deep down in

their hearts they are interested in one thing and that is an islamic government and a pashtoon islamic government now i don't want to make this too complicated for viewers but for them the pashtoon are afghanistan and they were at war before we came with what we call the northern alliance the tajiks these are different ethnic groups in the north so this is also an element here there's an ethnic war at play here as much as anything else but deep down more than anything else they want a unified pashtoon land they want an afghanistan that is deeply muslim their interest ultimately is certainly not to attack the united states but because of their exposure to the international world now they're far more capable of trying to go across to soviet central asia to expand the perhaps into iran yeah that element is there you were how hostage forty five things by the taliban what was that experience like.

frightening. thing. what did you learn that you didn't know about. i thought initially i would be killed immediately but what i learned and what surprised me was that even though i was a prisoner. even though i lived in constant fear. that i was also treated with respect and i was treated as a guest because and this gets to the heart of your question ultimately. tribal law pashtoon tribal law called question while the tribal codes take precedence over islam they deep down they are pashtuns they are members of

tribes more than they are muslims and i think that's one reason why i survived. i'm not sure why i survived and why did they let you go after forty five i still don't know the answer is i'm trying to find out i get many i hear i get many what do they say to you once they were unlocking the chains from your arm they said congratulations on escaping death i daresay this i will that about a year ago i got a call from someone a foreigner european and he asked me to go down to an apartment in new york two min there were questions from pakistan here by the by the by the state department on their way back to pakistan getting ready to catch a flight the very first question they asked me was. who kidnapped you. the taliban. or the government. my jailer said to me not

a shot would be fired in afghanistan without the backing of the pakistani government so were the taliban in touch with the government did the government of pakistan know i was there did the government of pakistan in intervene and ultimately save me. did jalali the in the whole county network that we are at war with. and with which i lived in the one nine hundred eighty s. and his name i use constantly to try and save me and who i was trying to get to because i thought by getting to a kani i could find out about al qaeda did he ultimately hold on to that tribal law and say me i've heard so many different things that's why it's a very murky complicated place in the war is far far different from the way we perceive it in the media speaking of tribes what are u.s. intelligence capabilities among the tribes do you believe that washington has

enough knowledge when it comes to the language and cultural experience of the particular reasons in afghanistan that need to be fully understood there was a general flynn i think his name was and this was about two thousand and nine two thousand and ten who was in chief of intelligence under then military general stanley mcchrystal mcchrystal who said and i quote we are flying blind in afghanistan how many pashtun speakers are there when you when you find out in the u.s. intelligence community when you look when you talk to for example interpreters you find out that there is a huge underground network of interpreters all of whom have to pay bribes before they can work with with the american soldiers who controls these interpreters well i'm not sure that they're going to completely free at all the television can easily infiltrate this is my own experience i don't think that u.s. intelligence capabilities are nearly what they're portrayed to be however.

when you get to someplace like pakistan i think it's possibly a bit different we have drones overhead we're constantly under president obama we've ratcheted up the number of drone attacks to those drones and i've been under drones how do they know where to attack you have to have the information on the ground what does that information come from and it comes from working closely in tandem with pakistani military intelligence that they would choose to attack their attack there why after so many years where we had we not been able to kill the leader of the county network ormal omar or goldman hekmatyar the three leaders of the taliban or why did we have to go in and kill osama bin laden why didn't the pakistani intelligence tell us where these people were maybe they knew and maybe they don't know but i happen to think they absolutely know. but they have we have to have that intelligence on the ground and i think it's far better in pakistan then in afghanistan but it comes because pakistan works closely with these people

and they work closely with the united states and who they want to attack they want to allow the united states to attack. i started this interview by asking about afghanistan but i want to wrap it up by asking you about something you said about oxfam because you recently said that you believe that your lesson and its allies are fighting a proxy war against talks. only time together but that is at all without a doubt that that could create a even more dangerous time make clearly and in that area of the world if they still don't know what they're doing in afghanistan i can't figure it out rackley right is pakistan our ally or is it our enemy now the taliban and you take something like former joint chairman of joint chiefs of staff admiral mike mullen who said that they have caught a network is an arm of the pakistani i.s.i. pakistani military intelligence that we the united states have paid at least twelve billion dollars and given a different forms at least twelve billion dollars to the pakistani military since

nine eleven. but the pakistani military. former admiral mike mullen said every everyone else is backing the taliban so we are supplying money to the very people that are providing this money to the taliban to attack us forces why would pakistan back to tell about what is pakistan's interest in afghanistan no single afghan legislature in the history of afghanistan has accepted the border between afghanistan and pakistan afghanistan was the only nation in the world to vote against pakistan admittance to the united nations in one thousand nine hundred seventy one single thing the border in one thousand nine hundred three the british when they ruled india created with this called the durand line they do not accept the fact that the land that once belonged to them that the british took away should belong to pakistan and this is deep down at the heart of this particular never ending war in the middle of which the united states and its soldiers continue to

die over a war that once started out against al-qaeda which is morphed into something far deeper far more complicated it's an old afghan saying it's going to stand it's very easy to enter but it's very hard to leave we're not leaving by two thousand and fourteen we'll still be there and we'll leave it right there thank you very much for your time.

ill. immediately. little bit of a little. thank. you. bowl of. the world i live.

that speak. to. her. i wish i. was pleased. to see misleader believe her. mother just sees the amount. of her. little mouth run of a little. join me on a journey to the heart of the problem to a place is hidden from the stories you going to meet some real crime the insiders although they may not be the usual news makers you see on t.v. .

recently. lisa.

bloom look. more news today violence is once again flared up look these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada. operations are all day.

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secret laboratory mccurry was able to build a new most sophisticated robot which fortunately doesn't give a darn about anything tim's mission to teach me the creation of why you should care about humans and. this is why you should care only. you know how sometimes you see a story and it seems so for lengthly you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else and you hear or see some other part of it and realize everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm tom hartman welcome to the big

picture. choose your language. holy week of you know if the mental health clinic today still some of the. treatments that the consensus here. q the opinions that immigrate to. choose the stories get in high school might. choose the access to your office.