tonight war is fun for one mobile app developer who made a game which allows players to retrace the syrian conflict but leaves little choice except to bring down the president the sad. rocky ride turns into tragedy here in russia as a thrill seeker dies in resulting accident after the ball carrying him and a friend inside flies of course falls into the gorge. and drugs take to the china sea two of asia's giants called cash into the high tech arms race warnings that supply lines could lead to skirmish. also fresh from bailout ireland takes the

helm of the e.u. and is now tasked with leading britain europe's charge have to be coming right. hello i'm kevin irwin here at the r t new center tonight just after midnight now moscow time now a top story then the bloody conflict in syria which has been dragging on for almost two years and claimed more than sixty thousand lives now has entered the realm of internet gaming called the end game syria players get the chance to fight on the side of the rebels exploring various options to conclude the war what is a goal piskun off takes a look at the game and he shared his impressions with me now. well i wouldn't miss this game for the world it's breathtaking action three d. graphics not really it's more about an online card game. basically

it has two sides well obviously the regime on one side and the computer plays for that and the rebels which the gamer plays for their side and basically you choose what sort of in syria or other methods you want to use against the regime and put it up against its weapons then you've got chopper the infantry some more choppers on the weapons and here and so on and then the game basically calculates your chances for success it's pretty much how it works what's being said about the appropriateness of this game as i mentioned thousands and thousands of lives have been lost over the last two years is a huge diplomatic standoff appropriate is this view well it's an ethical at least really tens of thousands of people have been killed throughout this conflict has been causing huge diplomatic problems not only with syria but between other. players this game did try to reflect so you could you could see it there the

political fees the developers have been saying that the game was beast on real media reports from the real situation in the in in syria. of all here there's the perfect example china which is automatically given by the game it's here represented as the country which supports the regime although we haven't heard any open statements from the chinese government russia is put in the same line with iran. has also actually has more hasn't openly supported president assad's regime either and neither has the russian fact we've been hearing constantly from moscow saying that it is not taking any side of the conflict but there's only one outcome apparently to this game no the only outcome well it does. actually there we go it offers a peace offer but the game itself recommends the user not choose the bad since it says that then you won't get much credit among the rebels so basically the best

ending of this game particularly is the fall of the regime. in office come off with me but earlier on america's military presence in afghanistan is up for discussion president karzai heads to washington for military talks though there is little hope for significant change to talk about that very soon to belfast loyalists originally built on the seventh night of union flag related wired some of them are but the returns to say they don't want to talk preparing instead to take their action to double in. time dominance appears to be turning into a high tech high stakes arms race in the east china sea japan and china are vying for power in the disputed territory it's drones that are quickly coming to the forefront of the race though james corbet editor of a japan based news website says some stand again from the escalating crisis. i think they are preparing to to be ready to commit more more resources to the military expenditures and they're getting ready to do that even as we speak and i

think we see really the start of a new normal here in east asia as unfortunately i think tensions military tensions are going to lead to increasing military expenditures on both sides as japan is looking to buy some more global hawk drones and china is launching a new line up to its own fleet of drones and i think that washington is perfectly happy to to encourage japan in this not only because it obviously benefits their armaments industry and the defense contractors who stand to make the billions that japan will be spending on increased expenditures but also because i think when the further the wedge is driven between japan and china the more it plays into american hands as long as this doesn't actually come to a full scale war i think the more off balance japan is the better it services america as they seek to get bigger toehold in the region and i think we're going to see more and more of this because now that abi is in power he's known as a hard line nationalist and now that she jinping is taking the helm of china for

the next ten years i think he's looking to to put his stake down it's as someone who can really be a strong defender of china so i think we're really going to see an entrenched position on both sides and it looks like there is a new normal of wars and increasing expenditures that are likely for the next several years. well fears over drones isn't just limited to asia the fate of the whole u.s. programs and sharp focus of it claims of bombers pick for cia chief is too trigger happy and also a gag for dissent kuwait throws to activists in jail for tweeting against the enemy even though one post didn't even mention the country's leader it's a head. it was meant to be a bit of fun but it ended in fatality a giant inflated rubber ball commonly known as a zorba carrying two thrill seekers insiders rolled out of control and plunged off a cliff for the ski resort in southern russia one of the other men and one of the men died the other man inside was badly injured my colleague must say discuss the tragedy of our correspondent tom first here is how it all happened this freak

accident was caught on camera. come on come on. how much is it. where would it go in a minute isn't it let's do it now. you can see the plastic zor ball here which has gone horribly off track from where we just saw it before some people try to stop it or try to push it against and rocks to stop it but it careers on it goes in the end one point five kilometers starting off over the edge of this mountain you can see this on this amateur video which gets a bit shaky now inside a russian father of two and his friends all the others watching the french can see careering down this mountainside it plunged off cliffs and then onto a frozen lake where it came to rest. inside both of them fired around like pinballs

one had a broken neck and died on the way to hospital the other escaped with just injuries i mean these kind of a exhuming to vittie is one always has to think about you know there are repercussions when doing this but what exactly is all being for those who have never even heard of the words are being it's looks like quite a strange thing is a giant plastic ball with the sport was invented in new zealand here's one with this two layers of plastic air in the middle and the person sits inside that there is the straps in his of someone getting in now they're either strapped in or they roll around inside it or slip around inside it i tried it myself once actually and then they push down usually quite quite a gradual slope reasonably short slope and then they spin around bounce around as the ball goes down and then the court at the end very popular sport it's caught on around the world many people try it all over the place you said you've tried it it

seems to be popular but isn't thing a thing is the principle is reasonably quite safe but people like to try and push it as far as it can go here's some people in the city one you see their point of this car people like to try and use this this great ball of plastic. as a creatively as they can and it can go wrong especially when it's not regulated or monitored proper. here we see a woman flies outside here in slow motion we can just see her right here and she shoots out and that was on a controlled course that wasn't that wasn't supposed to happen a tall so what is in principle looks totally safe giant protective plastic ball can actually prove quite dangerous. no social networking in kuwait has landed two men in jail or court has given each of them a two year sentence claiming they defamed the emmy with the tweets the uprising in the countries about the market second anniversary with a government accused of resorting to any means necessary to gag dissenting voices

or through a journalist i should return as he told me kuwait city another us back to pay to ship. it's obvious that the united states nato countries desire to keep their thousands of troops in kuwait and as we've seen of course there's been demonstrations in bahrain and of course saudi arabia which are not being covered on any corporate media it's very difficult to cover the brutal suppression of human rights in these nato and u.s. backed dictatorships rangers themselves or in the sense of a different subject because some of them are being knobbled by u.s. authorities but in fairness there and been some human rights groups that have campaigned for the horrible human rights situation suffered by the elements the we do people under a thousand of those stateless in kuwait and anyone really trying to look for greater freedoms in kuwait it's sort of forgotten country in terms of the arab

spring in fact kuwait is hosting at the end of this month a whole conference about syria and about humanitarian help for syria syria as love to say about humanitarian things in syria but it imprisons people that tweet anything against them even though it is one of the most democratic places in the persian gulf arab countries you can read more about the crackdown on the opposition at r.t. dot com including similar cases the jailing of tweets in another gulf state bahrain and why imprisoned activists they're losing hope for early release. islands assumed the presidency of the council of the european union with the head of the european council visiting dublin to mark the occasion and whose own economy was saved by a bailout back in twenty ten is presiding over an economic nightmare for the union with twenty six million people unemployed robert oulds of the british group think tank thinks the visit was all about reinforcing austerity. island has its own economic problems which are continuing it course has the economic problems which

have been happening ever since the euro which created high inflation there and then of course exacerbated the faster they had ready to take on the presidency of the european council is of course a very large piece of work not just for the senior politicians in the government but also for many of the civil servants and they would be better off spending their time really trying to address arlen's economic difficulties rather than trying to solve the problems within the european union which are very great indeed of course unemployment now in the e.u. is alarmingly high and of course the thing is that arlen when he says are in this is that we aren't supposed to boy for austerity means that the irish people are not protesting and taking up their white to protest as people in spain and greece have done because we know that austerity at this time point actually work last year in the euro in the single currency it will create more economic problems and that's why we see unemployment across the eurozone wising quite alarming lee so he's very happy that arlen is getting on with the policy of austerity but actually it's

actually the wrong policy this time. stripped locked up and kept quiet bradley manning with a ruling now against the u.s. military over the harsh treatment of him while we report on claims of double standards towards will soon grow. over the ability of president of the charges of rule venezuela is heating up we're reporting on a clash between the government is trying to cement the leaders of despite his recovery and the other side the opposition's own political opposition. critics three. four judges three. retirement three. three stooges. free. old free

broadcast quality video for your media projects a free media all done to r.t. dot com. wealthy british style it's. like. market why not. come to. find out what's really happening to the global economy with mike's cancer for a no holds barred look at the global financial headlines kaiser report on our. borders and beyond the courts eleven years on guantanamo remains open for business r.t. looks at the interrogation nerve center of america's war on terror. again

with barack obama nominating john brennan the head the cia the future of the u.s. drone program has come into focus again belle a nickname by some the assassinations are is a supporter of unmanned drone attacks now fred brand from an american antiwar activist and author says the deaths of hundreds of civilians are the controversial strikes proves one of two things about brennan. the message the president is sending is that i need to be able to say that i'm fighting terrorism for the short for my own short run political gain but in doing that he sowing a world when which i believe will kill many many more americans and next decade because where where ellen aiding so many muslims in terms of john brennan look at the first time he went public with this drone program and he said and this is a quote there hasn't been a single collateral death because of the exceptional proficiency precision of the

capabilities that we've been able to develop now for john brennan to say that there are only two possibilities one is the pathological liar he knows that will murder hundreds of civilians with the lives of but i think the second possibility is much more serious and that is that he's delusional. how do some big domestic decisions barack obama is preparing for foreign policy talks as afghan president hamid karzai is due to run in washington friday the u.s. military strategies in afghanistan and topping the agenda liz fund what to expect across lived with you know professor the department of politics at new york university how the issue of morning causes visit comes days after obama picked so-called pacifist chuck hagel as the pentagon's chief what does the president hope to achieve that you think here. well i think he probably hopes to achieve a few things one is continued military support for the afghan troops so they can maintain their own military or army if you well and the second is can only

continue to. add monetary support in some development efforts there should we expect changes in the u.s. policy in afghanistan any time soon especially of course when it comes to the number of troops left for the twenty fourteen i don't think so you all probably you know it's quite up in the air right now i mean there's a lot of talk about not leaving any troops there at all however i don't think the u.s. can afford that neither can the region because there's still. violence going on there so i think the president will probably leave some troops there for some time but i would soon president karzai is going to want that out because it gives him more. or it makes him look more powerful on the negotiating table and within the context of his own constituency however you also need some protection so it will be a little bit of a catch twenty two situation for that patricia was reading into twenty wooden

everyone's lips drones one of the crucial hurdles tween washington and afghanistan drone strikes that seem to be awfully agenda there with this upcoming meeting why is that well i think it's a more they're more relevant in the pocket study u.s. relationship because most of the drones are bombing the areas of pocket. i was there standing in that area the tribal areas so it's really that antagonizing that relationship it probably will come up because if president karzai you know in the back room sort of thing because of a president karzai expects to get more co-operative and stronger relationship with pakistan and instead of antagonistic. that's probably going to be one of the talking points that's going to help him win more support from his side and so far in the taleban so much time of peace talks are all the agenda because there's also going to the u.s. with a big military shopping list including helicopters another about just

a quick well she really up to do you think. yeah i mean it's like every other you know country that they you know they want the u.s. to support their military arsenal when i mean really that the challenge is to get the economy working and get a political structure or a civil society structure in place so the answer to the challenges and this is what's going to have to happen as far as that's concerned patricia we'll let you go take that coal thank you. for that. but it had their own thanks very much for being on the program tonight. sorry no. and as well as courts ruled that the delay of president to go to chad was his integration is legal the company's legislators have voted to give the common dante's facing complications after his fourth cancer surgery enough time to recover before swearing him in the opposition of a claims that the move is unconstitutional is calling for new elections and i spoke

to activist radio's someone coming john who thinks it's important to have a his political wing stays in power. just remember the opposition to the leader of the opposition they were part of attempted coup in two thousand so their attempt to call it was backed by the united states and the central intelligence agency the opposition they backed that cool they were part of that cool and so. you know it should be clear that anyone that. you know be willing to do that i think that when they come in that there you know their willingness to consort with finance catalin to us as well as you know us political motives slowly but surely i think that they would have plans to privatized more and more of the oil industry and the more and more you privatized the resource natural resource within business minutes where we're slowly you're going to see a slow evisceration and eroding of some of the social services because the social services are by and large paid for by the revenue that comes in from the oil

resources that are deep within the ground up in as well and as well as and there are in there their watch. they're often called man's best friend but when dangerous dogs they can leave scars field coming up we look at what's being done to control the u.k.'s dangerous animals. there's been a six nights of riots in belfast over the flying of the union flag as angry mobs threw petrol bombs fireworks and stones at police for the moment there's been no new violence but the situation remains tense there a special meeting of unionists representatives has been called to try and end the violence but the protest leaders say they will take part in discussions very preparing instead to take action in the irish capital dublin on saturday former top deputy leader of the u.k. independence party says it's up to the politicians to defuse the situation. but i think it is getting out one hand and the reports that there are sort of quasi fascist groups and far right elements who are now directing this this protest is

very worrying indeed i think the decision taken by belfast council to lower the flag not only allow the flag to fly and said it's a wrong decision i hope it is over the line but as i say i condemn the violence it's wrong and this should be done through politics and not through people up the street i'm not sure about the logic of. it is in effect obviously the republic of ireland of the country. it is part of the u.k. i fear that there might be violence i hope there's not as i say this is a job for the politicians this isn't the job for people over and let's get the politicians around the table and let's hope that the council come to see sense and let's have the union flag flying. here our tea we attempt to answer for you the big questions in life like is there life on mars while k. they could soon be a probably on our website we're talking about that the founder of the internet bank pay pal's planning to send people to live find out about his world idea of an a r t

the old calm and prepare for the football world cup vivian darnley the parties of the country leaving nothing to chance now they're giving sex workers free english classes you can learn about it through our website. a small victory for private bradley manning with the u.s. judge ruling any eventual sentence he may receive should be reduced by one hundred twelve days the justification was the especially harsh treatment he received after being locked up for leaking classified information to wiki leaks but retired colonel morris davis says he sings double standards here nonetheless. i think the government here is overplayed their hand if you recall when the wiki leaks

documents were going to come out it reminded me of the y2k scare everybody kind of braced in expected the worst and then when it came out not much happened and i think the government really overplayed i'm not aware of there being any thing more than embarrassment that has been caused by the wiki leaks documents there been any operations that have been compromised or any individuals harmed i'm not aware of it but it certainly seems at this point this is more of a case of embarrassment than actual harm it seems to be that there are good leaks and they're bad leaks that you know when it helps make the administration look good in a leak is ok when it's an embarrassment like it is with bradley manning you know it's a capital offense. this week marks not a verse for an infamous institution america's. you can catch our two special coverage of it from this friday. borders and beyond the courts eleven years on guantanamo remains open for business marty looks at the

interrogation nerve center of america's war on terror. and the world in brief at least one person has been left in a critical condition after a ferry rammed into a dock in new york as many as fifty seven other people said to been injured to the collision led to a huge gash on the starboard bow to look at the a dock itself was lifted by people on stretchers many with bandaged head wounds witnesses say it happened during rush hour worst but day it was packed with commuters heading to work. around eighty people have been arrested in athens as police finally ended a standoff at a squat in the city center thought to say the building was occupied by people who took part in violent street protests the sidespin used for squatting for about twenty years. which battles of ruptured in south africa between farmers calling for higher wages and the police the protesters many working in the local wine industry are calling for their salaries to double similar demonstrations last year left two people dead. the head of fattah mahmoud abbas and his hamas counterpart in egypt

for talks that could lead to reconciliation between the two palestinian groups president morsi smet with both leaders calling on them to form a unity government with a view to holding democratic elections further down the track how most unflattering put it all since hamas took control of the gaza strip five years ago. the records in the united kingdom for more to be done to protect the public from dangerous dogs but political inaction is proving to bring horrific consequences as we report next artist sara firth met one family struggling to come to terms with the cost of living vicious dogs roam the streets it was a nightmarish attack that lasted just a few minutes but one which these parents wake up every day earlier this year and to me in state t.v. year old son kiran with this italy set upon by a neighbor's dog by the straw. soldiers

a mistake it's been six months now and still is on going surgery for image of the week it's not going on kiran was staying at his grand house when he managed to slip and they test what happened next very nearly cost the child's life we were looking . at the dogs go in so then we ran round the corner the dog was chewing all the pieces. of chicken with dog. they released their picks him up when the dog started it all to seconds early it will not happen because two seconds later they say it was a pet but it's more of the god. also. karen stanley maintains the attack happened in the alleyway next to their house and not on their neighbor's property the law in the only covers attacks on public land

they take place on private property are often impossible to prosecute even though that's when most occur the number of dog attacks in the case is increasing more than six thousand people weren't mitta to hospital in two thousand and eleven now we hear a loss about how dogs can but the truth is that the rules in this country were also hurting them every year how innocent dogs are put down simply because of the way last you have to go to sleep just hundreds of dogs and people right here on site is just under two thousand dogs they most charities and politicians agree it's time laws on dog control changed there appears little consensus on just how it should be done. dogs the biggest fear with irresponsible owners and meanwhile all the abandoned washing up in places like part of the dog's home and it's a tragedy for the government agency whose remit this falls under ses is

a situation they're trying to rectify in a statement artie said compulsory microchip ing of pets and legal changes were under discussion and it will make an announcement. but that's little comfort to karen's family. situation. family and. one of his own and. oh changing the rules it's too late for karen and while the ladies drag on the how person handles its dogs another tragedy is simply waiting to happen so r.t. . it's coming up to midnight so you know moscow time let's talk business with katie hi there good to have you back again in the new year for the new year brings worries about the aliens were sort of i mean it's a serious problem actually as far as the idel i doubt it has but as far as the world economic or is it talking about all those.