posits make the country very attractive nearly eighty percent of all france's energy generated by almost sixty nuclear power plants is dependent on african remaining. french companies must go on the offensive and fight the growing influence of rival china for stake in africa's increasingly competitive markets all this is neocolonialism but with us simply france is far from the only nation to have been defending its interests in africa the french have intervened around fifty times in the last fifteen years since official declination contact in regimes from rebels like in djibouti to central african republic all fighting regimes like in libya france is always driven by economic or geopolitical interests this time is no different i call lies asian wasn't actually over apart from economic there is also strategic importance this part of africa opens routes to the red sea and the middle east britain and france have for centuries bought over it before it's like

a remake but with many others involved but that doesn't mean the round mutual interests here. if you ask people in mali you'd be surprised they were waiting for somebody to save them because their army is not equipped to are trained to oppose these militants but it was necessary to intervene in mali people see this operation as a liberation they hardly wanted to live under islamicists mess they had that is a philosopher in the form of tunisia ambassador to us co his view on the positive impact for the people of mali is that it is actually a colonial throwback. it's ok if you want to come you're resources put then it's logical that locals profit as well those riches go to improve their lives after but that's not the case this way is wild the kind of slavery in mali him on the richest international resources in africa yet remains one of the poorest nations in the world. for many years there's been in paris was the head waters of the country's

ministry of colonies the body which administered french territories overseas today that ministry no longer exists and former french colonies are independent someone that the law no idea as i would just part of history and that history may be repeating. very few notion out from paris. there have been numerous reports of weapons spilling into money after the toppling of moammar gadhafi regime in libya independent political analyst and glazebrook believes the western intervention in libya is the actual reason behind the man in turmoil and was happy mali is a direct result of the arming of of rebels and gadhafi in gadhafi libya. as well as the fall of gadhafi could have he was a key player in negotiating peace deals the last peace deal in northern mali. was negotiated in two thousand nine.

hundred by the rebel forces that's was created this instability and again this is not completely just this is not unforeseen consequences there may be stupid be impurities but they're not completely blind to the results of their actions. u.s. there democrat john kerry is set to replace hillary clinton as america's next secretary of state the first go to field questions in the senate committee of his confirmation hearing and so far kerry is choked up with emotion while talking about his father and being interrupted by an antiwar protester stay with us for the details and also a live expert opinion from new york on that plus. not once but twice i'll give you the story of a one year old girl who lived this. well that's still to come but first catalonia was adopted the declaration of sovereignty

a proclamation that gives it the right to hold a referendum on breaking away from spain but madrid is unswayed citing illegality and maintaining it's not up to countenance alone to decide if they want to leave but a metaphor all spaniards. sees a sociologist at the pump of fiber university says that's little more than an excuse well it's definitely unlawful i mean it's a lawful against the constitution the question is also you know how many people in spain right now. are really behind this constitution and when when does this constitution actually mean anything the constitution also guaranteed a right for instance to decent housing and yet we find that you know hundreds of people are being are being kicked out of their homes today and being left out in the street all over spain handed out alone so you know the constitution a lot of the times serves to i guess is about to validate an argument or to legitimize an argument whenever it's convenient for whoever is governing at the time. north korea is going nuclear over sanctions pyongyang and the slew of major

problems in atomic weapons tests all targeted against the u.s. which it sees as being behind fresh un had. later but first a confirmation hearing which is expected to see john kerry becoming the head of the u.s. state department has begun in washington democrat senator was nominated by president obama to replace hillary clinton as the country's top diplomat or to talk more on the potential challenges kerry may face and joined by daniel wagner's managing director for the political and economic risk advisory firm a country risk solutions hillary clinton's term has had many challenging moments just how much work because she left for her successor and is he up to the job. i think we have to characterize much of what hillary has accomplished as a work in progress we look in libya we look in burma we look so many places around

the world she has presided if you will over many of the things that are in motion now and yet they have yet to be completed so mr kerry assuming that he gets the nomination i think he will be. he's simply going to carry on i believe with much of the work that's already been done so continue with the same foreign policy that we've seen and yet she has acknowledged hillary clinton the arab revolutions have led to the spread of extremism the u.s. support of course many of the changes both politically militarily in those countries do you think that kerry might be less inclined to get involved in other countries affairs. you know i don't think i would characterize it that way mr kerry comes into the job having more experience in the foreign policy realm than mrs clinton did by a long shot he he probably knows almost as many heads of state as she does he's traveled widely he's very familiar with many of the issues my sense is that he's

a very much a realist and a pragmatist at the same time so while we can expect him not to hesitate to make difficult calls as any secretary of state would i also think he's going to be measured in terms of diving in if you will or or promoting suggesting military engagements where they aren't necessary he's going to be very cognizant of some of the resource limitations of militarily financially and in terms of pollute the political limitations that the obama administration is operating under and i think he's going to be cognizant of all of that going forward talk about his experience as a diplomat last year of course will rise in anti-american sentiment in the muslim world how do you expect him to deal with that that is a massive diplomatic challenge is it not for the u.s. . well he may be very well advised to leave it alone if you will it seems like first of all it's something that cannot be controlled if there

were an inclination to can to try to control it in the first place but wherever the u.s. has sort of stuck its finger in the arab awakening it hasn't ended well and yet of course they want to be able to influence the process as much as possible so my sense there is that he's he's going to. try to influence policy just as any secretary of state let's not forget that mr obama in some respects has been his own secretary of state he's a very knowledgeable person in foreign affairs as in his own right and i think ultimately he's going to work very closely with mr kerry to call the shots mr kerry of course having served so long as the head of the foreign. relations committee is going to marshal his resources in congress to hopefully to the benefit of the obama administration you're going to also see a very sort of middle of the road. new york we're going to talk about russia u.s.

relations interesting enough kerry has criticized u.s. policy towards russia saying that the current state of relations between the two pole do you think you'll be able to soothe existing tensions. well let's think about that you know mr obama is in place for another four years and the secretary of state works at the pleasure of the president and at the direction of the president mr putin certainly is in place for the next four years so you know unless there's some meeting of the minds at the head of state level i really don't know what impact if secretary of state is going to mr lavrov i don't know that he's going to be going anywhere in the next four years it seems to me that the only place to go with bilateral relations with between the u.s. and russia right now is up and my expectation and hope is that that will be one of the priorities that mr kerry will put on his agenda starting this year when the net positive note thank you very much indeed daniel wagner political and economic risk

advisor joining me live daniel thanks. in the dead of winter it pays to be careful on russia's icy roads and shocking footage has gone viral of what can happen if you're not buying let's say it takes us through the drama. the road is clear he decides to overtake his lips on the road the truck coming back she's on to him there you go something falls out there you see why don't your left corner is the baby who's just. out of the moving car into oncoming traffic now what's most surprising about this is that the father comes out luckily this driver is quite you know is pretty much aware of what's going on around him he picks up the kid goes back into the car his wife comes out picks up what is what's left of everything in the now this video has gone literally viral people are going crazy over it and it's only natural that they would because so many questions are being asked on why was this baby not properly settled in this car there was no baby seat

obviously seen that the baby fell out of the car and it's unacceptable that they just nonchalantly just went about their business but now the question that everybody should be asking is rather who was filming the video where all of this was happening so russia motorists saw that they'll put cameras on the actual car so that if anything happens in terms of insurance they have something to actually show the police and say this is what happened on the road the person who was filming this decided to continue for me even as he saw that there's a child who just fell out of this car he continued filmy didn't stop to help didn't say anything and he just went about for me maybe because he thought it was going to be on you tube you know i'm not involved who cares but something that got everybody even talking more is the actual parents they just nonchalantly pick up whatever's left of their belongings and just move on i think the lesson of the day here is that not only are you not you know supposed to be driving recklessly on roads as we

have right now it's winter it's slippery it's snowing you need to be a bit more vigilant and baby seats for reason to protect us and to protect our kids . fresh violence flares up in jordan as the election results emerge one person killed in the clashes is pro-government evidence dominate the new parliament amid claims that king hi jacked the election that's still ahead. of where the security service is assassination plots against senior officials amid a guessing game or have some battle of president hugo chavez that break.

if you're just joining us a very warm welcome aarti live here in moscow at least one person has been killed in jordan as fewer supporters of the islamist opposition clashed with those loyal to the king off to partial parliamentary election results were made public they showed the pro-government candidates will occupy ninety percent of the seats. has more in the first parliamentary vote in jordan since the arab spring kicked off there two years ago. despite a boycott by the muslim brotherhood and other opposition groups and jordan's first parliamentary election since the start of the arab spring turnout was quite high according to election officials more than fifty six percent of the country's two point three million registered voters came out to cast their ballots this is higher than in the last parliamentary elections in this country the muslim brotherhood and opposition activists meanwhile dismissed the results as illegitimate saying that voter turnout was actually much lower than officials describe now jordanian

officials want credit for what they claim are successful if cautious democratic reforms this is the first time that outside election observers were invited to watch over the polls and the new parliament for the first time will be able to elect the country's new prime minister the parliament will also have more of a say over day to day affairs but the king will continue to retain authority over the security services and foreign policy moreover the new parliament can still be dismissed at any moment by a royal to cream which has cost some jordanians to say that the new reforms were simply too little and too late now the opposition groups also claim that the new parliament is illegitimate because of the country's new election law which they say is tilted towards favoring candidates from rural tribal organizations that are largely seen as being supportive of the monarchy in fact of the one hundred fifty seats in the new parliament only twenty seven went to national candidates of which the muslim brotherhood is the strongest most powerful and most popular political

party they will continue to dismiss the results as illegitimate and are likely to try to ferment more street protests to boycott to continue their boycott of the new poll now at the end of the day jordan stability may not be dissolved by politics and may in fact depend on the economic situation jordan faces high levels of unemployment and has a twenty two billion dollars of national debt now jordan's new parliament will have to push through even more biting austerity or. forms which could severely undermined stability here in jordan the future of the arab spring may in the end depend on the economic situation and not politics. arts amman jordan. two british activists from the hacker group anonymous have been sentenced to eighteen and seven months in jail respectively for attacks on websites including visa master card and pay pal one of their attacks cost the victim three and a half billion pounds internet activism is what we discuss with kim dot com now

he's a web businessman known for his now banned file sharing service until last year his mega upload site was one of the most visited sites in the world and it allowed millions of users to exchange information freely now here's what comes up if you know go to mega upload it's banned by u.s. authorities has become a landmark case in the persecution of internet activists but kim dotcom is already started a new service and is determined to keep free fall sharing alive he spoke exclusively to break about why he's being hounded across the globe. here's a guy who grew up on the internet was a guy who made millions off the internet and here's a guy who designed mega upload at one site one of the most popular websites in the entire world and over one hundred million users is in the top five most trafficked websites and you know that's kind of why the f.b.i. wanted to shut it down i'm not. my hero he was selfless he is

completely the opposite of me but i'm a businessman i'm driven by the success of achieving something in the business world ok that's not a crime there's nothing wrong with that big raid on the mega mansion the dot com mansion happened january twentieth two thousand and twelve it was the middle of the night kim was at his guest house on this how the mansion all of a sudden the authorities the local police showed up on helicopters came into his house with guns drawn arrested him arrested his colleagues hauled him off to prison froze his assets shut down his website essentially they put his entire life on hold and caused him to kind of take this new stance in terms of what he thinks of the internet particularly what he thinks about the current state of privacy and surveillance of the government is quite exposed here because they really went in was completely be prosecutorial abuse and overreach and ignoring.

ignoring our rights spying on us illegal search warrants illegal restraining orders illegal spying going to the whole picture when you look at it shows that this was an urgent mission done in a rush to take them down i want them to go and it was a political decision to do that is still waiting a eventual extradition hearing to the u.s. at this point though it seems like every single passing day the justice department's case against him just crumbles more and more and more so sooner or later the u.s. government is going to have to prove that kim dotcom is worthy of the extra us and at that point if he's convicted he could spend decades. in prison but the opinion that i got from him and from his legal team is that that's not going to happen anytime soon. and you can see the full interview with kim dotcom on friday on. the career is what it is prepared to carry out a plethora of rocket launches and nuclear tests to allow them to compete militarily

should woods turn to warfare the message comes a day after the u.n. approved more sanctions against pyongyang over a satellite launch back in december but for more on this latest outbreak we're joined by brownback he's from the antiwar coalition joining me live from the u.s. brought north korea says it wants the capacity to actually strike at america itself that is exactly what is aims are but is it something that it really could achieve well we don't know about that it seems to be a very big stretch. but let's put the situation the military situation in the context of the united states government with the south korean government carries out its biggest war games anywhere in the world just off the border off the shores of north korea and each year once and oftentimes twice a year they staged a mock invasion in mock bombing of north korea so of course korea a country that had been invaded by the u.s.

and its allies in one nine hundred fifty a country that suffered five million losses during that three year war a country that still has no peace treaty with the united states when it's experiencing this kind of level of enduring threat from war games it too wants to escalate its military capability and i think the north koreans are trying to make their point that they have the right to defend themselves so it's being provoked but it is a very serious reaction to this provocation is not a direct threat against us what will the response be from washington now do you think will it settle for more sanctions or do you think it's going to be tougher on this now. well i think the direction is more sanctions but let's go back to just a ten years ago in the last days and weeks of the clinton administration madeline albright then secretary of state was sent to north korea by clinton there seemed to be a thought there seemed to be an opening there was the possibility of a normalization of relations a peace treaty as a mansion which was has been missing since july one thousand fifty three when the

when the hostilities came to an end and during that time north korea agreed to suspend its nuclear arms program it was only when george w. bush came in scotch that plan resumed extreme provocations against north korea did north korea say well you know what we're going to build nuclear weapons and they just kicked out the i.a.e.a. inspectors and went forward what north korea really wants is peace they want normalization of relations with the united states sanctions will only cause north korea more sanctions will cause north korea to do more that threatens those who are who are imposing the sanctions on the letter we had and then others too said that he believes that north korea's antics actually worked in america's favor by chief furthering its foreign policy aims that in asia he got a point and in what way could that help america's foreign policy in the region. well every time any country says that they are going to defend themselves from the united states the united states see your aggressor and thus we have the new excuse

the new pretext to up the ante but i think when you look at the whole picture you could see that north korea's sort of tenacious militancy even if it appears to be bombastic in the west in the way it's presented in the western media it's had the effect of preventing what would have been otherwise i think a war between the united states and its allies south korea in north korea that was a danger that existed in one thousand nine hundred four a very real danger it started again when bush came into office scratching and scotching the the normalization process that was under way during clinton so i don't think north korea is sort of. impression that it's prepared to fight is actually accelerating the conflict if anything i think it could lead to new negotiations and yet there is a reaction many saying tensions in the korean peninsula is not what is needed right now and saying that the war of words could perhaps result in an actual incident and you'll saying there is nothing to be worried about this is just simply posturing and could lead to more negotiations rather than any military action. not not quite

i want to be very precise about this korea is the most heavily militarized part of the planet the u.s. won't sign the landmine treaty one of the few countries not to be a signatory to it because they say they may need it in korea there's constant incidence in north korea one of those could blow up and become a major conflagration it's a serious problem all i'm saying is that north korea by saying that it too has the capability to strike back to defend itself is trying to reignite negotiations and in the past that has sometimes been successful brian thanks a lot good to talk to you get back in from the answer will answer coalition joining me live there in washington thank you. well finding the closest secrets about anyone in the world at all to dot com you can read about how an agency is in government because people's favorite client is the number of requests for private data gets the moment the great british brain drain a lack of opportunity for the u.k.'s brightest to look elsewhere for more money and

better jobs you can read more about that at r.t. dot com. security forces in venezuela run covered and the assassination plot against the vice president nicolas maduro and the head of the national assembly the claims came directly from the end amid i should say growing concern over the health of president chavez he's recovering from cancer surgery in cuba but hasn't been seen in public for six weeks now he's even gotten just spoke to the vice president who says there is no cause for concern over the condition of chavez. during the interview with vice president nicolas maduro the vice president of venezuela he informed us that president chavez is right now in his best moment. since his operation that took place at the beginning of december that there's a lot of expectation regarding his return to venezuela that he's definitely been

improving complications have been overcome that arise during his surgery and in the post operative phase at the same time he did want to speculate about when president chavez what exactly return to the country that that's definitely the cards definitely the near future. this isn't a good post-operative condition and he's recovering with very well will make an official announcement to the public we were able to visit him all the time. vice president said that right after this interview he would be leaving on a plane to have an excuse to meet with president chavez to visit him informing us also that president chavez is conscious he's awake he's aware of what's going on he's actively involved in his government wants to know what's happening and that he's still at the head of government that he's the one giving the orders and. decisions he's still making the decisions about the different paths that the government's taking. he's the president and more than fifty six percent of the people who voted for his continuing to fulfill his obligations everyone administer

the.