all the list of melons from around russia we've got the future covered. today's news on the week's top stories here in israel suggests it was behind this week's strike near damascus well russia attempts to mediate peace in a meeting with the syrian opposition. president claims french troops will stay in mali as long as necessary to root out the insurgency that's amid

mounting accusations of war crimes by money and forces. there's no sign of compromise looming between the government and the opposition in egypt where protests demanding the resignation of the president turn violent and rage on for another week. and the u.s. political john kerry is the new secretary of state with chuck hagel expected to get the post of defense secretary but neither appointment is expected to change much in america's foreign policy. with a look back at the past seven days top stories and the latest developments this is the weekly here on t.v. the syrian president bashar assad says he is able to confront any aggression aimed

against his nation he also says israel is trying to destabilize the country that's off the comments made by the israeli defense minister today hinting for the first time that his forces were behind this week's attack on its northern neighbor. has the details. it does come from the israeli defense minister it would be iraq and he has said that it is proof that when israel says something it means that he did stop short of actually affirming israel's involvement now u.s. officials have said that the strike targeted an arms convoy that was carrying anti aircraft weapons from syria to lebanon according to the israeli defense minister ehud barak he said that we do not think and i'm quoting that syria should be allowed to bring advanced weapons systems into lebanon it is important to make the point that his comments does not constitute acknowledgement of israel's involvement in the strike but it certainly does suggest the possibility that it took place and it was responsible for it but also said that the syrian president bashar assad's

fall is imminent and that it would serve as a major blow to his villa and iran need to look at this israeli strategy and it's a strategy that israel has employed in the past and that is namely a strategy of silence it is strategic it doesn't give any kind of confirmation or any kind of denial what israel has done in the past is known to an attack then leave and it really its response has been a no comment which really leaves the question in opposite of as minds it is a culture lated moves because this simons allows israel's enemies to save face and thus reduce the risk of reprisal and it's collation against the jewish state of course the international for now for any kind of israeli strike in syria would create immense arguments in the international community we've heard for example from moscow who says that if indeed israel did carry out the strike it was an attack on a sovereign state and as such it breached international law the arab league has also condemned the strike saying it is in violation of international law and it is

purported against a nother sovereign state so israel of course will not want to come out publicly and acknowledge that it carried out such a strike because it would not want to have the kind of diplomatic complications and diplomatic fallout that would follow from such an admission. meanwhile hopes of ending the on going conflict in syria have received a slight boost on the sidelines of a key security conference in munich russia's foreign minister sergei lavrov held his first direct negotiations with the leader of syria's main opposition group he called on them to be realistic and begin peace talks with president assad well retracing that any use of force is unacceptable the editor of politics first magazine marcus papadopoulos thinks diplomacy still has a long way to go before any real success can be achieved the meeting between the leader of the so the planes syrian national coalition and the foreign ministers of russia and the wrong an acknowledgement by the leader of the syrian national coalition that the syrian government it's not going to be defeated on

a military battlefield and it is acknowledgement that thousands of syrian civilians have died unnecessarily and all because outside players in the region turkey saudi arabia qatar have been holland weapons and cash to the militants in syria i think circle lateral the russian foreign minister said last year how surprised he was by the e.d.t. over the phone by a syrian opposition in coolie perceptual kristen's sat to go from power to resign to step down except that's not the way diplomacy works that's not the way peace process. hillary clinton about a year ago accused russian government of having blood on its hands flow unfortunately it's more the country saudi arabia it's on saudi arabia we have the blood of thousands upon thousands of syrian civilians on their hands because of their own geo strategic ambitions to see that removal of presence is sad and the

syrian government's. france is where the tree has reportedly carried out major air strikes on the training and logistic centers of islamic insurgents in northeast money but the own going military campaign in the country has been marred by alleged human rights abuses with activists reporting civilian deaths torture and ethnic reprisals by the local army welty has an exclusive report now exposing the realities on the ground in some of the most battle scarred areas ponies and i mean in this mob the area we've discovered allegations of war crimes information about them is under the control of mali's military government. i think it's getting more and more that he called to talk to people a lot of. human rights activists who are trying to identify witnesses are saying that people are climbing up and feeling the heat they are scared to speak a lot of people here. very sheer fool the malian army seems to be doing whatever

it can to prevent people from speaking to open. this government took advantage of the media's interest in all and for the first time visited the city's worst affected by hostilities today in the town of qana we were surprised by the arrival of mamadou c.v. bear the minister for humanitarian action and solidarity this was an attempt to bring the bomb a call government closer to people who regard the capital as remote from them with this visit and this event staged by politicians coincided with the publication of reports by international organizations such as amnesty international and human rights watch alleging atrocities crimes and violence on both sides for instance in qana several civilians were reportedly killed in french air force shelling we tried to interview the injured however were unable to obtain evidence in a community that has until now been strictly regulated by the military authorities

he said. the ministry says and. geisha is on the way so far no evidence has been provided so let the judicial system do its job these government its people and military are well aware of current events and we know that we cannot play this game with. the government has been attempting to assert political power despite very poor infrastructure today we spoke to an army private on his way back from he told us he hadn't been paid or even properly for fifteen days and if this war continues there will be a need for justice after a comprehensive internal investigation rather than heartfelt celebrations and demonstrations of power. during his visit to money president for oil and claimed french troops will remain in the west african state until the complete reinstatement of its sovereignty former deputy speaker of the belgian parliament a load of the news says that considering the current political state in mali

violence is inevitable. what i hear now is how this surprises me i mean first of all the mali an army does hold a grudge against people who are stemmed from the northern part of the country and secondly the soldiers very low grade and at very little armaments and such as they're not really a regular army in that sense there's only. hardly a state apparatus functioning how can you really just had people and examine what they do you can't you just ground nick underlying that should the only thing you can do correctly is if you think people might be terrorist is hold them and arrest them and detain them but you certainly are doing this kind of action judicial executions but eternally surprises me that this is going on right now this country needs support yes this country needs are we why is it that this help only comes in the form of military invasions that's a basic question you should we should ask ourselves deepening divisions in egypt

society continued to grow this week as an ongoing crackdown on anti-government protests fail to silence calls for president morsi to quit some of the latest violence saw one person shot dead and many others injured when security forces try to disperse angry crowds which attacked the presidential palace is only worsened the political and social stalemate the opposition yet again refused to join a national donald vowed to step up their protests the president warned of decisive measures in dealing with the unrest and military currently has increased powers due to a month long state of emergency imposed last week opposition activist ahmed you know with claims that the government's actions are heavily influenced by the army. the surface interpretation of what's happening definitely that there are groups who are willing to sabotage anything and try to embarrass the government specifically morsi and the military. on the surface however there are deeper interpretations of what's going on some of the interpretation goes as far as that the military council or the

military's big. all of this so that they can have. the grip over this way to intensify their presence militarily over there probably don't want to see an economic development of this specific strategic area because it would hand over to civilian oversight of the canal rather than military oversight of the canal according to the new constitution something called the national defense council this council in most countries and previously had an advisory stature now it has more of an executive that has military members on this board than civilians which numbers the civilians including be commander in chief the president which means they can force the president to take certain decisions which we have just seen in the past couple of days when they had the commander in chief say that he will declare martial law or emergency emergency law in those specific areas. you're

watching a weekly here in r.t. coming up this hour a final say before going behind bars we don't even realize how much of a police state the united states has become. to the former cia officer turned whistle blower of america's torture program he's now serving two and a whole few years in prison. and great protesters clashed with police outside the labor ministry in central athens with the public growing ever more weary of the government spending cuts all that still to come after this break. is he to.

do we speak your language i mean some of the law and out of. the music programs and documentaries and spanish matters to you breaking news i want to turn it to bangalore's kid stories. for you here. in troy altie spanish find out more visit actuality all tito is calm. well with. science technology innovation all the latest developments from around russia we've gone to the future or covered.

the two. week's top stories here in r.t. this is the weekly the first man convicted for blowing the whistle on america's prison torture program has begun to turn a half year prison sentence cia veteran john kiriakou was convicted of exposing washington secret interrogation tactics in one of his final interviews before being locked away he told r.t.

exactly what he thinks he's being punished for. first of all my case was not about leaking my case was about torture when i blew the whistle on torture in december of two thousand and seven the justice to department here in the united states began investigating me and never stopped investigating me until they were able to patch together. charge and force me into taking a plea agreement and i'll add another thing to when i took the plea in october of last year the judge said that she thought the plea was was fair and appropriate but once the courtroom was packed full of reporters last friday she decided that it was not long enough and if she had had the ability to she would have given me ten years in this post nine eleven atmosphere that we find ourselves in we have been losing our civil liberties incrementally over the last decade to the point where we don't even realize how much of a police state the united states has become you know ten years ago the thought of

the national security agency spying on american citizens and intercepting their emails would have been anathema to americans and now it's just part of normal business. the idea that that our government would be using drone aircraft to assassinate american citizens who have never seen the inside of a courtroom who have never been charged with a crime and have not had due process which is their constitutional right would have been unthinkable and it's something now that happens every every so often every few weeks every few months and there is no public outrage i think this is a very dangerous development senator john kerry was sworn in as the new u.s. secretary of state this week while defense chief nominee chuck hagel was grilled by the senate kerry took over from hillary clinton but as international studies professor stephen zunes told r.t. he's likely to be very old school in his approach. there is an outspoken supporter

of the iraq war and not being among the you know right wing minority of democrats on capitol hill that would authorize the war but. not only. making up the stance of tales about massive biological and chemical weapons stockpiles and nuclear program and delivery systems the livery systems that are. clear that that was all wrong or had no so-called weapons of mass destruction you said you were. in the way because saddam hussein was a terrible dictator and they had to pass the of making those kind of weapons sometimes mention of course back right here together for twenty or thirty countries retards that have a secret military. unconventional weapons and kerry was essentially they can reopen certain lines that hey we have a right. to criticize the moral and legal arguments no iraq was just asterisk now in libya we're seeing all those consequences in terms of two hundred thousand men

under arms. and these militias not controlled by the government you see the fall straight from mali to algeria elsewhere it's part of short sightedness that. we've seen so many other politicians in washington. gary and may be about to pull the plug on the construction of a new nuclear power plant which is being financed by russia that's despite a national referendum voting in favor of the project last weekend result was an l.g. to low turnout the country's ruling party is now expected to use its majority in parliament to hold the plant to the high cost but some experts believe it's the result of pressure from bulgaria is allies who are concerned the country could become dependent on russian local and pete woman of jobs says that the government went out of its way to discourage people from supporting the project. you have to take into account the. approximately fold q's. the sort of true city in the country also boats that were losing very safe and

thorough very reliable nuclear power plants in the super bowl year and so on are usually supporting nuclear power just. more were. approximately twenty percent just because of the efforts of the majority but created the special means special commissions in the parliament just so they were good just for that as the people looked overall not to support the new purple one but even in these conditions bulgarian favored. child abuse scandals and alleged cases of sexual harassment have dealt a serious blow to the reputation of the german catholic church and it's resulted in more and more worshippers turning their backs on it you may find somebody tells him people of his report on their lack of faith disturbing. the

abuse of trust the destruction of faith the theft of innocence. in one nine hundred seventy nine when i was invited to his house he locked the doors and forced me to drink what i now know was alcohol. he asked me what i thought of his penis which was a wrecked then the priest made me perform oral sex on him. the catholic church in germany is facing a crisis attendances dropped significantly over the past few years according to the central committee of german catholics one hundred eighty thousand parishioners stopped going to mass in twenty ten alone many citing church hierarchy unwillingness to do enough about claims of abuse like the ones made by wilfred the priest at the center of this particular scandal is now being moved to a different parish while this church where it's alleged that abuses took place

remains closed to worshippers but just how difficult is it to bring a criminal prosecution in cases like this if those people go to court now it's very difficult to get to a sentence because the weakness is sometimes died in between the memory has got lost and so those attempts to get to have a trial usually fail kristie invite for had been in charge of an extensive study into abuse in the german catholic church dating back as far as nineteen forty five his research claims that the church destroyed files on priests involved in abuse up to ten years also the twelve hundred victims were paid hush money not to reveal what happened to them he was dismissed after a dispute with senior clergy over what information would be made public the scandal that this research is no not going to be finished. it's causing problems to them as

well now they're losing members because of the new headlines of the last few weeks there are those within the church that recognize the importance of transparency it lapsed catholics not to be brought back into the flock a woman. thing and when we do not make things clear there will always be an aftertaste that something has been covered up this will harm attempts to get people into church because it is a bad foundation for trust and all belief is based on trust. for wilfrid that trust has been lost he says he will never set foot in a church a ged he's committed to getting compensation for himself and those others who claim they were abused by people who were supposed to be in a position of responsibility peter all over r.t. germany it was plenty of fallout in france this week following comments from the country's labor minister he said his nation was totally bankrupt michel sampat later corrected himself claiming it was

a joke but executive director devi advisors patrick young doesn't see the funny side. the problem is the french government is the biggest economic outer in france it spends the equivalent of fifty six point five percent of all of the economic activity the only other countries that spend more apart from sweden and the european union are places like north korea and we all know those are not the world's most prosperous nations there is absolutely no question the french need incredible radical economic reform it was not present on the sarkozy administration and frankly the fact listen and competence of mr hall on the president has resulted in the situation we have now i must of are pouring some cash if you do three billion euros that's the equivalent of about two percent of the entire economy left the country just during october and november last year let's face it the last time the french government balance their books was in the middle of the nineteen

seventies france is in a knock all in prices barely half the country are paying income tax you've got a situation where in fact public opinion is not just starting to realize that france is bankrupt. twenty three minutes past the hour here in the russian capital more news from around the world a bloody terrorist attack has killed at least thirty three people and injured many more in northern iraq a suicide bomber rammed a car packed with explosives into a police headquarters in kirkuk it was followed by heavy gunfire and grenades norge by men dressed in police uniforms in sort occurred in an ethnically divided city deeply embroiled in the sectarian conflict between sheer kurdish and sunni factions . a roadside bomb attack in southern afghanistan has killed a family of five two of the victims were small children the car they'd been travelling ran over a device buried in the road such bombs are commonly used by taliban militants in attacks aimed at putting pressure on the western backed afghan government. this is

the weekly altie still to come this hour america's secret prisons uncovered we take a closer look at what went on behind closed doors of the so-called cia black sites in eastern europe plus. with a member of. the. possible off my tortured she was beating me she looked at chewton medical workers in bahrain claim they were constantly targeted by the authorities for treating those hurt in anti government demos more on that story and plenty of all this after the break. the news sigrid laboratory to mccurry was able to build a new its most sophisticated robot which on fortunately doesn't give a dollar amount anything tim's mission to teach creation why it should care about humans in the world this is why you should care only.

the first baby steps are joy. folds and bones are not a big deal. but they can cause terrible trauma. for children can be broken by bare touch. and only the will of life can make. i'm source way. fragile people on r.t. .

the touch. we continue with weekly here in r.t. hundreds of greek protesters clashed with police on wednesday after stalling the building of the labor minister's office and activists were demonstrating against reforms to pay and pensions out of the latest spending cuts announced by the government around thirty people were arrested following the protest george says the

authorities response was part of a new approach to the strikes which of crippled the country. the government has decided to follow up on receipt of zero dollar us as it says ideas that is distance to their state the measures show because fifteen of the government to take in medicine measures that they are opposed to do so another against the very sentence likes it now we have seen the order it will release very violently against a generally peaceful and kind of the most recent where only seem to last three or four weeks i campaign of for propaganda try to convince us that now is the worse it's become best there is i don't believe that this is true is exactly because we are following this same set of policies of was thirteen measures that for three years has condemned greece. of slow death that this recession of the economy going

to axiom of the economy and a third source of measures hope by a vote i see some of the population and also look at that this was a right i think that as far as what we're following this said of. there's of course from greece to the u.k. now economists there have warned recent heavy snowfall in britain could push the country into a triple dip recession now that's bad news for retailers especially local independent stores who are going to the warning greater numbers than ever but that is pretty boy discovered there's one traditional business which has managed to turn the tide it's older than buckingham palace and tower bridge and it's been a local store in the heart of rural easting land for three hundred and seventy years this is to stumble across the altering and village shop in this remote region of norfolk say that it's like you know a seth in the middle of the desert.