from across the globe. the president of. troops one of the country's biggest. just. filled me with. the mine in question is of the facility a location in which the french company a revenue has a large stake now it's important to know that this is the second mission in africa completely separate from france's mission in mali which has been going on for nearly a month as neighbors mali and the situation there continues to remain unstable the french government is making it clear that they are ready and willing to protect

their assets in the region and on the african continent as a whole protecting assets in the region many know that france gets most of its energy from nuclear power hence the uranium is very very important indeed so massive economic concerns are indeed but as you also mentioned we've called the french led multinational intervention going in mali now boots on the ground in nigeria where it's certainly getting a lot of reaction from critics around the world at the moment certainly has been if you ask france they've pointed to the incident that happened last month in eastern algeria when islam ists took over a gas plant there eventually leading to forty eight people being killed thirty seven of those foreign workers france's predicting that more islamist retaliation to french presence in africa is likely and they say they want to prevent a tragic situation like this from happening again but then again there is the world's fifth largest producer of uranium a product that is vital to the french economy in fact it's estimated that nearly all or at least seventy five percent of france's electric infrastructure is

dependent on nuclear power given this it makes sense that france would want to protect that resource at all cost the president has welcomed the french presence in the country and recognizes the need for the have and security but has also stated that they want to better deal when it comes to uranium exports meijers economy is also largely dependent on your radio as well critics have already been wary of french involvement in mali claiming that the real motivation is a return to imperialism economic policy and a stronger control of a region that used to be french territory now with france's expansion into neighboring countries compiled with president expressing his concerns those critics now have a bit more that they can chew on. i was arty sean thomas i spoke to him a bit earlier in the program in the meantime or john walker lindh the director of studies at the institute of democracy and cooperation in paris he believes that securing natural resources is not the only goal that france has and there which i think the two main factors in this are france's own desire to strengthen the whole

role on the international stage in particular piece of you know european partners and also the american strict budget plans for africa it's important to know that america which strongly supports france in this mali an intervention has plans for establishing a military presence in the military control over the whole of the african continent some people speculated that used the phrase that this was america leading from behind that america decided to put forward its european allies to do as it were its dirty work in a continent where as i'm sure many of your you viewers know china has been establishing an economic presence now very successfully for a large number of years so there is a scramble for africa isn't there or is it just to grab the resources yes it's obvious that the securing of energy resources is one of the key factors behind many if not most political developments today and that's why i say that the of course

the issue of hydrocarbons and uranium and other energy sources is a key and may even be the decisive factor and i mean while in northeastern mali a french jets have carried out a series of air strikes on the bases and fuel depots obviously make terrorists with intervention now headed towards the desert and away from the cities are to report on what's left on the ground by after the liberating troops have moved in. francoise hollande victorious trip to timbuktu marked a declaration that three major cities in northern mali have been declared liberated from rebels although the sharia law and islamic extremism the rebels enforced will not soon be forgotten nevertheless this victory is a partial one the militants have merely retreated and fled and the suffering in this war has seems disproportionate to the gains made we're learning what happened

in battle day by day in the town of kona we heard stories from the fog of war this is small settlement in the mopti region was seized by the more yo tribe they fled to the north when french troops showed up but it's reported that the cost of that victory was high while french planes killed only two rebels the number of civilian casualties was an estimated fourteen. i wasn't home when the bombing began i started praying when i learned my house was under attack they ruined everything i had my family and my livelihood my wife's name was i mean not her she was forty my son ali was eleven when adam was ten and so you know group was six they all died but. people such as this farmer idris ask themselves if the victory was worth it. we also met the campo family who had suffered badly when the bombing began everyone scattered the campo lost two of their sons unable to swim they drowned in the river

while fleeing the fighting we also heard the story of a young mother who died from shelters leaving three children behind a newborn baby. the village was a complete mess it's impossible to describe a lonely discuss things i know for sure and i can say that all we had is gone. few some kids came running up to us and said their mom had a date i brought them to our house their mother died after an hour of cleaning too like the children have nobody else but us. disaster visited every house in the town people reject anything the military claims about victory and say war crimes must be prosecuted under the geneva convention towns like qana want more than just compassion people who suffered at the hands of terrorist groups and drug traffickers are now facing the misery inflicted by warfare. gonzalo want

mali for our tea and our tea is coming to live from moscow with just days ahead of crucial e.u. budget talks the leader of the blocks the toughest economy is meeting the head of one of its weakest german chancellor angela merkel will join forces with spain's prime minister. to discuss the euro zone's ongoing crisis though it's facing massive criticism back at home with corruption allegations on the opposition still calling for him to step down now the latest from berlin now with artie's peter all of. it could very well be called a meeting between the euro zone's haves and well quite frankly the have nots as german chancellor angela merkel sits down to talks with the spanish prime minister mariano what. germany still widely regarded as the euro zone's only real success economically while as many fear that spain could go the way of greece now the spanish prime minister will receive the full welcome of germany including

full military all this power they see was to turn up at the doorstep of many in his own country he may face severe criticism that's because many spanish citizens still think he hasn't done enough to deal with bank has the same basically the bearings are of this huge incredible fiefs run only by greed the government's not helping the people the topping the banks it has been at least thirty or fifty times the issue but in the last month there was three people they were going to be if he doesn't find out how it is but they hang themselves before the police were right there are. any i feel really sad when someone is thrown out because he has no one who can take care of him this meeting between the leaders of germany and spain comes ahead of a very important summit taking place this week where european leaders will try and

decide on the budget something which is separated countries within the union thus far. all of the reporting and most that i had for you this hour here on the presumption of guilt. something coming from polygraph tests now are guilty until proven innocent a cia veteran points the finger at his former employers saying the agency's compulsory polygraph tests are beyond the law and simply in effect if we bring you the details in just a couple of minutes. we

speak your language. with news programs and documentaries and spanish matters to you. use a little tonnage of angles stories. in the spanish find out more visit.

this is. in kuwait an opposition activist has reportedly been sentenced to five years in prison for criticizing the country's unelected ruler on twitter it's the third time a person has been convicted on such charges in the country just over the last two months now speaking out against the emir of kuwait is considered a state security charge misty international recently hit out of the monarchy for increasing restrictions of freedom of expression and assembly protests have been raging against the government and its crackdown on dissent going back to two thousand and eleven tensions flared even more after december's parliamentary poll which was boycotted by the opposition one former m.p. claims the country's democracy has been disfigured. and if. we refute claims that the national assembly represents the people of kuwait around seventy percent of the people boycotted the election and the assembly itself was

elected thanks to an unconstitutional decree passed by the governments which wanted to parliament control its lawmakers have failed to address widespread allegations of corruption democracy has taken a twisted for it is the only democracy which is seeing an increase of corruption we will continue to hold peaceful marches peaceful rallies and we will continue to gather and protest. or let's get some more reaction from middle east analyst joining us live from london good to see you today thanks for coming on the program we've been talking a certainly it for months now many months indeed about how opposition activists and outspoken demonstrators being put behind bars in bahrain now we have a story out of kuwait when it comes to this and there were action from this do you think we can get any reaction from those in bahrain they might find some sort of solidarity perhaps. well first of all it's a pleasure to be here with you today i think that the reaction from bahrain might be more muted suggests that they've got their own issues and they're hoping to

regime dialogue with the government next week and also as the second anniversary of the day of rage from two thousand and eleven next we push well so i think the reaction might not be as great as some people are expecting could be a bit of a muted reaction as you're saying but when it comes to who wait wait is not witnessed any deaths of protesters to date on life certainly in some of its arab neighbors did you think that could translate to meaning the regime there is perhaps less heavy handed certainly the government reaction has been more moderate than we've seen in some of the fellow gulf arab states this could of course change in the future if protests do escalates but so far well they say they have overreacted to some extent and sons of violence they have been much more fair with the protesters now certainly for many years now washington has had a number of military bases in kuwait or certainly several of them with more than

ten thousand troops in the country although washington also saying it's concerned about the handling of human rights in kuwait so what do you think are america's priorities that. well i think america's priorities are to keep feet on the ground in kuwait and we've seen that they've stayed in basra and despite the events of the past two years i think we'll see them maintain their presence in kuwait they're very interested in continuing to sell arms to the regime that's part of their security pact whereby they kuwait's security is maintained by external forces they are generous customers to places like the u.s. now when it comes to opposition activists in kuwait or certainly they've been trying to get the country's rulers to step down certainly since two thousand and eleven do you think the activists of achieved anything since then and if not or if the how do you think the prospects are for the future. they've they've had some minor successes along the way but overall i think they'll be disappointed with

their current position i mean they've managed to exile themselves from parliament effectively so they're outside of the main political process and really the only way they can influence events is through holding protests on the streets and how effective they're going to be or so far they haven't really proved to be effective i don't have very very. do you do you see the protests increasing in intensity perhaps in popularity. perhaps if the government. overreact to the protests tries to oppress them but if they. really don't see the protests. in london or middle east analysts or jamie joining us here and many thanks for coming on the program today. thank you for speaking to me. we are coming to you live from moscow and the artistic director of moscow's bolshoi ballet is traveling to germany for specialist treatment after

a violent acid attack against him just over two weeks ago the doctors there will be trying to help save sort of the feelings i cite. reports from the moscow hospital where feeling was taken immediately after the attack. he is doing rather well surprisingly well actually he did thank the doctors for doing everything in their power to pull him out of a very difficult situation that. third degree burns and those are very severe space and he said he's full of hope for full recovery and he's full of willpower and he actually looked very enthusiastic and the whole situation of course considering his circumstances actually he did appear to be on his road to. speak about who is who has been supposedly behind the attack he did say that he knows exactly who it was on this particular day today did not want to talk about the investigation at all so as not to interfere with the investigation he did

however. he did every thread before but he also mentioned and this is important. he didn't mention that he's continuing to work with everybody who has been left in charge. he said that the boys. performances and everything about the theater will be carrying on before our correspondent reporting right now an investigation by the guardian newspaper. britain's largest police force stole the identities of dozens of dead children. since the scheme went ahead without informing or consulting any of the parents in this potential scandal here and talk live with investigative journalist joining us live here in brazil good to see you as you can imagine we're already seeing the news it's raising some eyebrows among the british public is the story going to

where do you think. well it's just the latest chapter is a police corruption i mean i'm pinching myself the diagram rory wondering if i live in a democracy we're talking about. stolen by the police i mean you do want to tell you they seem to be indistinguishable from some of the criminals that they're supposed to be investigating and this wouldn't be necessarily so bad if these people who were infiltrated into these groups were actually criminals that they were looking at a lot of them have actually committed no criminal offenses whatsoever they were doing things like organizing peaceful demonstrations i mean we've seen a similar kind of attitude by the metropolitan police and i think it's fair to focus on the met and scotland yard rather than regional police forces who it doesn't seem were anywhere near as bad at these kind of things and then this is adding really to the other revelations from the guardian that god has been doing a fantastic job on this over the last few weeks and months of the eleven women who

had their lives hacked basically relationships even children born with police officers infiltrating into these groups and forming relationships with women and only. if i can just just stay on the initial subject here we're talking about the idea of basically intelligence officers using the names of dead children to infiltrate certain groups i've got to play devil's out of advocate for about meant here do you think do you think for a moment that the police were doing so with good intentions to infiltrate troublemakers and to root out what could be trouble down the road i mean you know they're just using the names of dead children are they. well i'm afraid trouble is not actually causing trouble it's not necessarily a criminal offense but the point being here one can understand extreme measures being willfully. to infiltrate serious organized crime for example maffia tonic organized crime may be you know people who are actually murderers and you know maffia types but actually these people weren't at all and that's the point that

there's really no excuse for this kind of behavior and actually the police ok they may have had these things authorized but actually what they're doing is breaking the law they should never have had the authorization to go and hack those you know those into those women's lives and either into these families so they're basically see themselves as above the law and i'm afraid that's the country we're living in now on the freight it looks as if the police of just as bad to scotland yard now for decades we've heard apparently that this is no longer authorized not currently authorized by the metropolitan police now i don't really necessarily trust that expression is not currently authorized well you whatever you talk about not having been authorized it is very apparent you know this it may have indeed started in one nine hundred sixty eight it's possible go back several decades but one former undercover agent reportedly said that he felt like he was quote stomping on the grave of a four year old boy whose identity he was given now you would imagine though with

everything that the police dispose all the great and world famous british intelligence surely they would have had more options than this to get the job done . well one wonders where else these infiltrations have been taking place as well do they have police agents within our political parties where are the lines being drawn because it doesn't seem like there are any loans being drawn are absolutely behind the former director of public prosecutions mcdonald who is now saying there must be a public inquiry into these kinds of police practices let's not forget these are crown servant does her majesty know that they're up to this does she approve and i mean there has to be really deep in choir here the guardian have done up a real can of worms and there's absolutely no accountability it seems why these things that have been authorised through through scotland yard the idea that people haven't complained about it therefore it's ok well of course i'm not going to complain about it if they don't know about it it's almost like the scotland yard is being run like some kind of secret cult we've got to break that culture if we're

going to have justice and we're going to have decent fair policing and some of the really big criminals that is the fraudsters in the city of london investigated by our police and taken to jail for it certainly is not the last we're going to hear of this story here attorney goes the investigative journalist alive from brazil a pleasure to have you on the program here on r.t. today thanks rory. or in the meantime thousands of people in america are forced to undergo polygraph testing every year all in the name of national security that somebody experts are ringing the alarm over the u.s. federal agencies exceeding their legal and ethical limits to determine who can be trusted so get over to r.t. is more important for more on the story. for more than three decades john sullivan worked as a polygraph examiner for america's central intelligence agency today the retired cia employee is offering some strong opinions about the nation's lie detector

policy too many honest people are too many people who should be passing their tests aren't and i and there's no there's no accountability for that. last year more than seventy three thousand americans were reportedly required to undergo polygraph tests in order to get or keep jobs with the federal government according to an investigation by mcclatchy newspapers a growing number of u.s. agencies are asking employees and applicants intimate questions that extend way beyond the realm of national security probing matters such as sexual conduct financial matters and past personal relationships a woman was pressured to talk about her experience being molested as a child and when the polar bear for said that he refused to go on with the interrogation he alleges that he was pressured to go back and continue interrogating or a decade ago the national academies an organization advising washington on

scientific matters urged the feds to stop using polygraphs as a screening technique scientists found that polygraphs aren't reliable enough to prevent innocent people from failing and deceptive candidates from passing i think it's important to understand that the polygraph is not just. for screening it's an interrogation tool. there's a question that they trip that leads to. the drilling down. question that they get asked may well be quite true over the past ten years. there's at least fifteen federal agencies including the n.s.a. and f.b.i. have reportedly continued or expanded their polygraph screenings with nearly five million people having access to classified information or washington maintains that

polygraph testing is the most effective way from preventing secrets from being leaked lisa ribicoff is an independent polygraph examiner and investigator who uses the polygraph program designed by homeland security she contends that it's ninety eight percent accurate i do think that there are some questions pertaining to some emotional aspects and personal situations should not be included but i do understand why they're included on the basis of that the government needs to see how exactly what their breaking point is what are they willing to discuss what are they not willing to discuss however applicants who are denied a coveted position after failing a polygraph are prohibited from accessing the records of their interrogation and are often barred from contesting the results were filing complaints in federal court in two thousand and four the cia veteran who conducted lie detector interrogations for thirty one years failed his own screening there was absolutely no question that the test was wrong. was

a terrible test sullivan lost his security clearance and was denied a job with a federal contracting agency he claims his examiner falsified the results possible retribution for solving his book detailing america's polygraph system subs a come in for a polygraph test now are guilty until proven innocent and i think that's a. corruption and an abuse of the process the obama administration is now promising to draft a new national polygraph policy that would prevent agencies from pushing legal or ethical boundaries during screenings but at the moment the program has no oversight or accountability meaning tens of thousands of u.s. citizens will continue getting personally probed in the name of national security green up or not our team new york. my colleague bill dog is here in half an hour's time but i coming up before him though it's crosstalk and the issue of same sex marriage to stay with us if you can.