french troops secure one of the shares of biggest uranium mines after the country's president confirms he asked paris for help fearing islamist attacks this as he pushes for a better deal from the nuclear dependent france. while it may bring mali eyewitnesses report a number of civilian casualties as french led troops battle islam as militants for control of the country. as john kerry starts his term as u.s. secretary of state a new study finds some foreign service personnel are paying for the privilege to serve by donating millions for the top job. in kuwait another activist thrown in jail for criticizing the emir on twitter sparking protests against the country's unelected rulers.

three i'm in moscow i match reza good to have you with us here on r.t. we begin a new era where the president has confirmed the presence of french troops at one of the country's biggest uranium mines in arlit he said special forces were asked to come in to avoid a repetition of last month's hostage crisis in neighboring out geria the arlott mining sites itself been the scene of a kidnapping two years ago and those taken hostages that time haven't yet been freed or he's shown thomas has more. the mine in question is the our live facility a location in which the french company a raven 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 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 well 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 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 measures 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. john lachlan from the institute of democracy and cooperation think securing natural resources isn't the only goal france has in the region. i think the two main factors in this are france's own desire to strength from the role on the international stage in particular piece of you know european allotments and also the american strict egypt plans for africa it's important to know that america which strongly supports france in this mali and 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 some resources yes it is 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 french forces have seen action in neighboring mali with fighter planes targeting muslim terrorist strongholds in the northeast of the country where president declared his troops are victorious in the northern cities the campaign is now heading into the desert but that's amid increasing reports of civilians killed in the fighting. francoise hollande

victorious trip to timbuktu marked the declaration that the three major cities of northern mali have been declared liberated from rebels although the sharia law and islamic extremism is the rebels' enforced will not soon be forgotten nevertheless this victory is a partial the militants have merely retreated and fled and the suffering in this war has seems disproportionate to the gains made as we're learning what happened in battle day by day in the town of qana like we heard stories from the fog of war this is small settlement in the market the 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 he said 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 she

was forty my son ali was eleven you made adam was turned and say no god was six they all died. but so many. people such as this farmer ask themselves if the victory was worth it i mean we also met the campo family who had suffered badly when the bombing began everyone scatter it the campo lost two of their son of those unable to swim they drowned in the river 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 how many discuss things i know for sure and i can say the all we had is gone. there's no few pool we can get some kids came running up to us and said their mum had donated but i brought them to our house their mother died after an hour of cleaning too like the children have nobody else

but us let's get even as they get out there it's a 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. about that yes probably without guns i want. president all on is acted decisively in mali at home the french are growing impatient for action particularly on the economy starting to worry if an ocean reports from paris unemployment continues to grow despite a long promising to create more than one hundred thousand new jobs. well president on land is welcomed as a liberator in mali after france's military operation against the islamists occupation back at home crowds are also gathered but with a starkly different mood where people are fired up over the continued decline of

europe's second largest economy despite the president's promises to create at least one hundred thousand new jobs the nation is shedding them at an alarming rate last november about a thousand every day the worst figures in years the country's unemployment is approaching a shocking eleven percent with more than three million jobless the french daily lives and claims that the exact situation could be even worse if official statistics included youngsters never registered for the unemployment program or those who left it and those stuck with part time work the paper says the rate would then triple but there certainly is a lot of people expected to have a strong president and they understand that a law on doesn't have enough experience or competence to improve things the last two weeks as we see from. the fans who are so you know believes the strategic mistake was to rectify the e.u. so-called three percent treaty force in france to reduce its budget deficit down

from four point five percent by hiking taxes and cutting spending. but while harsh criticism expected from the opposition disapprovals also been growing from like minded left wingers or complain but i think the president especially of a country like france one of six e.u. foreigners should be strong enough to say stop to others and say hey i have my nation behind me and they elected me to make changes instead he surrendered because he's more worried about the country's debt and the ratings agencies make. in a short video french communists put together some of the lawns major presidential campaign vows none of which they say came true. look what that's going to be oh the value added tax increase. i think it's an appropriate and unjustified and unreasonable and too hasty. what happened to well that's two reminded presidents do you remember you promised to review the

european treaty you didn't do that your german bring said a three percent deficit isn't real but now only say it's possible etc etc you can't do what you promised meanwhile recent polls show a little rise in the frankly disapproval rating into four percent january to december through two percent and the lawyers see salons to office in maine. every week that is a new subject to discuss in the french media and to draw people's attention from the real problems like gay monitor deployed you are now in mali the strategy may work but not for long. after a land wonder french election last year some analysts described his victory as a victory against his predecessor. rather the long now be seen many things the past of the team that actions in the. months of the presidency have been anything but sunny happenings and even his once staunch supporters predict even harder times lie ahead for the leader the country's municipal elections in two thousand and fourteen

have historically held great significance and will show whether they can forget and forgive. me for not seen from paris. and stay with us here on our can you still to come when getting the royal treatment is on well we were put out how cold wait and see the people behind bars just for criticizing the monarchy plus. artistic director of moscow's bolshoi ballet heads to germany for treatment after he announced he knows who was behind the acid attack on him more than two weeks ago that's all still to go. as john kerry begins his term as the new u.s. secretary of state many of the ambassadors serving under him or major donors to the president's campaign a new report says this year's competition among big money backers to land one diplomatic spots well especially tight or he's going to take you on has more. as you can imagine the competition for diplomatic post is tough especially in safe and

wealthy country somewhere in western europe and asia a recent study by two professors of international relations at pennsylvania state university looked at available information on president obama's donors direct political contributions and the positions that they received and they concluded that those whose political connections to president obama were measured in dollars rather than that ministration service had an increased chance of representing the united states in western europe and a smaller chance of serving in say central asia or sub-saharan africa donors and advisers involved in the diplomatic selection process say the competition this year has been so tight that those who have raised less than a million dollars are for the most part unlikely to be considered so what is the quote unquote price tag for the highly sought diplomatic posts according to this study friends and monaco topped the list with a level of personal contributions at six point two million dollars the price will quote unquote the price for a position in the u.k.

the authors find appears to live between six hundred fifty thousand dollars and two point three million dollars a posting in luxembourg that tiny but very wealthy european country for example is valued as three point one million dollars dollars in direct contributions and appointment to portugal was predicted to have a value of around six hundred thousand dollars like all modern presidents before him president obama has appointed friends and donors to about thirty percent of diplomatic posts while seventy percent of the posts go to career diplomats so judging by this research career diplomats go to places like yemen while big donors go to monaco nobody of course calls it bribery here these are just respectable donors who get what they want when they pay the price. or news still to come right after a break you're watching also here on our t.v. stay with us.

technology innovation. developments from russia. covered.

with us here on r t fifteen minutes past the hour the bolshoi ballet's artistic director will get treatment in germany in the hopes of saving his eyesight this after saturday fillin had acid thrown in his face just over two weeks ago while filling claims he knows exactly who is behind the attack no one has yet been arrested or reports from the moscow hospital where the director was taken after the assault. 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 he found himself in. third degree burns and those are very severe to his face and neck he said he's full of hope for a full recovery and he is full of willpower and he actually looked very enthusiastic and upbeat about the whole situation of course considering his

circumstances actually he did appear to be quite so on his road to recovery he did speak about person 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 mention. he did every see threats before but he also mentioned and this is important according to the gate feeling himself he didn't mention that he's continuing to work with everybody who has been left in charge of the bolshoi theatre he said that nothing about the boy st peter's changing. performances and everything about the theater will be carrying on as before in kuwait an opposition activists reportedly been sentenced to five years in prison for criticizing the country's ruler on twitter it's the third time a person has been convicted on such charges in the country in the last two months

and most international recently hit out at the monarchy you for increasing restrictions on freedom of expression and assembly protests have been raging against the government since two thousand and eleven resulting crackdowns on demonstrators have only fueled dissent tension flared after the summer's parliamentary poll which was boycotted by the opposition one former m.p. claims democracies in the country who completely undermine. him. and we refute claims that the national assembly represents the people of kuwait seventy percent of the people boycotted the election. and they simply itself was elected thanks to an unconstitutional decree by the governments which wanted to parliament it could control its lawmakers have failed to address widespread allegations of corruption so democracy has taken a twisted for them it is the only democracy which is seeing an increase of corruption and if there we will continue to hold peaceful marches on peaceful rallies and we will continue to gather and protest with and one thing about

a minute and there is more online for you would r.t. dot com including how president obama could start a cyber war with the push of a button add to our website to find out about the executive authority allowing him to launch a preemptive cyber attack on any country plus. city in pakistan where osama bin laden was killed is due to get fun may go over to improve its image our t.v. dot com has more to find out what in the islamic ad has in mind for the former home of the world's most wanted terrorist. in the u.k. reportedly preparing to test out a brand new drone which could herald a breakthrough in unmanned warfare the aircraft is designed to be undetectable by radar and can even select targets by itself artie's sarah firth as more from london . it can fly faster than the speed of sound it can deploy its own weapons and it can go deep into enemy territory now this is the nearly british

super drone as it's known in the trenches has been under development for many many years now costing hundreds of millions of pounds already but it's thought that this where the legionary niecy project is going to be taking is needed in voyage over the next couple of weeks that's what's expected now military chief has said that the transits will pave the way for a whole new generation of these new drones and it's being billed as the future of the air force but experts have warned that this could open the doors to a whole new type of warfare there's concerns about robo wolf air where machines that are able to launch their own attacks could attack humans and of course a lot of control the sea that always surrounds the use of drones as well as deal then with the here and now because the controversy surrounding drone warfare has been highlighted recently when the u.n. launched an investigation in to civilian deaths caused by the drones now assisting

the u.n. in their research it's a team from goldsmiths university of london and i'm joined by one of thirteen now professor. and i think you very much for joining us and this new technology a lot of talk about a lot of excitement but a huge number of unanswered questions that go along with these developments you're taking part in this investigation now we haven't even really got questions answered eight of the legality of these attacks and yet we're seeing technology sort of leapfrogging over the law at this point i think that what. we are seeing a de facto legislation by practice. of warfare actually creating the law for the problem of the law for war because it always legs behind the technologies are full of course the chronology moved much. plastered in the laws of war and if technology changed the way in which we conduct our wars when we speaking about drone warfare we're not really speaking about the area bomb being we're

speaking about targeted attacks and especially the kind of the new type of attack that we've been seeing in the last decade that is called an extra duty juridical assassination these really are based on kill ists and they are compiled by somebody either authorized by the people with the reason or transparency and we do not know how that process is undertaken and of course this is really what your investigation singeing on is gathering that all important data is absolutely in the forensic architecture project at goldsmiths what we look at is the nature of war in an urban area now most drone attacks are launched on inhabited areas areas with a lot of civilians with civilians and militant. entangled in the numbers are very difficult to establish because both israel and the united states would consider every man over a certain age sometimes sixteen sometimes eighteen is

a militant by definition we know it is not true the details of that investigation the results are expected towards the end of the year old tabor thank you for joining us today to talk about britain's steep terrain and of course all the unanswered questions that go along with that south korea and united states have started a joint three day naval training exercise in the east sea when over is come amid rising tensions with the north after pyongyang threatened to conduct another nuclear test erik's iraq and co-founder of the national campaign to end the korean war thinks the saber rattling may only make things worse. the worst thing you can do under these circumstances is to inflame volatile situation to conduct these military exercises that always inflame that use live ammunition up and down the border with the north korea this is inflammatory on a lot of levels and we need to step back from these naval exercises it's like a race to the bottom if you will when are we going to get more creative in the way that we resolve conflict in this world this conflict gives us such an opportunity

with a new secretary of state new leader in south korea we should be pushing for peace suspend these naval exercises and go from there yes there should be nonproliferation of nuclear weapons on the korean peninsula but we don't even recognize north korea as a nation have a peace treaty or formal relations to deal with these matters what do we expect to turn now to some other stories making headlines across the globe bahrain's government has set a new date for a long delayed talks with the country's opposition the call for dialogue aimed at resolving the political crisis comes amid a new wave of violent clashes between anti regime protesters and police across the country in the capital security forces used tear gas to disperse crowds who are hurling fire bombs the gulf kingdom has been cracking down on pro-reform demonstrators for two years arresting thousands including many prominent activists . a skeleton discovered under

a car park in the city of leicester in the u.k. has been confirmed is that of king richard the third the monarch was the last english king to be killed in battle batten back and fourteen eighty five but his grave was lost in the sixteenth century after the demolition of the church where he was buried next to their reigns will be reinterred in leicester cathedral with details of the re burial ceremony yet to be released. at least eight people have died when it tore a bus flipped over and collided with a pickup truck on a highway in southern california authorities warn that the death toll may rise as dozens of the injured have been taken to hospitals some in critical condition the luminary reports say that speeding could be the cause of the accident while the driver claims there was a problem with the brakes. demonstrators gathered outside germany's parliament protesting against the visit of spain's prime minister mariano rajoy is in berlin to discuss a loan deals that economists say are vital to reviving his country's economy during the trip roy once again denied corruption allegations that sparked protests in

madrid last week this video is from a ruptly artie's recently founded international video news agency. israel's prime minister has announced plans to build a security fence along the syrian border benjamin netanyahu says it's to protect against any threat from radicals if the assad regime was overthrown but joaquim thinks the move has little to do is security. nearly two years now. at the time of the surge in c. there were no attacks against israel by the insurgents not by the regime itself so this is a mere pretext israel wants to take advantage of. weakening regime in syria to improve its strategic position specially in defense of its claim to the golan heights imposing a buffer zone will make israel in the future to. negotiate over withdrawing from this buffer of their own zone rather than withdrawing from the golan this is an

attempt to annex more territories and it's at the same time and at them to threaten . damascus itself if israel expands its domain by another seventeen kilometers this will make it reach close very close to damascus it's trying to destabilize the regime and it knows very well that the collapse of the regime will lead to a probable division of syria which runs in the interest of israel. next artie's piero of oil and gas discuss same sex marriage on crosstalk stay with us here on r.t. . wealthy

british style. time. market why not come to. find out what's really happening to the global economy with mike's concert for a no holds barred look at the global financial headlines tune in to kaiser report.

has a. glowing welcome to prop up where all things are considered i'm peter lavelle what is a marriage and should same sex marriages be legally protected is it a universal human right to marry whomever you wish is this debate about equality and discrimination and what about the issues of religion social values and children . to cross-talk same sex marriages i'm joined by peter tatchell in london he is a human rights campaigner and director of the peter tatchell foundation in the hall we have godfrey bloom he is a member of the european parliament and

a member of the u.k. independence party and in washington we cross to thomas peters he is the communications director for the national organization for marriage gentlemen cross-talk rules in effect that means you can jump in anytime you want thomas if i go do you want in washington first how do you define a marriage well i define marriage like the vast majority of human history societies and cultures the marriages the unique binding of a man and woman for proper raising of children the next generation and it's very close in sync ok peter in london give it a shot what's your definition of marriage go ahead i think marriage is a bond of love and commitment between any two people and they could be opposite sex or same sex and indeed in britain until nine hundred seventy one there was no ban on gay marriage so the ballot in britain is a very recent invention godfrey go ahead and. very much agree with us in washington i don't think i could improve upon that definition of marriage ok .