a vote of last hope austerity had italians are choosing their parliament with a former comedian stealing support from mainstream politicians and disappointment running high. america's new secretary of state john kerry is checking the box a with key allies in europe on his first tour abroad and we'll look at what his mission with partners there could be all about. the. syrian rebels release a video which they say shows a government helicopter being shot down with a missile that the regime says it's ready to talk to all sides of the opposition even doe's who are armed and fighting. and afghan drugs amid a russian vegetables drug control officer sees almost two hundred kilos of heroin

hidden in sacks with radishes at a market near moscow. good evening we've got news and analysis live from our moscow headquarters of course you're watching r t with me lucy catherine of well on to our top story voting has ended in italy where a disillusioned public has been choosing its parliament early results show the center left coalition is leading with the main surprise of the selection the party led by a former comedian who's also doing well now for more on the outcome let's turn to our tease arena who is live for us in rome arena great to see you vote counting is underway how the numbers are stacking up right now. but at this point we're kind of having this whole. up and down which is happening between the candidates which is

of course something to be expected in the preliminary stages of the counting of the results it's first it looks like the evolution was at the head then. he made a surprise appearance at the top and then back it went down to being in first place better going to being in second and the biggest surprise well possibly for maybe not for others because the prize though the best agree lo a former stand up comedian coming in the a very firm third place and of course modern monte the prime minister told numerous assyria to measures. and public his coming in the fourth place he's actually trailing quite severely this is the these are the results right now we can expect them to maybe change but not so much a lot of experts are saying because it does look like this vote is not so much of all the politicians or not so much about voting for one as it is about voting

against and against the vote is coming against the steroids of measures which have been put in place by mario monti over the past year and a half and they have been proven quite unpopular so it does look like the italians are voting with monty in everything that he had to do with the economy which hasn't gotten any better and ended with anything serious terrorist measures even the old silvio berlusconi with his dependence promises of a better life seems to be making it into the option a good option for the talents were just tired of being in the economy right that they are in right now and read i'm curious of course the results are still coming in but you say this is a former comedian character is coming in third at the moment what's behind the support for him why do you think that he has gotten so many people behind his policies. well we've spoken to a lot of people out in the street the taxi driver stephen people you know the hotels and the shop. and they're all saying that it's italy has been going through

some really harsher session right now nobody has enough money or at least as much money as they used to have even five years ago better than the low is offering the sort of message we're says tired of the men in suits we're tired of the politics the way they're supposed to be we're tired of the bureaucracy we want to bring on the back that's actually was the message that he had on his twitter just a couple of hours ago and that was we will make on this day fashionable again and that is their main message to the public just be simple do away with the long words and with the can try to do with the with the very sort of complicated messages that will promises which actually offered nothing but the little house the vote of course of majority of the young people actually a lot of the older generation seem to vote for him as well we were active rally and it was amazing how many there were hundreds of thousands of people there and it was amazing the diversity of people that were there who were ready and supporting him

obviously did show that the country is ready for a major change and of course about change does happen it will be closely watched by the rest of the european union and of the word zone because it's really is the third biggest country in the eurozone whatever happens here does affect the markets in the rest of. off the european of the eurozone of course and so a lot of the politicians and bankers as well are probably watching of the results a cross to europe or at this point well and we're watching closely here from moscow a renegotiation reporting for us from our team from rome thank you for that report . while paulo rough own a strategic and political analyst says it's likely that another period of broken promises lies ahead for italy. people who need to be on time of the measures which are not produce the structural reforms of the society you know that do have

a trustable future for those who are already working and for those with land to do the work force people are dying of promises which have not been fulfilled the second left the. getting what it was already. in the polls elections but certainly many people are wondering why they didn't make the reforms in the previous the stations where they had the majority so the situation is very cultic at the moment it is not certain that the government can be forced if not the coalition government involved in almost all the major political forces that are present in the bombs well moving on the new u.s. secretary of state us testing the ground for us foreign policy on has made in a foreign tour which a first includes traditional european allies and then moves him to the middle east well during talks in london john kerry said ties between america and the u.k.

are closer than ever to take a look there is a reason why we call this special relationship or as president obama prime minister cameron wrote really partnership of the heart john kerry speaking there well earlier i spoke to jeremy corbett he is a british labor party m.p. and he gave me his view on what the alliance between the u.k. and the u.s. is really based on. snarl more than anything military alliance through nato and the substantial u.s. bases in britain well speaking of the military alliance there is another sound bite that i want to play for you from john kerry now the secretary of state let's take a listen to this one the united states and great britain the major countries both stronger we've made the world more stable secure we can be proud of if we look at the different conflicts where the u.k. and the u.s. have collaborated on we're talking about afghanistan iraq libya do you feel that

this has made the world more stable and secure as john kerry says. no i think tony blair formed a very close relationship with george bush took a straight into the war in afghanistan and later on accepted all the arguments bush used about iraq and britain was then deeply committed in iraq and as a result we've been involved in two major wars we've lost a very large number of soldiers spent a vast amount of money and made the world an infinitely more insecure place we've also damaged civil liberties in our own country just as much as the united states has with its department of homeland security and all the controls that go with that and i think we need to examine the whole strategy of the west involving itself and iraq then later libya and now syria to some extent and wonder if we're not really heading off in a completely wrong direction as if all this isn't enough a new adventure is broken out in north africa where britain and this time france

involved in deployment of forces all across the sahara well on our website that's r.t. dot com we've got more details on where exactly john kerry might be taking america's foreign policy so our mind to get the facts analysis as well as reaction. a massive drugs bust on the edge of moscow has once again highlighted the alarming rise in the illegal heroin trade from of ghana sam into russia almost two hundred kilos of high grade heroin was seized by a drug control officers those monday at a busy market now earlier artesia sean thomas describes those details. great story

here the russian federal drug control services say that they have discovered one hundred ninety kilos worth one hundred eighty million u.s. dollars outside of moscow and how they discovered it is kind of interesting in fact the drugs made it all the way from afghanistan here in bags of radishes in fact you can see the radishes and then the green heroine check this out it's dyed the color of the red it is radishes so that it's less noticeable less easy to detect and there they've discovered one hundred and ninety kilos worth now the big news here is that they have blocked where they believe they've blocked a major supply route from afghanistan through and it was back to stan company a vegetable contract that was sending things to the urals russian company there and then brought to moscow in this particular case they have detained two people two more people have been arrested of course the investigation is ongoing if you look at this week around russia in different regions around thirty tons of various types

of drugs between heroin marijuana synthetics drugs and psychotropics as well they were discovered in various regions around russia but the bad news is since the west hasn't gone into afghanistan since the u.s. invasion drug production from afghanistan up five thousand percent from not good news at all and then again narcotics into russia from afghanistan has more than doubled in that amount of time and in fact of the director of the russian federal drug control services states that two thousand and fourteen may actually be a very good year for russia saying that when the u.s. bugs out of afghanistan they actually expect that the import of drugs from afghanistan to russia will actually decrease. hearties sean thomas reporting there well unfortunately drugs are just one of the many problems facing of ghana stan these days the country has seen further turmoil president karzai ordered u.s. special forces out of the war dr province is trying to quell public anger over

numerous cases of civilian murders and abuses we're going to report and a bit later this hour. syrian rebels have released a new video which they claim is evidence of a growing success in their fight against government forces. all know. this amateur footage apparently showing a rebel fighter shooting down a syrian army helicopter with a missile voices in the background that you were just hearing shouting god is great or a lot you know bar throughout the attack now after being struck as you can see the aircraft goes down in flames surrounded by black smoke the incident allegedly took place near the city of aleppo it's been the scene of heavy fighting last week rebel officials said that they received a new batch of heavy weaponry from outside sponsors across the joining in order.

meanwhile syria's government says that it is ready to hold talks with the opposition including its armed factions the country's foreign minister made the announcement while meeting russian diplomats in moscow but attempts to bring peace to syria have suffered a fresh blow after the main rebel coalition decided to pull out of all international talks there reason well a lack of international action against president bashar al assad. takes up the story. this visit is taking place at a very uncertain time it's really not clear what's needed to be done in order to get the syrian opposition engage in talks with the government and saddam askers does stress that it is really for dialogue with the opposition and in the last week there were some positive signals coming from the wells they said that they were willing to hold talks with the government now they refused coming to moscow accusing russia of supporting president assad. so the number of those who support this realistic approach towards a peaceful resolution is growing those who want to continue fighting to the end

realize that so they're trying to suppress positive news from the opposition and stop any steps towards dialogue. in the meantime soon after thirty years have put together a government commission headed by the prime minister designed specifically for negotiations with the opposition and they say that they are ready to talk even with armed rebels because. we are ready for dialogue with everyone including those who are fighting on the ground as we are convinced that reforms should not be made through bloodshed meanwhile it was more or less predictable that the rebels would refuse coming to moscow it came as a total surprise that they rejected coming to washington and drawn to take part in the upcoming meeting of the so-called friends of syria group which was initially designed to support to the syrian opposition and foreign minister lavrov a stress if nothing is done now and no political process starts if the violence

continues there then the whole country is on the brink of collapse don't click that remote we'll be back in just a short break. well . it's technology innovation all the least of elements from around russia we've gone through huge earth covered. you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so for langley you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else and you hear or see some other part of it and realized everything you thought you knew you don't know what i'm charging welcome to the big picture.

you. please. welcome back i'm lucy catherine of the afghan president hamid karzai has ordered u.s. special forces to leave the key battleground province of wardak troops there were accused of torture as well as the murder of civilians earlier i spoke to brian becker from the antiwar answer coalition who told me that it's not just security kabul will now have to worry about. well you know the problem with the afghan army and the afghan police is that it's the creation the proxy the client of

a foreign occupying force which is despised really by the people of afghanistan including many who may hate the taliban but who realize that the foreign occupation forces especially these special operation commandos commit any kind of atrocity kill the people torture the people set afghan against afghan without any accountability and so of course that leaves the afghan military in the police even if they were doing pristine work which of course they're not they have many they've committed many crimes on their own but that would leave them in a position of having no credibility with the local population the fact of the matter is the american government has stopped trying to win the hearts and minds of afghan people and resorted to the methods of terror and of course that strains the credibility of their partner the government well the rivalry between the u.s. and china has gone digital and it's threatening to turn into a full scale cyber war a recent scandal involving a chinese military unit allegedly engaged in cyber threats that for american

companies has put washington well no surprise on the defensive but it may not be long before more washington make the move on its own in this new era of cyber arms race r.t.s. marina park niamh has the report. in january it is my pleasure to welcome president hu to the white house washington and beijing were the a list couple of geopolitics the positive constructive cooperative u.s. china relationship is good for the united states in february america's feelings are fleeting china unleashing its full spy power let's return to the alleged link between china's military and a prolific hacking group most cyber attacks are being carried out by teams inside the chinese military china is officially out of control because don't look now but prove today our sugar daddy is a thief beijing became an overnight security threat last week after the american

information security firm mandiant identified a secretive chinese military unit as the likely source of hacking against u.s. corporations a charge china vehemently denies however as the u.s. refocuses its military from the middle east to china's backyard critics say it's no coincidence that beijing is suddenly morphing into america's virtual al-qaeda i think this is part of what obama calls the egypt of it which is really a china and this cyber thing is is fits right into that pattern i think what we're looking at is art of this obama pivot to focus on china and to paint china is the new military threat to the world it's a demonization china earlier this month u.s. president barack obama signed an executive order aimed at strengthening america's defenses when you know hackers steal people's identities and infiltrate private e-mails we know foreign countries and companies swipe our corporate secrets.

now our enemies are also seeking the ability to sabotage our power grid our financial institutions our traffic control systems we cannot look back years from now and wonder why we did nothing in the face of real threats to our security and our comp but according to reports washington is all too familiar with the offensive side of cyber war it's the u.s. who launches things like stuxnet that together with israel to to cripple certain iranian technology capabilities in two thousand and ten a computer virus known as stuxnet infected tehran's enrichment facilities destroying nearly one thousand of iran's six thousand centrifuges according to reports the virus made entirely out of code was a joint collaboration between the us and israel in terms of a pandora's box i think it will be slightly harder for the united states to adopt a position of purely defensive we sort of made it clear that we're willing to use

cyber in advance of our national interest while reports about china's a legit cyber attacks have dominated u.s. mainstream media much less is being said about the pentagon's decision to double down on its cyber war work force expanding from nine hundred to more than forty five hundred employees experts say the move is indicative of washington's evolving military strategy every commander with whom i have spoken is going to be the next major war will include cyber component it will just be a traditional insurgency a bombing of their practice center a ground troops the next floor all certainly will include a cyber component and the edge of cyber war france could become foes by the click of a mouse and some say in a very short time relations between the u.s.

and china over virtual espionage can resemble the long stalemate that took place with the soviet union during the cold war we're in a port i.r.t. new york. well here in our team we don't just present the news to you we want to have you get a chance to have your say and specifically what we want to hear about is what you think about these hacking scandals what are they actually all about so head over to our t dot com and take part in our poll now for those of you who have voted so far we've decided to break down the result as you can see right here in this beautiful pie chart now more than half of you as you can see sixty five percent in the blue think that all of this frankly is just a p.r. stunt to support president obama's cyber security policy is now a much smaller percentage sixteen percent in the purple there believe that the so-called hacker war scandal is purely about espionage almost the same number thirteen percent think that this is a glimpse of the next world war so some doomsday sayers out there and finally

a small minority just six percent over there in the green and believe that this is simply a warning to china so head over to r.t. dot com and let us know what you think. well there's plenty more for you on our website including news of canada's state of the art satellite aimed at tracking down dangerous asteroids online we've got the details of a multimillion investment aimed at saving the planet from potential dangers in space. and web freedom north korean style the country plans to make life easier for tourists by giving foreigners online access. to the.

well germany has a valid to renew install talks on turkey joining the e.u. as chancellor angela merkel is there on an official visit ankara is increasingly frustrated over a lack of progress in negotiations with the prime minister calling the delay on forgivable political analyst manuel oxon writers says the current economic situation in the e.u. has actually leaving many turks determined to stay out rather than sign up. we have to see that the european union is no democratic pro-choice it's a political approach a sort of ideological approach take because when you ask the people in germany if they wanted to have the euro for example fifteen years ago the huge majority of the people who were against getting that europe the people if they want to send troops to the turkish syrian border they say no the european union is

a construct with out any democratic base it's an ideological base and so maybe hopefully we can hope for for the turkish people that they will have the right to take part in the referendum about to about a turkish deal membership because i can imagine that for a turkish citizen to see how the you repeat the whole of the european union develops now in those states is doesn't seem very attractive to become a member of that club. all right folks time for a world update and we begin with where at least ten people have reportedly been injured in clashes between israeli soldiers and palestinian demonstrators its claim that shots were fired during the protest against the death of a palestinian man who perished in israeli custody under disputed circumstances now there are allegations that thirty year old arafat's pajaro daughter was killed by torture inside the prison walls but israel is denying this saying that more tests

are needed in order to establish the cause of death. the world go to place for cheap furniture ikea has been caught up in the european horsemeat scandal ikea's famous meatballs known for sustaining millions of shoppers worldwide were revealed to be in fact partly horse meat balls that have been fold from cafes in a number of countries including sweden and the czech republic after tests revealed they contain horse d.n.a. in the past month horsemeat scandal has battered trust in the e.u.'s food system exposing failures across the continent. italian prosecutors have called for the captain of the luxury cruise liner the costa concordia to stand trial for manslaughter francesco schettino is charged with having abandoned the ship during passenger evacuation the indictment involves five other crew members the costa concordia slammed into a reef off the tuscany last year leaving thirty two people dead. after

a short break it's cross talk with peter lavelle stay with us r.t. .