u.s. secretary of state's a visit to cairo opens a floodgate of criticism from opposition leaders who say the u.s. is too heavily involved in egypt's internal issues. for the syrian opposition the rebels are preparing to receive millions of dollars in aid direct support for armed groups fighting the assad regime. with their foreign backers. private bradley manning pleads guilty to. military data and turning it over to wiki leaks saying he had to show the public the true cost of war but u.s. authorities will pursue the more serious charges of aiding the enemy. leader lives with a hope standing down for the first time in six hundred years leaving the church's reputation spiralling amid. accusations. and the sequester kicks in taking a chainsaw to america's economy with eighty five billion dollars potentially

hundreds of thousands of job cuts thanks to republican. from our studio in. recapping the week's top stories glad to have you with us america's top diplomat john kerry has faced a wall of criticism and public protests during his visit to egypt some of the country's opposition leaders accuse washington of interfering in the country's domestic politics that sentiment is being echoed by their supporters on the streets as parties correspondent bill true reports. and egypt's. foreign minister. carry.

supporting the muslim brotherhood and u.s. interests in the egypt on a plane on a formal political level opposition leader is creating a hamdeen sabbahi i'm really so on mohamed el baradei failed to attend the meeting on saturday yesterday six of the eleven opposition because he used to attend the sabbahi himself who of course is part of the national salvation front the leading opposition coalition here he said that he wouldn't open dialogue with john kerry the u.s. continues to pursue their interests here and to interfere at a domestic level. for his part apparently did to meet with john kerry we're not sure what was actually discussed. they talked to him on the phone there's clearly a feeling of anger towards the u.s. secretary of state who was calling for political consensus which many people interpret as a bucking the muslim brotherhood policies he has historically been a lot of anger towards the u.s. since the revolution people saw america supporting muslim back to form and to take

this switching their decent reasons to their most in brotherhood and of course pushing forward this very unpopular four point eight billion dollar i.m.f. loan which will see subsidy cuts and tax hikes affecting the poorest of society and we will have john kerry meeting with mohamed morsi the president here today we expect by the protests yet to be seen. archies belcher reporting for us there now to talk more on u.s. foreign policy in the middle east and north africa and why it is causing concern i'm joined now live by william and dull geo political analyst and author of myths lies and oil were wars thank you very much for being with us now why have kerry's calls for a political consensus in egypt been greeted with protest is this not in everyone's interest to end of the turmoil in the unrest. but kerry is going to egypt with an empty bag he's demanding that egypt egypt's government the morsi government signed

on to the i.m.f. conditionalities which mean huge subsidy cuts as you just pointed out and also big tax increases that are going to worsen the economic situation not improve it. furthermore the the entire muslim brotherhood project that the obama administration has backed since the kickoff of the arab spring that toppled mubarak. the muslim brotherhood project is. spinning out of control it has no popular base within the egyptian society other than the twelve percent or so hard core members of the brotherhood and most egyptians while some kind of a democratic. society and this is why is the opposition has voiced fighting with kerry on this trip around the washington has a very poor faggot of cards for play in egypt right now and that's what's been reflected in his reception i think now you mentioned that egyptians want to democratic society speaking about that why is america appearing to side with what the opposition are calling a hard line on the thora tarion muslim government after its vocal support for

democratic change in the region well that's a very good question i think there's a double faced policy in washington the backing of the muslim brotherhood goes back to the cia's role in egypt back and nine hundred fifty s. when the saw the muslim brotherhood as a potentially useful tool to put in their bag of organizations that they manipulate around the world and then they brought the brotherhood into saudi arabia in the fifty's when it was banned in egypt and from there the brotherhood has expanded out now they're playing a key role in all of the countries of the arab spring i think some people around president obama have the delusion that they could control what's basically a political islamic fascist movement it's not a movement for democracy and he's for much of the imagination and that's what this brotherhood is it's a secret society. they have a public agenda that sounds lovely and they have a private agenda that we're seeing unfold on egypt with the dictatorial

authoritarian measures that morsi and company are advocating so i think. at this point morsi is in a life and death struggle because the popular support is not there for this this coup and washington is beginning to get a little bit wobbly on its support for morsi for that reason they're beginning to rethink i think that's one of the reasons for the change between hillary clinton and john kerry to bring in a new cast of people and see what what kind of options there are in egypt this morning now kind of going down the rabbit hole a little bit how does this alleged u.s. support for the muslim brotherhood in egypt match up with years of an alliance with israel. well this is a bit old but i think the some people in israel probably think they can control over much of the muslim brotherhood although i think increasingly israel is becoming. very leery of this whole process good option. if you're more

comfortable with a military dictatorship such as you had under mubarak maybe with a civilian taste but i think that's what. is gradually going to involve in the region for better or worse for the victims of this of course are going to be interruption people and the people in the entire region all right certainly interesting to have your thoughts on this as william engdahl geo political analyst and author of myths lies and oil wars thanks for being with us thank you. it was syria's apparently never ending civil standoff which became the key issue of u.s. diplomacy this week after bargaining and mixed messages syria's key opposition group managed to get more concessions from washington and its pro rebel allies the u.s. has agreed to provide direct non lethal support to opposition fighters battling against the assad army on the ground it has also promised an additional sixty million dollars in aid but washington's been reluctant to send arms to the rebels citing that they could fall into islamist hands opposition fighters are however thought to

be getting covert weapons and supplies from gulf states john walker lindh from the institute of democracy and cooperation in paris says the attempts to beef up the rebels won't bring syria any closer to peace. sixty million dollars should not be sneezed at and while the americans are trying to do is basically to prop up a project that so far has failed if we look back to two thousand and eleven when entering clinton was calling for the overthrow of a sense they expected the regime in syria to fall very quickly and that hasn't happened however great the rebels' gains may have been the regime is still fighting back and still shows no signs of collapsing instead is the opposition which is fractured famously the syrian national council is a rag bag of different interests the opposition is breaking up and there are plenty of people within the opposition at least according to my sources in the region who are bitterly disappointed with the west who expected a lot more money they probably wanted to steal

a lot of it but certainly they have not received all that they have been promised it'll be interesting to see how much of this sixty billion dollars gets through that the only syrian population is suffering very greatly from this opposition from this so-called liberation because this these paramilitary groups clearly cannot provide any basic services they are not the state. what do a comedian a communist attorney democrat and a sex scandal survivor have in common well it's not the beginning of some joke they're just some of the leaders tasked with attempting to form a coalition with a post-election italy split on austerity and corruption and government that's coming up shortly. also israel is sliding down the press of freedom rankings as it stops palestinian journalists from working for israeli media. this week u.s. private bradley manning pleaded guilty to handing over secret military data to the whistle blowing web site wiki leaks prosecutors say they will push forward with the

more serious charges of aiding the enemy and call over one hundred forty witnesses to prove their point a guilty verdict could mean a life sentence ortiz miniport now has the latest developments. guilty but not sorry more than one thousand days after his arrest u.s. army private bradley manning admitted to being the source behind the largest leak of classified information in u.s. history private first class bradley manning has pleaded guilty to ten of the twenty two charges against him private bradley manning minutes he gave thousands of secret document to the wiki leaks website manning gave his first detailed explanation of why he did it manning said he uploaded troops of u.s. secrets to the weekly leaks website because quote americans have a right to know the true cost of war he is the purest form with he had the very sophisticated now a fifth of why he had to do it as a duty to spread americans to expose what their government was doing in the name

which with illegal uncouth in homes around the world so all credit to him he's. the former intelligence analyst said he attempted to contact traditional media outlets like the washington post the new york times and politico but failed to get through to them later deciding to pass the documents on to wiki leaks manning said he engaged in a prolonged internet conversation with the wiki leaks member called cox who he assumes was julian a songe i think it's very clear that the risks of street government secrecy are much graver and have already done much more serious damage to the united states and god knows other countries and the risks wrought by whistleblowers and leaks like this one manning pleaded not guilty to aiding the enemy the most serious charge which washington is determined to prove the u.s. government is reportedly planning to call a key witness to testify that osama bin laden actively sought to access material manning passed along to wiki leaks some reports suggest the unknown individual

could reportedly be one of the navy seals involved in the about about raid that killed bin laden the fear here i think is that you would be sensationalizing the proceedings and it would it would make it nearly impossible for manning to have. a fair trial in a just because we'd now be talking about terrorism terrorism and terrorism will get away from the fact that he is charged with the offense of releasing the information and they don't have to show that terrorists received it this will continue the obama administration has ushered in this era of pursuing whistleblowers and making certain that they are prosecuted and they go after them zealously in a manner that they do not go after other individuals that's been the thing i think is the most particularly striking is you can have private contractors who engage in weapons smuggling right like the blackwater executives or you can have bankers that engage in financial fraud and they are pursued as jealously as whistle blowers

following his arrest in may two thousand and ten manning was kept in solitary confinement at a military jail in kuwait then at a marine prison in quantico virginia for the first ten months of his detention the former army analyst spent twenty three hours a day in a six by eight foot windowless cell and was forced to sleep naked without bed sheets treatment that hundreds of legal scholars including president barack obama's former harvard professor claims was cruel and inhumane punishment that may have undermined manning's psychological stability i think he was treated very horrendously and they would be they were very much trying to break him and subject him to horrors and to make it clear to intimidate people around the world who would do the kind of heroic things the ground the meeting did to try and it through them from doing that manning himself said he believed that the move would only embarrass but not damage to the u.s. and eventually kickstart the public debate the result the u.s.

was shamed in front page headlines around the world a nervous superpower launched a witch hunt against whistleblowers and wiki leaks became a household name the cost i own private may spend between twenty years and a lifetime behind bars for an important i.r.t. new york. i. a week since elections in italy and it's senate remain in limbo with parties across the political spectrum so far refusing any talk of coalitions and one party led by an enigmatic comedian now finds itself in the role of king maker that big reloads anti austerity anti corruption rhetoric rallied millions of italians securing him a quarter of the vote but he was still behind the democrats and a coalition led by disgraced former prime minister silvio berlusconi the president is now calling on all sides to work together to try and form a stable government or else face new elections but pollo ruffo neo strategic and political analyst says the people are as weary of broken promises as they are

austerity. people need to be on time. stated measures we should know could use the structural reforms all the society you know that do have a trustable future call for those who are already working and for those with land to do the work force people are tired of grosses which have not been fulfilled the center left the ease. of getting what it was already seen in the polls the 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 caustic at the moment it is not certain that the government can be forced if not the coalition government in both the old the major political forces that are present in the problems. israel could soon get the unique benefit

of being america's official major strategic ally that measures to be discussed at an annual pro israeli gathering in washington but the leaders of both countries are absent we've got analysis right after a short break. then

live from moscow this is our team welcome back to the catholic church witness history this week as benedict the sixteenth officially resigned to something a pope for six hundred years and as the church remains leaderless internal divisions and a marred reputation mean many are losing faith eroding the church's foundation. reports. it's not just about selecting a new bishop of rome some say but the very future of the catholic church the

catholic church is undergoing a very important sizes it is a crisis at two levels this is a government crisis and it is a crisis of the believers there was a lack of leadership which culminated in the great scandals of about the leaks far from the splendor of the sistine chapel a closer look at the recent events in the vatican to highlight disillusionment and frustration with the church once all about i distanced myself from the church when i became an adult when i started talking about what had been taught and was eventually after all the scandals broke out in the catholic church i realize that it doesn't represent my spirituality but indic the sixteenth may have been the first pope with a twitter account but many argue this measure alone was not strong enough in appealing to the masses now this is the age of transparency the age of the people the churches should be properly. they'd be. considered sacred she went.

to great assets everybody now you see that they will be to be. the problem of the media they're really working on leases he went to change many things about the church for people of gabrielli of this inability to face up to and much less to punish those who may be responsible for tainting the image of the church is the deciding factor in abandoning catholicism. there's another scandal with a girl who disappeared in the vatican twenty years ago and they say the man found her remains the italian police are leading the investigation here but instead of helping them with vatican is obstructing the investigation going on it's likely they knew about this and stayed silent and on top of all those cases of pedophilia was that this is just disgusting the list of controversial events involving catholic priests or vatican officials reads like a tabloid reports of sex abuse put a feely i. zation allegedly scale corruption and possible ties with the mafia while

the media especially in italy has been having a field day with the scandals the vatican either stayed silent or rebuffed all accusations but those things may be looking rather grim for the seat of st peter's at a first glance there is still a chance the catholic church can make a comeback which would be which would put exchange. with the church would be splitting you know being with a group through it but then came out stronger could be stronger we become twenty four but in spite of that spirituality recent revelations have left me wondering if the holy see has been blind the world is rapidly changing and the rock layers of the catholic church has failed to keep pace sure it has seen a fair number of ups and downs as well as scandal in two thousand year long history but there is opinion that perhaps taking on pleasant development sweeping it under the carpet and feeling it with the people ring for secrecy is a tradition better left in the past in rome. r.t.

. sequester cuts have kicked in in the united states with the government now slashing eighty five billion dollars from its of budget following political deadlock but even as the first snaps are made of the blame game is raging with democrats and republicans desperate to offload responsibility professor of political economy jack rasmussen believes the new cuts will bring worldwide uncertainty i think the psychological effects of america and it's it's just an order will have an impact not only on an us as we've talked about but i think it will cause more on certain certainty is a key economic variable across the globe and i think you know once again the whole issue of austerity solve the problem will be a big issue and as a result i think will turn more globally towards monetary tools quantitative easing but that has big problems dissipating currency wars so we'll see what what happens

on the monetary side and that will be an alchemical. israel could become the first ever nation to enjoy the official status of america's major strategic ally this among other things could mean the u.s. would be obliged to support any potential israeli offensive against iran the proposed legislation is to be discussed at the annual american israeli public affairs committee gathering about to kick off in washington despite the significance of such a move neither of the leaders of the two countries are attending geo political analyst patrick kennington says that this could be a sign that the israeli lobby is losing influence we know the u.s. and some noises coming out of washington there is quite a little contingent within the united states that is looking to perhaps get into the batek because and not be talking abrasively as they have in previous years and israel has entered the fray the israeli lobby is really putting pressure on those

politicians in america to take a more israeli line which is a more hardcore lied to us to do with perhaps a flame war with out of around the big change that we're looking at is a shift there is a shift away from this kind of like allegiance to israel that is on capitol hill in washington d.c. there are splits appearing because americans are realizing that it's not in their best interest it's not in american interest to follow israel's agenda so therefore aipac is it's not beneficial for aipac to be running the government and want any more as for the past thirty years. this friendship leaves. the apac congress this sunday. president freedom has become the latest victim in the gaza israel confrontation made tit for tat exchange hamas has start israelis from working in the territory

and the israeli government says palestinians can no longer work for media on its soil aren't his policy a report. november last year israel and gaza are at war and in the middle of it a gaza journalist reporting in hebrew for leading israeli newspaper it was the last major story some rami would write for the hebrew priests a month later gaza's ruling hamas party banned palestinian journalists from working with israeli media accusing it of being hostile tel aviv refuses to recognize hamas and regards it as a terrorist organization and a magnet for mother i do not understand this decision unfortunately i feel that our struggle will have less meaning if we do not speak to the israeli media and make them hear our message sami feels he's on a personal crusade to help both sides better understand each other when his nine year old daughter was hit by an israeli missile it was his israeli editors who arranged for her to be brought across the border and treated and it was in the

newspapers that he published his anger and anguish over israel's bombardment of gaza. the how to. israelis using the media in its war against us in this war journalists are under attack they want to kill all our words and reports that prove that there were no crimes in gaza as the father has to have he in the attack is coming from both sides of the border israeli journalist two are banned from working in gaza but ironically it's not hamas but tel aviv that stops them deeming it too dangerous for them to report from their overheard him over is among a handful of israeli journalists who'd regularly work in gaza but after his government made it illegal six years ago his station employed gaza based palestinian journalists now because of hamas is ruling even that has become impossible it's very problematic decision of hamas of a lot of other decisions that the hamas from. the result is that the only reports leaving gaza but all those hamas sanctions not particularly promising in one of the

recent human rights watch report that accuses a muscle harassing assaulting an arbitrarily detaining journalists israel too has come under fire for deliberately targeting reporters and media houses affiliated to him us during its last one gaza israel fell twenty places in the two thousand and thirteen will take place feeding index due to the actions of its army in the palestinian territories the media blackout does little to shed light on the fate and future of ordinary gazans it also pits rate stereotypes on both sides of the border that have done nothing but breed mistrust and hatred policy on t.v. television. and coming up in a few minutes our travels to russia freezing cold city of murmansk one of the best places in the world to witness the astonishing northern lights or bread.

i've got a lot of messages from our t.v. viewers who are very concerned about drones living under sky and that is not the american way and many are concerned about their safety and privacy congressman ted poe has introduced a bill that may address some people's concerns about drones this bill is the preserving american privacy act which clarifies how the government can use these drugs so basically the act adds bureaucracy to drone usage in order to restrict it in theory protecting people's privacy. the thing is that one side is arguing for drone usage and the other side for bureaucratic restricted drone usage but what about not using drones to spy on americans ever no drones should be used on american territory period and overseas they seem to breed more terrorists than they kill saying that there are only two sides to this issue for drones and well kind for drones is absurd congressman poe if you would please be so kind as to change the name of your legislation to the drones are on.