the new chinese president is in moscow on his first overseas trip since taking office with the two economic giants seeking to bolster their shared cloud in the global arena. first ration in cyprus the citizens fear losing their savings and politicians race against time to avoid a default. on cracks emerge in syria's main rebel force with some opposition activists claiming the group is being guided by islamist radicals. welcome good to have you company watching r.t.

come to life from moscow. now catching the chinese wind in russia's economic cycles that's what russia's president vladimir putin says he's aiming to do at landmark talks in moscow with the new chinese leader xi jinping picked russia for his first trip abroad since the shimming power early this month well correspondent lisa now he joins us live. and he said it is quite a symbolic first trip isn't it. it is indeed absolutely andrew let's not forget that lead to murder putin went to china on his first visit as president this term now the favor is being returned this is cheating paying his first international abroad visit in office like you said surely not a coincidence perhaps even seen as a symbol a message to other leaders to other nations that this is a partnership that is strong and is only growing at the forefront is china and russia is joint interests to break the washington consensus around the world and

transform the global stage into a multi-polar one. pushing two powers together a common goal to shift global balance is forging a tie between russia and china that could soon be unbreakable yes a new chinese leader his first stop moscow to something surely washington must notice but is brushing off no they don't take it seriously at their own peril russia and china fellow brics major trade partners and team players at the u.n. security council were there too often stand up against intervention and to gresham mosco and beijing are seen really impacts of nato backed attacks and they don't want the instability that washington seeks in the middle east beijing and moscow want to do business china is booming and russia is right next door the potential for gas deals and pipelines are vast a suit is the two can agree on a price russia also sees china as

a way to diversify its economy like helping tap untouched water sources in the east and investing in the west now they could join forces on cooperation military but it's the inevitable i think result of the type of us that these are pacific pivot that is is threatening china on one side and the nato increasing military. encirclement of russia on the other side the more the u.s. pushes its agenda in certain parts of the world the closer they push russia and china together that opens the door for growth and enormous economic ramifications the nations that make up the brics group may be divergent but experts now see they are much more than an acronym coined by a guy at goldman sachs. the brics are developing andrew and fast they agree on all of the fundamentals they want a multi-polar world and they want to have more say on everything that happens geo

politically when you have the world's biggest country join hads with potentially the world's largest economy this becomes a very powerful possibility ok thank you and he said thanks very much no doubt we'll get updates throughout the day we do have just a bit more time actually so we'll ask you when you were poor to mention the brics group how big a role how much influence does that actually have in the world well that's just it really in short to answer your question the brics need to put their money where their mouth is in the words of leds in europe and just ahead of this visit they need to shift from a dial want based format to a full scale strategic cooperation mechanism and so that they can solve key world issues together in order to do that they need to move forward on their plans to build a brics development bank to counterbalance institutions like the iceman. ok we will leave it there thank you anita that's

a nice and now we live from moscow. well let's now talk to professor joseph chain a political analyst at hong kong city university mr chen can you hear if you firstly there is mr chang the first question what signal is china sending out to the world by choosing russia for its leaders first overseas visit do you think. typically when china feels pressure from the west it turns to russia and a third world chinese official think hang researchers would like to use would like to use the word balancing that and confronting the united states because certainly china student needs a good relationship with the united states because he is still the mond say peaceful international and roman to concentrate on his modernization but certainly you would like to balance against the united states return and asia strategy balancing strategy which fully exploited the engine strategies

of china which worries about time as assertiveness in years to retire ruled his fields but he talked about balancing the edgy think that china actually has to bolster its relationship with russia a lot more in order to achieve that balance well both countries share the strong common interests of sifting a small more multi-polar though and preventing the united states from dominating the global political and economic olva at the same time both countries understand. that the coordination and new tools of for a bill both increase their influence in international forums and varied and on various international issues ranging from the middle east to the when we structuring to. change and so on let's just talk about the

brics countries shall we present patron says that brics is not a geo political competitor to western countries or their organizations is that something you believe. yes. i think the previous commentator certainly it's right the brics countries to do their staff through is effective mechanisms to get their act together so the year of establishing a common joint development bank of better coordination among their official thing towns and so on will be useful i think there is a lot of complimentarity among the brics economies for china's capital serves with. huge surprise of natural resources and so on and of course again there's a very strong common interest in the sense that all five members were to see

a larger role you do you turn national community and they also understand that effective coordination within your big screw ups you know how all of them to achieve this goal ok well we'll have to leave it there but thank you very much for that insight that was there professor joseph chang a political analyst at hong kong city university. and panic is spreading three cypress with parliament set to vote on another plan to raise funds to secure a vital e.u. i.m.f. bailout loan and avoid paying for the folds bank employees have attempted to storm the parliament building and just over possible job losses amid speculation the country's banks won't reopen after being paralyzed for a week and as artie's tests are still in our reports people are preparing for the worst. all of this panic this negativity started of course on the announcement over

the weekend from brussels that in order to get a ten billion euro bailout package cyprus will have to cough up about five point eight billion and the suggestion was to impose a tax on the pauses now ninety one percent of cypriots according to a poll have been against. we've seen protests on the streets of people angry really at the e.u. the troika and specifically a germany they feel of the country has been cornered into a position where they really have no choice but to take a very hard decision now here's what some of the cypriots feel right now towards europe. well the mood here in nicosia cyprus remains rather negative it seems of the people feel that they're receiving one bad news after another the latest being that the european central bank will only continue to provide liquidity to the country until monday and after that it will only continue to do so if there is an i.m.f.

program in place now this means that there really is a cash problem on the ground cypriots going out to early in the morning trying to get as much cash as they have told me that the limit on their cars the amount that they can take for the change has been lowered we've also been speaking to some shopkeepers they're really having a problem big losses in their business and it's been a headache for them since this started. my business is down over seventy percent in just the last few days. and you really read that. and one of the direct effects of the financial predicament you can already feel on the ground here the size of it put up only. at this gas station they really want to hold on to as much cash as they could as the banks will be closed until next week and really they're not confident that the banks will reopen when they govern. just to be safe because he decides if you don't have cash you won't get. to pay

for our people. something we have to play in cash so we. now as a political leader is along with the financial sector here try to figure out a way to maneuver the country out of this predicament people are simply sitting tight trying to hold on against it was much cash as they can because really for them their main concern is how to get through these next few days when they've already experienced being in limbo for the past week reporting from nicosia cyprus . following all the developments in the cypriot capital on her twitter feed she has the latest pictures from outside the parliament building where protesters are gathering ahead of the rescue plan discussions. so as the clock ticks for cyprus at least one rescue operation has evaporated the island state and russia have failed to agree on any deal during the cypriot finance minister's visit to

moscow. as this report. the finance minister of russia and light in dust on the situation saying that the proposal by the cypriot finance minister to create a joint state company allowing russian access to the natural resources exploration fields on the island did not receive any interest from the russian investment companies and that's why the talks failed he also added that the matter of providing the cyprus with an emergency loan from russia was not even considered. simply for the fact that cyprus has a certain limit imposed by the european union on the loans it can get from other countries and by getting another loan from russia. it would have breached this limit and violated the internal economic agreements of the european union definity brussels remains probably the last solution for the cypriot ailing economy but it's

not so easy here as well apart from all the regulations and all the limits that the e.u. has imposed on cyprus it also demands that cyprus must impose the much maligned deposit tax in order to receive the bailout loan there is a certain dissent growing on the island now at the head of the we simply have parliament saying that the parliament will probably will vote without considering the e.u. regulations and this leads many experts to believe that cyprus may even pull out from the eurozone in some nearest future because of all these regulations by the european union besides the bailout loan from the european european union as experts say it would not solve the economic problems of the island completely that you can see it will still have to find some money elsewhere and that is the biggest question of course where it will find these this money on top of that old brussels has once again reiterated that can even ahead of the talks in moscow that it

doesn't need the russian capital. in order to solve its domestic it's internal economic problems so certainly with even without the finance minister we are in for some interesting and probably some difficult talks in moscow we will certainly update our viewers on the situation as we get it. well economist harry been a member of the free vote his party in germany explained why the e.u. and in particular being so heavy handed with cyprus don't forget that we are heading for elections in germany rescue packages that we have gone through in the past and totally on popular with the german taxpayer and going ahead now with a simple solution to what we've got in the past you just cannot sell it to the german taxpayer i guess that's an issue as well also you don't you shouldn't forget that those negotiations go she was a cyprus are very complicated every party has to keep up its bargaining power and so we like game theory you know you have to be on guard you have to bluff and god

knows what will happen and us germans we're not saying that we shouldn't help cyprus but the germans told that at the end of the day the money the loans the guarantees whatever you want to call it does not support the people in cyprus it's supporting the banks that's supporting the bank owners it's supporting wall street and supporting the big people and that's the whole issue here now in a couple of minutes we take a look back at president obama's visit to israel and palestine to see what if anything was a change. you know how sometimes you see a story and it seems so for langley you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else you hear or see some other part of it and realize everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm tom harpur welcome to the big picture.

on. the news today violence is once again flared up. these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada. the giant corporations are all today.

hello welcome back the hunger strike among guantanamo bay prisons has entered its forty fifth day a point that could become critical for inmates health according to doctors rights groups claim more than one hundred detainees are refusing food over mistreatment while the pentagon maintains the number is much lower the strike has brought the plight of prisoners back into the headlines at least one former u.k. resident is being kept there without charge reports now on the british government's response r.t. turned to the u.k. foreign office for that position and we can have a listen to the statement that we received back right now. the u.k. has long held that indefinite detention without trial is unacceptable and we welcome president obama's continuing commitment to closing the detention facility at guantanamo bay and to maintain the lawful sustainable and principled regime for the detainees. so quite an anodyne text read that sounds like it could be

in some serious need of updating actually it refers to us president obama's continuing commitment to closing down the prison now the closure of guantanamo bay was actually one of us president obama's main campaign promises back in the two thousand and eight presidential election it's something he's spoken about a lot it's a promise he's made repeatedly get half a decade later and nothing has happened in fact nearly shutting down that's taken place recently is the closure of the government office that's charged with transferring the detainees and closing down the prison so just to recap in case that sounds in any way peculiar they've closed down the office that's meant to close down guantanamo bay and the british foreign office supports this continuing commitment to shutting down the facility shack i am

a has been. at guantanamo bay for over eleven years now and quite astonishingly this is a man who's never been charged with any wrongdoing he's never been put on trial he's been cleared for release twice yet he's still there the british government's efforts to negotiate his release have been few they've been feeble and most importantly they've been completely and utterly fruitless so the red cross human rights watch amnesty international they've all expressed frustration that they haven't been allowed to visit detainees they condemned was been taking place at the facility for. a decade now but at the same time over here in the u.k. there's been little more than a peep from the mainstream media both about shaka amma and about guantanamo bay in general with this little awareness of the situation shock imus future is very much

uncertain. it appears prisoner mistreatment is not so rare in the u.s. to head to r.t. dot com to see how one inmate was restrained and then pepper sprayed before being left unattended at a jail in maine there is a link to the footage on our web site at r.t. dot com. at least forty two people including a top sunni muslim preacher have been killed in a suicide bomb attack in a mosque in central damascus the blast occurred with the mosque packed with worshippers who had gathered for evening prayers more than eighty people were injured in the explosion which authorities suspect targeted the cleric mohammed al bootie a staunch supporter of president bashar al assad is the first time since the start of the uprising that has been a suicide attack in a mosque reporter. has. the most shocking news and details that after the bomb they discovered another bomb which is the door of the mosque and. happily the happy news that it wasn't exploded. they managed to or

dissolve it it's inside the mosque. which is one of the most important. one of the most important one in the islamic word he is the one who was targeted mainly because. he was considered a supporter of the. government and he made some strong speeches every friday trying to convince people to join the army and fight for their country and he was he was under a lot of threats around the time of the and said syria but he insisted his position and did not change into becoming one of this one of the people who were. remark cracks are appearing in the n.t. a sad syrian national coalition after the election of a new prime minister to govern rebel held areas the election of u.s. citizen hassan he twelve members of the body to resign from the umbrella opposition

group. who took part in the anti assad movement says the coalition is being guarded by islamist radicals. the coalition went too far forming a monochrome government which we can characterize as extremist the reason behind this is the mechanisms that we used to my selection of the head of government were wrong and under the ground this coalition wasn't elected it was the point and radicals make up the majority the does not match the reality of syrian society if this coalition was the result of free and fair elections then we would have accepted the results of the vote one should not deprive syrian minorities of the right to produce a bit in political life as one should not bribe the syrian liberal political groups of their rights at this stage of rebuilding our own with the coalition should not be about revolutionary power it should be made legitimate government and legitimate government should represent the opinions and interests of the whole syrian nation

our position is balanced and we see that what we are seeing now is wrong. a quick look now at other international news making headlines around the world in venezuela's capital caracas several hundred pieces have clashed with supporters of the late leader hugo chavez the students demand that the government and the election council not appease its position and power in the upcoming election police used tear gas and plastic bullets to disperse the crowds forming a cordon between the two sides the country's elections are scheduled for april fourteenth of experts predicting a win for chavez's successor nicholas the daughter of. former french president nicolas sarkozy has been placed under investigation for alleged corruption during the two thousand and seven presidential campaign ruling follows a three year long inquiry if he isn't so cozy of taking illegal donations with france's richest woman l'oreal paris in the end betancourt his lawyers say he'll appeal the decision calling it incoherent and unfair prosecutors will now decide

whether to put the ex-president and trial. president obama's middle east tour has been greeted with mixed feelings both in israel and palestine with no tangible results despite his calls for peace the palestinian public who greeted the u.s. leader with protests were disappointed by his show of unwavering allegiance to israel and lack of pressure over the issue of settlements in the west bank obama was more restrained on the issue than before saying that halting settlement expansion should not be a precondition for peace talks at a meeting with the palestinian leader as for israel during his two days there a bar missing plane to repair tense relations with the country's prime minister there are signs of discord on issues like iran will still clearly visible still it's obama's stance of clearly favoring one side of the conflict that is making peace prospects of a more distant that is the view of palestinian political and social activist a big hope to. prove to be a very good speaker he gave

a great speech yesterday but again palestinians do not expect wars they expect actions and in terms of action obama has been the most pro israeli president a u.s. president in history the american administration kept supporting israel military diplomatically economically and that's exactly what palestinian question how can a president who wants to promise b.s. . take one side and they keep saying granting phone support unconditionally. while ignoring the palestinian plight he indeed mentioned some of the injustices palestinians faced but at the same time he is the one who is totally complicit under sponsible in those in creating those injustices and in maintaining those injustices twenty years of negotiation have they given nothing to the palestinian have changed totally that. on the ground the number of settlers in the west bank

tripled in those twenty years. u.s. oppression of the palestinian people learn grow up confiscation house demolitions displacement of people continued and actually anyone i invite anyone to come and see reality on the ground the two thirds solution that obama is applauding all the time is that. more international news in around thirty minutes time next day it could be nothin i'm frightened he said. jorge rios an argentinian student at seventeen other similar students from foreign countries all paid a private company between three thousand and four thousand dollars so that they get

to take part in a u.s. state department work study program he was promised forty hours of work per week at a common fast food restaurant with a decent salary but the reality he claims was quite different he was actually only given around four hours of work per week what was expected to be on call twenty four seven like a surgeon i guess in case of some burger emergency he says he was forced to live in accommodations that were provided by the restaurant real six plane that he had to sleep in a child sized bunk bed in a basement with seven other people in filthy conditions and for this service he had to pay the restaurant three hundred dollars a month overall real swallowed up paying the burger joint to work for them what a way to not make a living though this story sounds funny on the surface many foreigners in work and study and work in travel programs do experience exploitation upon arrival in the usa i've even personally met some of them so i know but more than that in

a time when millions of americans are struggling to put food on the kitchen table why are companies searching for thousands of exploitable foreigners to work for two dollars an hour cheaper it is corporate greed and their absolute disrespect for americans that allows this to happen just pay the extra two dollars and have americans work for you to cheap corporate pigs but that's just my opinion. you live on one hundred thirty three bucks a month for food i should try it because you know how bad the less bad luck i got so many i mean. i know that i'm still really messed up. in the old story so personally. it's. worse you're going to go lie down soup of a. radio guy for minestrone. what. we're about

to produce never seen anything like this i'm told. what's good folks i'm abby martin and this is breaking this set while the head of u.s. southern command general john kelly has told congress that the guantanamo prison needs a major overhaul to the tune of one hundred seventy million dollars that's right what was supposed to be a temporary detention facility one that president obama promised would always hard to close down and apparently falling apart kelly says the living conditions that get mail are close to squalor wait he can't possibly be referring to the beach front portion of the camp that guards frequent right maybe it's because their golf course was only nine holes instead of eighteen. did anyone consider asking how bad the conditions are for the actual prisoners.