north korea and the united states. says it needs. humane treatment.

out of. the area. around the world. looking to pull billions of pounds into. the country. what he calls the. north korea

of course topping the headlines with. dr. takes a closer look into whether david cameron's initiative will be at all welcomed by british. he made the case in a newspaper for renewing britain's nuclear deterrent saying it was underlined by what's happening in north korea at the moment and the escalating tensions and he said it would be foolish for anyone to think of scrapping that meet it a tyrant right now at a time of such global uncertainty well the prime minister was in scotland on board the hate victorious which is one of the four vanguard submarines that make up the tritone twenty four hour around the clock nuclear deterrent that always sees one submarine out now trident quite an old system it's being full bankcard submarines being phased out by twenty twenty and the conservative government the prime minister arguing for

a like for like for placement where these submarines are not tried an system will be replaced out of the signal is going to be made in just a couple of years time and it's thought it's going to cost the british taxpayer tens of billions of pounds going up hundreds of billions over the lifetime of that new project now the liberal democrats have argued that they want to see a cheaper alternative there's a review ongoing at the moment so quite surprising that he came out with these very strong comments he questioned in the article how anyone could now at this time talk of surrendering the nuclear deterrent well funny hundred some into the talk the liberal democrats and no one can argue that we're not going to have much to talk about or way of course people to argue yes that's true i mean i think that the lib dems will be completely blindsided by cameron's approach to cause they clearly want it you put time to sort of those sort of the labor party and cameron is basically using the current crisis in north korea to say we have to take this step because

look what's happening in north korea and i think it's kind of disingenuous because north korea does not even have me the capabilities but even cameron says in his article at home so you know we are basic. we giving them far more credit than they deserve yeah i mean we've actually got a graphic that i think we can get up to do is to look at that ses kind of chart of the range of the missiles capabilities that north korea is maybe has maybe doesn't have an operational about three thousand kilometers in development six thousand kilometers u.k. nine thousand kilometers away nearly i mean why why we waiting into this debate well i suppose i mean that's exactly right it's not a conflict however you could argue and that's what the prime minister is arguing is that this is a long term decision to make and so in about ten years time if north korea does have that capability then we have to take precautions against that north korea is not a threat you know we have other threats purely mostly from small terrorist groups

for example those are the ones that we should be focusing on so we're focusing on the wrong enemy and her think thank you very much for joining us huge amounts of money that we're talking about half the something that many people say could never be used thirty thing to ponder as a british taxpayer could well in the not too distant future be being asked to stump up that vast amount of cash. are to correspondent sara firth right now a growing atomic potential is not something that can make britain a safer place that's according to our teams contributor afshin rattansi. in any case the dragon missile system because of that idea sixty three brothers agreement means it's not under the control of the british government the united states controls this system military generals have been saying all around. the wars that britain fights these days for by conventional forces they're hugely under threat from budget cuts and of course having

a loan submarine right now somewhere around the earth with a british flag on it to the teeth with nuclear weapons that's not going to protect british interests and the fact that so many scottish people want to get rid of that base along with its eight thousand jobs this is a very recent poll shows that if anything citing a nuclear base in britain makes britain a target for militants of any type of persuasion. in the meantime north korea has asked russia to consider evacuating its embassy staff in pyongyang in lieu of rising tensions and risks on the peninsula and follows reports that the north has armed a second ballistic missile with an unknown payload just on the eastern coast of the country and washington and south korea meanwhile say they're taking precautions dispatching more ships and missile systems towards the north but john a fresh for co-director of foreign policy in focus says that this is a war that nobody wants. north korea basically is trying to get the united states

back to the negotiating table and its missile range is frankly not reliable nor long enough to make it to the u.s. positions if these were to rational actors i would say they would have already made that decision to back down and unfortunately in a situation like this it's really not rationality which governs the actions of players there were sponsoring to sometimes unconscious cues sometimes to non-rational factors but you know north korea is not a suicidal regime and of course the united states is not particularly interested in any kind of conflict at this point especially with cuts going through and military sector well north korea unfortunately has been alienated from its allies for some time china has never been enthusiastic about north korea's nuclear program nor is it been enthusiastic about north korea's decision not to follow chinese economic

reform so the alienation is set in. the real question is at what point does china say hey it's not worth it any longer and we're going to pull the plug the plug in this case is considerable back anomic assistance to north korea up until now china has made a calculation it's much better to have an unreliable ally as opposed to chaos collapse which is unpredictable and could have dramatically bad impact on chinese economic development. and danny schechter independent filmmaker and very outspoken media critic he believes that fears over north korea stem from stereotypes and years of the regime being demonized. we are just listening to our own fears and our own voices based on stereotypes and historic reactions you know to the nasty commies in north korea i think there is something else going on here that we're not seeing we also have to recognize that in the korean war we called the police action

in the fifty's last third of the north of korea the people who lived there were murdered of killed in this war this is a situation with historical roots that we need to understand to this other stuff happening in north korea that we don't know the perhaps we don't want to know because they're more convenient as a faceless legal enemy than as a possibility for in the region in a country that's peninsula that still divided all these years later oh it's divided by by war dictatorship the aftermath of the second world war etc you have to get a little bit into the history and understand where they're coming from if you want to talk to them and communicate with them and not just feel good by denouncing them . north korea also features in today's edition of breaking the set as well host abby martin explores who gains from provoking the communist state to the brink of war. the war rhetoric from high level north korean officials is not letting up and

as a result the u.s. announced that in a precautionary move they'll be speeding up the deployment of advanced missile system defense to the region in the next few weeks this following a series of u.s. training exercises in south korea as a show of military straight including sending b. two stealth bombers each of which cost taxpayers more than three billion dollars but wait before you run for your bunkers it's important understand the legitimacy of these threats and the context of why they're happening in the first place. in the world do you ever seen anything like. oh. this is t two months without food but still retaining a good appetite for justice the hunger strike on guantanamo bay prison is has managed to bring the issue of human rights and america's unto terra facility back into the spotlight to use election to shift the reports. a

russian citizen of one thousand or more. of the man who spent eleven years in the prison for his alleged links to al qaeda and russia haven't been concerned with the situation right now in the prison with the hunger strike has asked a delegation to visit this detainee when a journalist asked victoria nuland about how things were with him in gaza from the state of situation there was a very interesting exchange between the state department's spokesperson and the journalist let's have a listen mr mingles of has refused through his own legal counsel to meet with any russian delegation we've conveyed that to the russians so we're not able to facilitate the interview that they requested because we have a longstanding policy of not forcing such interviews if they're not voluntary so it's ok so off the battlefield of course route to make one trial but we're

certainly going to respect his right not to see the russian. not to see the russian delegation we have when work is interesting which wrote to you we have been we have been working hard as you know to. meet international humanitarian law standards at guantanamo including the right to refuse visits by individuals victoria nuland went on to say that the invitation for the russian delegation to visit guantanamo still stands but the russian foreign minister says he knows nothing about this invitation rational decision. it's been ten years since we started trying to get access to the russian citizen to be honest i see no such invitation as i've been traveling but if it's true we would certainly like to make sure the russian citizen is held in acceptable conditions the majority of the one hundred sixty six detainees at guantanamo have been held without any charges for nearly eleven years more than half of those eighteen. nine have actually been cleared for release but

the authorities failed to either send them home or close the facility altogether has led to the current act of ultimate desperation with one hundred thirty inmates now on hunger strike according to lawyers at least three people have already been hospitalized and almost a dozen are being forced fed through a tube but the authorities who worry about inmates right to accept or reject a meeting with the country's delegation seem to be taking no action at all to bring this protest that could turn fatal to an end instead camp officials have been already pressuring detainees to end their hunger strike by methods criticized by human rights watch dogs worldwide hunger strikers have complained of being denied drinking water and being forced to drink from the tap lawyers say that they further exacerbated their conditions and lead to health problems with their kidneys or in areas systems and stomachs in addition the prisoners claimed to temperatures in their cells were being kept extremely cold so you can see for yourself whether these facts actually correspond with what the state department spokesperson said at the press conference about respecting inmates rights. hidden billions that

revealed presidents international celebrities and captains of industry are implicated in a mammoth tax evasion scheme being laid bare by millions of leaked e-mails from the british virgin islands a details on that after the break.

international in the very heart of moscow. it's just about a quarter past four in the afternoon here in moscow this is r.t. part of the trillions of dollars hidden in tax havens by the world's most powerful and influential figures could soon be

a matter of public knowledge leaked e-mails about. money in the british virgin islands has already implicated the friends of french president francois hollande american politicians as well the entire arab ruling families and international all of god's let's get more on this artie's tests or are syria can join us now and give us more details about exactly who's behind the leaks has a good to see you and some a warning i mean this could have a real seismic shock to the world's tax havens can you tell us a bit more about the leak. well that effect has already started with the already see that happening let's just look at the actual league we're talking about two hundred sixty jigga bytes of documents here two million e-mails and about one hundred thirty thousand people from one hundred seventy countries could be implicated in this massive leak this information was passed to the a washington based international consortium of investigative journalists in collaboration with the u.k. the guardian newspaper and other media. was given by an anonymous whistleblower now

already this has really cost a lot of effects we're talking about a money stashed in the british virgin islands and you know it's not illegal to set up a company in the british virgin islands there are a mammoth of reasons why you could be doing so personal reasons to keep your wealth discreet however where when we're talking about possible criminal offenses such as tax evasion or tax avoidance that certainly would be coming to light and already there's been some embarrassment we're looking at the front wall and close friend for example also his campaign manager during the presidential elections and now he had been forced to to reveal his in the name of his chinese business partner and to acknowledge that he has offshore investments also and this is an investment afonso along because first of all artists are staunchly against clamping down on tax havens also we've seen a number of a politician saying that they may already be thinking of leaving their post because of this investigation we see russian oligarchs names public public officials from

the us from the u.k. basically around the world know what this is all mean it's really interesting to see that we've seen a slew of whistleblowers or citizen journalists making use of technology to reveal important information and in fact it has really proven a bit more effective if you will government or legal systems in place around the world when it comes to clamping down or looking for transparency and governance pursuing those values of course and revealing information we have to acknowledge that it is a double edged sword however one it. coms to really going after those in high positions who may have been hiding information that should be made known and should be criminally or publicly liable the rules of the game has certainly changed with the with this way of technology and whistleblowers and leaks of information and the what they thought they could hide forever from public view may not be the case anymore it. could be a lot of multimillionaires around the world quaking in their boots are to live thank you very much. what a financial turmoil

a record unemployment in the squeeze of austerity have culminated and yet more grim figures for the eurozone are expressed in the growing wealth divide and the vast majority of europeans have seen their incomes stagnate with the poor and working classes especially hard hit but europe's rich it seems are making a killing as artie's kitty pilgrim reports during these times of economic uncertainty is comforting to know that the filthy rich are getting even a filthier or richer i should say the pace so i'm not disrespecting these privileged folks but i'm talking about the euro zone's per rest a condom is portugal italy ireland greece and spain otherwise known as the fakes according to forbes magazine there are now seventeen more billionaires than i was back in twenty eleven with an increase in net worth of more than ninety billion dollars but the reality is the poor are not improving their situation at all three

of these countries have the highest unemployment rates in europe with rates even while us than a year ago. with unemployment rates increasing and nineteen member states and fully in it just eight so while the poor struggle to make ends meet the rich remain whole in a world where corrupt kids get belle's owls and big corporations move labor operations to third world countries to take advantage of cheap labor which means the task of getting a job even tougher. i'm reporting right now bird flu panic is spreading across china and its neighboring countries many thousands of poultry have been slaughtered and markets are closed down to prevent the spread of the virus six people have died so far out of the fourteen infected raising the alarm over a possible outbreak of the new flu strain of more of the virus and the panic as

well as talk to shawn thomas are joining us here on the program our strong good to see you before we get to the hype or the panic whatever you want to call it what about the measures that are being taken right now they're pretty serious well certainly locally they are in fact there is evidence of a localized type or panic specifically regarding the h seven n nine strain of the flu virus if you look at what's happening in china twenty thousand birds slaughtered from one market there from a place where the birds tested positive live birds tested positive in hong kong the stock market shares dropped particularly in relation to chinese airline companies because they want to restrict travel vietnam bans poultry imports from china japan puts health posters up at points of entry from people coming from china taiwan raises the quarantine level alert and us in canada they decide that they're going to move to develop vaccines specifically for the h seven n nine virus just to be on the ready now all of these moves are localized there is not coming from the world

health organization in fact of the world health organization on the other hand they are saying they want a more measured watchful response in fact they are saying they're not going to be mass producing and the vaccines they're not going to be making recommendations for trade restrictions and they are not recommending special screenings for one thing if they stop what they're doing and do you know this h seven n nine vaccine then they're going to have to put regular flu vaccinations on hold and they're also pointing out that there's no evidence of the disease spread easily between people and that you actually have to have contact with the disease bird in order to contract that so. here's where it gets interesting leading vaccine companies the top three where the money is being made and where it gets controversial they're all in the ready they're saying hey we want to do this we want to make sure that this happens no surprise that you and i've been in the news business for years now and we're well aware of how you can be told to hype up such an animal animal flu strain we've had the sollars the west nile the avian flu i mean take us back for

a bit while you tell us about some of the headlines on the panic of the past really quickly let's go through the swine flu back in two thousand and nine first case in mexico march seventeenth april fifth epidemic mentioned for the first time in the news twenty seven first confirmed deaths from that time until may third the swine flu was the most covered story then from may each day new countries getting on the bandwagon and if you break it down back in the thirtieth of june forty million expired doses had to be destroyed of a us order of two hundred fifty one million doses that was eighteen billion dollars of profits for the drug companies made in just the course of a few months to put this in perspective the c.d.c. says that the united states countries three hundred fourteen million about thirty six thousand deaths from regular you know so given these small numbers looks like a lot of hype over nothing and you gotta watch out for some of the big networks out there that off quite heavily by the pharmaceutical companies so it's very

interesting that i suppose we all have some point have to make up our own mind on this but of course when it comes to the ongoing avian flu as shawn was saying when it comes compared to the most normal common cold well the amount of is all minimal compared to what we all have to tend to cough and splutter with every winter time around the world so the new h seven n nine bird flu in china is it just a big hoopla is it panic is it taking your votes right now it. basically the vast majority of voters and i would say on a personal note rightly so saying well it will let the big pharmaceutical companies cash in no surprise there a distant second when nearly a third of all. voters saying it's just a flu it shouldn't be hyped up twenty percent of our voters saying it's dangerous it must not must not become an epidemic or for that matter a pandemic down to the minority will this will harm economies but it could stay in asia or so certainly at r.t. dot com we are still taking your votes right now on what is at the moment one of the biggest stories on world wide headlines for now though the temporary

no fly zone over the city of mayflower in the u.s. state of arkansas which is suffering from an oil spill has now been lifted and the federal aviation administration says it is allowing a media access to the site meanwhile the consorts county general is demanding exxon mobil provide documents about the oil spill which led to an environmental disaster and locals worry they may not get the conversation they deserve zante is more important higher now reports. r.t. recently spoke with him a fellow mayflower resident chris harrell now mr howard told us that he has not received any indication of any kind of compensation or settling settlement offers from exxon mobil mr harrell said that on sunday when he went home briefly for easter here in the states he received a letter on his front door from exxon mobil that apologized quote apologized for the inconvenience mr howell said that those have that have been evacuated are being provided the hotel rooms paid for by exxon mobil but at a community peat

a meeting that took place over the weekend with some exxon officials mr howell says that very few answers were given and all those in attendance were very frustrated very angry exxon mobil has not indicated how long cleanup will take mr howell told r.t. that the major concern for many people in the neighborhood is the longer term impact of from the spill both environmentally and financially what will this circumstance do to property values in that area of course this oil spill to please in arkansas is not as big as the one that took place in the gulf of mexico a few years back but the concern for many people especially residents the that are directly affected by this oil spill is that it's not going to receive the coverage that it needs to receive to find those responsible for the spoils fill accountable this is still a very disastrous for oil spill that's going to harm the community harm the environment and if the media does not and is not given access to cover this oil

spill to cover the extent and the damage and the circumstances of it then there may be less accountability that is the major concern and at the end of the day those that are affected by this and i think citizens all throughout the united states want to know why it took place what could have prevented it and if someone's responsible for this they should be held accountable. and i'm back in half an hour's time with more news up next though in just a moment crosstalk and people about. what if one third of the population of a capital city of

a small arab country took to the streets in protest while the mainstream media would scream the people of nation x. are crying out for democracy we have to intervene and take their oil i mean help them but the earth shaking a large protest is in arab countries it's in paris france and for traditional marriage yes protesters in paris claim that they had eight hundred thousand people on the streets of france's capital and even though the police said that half those numbers for a city of less than two point five million people this was a huge protest for guard less the european union loves to educate the world about democracy and show that's liberal values around and yet that doesn't really seem to listen to the citizens very much who want to stop the madness of waves of illegal immigrants bailing out members on the dimes of other nations and for focusing the union's national attention on social issues like gay marriage instead of creating jobs to the e.u. officials out there who claim to believe in democracy maybe it's about time you

actually try you know listening to a few voices who disagree with you before you keep promoting policies against possibly the will of the majority but that's just my opinion. little eagerly little. little. little little. limitlessly.