breaking news on a. crowded areas in the iraqi capital baghdad killing at least twenty four people just hours earlier to similar attacks. on the cross in syria government troops and hezbollah militants are fighting together for control of a rebel stronghold in the lebanese border to be a key supply. at least fifty eight people have died in the battle for the city. skeptic britain referendum by the end of twenty seventeen other bloc members to lose trust in a united europe as well. and make allegations iran that gives the go ahead for u.n. inspectors to visit one of its nuclear facilities the protocol laying out this

mission about the country's nuclear program the head of the international nuclear watchdog. world news on the very latest developments this is. a double car bomb attack in the iraqi border town of basra has been followed by another string of deadly explosions in the capital nine blasts in baghdad neighborhoods killing twenty four and wounding schools more at least ten people died in the explosions in a town near the border with iran paula slater is monitoring the situation there let's cross to her live now paula what more do we know about these attacks. well according to iraqi officials my own car bombs have exploded in shiite neighborhoods

in the capital city of baghdad now we're hearing that they took place at outdoor market places at bus stops and on the streets of shiite areas on monday morning also on monday morning before these attacks there were two deadly car bombs that targeted a bus station and a restaurant in the southern city of basra which is close to the arabian border in that attack at least ten people were killed and some twenty seven people wounded not no one has immediately came responsibility for these blasts but they do have all the signs and the hallmarks of al qaida attacks in the mainly shia muslim bus route which was previously relatively peaceful have increased recently back in march a car bomb in that city killed ten and wounded many others a poor that the sectarian situation seems to be spiraling out of control in the country doesn't it. these situations are going does seem to be spiraling out of control tensions have been intensifying since the country's minority sunni

population says that it's mistreatment at the hands of the shiite led government has been increasing including random detentions and also neglect not protests which began back in december were launched the peaceful but in april the number of attacks rose because of the deadly security crackdown on the sunni protest camp in the country's north and what we've seen is a spike of bombings recently targeting either sunni or shiite civilian targets especially in the last week on sunday at least ten policemen were reportedly killed in northwestern iraq and attacks that are blamed by the authorities on the sunni militants a few days ago there was also the deadliest day in iraq in eight months more than seventy five people died in just one day according to the united nation of april was the most violent month in iraq since two thousand and eight and this is fueling fears of a return to the. civil war two thousand and six two thousand and seven when widespread

sectarian violence left tens of thousands of people did. thank you for that update. meanwhile in syria hezbollah militants are fighting beside government troops to retake the strategic town of concern from the rebels is considered a key weapon smuggling route for opposition forces near the lebanese border the battle for the city in the contested holmes province is viewed by both sides as a turning point which could prove crucial in deciding the conflict local journalist a dollar amount xeni has more. syrian army managed to make a full circle around the city fighting the opposition position fight is the main achievement is to stop that line of supply chain between lebanon and syria most of the fight is gathered from different areas and syria in order to gather in course sokol said become the capital of pollution this operation move very slow but it's

wise for these studies statistically speaking they managed to make the first they start from the west from western side of the of the city and bedouin areas they control this this zone with some fighters from lebanon some extremist group were preparing to go into syria to fight with that it builds they are going to make they were going to make a kind of a bigger front in order to fight and expand. the fighting line between government and opposition by this now we have limited the fighting into one city or one into one part of the city the international arena and international has started to change with the russian american agreement. it's less acceptable. acceptable for countries to go against the american will by providing more weapons that if aleutian. in syria by this it's a kind of a green line for the syrian government forces to go into that it will. say which is

of course said now by this no more smuggling will go on. weapons coming from cut off from other countries. or the knees now to stay or to go that's the question at center stage of british politics as a pros and cons of either membership or thrashed out drove to belong and in out referendum recently issued by the ruling conservative party so it must be held before the end of twenty seventeen has been hailed as paving a clear route towards chain. and opinion polls suggest an exit from the e.u. is the most likely route let's take a look at a survey by the europe or ometer polling center back in two thousand and seven they found almost half the u.k. population of forty nine percent didn't trust the european bloc with anti u.s. sentiment growing in recent years a similar survey in twenty twelve revealed that sixty nine percent there of those who took part were euro skeptic let's talk more on the issue with more pritchard an

outspoken and politician conservative m.p. with thanks for joining us here on r.t. now the e.u. referendum bill is here presumably you've seen the draft are you satisfied now. well first or can i say i'm not anti e.u. i'm actually pro independent united kingdom and pro having a sovereign nation in the united kingdom and in fact there are many benefits from our membership of the european union but there are issues around the democratic deficit in this country the majority of people have never had a say on europe either they were born in one thousand nine hundred five the date of the last referendum or if they were born there weren't organ after vote and even those that were born and old enough to vote and felt that europe has become more the political rather than an economic project so it's absolutely right that david cameron the first british prime minister since then to offer a referendum it's right that we have a referendum in two thousand and seventeen personally i'd like to see the

referendum before the last indeed a lot of my colleagues of the same view i think again a personal view that the political position of offering a referendum after the date of the next general election which is in may two thousand and fifteen one has many risk and secondly is politically unsustainable because of course the british people being offered referenda on other parts of our relationship with the european union for example the there's been treaty and yet the politicians haven't delivered to there's a democratic deficit not only the united kingdom but also with the european project as a whole and that is why a referendum needs to be held sooner rather than later ok you mention the positive aspects at the start and what about business trade and travel belum in some people would say if there wasn't a u.k. exit those kind of things would suffer wouldn't they. well we don't know whether there would be a u.k. exit let the british people decide and that's what i hope will happen sooner rather

than later but i i don't subscribe to the view that the world would end the day britain left the european union if indeed that is what the british people choose i also don't accept the view that somehow trade barriers would go up and terrorists would be introduced by continental europe it's not in their interest they export more to the united kingdom than we export to the european union so that is not going to happen of course we heard so much scaremongering over the euro if britain didn't join the euro we were told that there would be a massive divestment out of the u.k. particular in car manufacturing what is what have we seen over the last few years actually record investment of car manufacturing in britain and we're not in the euro thank goodness we're not in the year and indeed our exports other parts of the world the commonwealth the bric countries including russia the civic countries vietnam and so on and so forth we've seen record exports to those countries so we

live in a global. globally competitive world as a global race on and with all the economies and i think the united kingdom as an independent sovereign country would be better trading with the rest of the world also with the european union but well. this is our strategy and it's a. just a second because you say it's a global situation what about the other european countries the french president for example been quite critical of britain stance as needed do you care what the other countries think. well i have great respect for president along but i you know he's perhaps masquerading as the growth guru of europe i don't think anybody that wants and introduce a top rate of tax is seventy five percent challenged by the court perhaps now sixty six percent is anywhere anyway to introduce growth either to france all the rest of europe so with the greatest respect to the french president i don't think that the united kingdom should be taking advice from people who seeing record numbers of

wealthy people these people that create jobs these people who are entrepreneurs actually coming to the united kingdom and other parts of the world so it's french socialist high tax policy that is driving people out of france i don't want that in britain ok after the u.k. considered m.p. mark richard thanks for joining us here on r.t. today. well the ukase hand on the handle of exits while the rest of europe is left contemplating whether it wants britain to be a part of it one of the blocs powerhouse germany chancellor angela merkel said she will lobby british friends to stay people in germany appear to have no more feelings about the u.k.'s departure and artie's its all of it has been funny. should it stay or should it go britain's future in the e.u. is getting serious air time at home that we're better off out now whether britain should remain in the gate for britain to leave the european union to those that britain would leave behind think about an e.u. with no u.k.

britain it's important but the truth is of course you are could thrive without britain it still would be european union it would be still a very large market it is possible it is thinkable we can have a european union without britain among germany's euro skeptics there's a grudging respect for their british counterparts challenging brussels bureaucracy however they fear they could be in for more of that bureaucracy should the u.k. leave it will probably have a backlash for the european thinking and then they may think well now we have these oddballs and we can go even further with the way of centralizing everything and even overregulating more than we have already and how do the german people feel about britain looking into divorce. if they want to go than they should if they don't use the euro it's not really. i couldn't care less but if that's what they want then we'll just continue without them. we

can't leave europe never became part of it because of the iron mentality and colonial past. when you're going to be able to they are not in the euro zone if they want to leave i say go for it i'm not sure what they'll get out of. those germans that say that they are concerned whether the k. remains in the european union or not they find their infer something of a shock should the united kingdom opt for independence because if the u.k. were to leave the single market would shrink by fifteen percent and three hundred billion euro worth of annual trade would face extra costs and this would affect of course everyone those in german chancellor angela merkel's own party have wondered if the u.k. as a truly became a member of the e.u. great britain the i'm going to accrue part of europe for more than one thousand years has always been uneasy with been a member of the european union so now it comes to the fore we have to deal with

some having promised britain a referendum on e.u. membership it's going to be almost impossible for this government of the next to take the issue off the agenda if that split does come about it should to bring about changes but perhaps not too many tears from the heart of europe. peter all of our party. for financial doldrums and toughing austerity have been feeling dissatisfaction with the e.u.'s policies across the continent and searches are feeling any people in the bloc are losing faith in european project starting to think they'd be better off on their own also he has been gauging the mood among you members. oh if you're talking about the gloomy situation here in europe it's no longer just the naysayers of a so-called euro skeptics who are voicing their pessimism ordinary citizens across europe have now been starting to change their minds really on this entire european project if you look at

a couple of recent surveys one is the pew study it shows that right now less than half of the european citizens support this entire a european project that they're even optimistic about it it's at forty five percent right now down from sixty percent a last year and this of course has largely to do with the entire economic situation we've seen dismal numbers come out this week putting nine out of seventeen euro zone countries in a recession and if you look at one of those countries which is france it is also one of the two poor countries at the very foundation of the creation of this union seventy seven percent of the french feel of that economic integration has been bad for their economy that more business within the e.u. has undermined their own economy and if you look at the biggest concern of a citizens here it is the lack of jobs at seventy eight percent and that is not surprising considering that the e.u. has reached record unemployment rates and still continuing to rise also we look at

the youth unemployment here we've seen that going up above fifty percent in countries like greece and spain and the optimism really has gone down into the most pessimistic countries really france and italy not seeing any future for the young people we've seen a rise in suicide rates again in countries like greece spain and italy we've seen on employment skyrocketing poverty among young people children here in belgium has just gone up as well as a result of a lot of parents losing their jobs so these numbers are just confirming the kind of pessimism that is across europe it's not again just an opinion of the euro skeptics or naysayers these are figures of citizens themselves creating this european union looking at what the future. for that we really are not very optimistic at all. well the e.u. is definitely getting through changes now but where is it all heading that's what we're asking you on our website today at r.t. dot com well over half of those who voted so far say we will end up financial

collapse and possible dissolution while around a quarter predict in pollution into a virtual german empire no less sixteen percent today will just carry on losing its weaker members along the way and a minority four percent of you who voted so far today are more optimistic saying evil manage the debt crisis and grow stronger so you can cast your vote if you haven't done so already at r.t. dot com. and while you're online find out should others consider you were exhibiting during its largest economy some say it's germany who should leave if not the bloc in the euro currency. also europe was there long before britain joined in french president francois hollande for rates the u.k. after it's sure to reform the e.u. that's all on our website. it is time for us to settle this question about britain and europe. well that's still to come this hour we take

a look at the latest twist in iran's nuclear deadlock and hear the story of a family which fell victim to the u.k.'s justice system that's in just a couple minutes stay with us. pakistanis have gone to the polls and elected the new parliament what will the new government do domestically and in the area of foreign policy particularly washington's drone war with growing economic dislocations in a very threatening taliban ok and should pakistan move forward and will the military continue to watch from the side was. he to.

talk about the program now of course in the u.k. it's been a stoking controversy exercising sweeping powers to decide the fate of families individuals judged unfit to make their own decisions children have been separated from their parents and some people even jailed a secretive body called the court of protection. met one family at the center of

one of the most notorious cases. when john maddox was diagnosed with dementia his children ivan and wanda intended to give him the best care they could but they clashed with social workers and their local council which took the family to the secret court of protection it will get the eighty year old lack the mental capacity to make his own decisions and needed to live in a special care home he didn't want to be in a home basically told he didn't want to be in a home. he wanted to either want to go with one to the final home that he went i'm swear to got to look after not. the court makes rulings on behalf of citizens deemed to one well to be responsible for their own affair as it has power to take control of assets and separate family members all in secret one day and i even want to allow to take their father out of the state run facility or even discuss his living arrangements with him so we can't ask you want to go. but i

didn't like to tell him that it didn't mean i was any more they got it because of the court tension and the sickos will do whatever they want with the finances in its house what works are going to be locked up in these rooms week long grocery where. i don't feel free. in order to mount a legal challenge to the secret court ruling wonder took her father to see a solicitor one day tried to draw attention to the case but was sentenced to prison for contempt of the secret court so instead of caring for her father like she wanted to she had to spend two months in here in the company of criminals i cried the first two days i was in the prison i cried because nobody you treated like an ardent criminals initially go in there you really cannot challenge the question as to whether somebody has mental capacity or not without talking to them and she was in prison firstly for taking her father to see

a solicitor in birmingham which makes it sound quite educated well in a sense it's worse than dr drew conan because draco would not have gone that far when i was in the jail i was frightened because the list minting of phone calls so i was afraid to speak to dad. because of the conditions they put on is and also you know in case they got in more trouble meanwhile her brother ivan watched their father's health deteriorate under the strain of her absence in the end when he moved into that final home that was the end of him and he wanted it wanted still moved him anything i said you got to know this she divorce. she's put herself in prison port. observers say the difficulty with justice behind closed doors is that no one knows if the lore is being followed the evidence is had in private defendants often lack legal representation and i want to allow to publicize their case with us and it is giving the state too much power to intervene in people's

lives preventing people complaining about what's been done to them is never right the government's faced a barrage of criticism over the practice of secret justice justice secretary chris grayling has said i have written to the president of the court to ask him to look at what steps can be taken to increase transparency while continuing to protect the interest of vulnerable adults but john maddox never got to go to his home or to his family he died in january of this year he swore to me what they're doing that taken away from islam and the world and what's going on to us when we get older you know we've got to be really careful. not safe here like. stoke on trent but at some other news making headlines around the world this hour a suicide bomber has hit a government building in afghanistan's northern province of babylon the blast killed fourteen people including the local town chief many state workers young the

wounded it falls in line with a promised spring offensive by the taliban who want people to distance themselves from the authorities. some five hundred members of a notorious libyan is the most brutal police in the streets of tunisia's capital on sunday even one person dead government ban on a hardline islamist conference on the street violence and sorrow sharia claimed responsibility for killing the u.s. ambassador in the libyan city last september tunis has been struggling to contain its extremist religious elements since its twenty seven. the us state of oklahoma has been in the group of extreme weather that has left at least one person dead as many as twenty six tornadoes ripped through american central states causing oklahoma's governor to declare a state of emergency and later is head to long with a massive hail and wonder storms and local weather service and have warned of the possible strike. iran is ready to allow atomic

inspectors into one of its facilities but only if they sign a protocol de telling their suspicions of the country's nuclear ambitions and that was the message from iran's ambassador to russia to the un's nuclear watchdog want to take a look at the parchin facility near tehran suspecting it's a nuclear test site a political analyst side mohammad marandi told r.t. esteban would say western nations seem unwilling to compromise on the issue. for each gear there must be a take in other words if you run takes a step forward die a must also give something in return and vice versa what the iranians are saying is that part of a chain which is a military complex is it's fine with iran for the i.a.e.a. to inspect at site but the iranians wanted to be done within a comprehensive framework otherwise if the iranians allow the i.a.e.a. inspectors inside there is no reason to prevent the americans from giving when they

find nothing then the americans will say no well it wasn't that building it was another building in the parching insight that you need to see and this story will go on forever and ever so the iranians are saying let's sign a comprehensive agreement and then we will allow you into the side and return you have to give something to us if it is proven that there is nothing there that is dangerous or suspicious then the i.a.e.a. must give us a sign of approval so it's very easy from the perspective of the iranians to resolve but i say chief is basically someone who is controlled by the united states he was installed by the united states and he is one willing to resolve the situation would you say this is why didn't it did the world powers are they running in talks in kazakstan last month and who would you say is the more stubborn of the two sides the other side because of the situation that western countries have brought about as unable to make

a decision and to move forward to constant threats made by israel are themselves a sign that it is an irrational regime and hostile regime and the fact that the united states and western countries support it every time it makes a threat against the iranians again shows that the iranians that western countries do not behave rationally when it comes to iran israelis who would lose militarily as well as politically because the international community aside from the west. they would recognize israel as the aggressor state and it would cause further instability in the region which does not serve the interests of the united states or israel so the iranians really at this stage don't take any threat of military attack as serious but it does see it as a sign of israeli in human behavior. well on the eve of a new round of nuclear talks with iran in vienna. speaks to the chief of the international you can watch dog you can catch that full interview with the i.a.e.a.

director general hare on r.t. eighteen zero forty five g.m.t. but up next he discusses the future path of pakistan after its troubled and often bloody as they were this. although i was born after the vietnam era i remember t.v. discussions about that buddhist monk who burned himself to death as a form of protest the commentators on the news that people there just have a different mindset that westerners could never understand you know which is probably true but they were implying that people in the west are just different and would never use this absolutely extreme form of protest which is also probably true until just recently with the cost of electricity exceeding the income of the

average bulgarian and a new government coming to power that looks exactly like the old government that collapsed at least six paul geary and have used self-immolation as a very desperate and extreme form of protest but why kristen ghodsee a professor at bowdoin college who is extensively talked about here in protesters claims that those who self-immolating are just incredibly desperate and cannot feed their own children and that people are actually becoming a stealth check for communism because at least that system at the people's basic needs the current democratic system from the populace is perspective according to her just cycles through a few new crooks every few years although it does get media attention and you may be feeling desperate suicide is never an answer the more living bulgarians the better bog areas chances believe me but that's just my opinion.