a russian team uncovers evidence of alleged rebel involvement in the deadly syrian chemical attack while the u.s. congress puts the brakes on military aid to the opposition fearing the weapons could fall into the wrong hands. egypt's political forces failed to agree on a transition plan while crisis convulsions in what used to be a popular tourist destination are turning visitors away dealing a heavy blow to its volatile economy. edward snowden reportedly leans towards venezuela for asylum while r t speaks to foreign minister on the reasons behind latin america's backing for whistleblowers on the run.

world news and analysis live from our moscow headquarters i'm lucy catherine of and thanks for tuning in to our. well russia says that it was the syrian rebels are not president bashar al assad's forces that were behind a chemical attack in aleppo that left two dozen dead earlier this year now that incident was used by washington to justify sending arms to the opposition but those weapons are now in limbo with congress refusing to greenlight their shipment well let's cross live now to our now we for more on this. we have heard from washington there are sure that the assad regime is essentially behind this attack why is russia saying otherwise. well like you said washington seems very convinced that bashar al assad was behind this attack that it was allegedly a chemical attack they say they had evidence no one seen it hasn't been published or given to it to the press in any way so

a lot of people still wondering what exact evidence that is but russia has conducted an investigation a long sight so actually on the ground and embassador to the u.n. to tell you turkey and now can explain what exactly they found and why they believe that it wasn't assad who was behind that attack but the results of the analysis clearly indicate that the ordinance used in kannada so was not industrially manufactured and was filled with sudden the sudden technical specifications prove that it was not invested in the manufacture of either the projectile involved is not as standard one for chemical use therefore there is evidence you seem to believe that it was the armed opposition fighters who used the chemical weapons so . now we know that the target turkey and went on to pass these results the actual the actual results of this investigation on to bonk a moon and there has been some reaction from the u.k. from the u.s. and the u.k.

they say they highly doubt that in fact these results will prove that it wasn't behind the attack and it goes as far to show that the u.s. in fact the white house spokesperson when asked if he had read the report he replied no but they're already saying that they believe it's highly unlikely that this will really prove anything and he's of course the chemical attack was one of the major reasons behind washington's decision to actually arm the rebels of course now we're hearing that there are some delays divisions within the congress over this what's behind the hold up. well it's pretty pretty clear cut what you have is you have people in washington who are behind some kind of military involvement in syria and then you have people who are out right against it you have congress blocking this delivery of arms which was made possible it was proposed after this attack this these alleged reports that assad was behind this so-called

chemical attack this was the reason they began laying out this arms shipment shipments it's being blocked by members of congress but then you have certain committees in congress so-called war hawks one of them being led by carl levin who writes open biters calling for friends of syria to begin as soon as possible precision air strikes against assad so it's a very complicated for a civil war but in washington like i said it seems very clear cut you have people either completely against or completely for military action and certainly a complicated situation made much more so by the fact that you know this is an act of war going on and definitely difficult for both sides to get accurate information on the ground and he said now we thank you for that update. force feeding guantanamo inmates is just a symptom of a far more serious disease that is the view of one us clear congressman pardon me who believes that kind of a cleric who believes that conducting the painful procedure at night during ramadan is far from one of the key concerns in the prisoner's plight.

plus losing that spark in britain millions of pounds worth of electricity is being stolen from the grid to grow illegal drugs and it's householders who are footing the bill that's coming up later. a transition road map for egypt's proposed by the interim leader has failed with both the muslim brotherhood and liberal opposition saying no to the motion the plan outlines constitutional amendments and a parliamentary election that was supposed to be held by twenty fourteen the army though is standing behind the interim government warning against any attempt to disrupt the transition the country is struggling to get back on its feet after its second clue in two years which has led to the ousting of islamist president mohamed morsi now the situation has been further aggravated more recently by deadly street battles across egypt which have landed a blow to the country's tourism industry as well as the wider economy more details from our teams cairo correspondent bill true. behind me is the egyptian museum one

of the most popular tourist destinations in the whole of the country is the first port of call for many tourists coming off the plane here in downtown cairo however it isn't empty this is a scene that's been seen across the country in all the most popular tourist destinations following a week of political turmoil after the ouster of mohamed morsi egypt's tourists and history which makes up american percent of the country's economy has taken a massive beating since the journey with a defined revolution particularly as tourists are becoming increasingly scarce in the last week we've seen massive make more demonstrations funded by clashes between rival groups on sunday fifty people were killed in clashes between security forces and supporters all to produce president leaving many to feed it to respond calling to egypt in the future. i've been travel warnings have been issued by embassies including the u.s. embassy who's actually sent my spend on emergency stop time off turning us citizen were stopped last week in these bloody clashes made to international tour operators that are becoming can also come so better to my oldest on september fearing the

first bush term i will continue to do through this this is a free look but still work this has most kids however local tour operators on souvenir shops and you don't have international backing spare plug the gaps i'm here with a showcase of the him who works in the museum behind me. and he's saying that this made it very difficult week here for tourism so tell me. how you know how has the last week being in the in the museum all that any tourists last week this week be fooled woman's. new duties to pull the plug the no this don't play pursuit. we seem to be that somebody close close and you sees it as you choose you know will. you steve thank you very much sarkozy. so people are fearing meant as those supporters of the previous leader

mohamed morsy remain in their city and refused to go home in various parts of the country they're going to see further clashes but those like shoki working in the tourist industry they feed this means tourists are going to continue to be scared from coming to egypt and that actually the future of egypt's tourism is going to be even worse. well to help us break down the numbers in terms of how the economy in egypt has been affected especially with the tourism sector is our team business presenter katie pilbeam katie of course the economy critical issue here but in terms of tourism i mean how badly hasn't been how badly the beating i guess hasn't taken you know will is quite substantial as you go have a look at the figures and see that the numbers have been dropping and it's pretty obvious that. it's going to happen people are simply too frightened to go which is just a shame considering it normally is a popular place to go and holiday with your family have a right here we can see really it started in twenty eleven just when the trouble started we had a death and we did have

a rebound coming up and that rebound was set continue but that's not likely to happen now that the troubles of agave erupted once more now this is a decline altogether of thirty seven percent of the amount of people that holiday and that in terms of money and what this means for the economy way. since the beginning two point five billion dollars have been lost as a result and again we'll be able to see that we were expecting a rebound once more but that's not set to happen just now so again two point five billion dollars we got the likes of the u.s. u.k. canada out all issuing warnings for people not to go to holiday there right now and as it stands it's the eighty fifth and the most popular destination to go which is quite phenomenal when you consider the pyramids the beaches and of course the thing of storage and two point five billion i mean that's a huge sum but i'm curious given the fact that the economy is such a critical part of the unrest that's going on in egypt how much of a role does the tourism actually play in the overall economic picture there will

equates to over ten percent of the country's g.d.p. actually employs over twelve percent of the population in right now we're dealing with a negative multiplier effect so it's not just hotels restaurants book or kinds of things travel taxes you can see just as i say over ten percent of growth that's going to suffer as a result of all of this and even down to a camel ride on a boat trips and all sorts of things are going to suffer as a result of this and the economy was said to continue rising but that's not going to happen as a result of the two and is expect. crisis level right service self-defeating cycle i mean i cannot make issues help start the understand of more of the unrest as furthering the economic problems thank you so much for that update our team is katie pilbeam.

meanwhile there are those who are more than happy to help egypt out of its dire financial situation during its sensitive transition period well saudi arabia has agreed to provide the struggling egyptian country with five billion dollars that's the lion's share of which is actually in energy products and cash that's right here meanwhile the united arab emirates will stump up about three billion dollars in loans and bank deposits eight billion dollars in total for egypt now r.t. contributor option rotund c. says that it's not necessarily a gesture of good well the u.a.e. and saudi definitely did not like the muslim brotherhood and so the saudi station al-arabiya quite called it in dubai in the u.a.e. backs the rebels and you go. back to qatar which is backing the mostly government is against a military coup so you have both sides using media using financing using weapons sales to back them and in egypt all the time the united states we must remember

that president obama was backing mubarak dictator up until the end seemingly not quite knowing what he's going to do and perhaps the saudis are threatening him even john mccain the presidential candidate used the word coup for obama we get nothing and in the mainstream media all we get is mama del baradei another nobel prize winner like obama saying nothing about the house arrest without charge of a democratically elected president let alone the ending of a parliament and the destruction of a free media which continues at the moment in egypt. the fall of egypt's democratically elected president and the return of the revolution now these are among the issues that will be discussed in today's edition of crosstalk. you know it's it's easy to want to call it a revolution it's easy to want to call it a coup it does fit the textbook definition of a coup but at the same time secy isn't sitting here trying to walk to be the new

dictator he's not trying to be the new mubarak hold on a minute that's supposed to pull look at the facts on the ground what city which who is general since you is that defense minister did when he first declared giving more c o u forty eight i was. a huge mess which was absolutely impossible if they knew fully well that he was going to spectacularly failed because he's been trying to give that moral value and probably did you know maybe i need to defend morsi had don't get me wrong. and you can watch that full program here on our t.v. at eleven thirty g.m.t. later this hour though the first battle for moscow in a decade the russian capital prepares to choose its next mayor out of forty candidates from the ruling party's acting they are one opposition blogger to a rock band front man in a few minutes we'll look at who is in the running and what awaits the winner.

with the military getting control of troops which is the future hold for egypt is this country's experiment with democracy a thing of the past what signal does this coup send to islamic parties in the region and we want to contribute a shimmy gypsies ever be redeemed. speak the language. programs and documentaries in arabic it's what you hear. from the world talks about six of the c.o.r.p. interview intrigued.

arabic to find out more visit arabic don't call. three latin american states have offered asylum but edward snowden has yet to pick which one he'll of sept now reports say that he is leaning towards venezuela whose offer came in early on a wave of south american support speaking exclusively to our t. ecuador's foreign minister explained that the continent wide backing for whistleblowers he thinks is quite important the details on that from marina partner . as the world waits to see which country edward snowden will pick as his new home martine spoke exclusively with ecuador's foreign minister ricardo patino about the n.s.a. whistleblower and the fallout following his revelations now ecuador was the first to initiate an emergency summit among south american states after

a plane carrying bolivian president evo morales was grounded in vienna last week it was grounded according to reports on suspicion that snowden was on board in route from moscow foreign minister put seno says the unprecedented violation of international law should prompt more countries to offer their assistance to snowden . after the incident with any of them around as we have no doubt that snowden is being pursued at an international level i mean countries to offer him asylum ecuador is also considering this option but it'll be better if it's not just three countries that come forward to offer him protection but ten twenty or one hundred states ecuador's foreign minister told r.t. that he was thoroughly surprised at the scale of the u.s. surveillance system in particular that programs were created to indiscriminately spy on people in latin america and even friendly states in europe now but senior said he was also shocked that instead of being persistent in demanding immediate

explanations from the u.s. about its pervasive spying some european countries allegedly work together to ground the plane of a world leader and put the life of bolivia's president in danger. it's just outrageous if it had been a european leader or the american president it would have triggered a war if any latin american country had done this then troops and fighter jets would have been sent in to rescue the leader just discriminate against countries so that some nations see their international rights observed while others are ignored . now the foreign minister of ecuador argues that the plane incident indicates that europe he says now functions as america's back yard a position that latin america has rejected to serve. in the u.s. two leading democrats have called for the force feeding of the guantanamo bay prisoners to be stopped but the parties whip labeling the procedure as inhumane and

this adds more pressure on president obama to end the practice after a u.s. federal court condemned it as quote painful humiliating and degrading and this is as prison authorities say the force feeding will take place only at night during the islamic holy month of ramadan the hunger strike is now in its sixth month was almost two thirds of the inmates taking part in a protest against they call inhumane treatment and being held without trial for years meanwhile in mom leaves from the council on american islamic relations says that the indefinite detention is the actual problem at the prison. just ridiculous and then to see if you're having some sort of religious accommodations by. basically torturing the people at night instead of the day it makes the situation you know no better and this discussion about force feeding you know this is only a symptom of the bigger disease in which there are over eighty individuals in guantanamo bay who are being cleared of any wrongdoing they're being held

indefinitely against their will and really want a person gets to the stage we need to be worse but they've really given up hope that they can get any type of justice and this is really the bigger problem with the bigger issue at hand that we really need to be addressed. held in total secrecy complete isolation and no access to the outside world you can find out about those held incognito by israeli intelligence as well as the toll that it takes on the prisoners on our website. also they're digging deep more than ten million barrels of oil were pumped in russia in june and that is more than during any other month for a quarter of a century. it's one of the basics of being a consumer that you get what you pay for but people in britain are finding that their elektra city bills are a few pounds higher for power they don't even use now this is to cover the massive amount of energy which is being stolen from the grid and according to regulators

being used to grow illegal drugs well here's our tests are so low on the effects of the cannabis growers who are sucking up the electricity. when you can consumers look at their electricity bill in the year they're maybe seven pounds in there that they didn't actually consume that's according to energy watchdog who has highlighted the rampant nature of electricity industry falls victim to about twenty five thousand known cases of electricity and that's costing consumers about two hundred million pounds now one third of that amount actually goes to one of its farms a production of which is very energy intensive so that's about seventeen million pounds a year ago we get to those kind of his farms how often has put forward a set of stricter guidelines for energy suppliers to comply with and maybe imposing fines on those who refuse to do so or don't want to. be the problem of electricity the more will be spoke with to a library on these proposals why was it important to raise the issue that one third

actually goes to kind of this farms where it's a growing problem according to police that they place around just under eight thousand people a year growing cannabis and that figure has doubled in the last four years so this is a new politics of. how we want to bring it people's attention let's get one things right the supply has responsibility to crank on electricity so what we're trying to do. so the energy industry does but you can do it so make sure all the fifty's reduced to its lowest level false. energy u.k.b.a. association that comprises of about eighty energy companies have already welcomed these proposals whoever they're not too happy about the proposed impose fines on them however at the end of the day no matter what will matter to consumers is going to be assurance that they're not paying for any more than they're using and that they're not funding any criminal activity. reporting from london. all right

folks well let's take a brief look at some of the other stories currently making headlines across the world. the police have launched a criminal investigation into the deadly train accident in canada that has killed at least fifteen people a rail company has pointed the finger of blame at firefighters for failing to prevent the disaster after a small fire on board was put out just before the accident took place and the train was carrying crude oil when it hurled off the tracks in a small town in quebec on saturday exploding into a massive fireball that had engulfed shops buildings and people. over one hundred thousand korean business and government delegates have crossed into the north for a new round of talks on reopening the joint k. song factory complex or there was halted in april following tension over pyongyang's latest nuclear weapon test now both sides do blame one another for the suspension south korea is expected to demand safeguards against the new freeze

while the north once in the media restart of work as well as higher pay for its employees. one of mexico's most active volcano has erupted near the capital spewing a cloud of ash and vapor three kilometers high several days of activity flights in and out of the capital have been canceled leaving hundreds of people stranded the authorities have raised the alert level but have stopped short of evacuating the surrounding areas. the reason the moscow's next mayor has no shortage of contenders applications close in just a few hours but already forty candidates have put themselves forward for the first mayoral election in the russian capital in a decade now being in charge of a rapid growing twelve million population mega city with a budget the size of a small european country certainly sets a number of large challenges and want to be mayors have some well rather interesting and maybe surprising solutions for example. personal helicopters for richard muscovites and also replacing migrant workers with robots more on that from

. those who last visited more than two decades ago would hardly recognize it today from a grim often unfriendly city it has turned into a major european capital with glossy lights and vibrant lifestyle however the facelift came at a cost traffic jams overground human jams on the ground and the never ending din of construction have reached a critical point six generation. believes the time has come for change because all the. real global city from. pushing the business some somebody. who can see all that you could do is ministration much appreciation it not being clear how to provide the will be to see a show now or have what would have it's not just the collapse but if people do this

and that change may well be on the way to acting mayor said bannon handed in his resignation letter a snap election was called and the reaction from mayor want to be has been swift the flight that's on the way for the mayoral seat is unprecedented not only due to the number of candidates which exceeds thirty but also because the last time russia's capitol elected its boss was a decade ago this position so long as been appointed one and this is part of a huge pro. i think this is a second major. political system of the russian federation this position is very important and it's crucial to the future and the current state of the country not just moscow itself in this battle for more school candidates of radically contrasting. are coming up with very different ideas from charging car owners for driving into the city center to replace the labor migrants from central asia with the robots. who is this time running without the ruling party support to build on

his current achievements and is offering to implement more high tech features into everyday life opposition activists. currently on trial for allegedly prioritizes the fight against corruption and introducing younger faces into local authorities this eccentric candidate. the spider a former heavy metal front man has promised to hand a new sun over the russian capital and build a new imperial moscow each political party has put its own contender forward but regardless of who wins and it's still an open race with no clear front runner everyone agrees that this job will be no walk in the park moscow is often called a country within a country so whoever takes the rain here they have to be more than just a talented manager so after years of practically nonexistent elections the russian capital braces itself for and heated political battle and that campaign is gaining

intensity with every day. reporting from moscow. next how global finance and its pound of flesh from the african. well the. funniest technology innovation all the least a mellow minutes from around rush hour we've got the future covered. i would rather ask questions for people in positions of power instead of speaking on their behalf and that's why you can find my show larry king now right here on

r.t. question more. sixty . six. you know how sometimes you see a story and it seems so 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. lazy i'm going to go through no other job. so that i could money to buy seeds. dies or to bundle money i have for seeds and i suspended i'll go.