edward snowden says he wants to stay in russia and will comply with the kremlin's condition to stop the u.s. over washington. for providing a propaganda platform for the whistleblower. lawyers for the guantanamo bay detainee say there's no indication the hunger strike is ending despite u.s. officials claiming most of the protesting prisoners have eaten a meal now for the first time since february. as clashes break out of the annual orange order parade despite a heavy police presence. shooting dead a top syrian rebel commander this in the latest escalation of infighting all among

the opposition. well good morning from moscow worse now we're just off to eight am on saturday. world headlines let's get straight now to the whistleblower. lawyers have fresh support for edward snowden's application for refuge in russia now this following his meeting with russian and international human rights activists at moscow's sheremetyevo airport that's where he's been holed up now for roughly three weeks get the details out told scott who joins us here on the program paul good morning to you so what's next morning well after three weeks in hiding edward snowden has finally been seen in public he called yesterday's meeting with human rights activists and noise not just from the international scene from into. national

groups but also prominent russian figures as well now in this meeting he laid out his current plight explained his current situation and as you say he said that he was also seeking asylum in russia now it seems that he needs assistance in trying to reach his end goal which it seems still appears to be asylum in latin america hey expressed his gratitude to the countries that have suggested they would take him in these include the likes of venezuela bolivia and nicaragua but it's becoming apparent that it's increasingly difficult for him to get to these countries not only because of a lack of paperwork but also because of america's aggressive pursuit of him which led to the grounding of the bolivian president's plane over european aspace of course last week and edward snowden says that such the such an aggressive pursuit is not just endangering his life but also the lives and liberties of other people as well which is why he's got these human rights groups and lawyers involved in it also because of the difficulty in traveling is why he's got russia are involved as

well applying for political asylum in russia now of course he initially did this just done that two weeks ago when vladimir putin the president laid out some conditions for that to be met and they were of course that he stops these leaks or stops the actions and i quote our u.s. partners russia's stance has not changed so what conclusions can we draw from that well glenn greenwald the guardian journalist who has been working closely with edward snowden to reveal these leaks he says that he is in he is in possession of all the relevant documents and the edward snowden has passed over all documents to him effectively meaning that snowden's leaks are over and that he is effectively now a bystander and he too is at the mercy of his glenn greenwald and the press who are deciding what revelations will be revealed and when meaning that edward snowden's role in this is over which could be exactly why he meets russia's criteria for.

asylum and whether his application is successful or not only time will tell but the indication is that it will be granted russian lawmakers are. in the meeting yesterday and indicated that snowden's application would be looked upon favorably snowden no says that conditions are acceptable he can get it i think he really. satisfies the requirements for a political refugee human rights activists of lawyers who were there. at the end to worry green he was prosecuted for political reasons rather than on legal grounds appalled you think it's a fair to say at the moment that while washington and moscow right now are not exactly bosom buddies. it's probably a headache that president vladimir putin could do without i think russia has played this very much by the book from the start initially of course when he was in the transit zone the argument was simple from russia's point of view he doesn't come

under our jurisdiction he hasn't crossed the border he's not in russian territory we don't have a decision to make the president starts and russia's stance has always been that it was snowden will not be extradited to the united states of course america a country that still has the death penalty that remains the case and as i say i think it was it was an easy way for russia to score some simple points over america was he remained in the transit zone now he's applied for asylum in russia and says he will meet the criteria laid out it's a decision for the russian authorities to make but i think it's becoming increasingly apparent as well that president vladimir putin doesn't really want this to become a major issue between the united states and russia tensions between the two countries great at the moment and i think this is an issue that both countries could do without now both presidents barack obama and vladimir putin did have a phone conversation late on friday the exact details of what was discussed is unknown but it is believed that edward snowden is of course one of the topics that

was up for discussion but i think it's fair to say that russia will be keen to maybe try and score some simple points over the united states but hope that this doesn't become too much of a thorny issue between the two i suppose at least it's a bit of good news that obama and putin at least talking about this and not interrupt not playing not playing games behind closed doors all right thank you for the meantime was a closed meeting with human rights activists of course yet another outburst of criticism from washington which now demands snowden be handed over these guy nature can has the report. the white house has basically accused russia of providing quote a propaganda platform for edward snowden this is washington's reaction to edward snowden meeting with russian human rights activists at the moscow airport take a listen i would simply say that providing a propaganda platform for mr snowden runs counter to the russian government's previous declarations of russia's neutrality and that they have and that they have no control over his presence in the airport it's also incompatible with russian

assurances that they do not want. mr snowden to further damage u.s. interests we know that president obama and president putin discussed edward snowden over the phone we don't know how that conversation went but the obama administration's latest statements can give us an idea the state department has earlier reiterated washington's disappointment over snowden's meeting with human rights activists suggesting that somehow russian authorities could have been should have barred edward snowden from speaking take a listen we are disappointed that russian officials and agencies facilitated this meeting today by allowing these activists and representatives into the moscow airports transit zone to meet with mr snowden despite the government's declarations of russian's neutrality with respect to mr snowden so you're disappointed that they let someone into their own airport i don't know that well that they facilitated this event of course why because this gave

a forum going to be should have before as before you forfeited his right to freedom of speech as well met miss mr snowden as we've talked about let me just say this because i think it's important he's not a whistleblower he's not human rights activists he's wanted on a series of serious criminal charges brought in these certain eastern district of virginia in the united states i'm sorry but i didn't realize people wanted on charges forfeited their right to speak to free speech it's very interesting how washington now uses the word propaganda referring to edward snowden's speech basically suggesting that somehow russia should deny him free speech the journalist who challenge the state department spokesperson sort of showed how ridiculous that sounds coming from the u.s. it almost sounds. i we don't like what he's saying one could just imagine what the u.s. reaction would be to a similar call from russia if it were let's say some russian whistleblower who stood up for civil liberties in russia and was asking for asylum in the u.s.

not hard to guess what the reaction would be regardless of what russians think about snowden according to the most recent polls fifty five percent of americans do snowden as a whistleblower and only thirty four percent consider him a traitor so the majority of americans do not think what edward snowden is saying is propaganda. and stephen cohen professor of russian and slavic studies at new york university he believes edward snowden's case has landed in moscow and washington in quite a predicament this is a classic case of the testing of leadership both in moscow and washington neither leader neither obama nor putin can be happy about mr snowden sitting in the moscow airport and didn't invite him to be sure but he can't toss him out for various political reasons obama needs to show he's tough on snowden. i can't believe that the united states actually wants to put snowden on trial because if it was

a fair trial or a legal trial all snowden would have the right to subpoena american officials who have knowledge of all this intelligence he's exposed would not be so i think there's a vested interest with obama and putin to find a way to solve this problem so that neither is damaged politically so we'll know what kind of leaders they are. south american nations belonging to a regional trade bloc have recalled their ambassadors for talks from european countries involved in the grounding of the bolivian president's plane and that's according to the euro gwion foreign minister and members of the bloc include among others both brazil and argentina i mean american embassies across the region of issued a warning against letting snowden into latin america. while washington's unrelenting pressure on latin american governments is a blatant disregard of international law human rights activist peter tatchell

what the united states government is doing is seeking to obstruct edward snowden's bid to seek asylum not to get asylum but to seek asylum in his bullied and managed to threaten other countries around the world to not grant him asylum and to not give airspace over so that a flight can take him to another country that is a direct attack upon the united nations refugee convention and it is shocking and appalling there's supposedly democratic government the united states with the collusion of european governments including the government here in britain has been conspiring together to not allow mr snowden to make a valid asylum application there is no way that he is a spy he has not contacted any foreign spy agencies he's not divulge any information to foreign governments he has simply exposed the fact that the united

states national security agency britain's spy agency g c h q had been snooping inspiring upon millions of innocent private citizens that is not spying charge he is a whistleblower and he deserves asylum. of course here at r.t. we've been following the developments in a good snowden's case since the very start the final the latest on the leaks on the asylum controversy just a click away right now at odyssey dot com. and for now in the program u.s. officials claim that most of the hunger striking detainees at guantanamo bay have eaten a meal for the first time since the protests began more than five months ago and lawyers for the captives say that doesn't mean the strike is going to end forty five prisoners still being force fed and what are u.s. federal judge has slammed as a painful she merely aging and degrading process is more important as more.

ninety nine of those one hundred and two men on strike have eaten a meal within the past twenty four hours according to the dept the director of public affairs at good mo samuel house he says that most of the prisoners took part in a meal of lamb to break the first day of fast during the muslim holy period of ramadan which lasts through the month during ramadan observance abstain from food or drink from sunrise to sunset the prisoners who have eaten are still considered hunger strikers because the us military requires several days of sustained eating and minimum caloric intake before pretty a prisoner is removed from the list of hunger strikers now u.s. military officials say forty five of the prisoners are still on the forced forced feeding list meaning they can be strapped down and fed a liquid nutrient mix through a nasal gastric tube on monday a u.s.

federal judge called the procedure quote painful humiliating and degrading process that comment was made in a ruling in which she said she had no with already to order a stop of of the force feeding that's been ongoing at guantanamo bay now get moved fishel say out of respect for the prisoners religious beliefs the forced feedings will only be carried out at night during ramadan now so far what's not clear is if they get moved detainee's in time to completely abandon their hunger strike or if the evening is a temporary reprieve during the holy month of ramadan some lawyers for the prisoners remain very skeptical of the leaders reports coming from u.s. officials because they say the u.s. military has tried to downplay the hunger strike from the very beginning the very beginning which is dated back more than five months ago now the protest at guantanamo has continued to raise awareness in the u.s.

and throughout the world and it has forced u.s. president barack obama to renew his efforts to close the island prison where one hundred sixty. and i u.s. public defender carlos warner he represents eleven of the detainees and says they don't intend to stop their hunger strike that is until barack obama delivers on his long running pledge to close the notorious prison the president has the power to released eighty six men right now and we've heard noises that he intends to do so but we've seen no action since that speech and i believe you're still going to have a number of hunger strikers until we see people transferred that's just the bottom line hopefully the military has started to engage the man and his duly positive steps to end the hunger strike again all of us hope that it does and i hope that my clients are eating i don't want them to starve i don't think any lawyer does but at the same time we are waiting for president obama to do what he said he would do and that is to transfer the innocent men eighty six innocent men. it's good to have you

with us here at r.t. this morning still to come for you thought of atomic rage assume we investigate why the launch of india's largest power plant is sparking mass protests and what could be behind the environmental drive to get rid of a nuclear energy. but i'll go four police officers and an m.p. have been injured in belfast after the annual orange order parade ton violent with several fires burning across the city and more than six hundred police drafted in from all across the u.k. used water cannons to disperse angry mobs. as this report from belfast. i didn't. want to. find out that.

this is. probably. the. wrong simplest thing. the. sort of. thing that. the great i think that it. will be once again. around the. detention to. be able. to number. as well as some of the. things the little bit of. all the. question will be all about whether anything to prevent this from happening.

now a civil war within a civil war the situation is said to be brewing in syria and so are a top rebel commander who's been shot dead by islamist militants of the moderate free syrian army officer was ambushed by fighters from the radical al nusra front an f.s.a. official says they've since received threats from the islamists to kill all of the rebel commanders in the various factions of the syrian unable to form a united front against government forces which are on the offensive across the country and the latest outbreak of infighting. was also stoked fears that weapons smuggled to rebels would end up in the hands of extremists a free syrian army spokesman. says the anti assad front is being weakened by the fear that. this problem between the opposition on the ground will escalate and we could possibly see. an internal all there fight between the rebels

themselves who are the free syrian army and. and that's what i fear wants as that is going. to be a pinch will conflict between the rebels themselves the free syrian army and members such as and that's the very concerning they have an object and that is to oust and get rid of asset and regime and now that you create this internal problem within themselves it's going to be a further backlash for the opposition in order to advance. so that's just a problem right now but internals who are finding themselves with the opposition and i said and his regime is sitting back and we are to egypt now which is are seeing more rallies with tens of thousands joining marches demanding that the ousted president mohamed morsy be reinstated for the protests come amid a crackdown on the country's islamist movement which has led to bloodshed and

arrests of the muslim brotherhood says morsy supporters will stay in the streets until their demands are met or his opponents of more demonstrations of their own the country's military which remove the president from power is hardly preparing for fresh parliamentary and presidential elections the u.s. meanwhile has joined the german foreign ministry and calling for morsi to be released a new york based scholar and activist of dr sarah marusek he thinks the egyptian revolutionaries should choose a leader they can trust otherwise face a military dictatorship. i think we need to definitely is a revolution by the army but the problem is that there are grassroots support for change in egypt there are people who feel that the government morsi is not listening to them it's true that doesn't want to see cho on several occasions to the various opposition leaders say he tried to incorporate them into the government but he also meets very many errors he passed. several dictatorial

policies of course he's not a dick you know that he's an elected president and i think people really need to think about how to change how democratic change can be realized in egypt today and there is popular support for change in egypt is popular support for a new leader but there is no fighting on here is through a military has to be elections so i think so gyptian revolutionaries figure the figure out how to form a coalition how to choose who you know so they can toss them to being a liberal like about i and with people she is there they're going to be and a difficult position because they're either going to have a military dictatorship or they're going to have a life with those who don't speak on their behalf i mailbomb is reported to have exploded near a mosque in the u.k. town of making just a fourth such attack in a month this incident came up a day at the funeral of soldier lee rigby was modem broad daylight by alleged its lawmaker extremists more on this now of the story she's pretty boy. the mosque

cap'n to be nearly empty and luckily nobody was hurt but people in the area saying that they're extremely shaken that they're now going to be looking over their shoulder next time they go to their place of worship now this is happened on the day of the funeral the private funeral of a british soldier drummer lee rigby who was killed in an islamist terror attack in which in may since then there's been a real spike in islamophobia tags across the country so tensions are starting on the rise and people speaking outside the mosque saying that they're not feeling very comfortable tall about this now as to who may be responsible for this attack it's much too early to speculate the police haven't said anything yet but there's already speculation on the internet they're saying that this potentially could be a reprisal for the death of drummer lee rigby by perhaps the far right movement we've seen a number of attacks against most mosques in the past months so it's definitely part

of a worrying trend now to talk about this further i'm joined by fear as a gal from the charity faith matters now there's a very worrying survey that recently came out saying that two thirds of britons believe that there's going to be a clash of civilizations between white britons and between muslims living in the u.k. do you envisage these sorts of tensions getting worse in the u.k. and i think certainly we're seeing localized areas where there are where there are heightened tensions particularly where. i think general. theory of a clash of civilizations will more take place take root to the united kingdom but a lot of the incidences of coups and localized issues of localized tensions particularly with the english defense league that comes in and tries to manipulate those tensions we should approach which and other areas so really low clouds tensions within the national picture of. these kind of issues play a much more why the level struggle thank you very much for your comments. well the

investigation into this incident at the mosque in ted turner still underway is being treated as an attempted terrorist attack and already a number of muslims in the area as i said saying that they feel extremely unsafe in the light of the most recent attack or straight to iraq not open up. more than thirty people have been killed after a blast to a through a crowded teashop incurred of cookouts in the north of the country and the oil rich city is rocked by frequent sectarian attacks as it is home to our. peeling for influence in the area according to u.n. stats more than seven hundred people were killed nationwide last month as iraq struggles to deal with the escalating violence. at least six people have been killed and dozens injured when a passenger train derailed and hit a crowded platform in a southern suburb of the french capital partners rescuers have been searching for people trapped under the bridge

a french president francois hollande who visited the crash site promised a thorough investigation into the cause of the accident. now india's supreme court may have given the final nod to the commissioning of the country's largest ever power plant but the move hasn't calmed the furor surrounding it and the station is split locals into those who claim it's crucial for the economy and those insisting it's a major health hazard aussies elected a chef he has been investigating what's driving the anti nuclear campaign. this may have seemed as a minor peaceful protest but it seriously stalled one of india's most ambitious projects the first energy block of the nuclear power station destined to solve a growing electricity problem for millions was due to be launched in twenty eleven but because of these fishermen protesting against what they see as an environmental threat india's high court refused to give the go ahead for the station to start working however protesters were forced to declare they were acting in good faith with no foreign financing

a small amount of money that we need comes from our own people the fishermen contribute part of every once in two weeks but not everyone quite bought that india's prime minister accused western states of derailing india's nuclear program the atomic energy program has got into difficulties because these n.g.o.s mostly i think based in the us don't appreciate the need for all countries to increase energy. this protest is not a one off rallies organized by non-governmental organizations targeted other projects in india mining was also hit by unrest leading to multi-million dollar losses and severely hampering development and your. local. tribal people. that these people are coming to expect. anything to go. after one of their program. ben be. the most recent u.s.

officials have been staunchly denying all that a geisha is that washington had a hand installing projects in india but actually say this has been a tactic employed by the state department for more than quarter of a century so the state department or any agency for international development spends hundreds of millions of dollars each year to fund a series of n.g.o.s which are not governmental organizations they appear organizations that supposedly promote democracy that's their official line is n.g.o.s really are the tip of the iceberg but they are a visible portion of a larger agenda of the united states and of the western transnational elites he is going to follow the same patterns that we've seen. elsewhere around the world with this n.g.o.s asian indian leadership is clearly concerned about these prospects the last known date on the financing of indian n.g.o.s was published in twenty eleven back then the government established that twenty two thousand organizations had received a total of more than two billion dollars coming from abroad six hundred fifty

million of which allegedly came from the united states this year new delhi has yet to publish such a report but government sources claim that nowadays this funding has dwindled to almost nothing the bank accounts of more than seven hundred such organizations have been frozen and legislation against foreign agent has been toughened and while activists bristle over what they believe to be a suppression of freedoms in the country often described as the world's most populous democracy india's economists say that numerous vital projects including the nuclear power station will now get the green light. of ski. just turning eight thirty in the morning on a very sunny saturday here in moscow thank you for joining us for the program and next hour we're heading over to washington our program of prime interest after the break.

right. and i think the church. on a.