i'm going to. run. the latest news and a look back at the week's top stories here on our t.v. the olympic torch is lit in the game's ancient birthplace of greece and begins the longest journey in the history of the winter olympics to suffer in two thousand and fourteen. a rare note of a chord and hope of the u.n. general assembly that's up to the security council passes a unanimous resolution on syria over its chemical weapons and a potentially historic glimmer of light and u.s. iranian relations. a russian court orders all of the greenpeace activists arrested trying to scale an arctic oil platform to remain in custody while the group is under investigation. and in the british city of manchester tens of thousands take to the streets angered over cuts to health care spending

while the militant military and surveillance budgets continue to grow. we're watching our two live from moscow i'm lindsey france thanks for joining me. in greece at a grand age old ceremony of the olympic flame for the twenty fourteen winter games has been let's and set off for an epic journey to the host city of soft cheek the torch will travel over fifty thousand kilometers across seas and mountains and even go into space and your former watch the event in olympia and tibet must say reports from such a here in russia. lympics flame for sorcery twenty fourteen has been lit will probably be able to see it just behind my left shoulder there and it also we will see here at olympia the birthplace of the games the longest torch relay in the

olympic history just a few moments ago the lighting of the flame ceremony took place it was basically a step back in time winding back the clock perhaps two and a half hours and juice is so not trust stressed as a high priestess light the flame using the powers of the sun and a parabolic mirror which is basically what happened in seven hundred b.c. that flame is them brought here to the ancient stadium which is where i am standing and it is now being used or just was used to light the torch the very first torch bearer he runs off to my right by tradition he's always a great god on this occasion he was an eighteen year old ski called yanis antonio who hopes to compete for his country in sochi next year and he will hand this torch the first russian torch bearer alexander ovechkin the ice hockey star he himself has only been released by his club the washington capitals for forty eight hours to carry out this honor he flies back to the states this evening but he says that this

event today was one of the highlights of his career while the torch will go on a tour of greece for the next seven days and that will end in athens next weekend before it flies to moscow but it all has started here as we've been on air in the limpia the birthplace of the olympics well it's definitely going to be an olympic torch relay that's going to break a many records and here's why it's going to take around one hundred days for all of that torture to go through russia it's going to take sixty five thousand kilometers and fourteen thousand torchbearers to bring it right here to the host city it's going to date through nine at times earnings in russia eighty three regions two thousand nine hundred and and cities. settlements across russia and also visit at the north pole also it'll go to the top of the europe's our highest mountain in the rushes the north caucuses it will then make a trip outside of earth or to the i.r.s.

says away cosmonauts they will take it on a space walk now this is never happened before in the history of the olympics now in terms of traveling the torch around russia it's going to have a conventional ways such as you know the train a plane as well as on foot or through personalities but it's also going to go through unconventional ways us through reindeer sleighs and hot air balloons of course a russia wanted to highlight some of its culture its the history and of course this emerging new younger russia that we're seeing being developed here at the host city in. and we will of course the covering all the spectacular stops along the way for the olympic torch relay over the next few months here on r.t. on air and online at our website r.t. dot com. deliberate george is on an epic journey to such. one hundred and twenty three days. through two thousand nine hundred towns and

cities of russia. relayed by fourteen thousand people or sixty five thousand killing. in a record setting trip by land air and sea another's face. let's take a large really special coverage on our i. and no one expected it just two weeks ago but this year's u.n. general assembly has proven that there is enough space for consensus between world powers and has seen a historic phone call which raised hopes that a deadlock can be broken in iran's nuclear crisis but the show of unity paid when the u.n. security council unanimously voted on a syrian resolution something that seemed to be elusive for more than two years parties and it's now reports from new york hope for diplomacy progress on two fronts at the united nations a new tone in policy towards iraq and

a security council resolution on chemical weapons in syria the opening union we've been hearing increasingly off to the argument that the threat or use of force which is directly precipitated by the u.n. charter might be the most efficient way to solve international problems the united states of america is prepared to use all elements or power including military force to secure. are core interests of the rich. but where consensus at the u.n. emerged after years of deadlock over how to deal with the syrian crisis the un security council unanimously passed a resolution to secure and eliminate syria's stockpiles of chemical weapons according to the geneva agreement put forward by russia and the u.s. the mandate outlines a legally binding compliance but no threat of automatic sanctions or military action i think it shows there were turning towards a diplomatic solution least on the issue of chemical weapons but the other issue

that is still remained outstanding is what will happen outside of the issue of chemical weapons will the promise to be pursued by the united states or will they continue to find as they have the opposition are in the opposition it was still a day that happening and trying to deepen the conflict over there was it another way it's a u.s. policy that iran's new president says has no place in the region his debut at the u.n. this week star hassan rouhani reach out but also defend tehran from political attacks iran is an anchor of stability in unstable region the iranian threat is imaginary and is used as an excuse for the misdeeds of others iran poses absolutely no threat to the world or the region ronnie made it clear that iran does not want nuclear weapons and that it wants peace but also to be treated as an equal rainy and u.s. officials praised high level meetings that took place on the sidelines of the general assembly and the country's president spoke over the phone for the first time in over three decades but what would it take for

a would be photo op to become a new u.s. approach towards iran but as has our very tied there his hands are tied that there are people and lobby groups in the united states that do not want to see the united states and iran after thirty four years of demonizing the country to have relations the u.s. is in a tough spot. to keep from normal relations in the middle east and now the nation of the. muslims in general against the earth is mostly due to the commitment. of the shows. obama said to meet with israeli prime minister netanyahu on monday in washington now is the real test will the u.s. be able to move forward with diplomacy in the middle east both with iran and syria the first week at the u.n. general assembly has opened the door to rethink

a failed policy the question is will the obama administration shut it the first chance they get reporting from new york and he said no way r.t. the resolution adopted by the u.n. demands that both the government in damascus and the opposition comply with the disarmament earlier we spoke to author and historian gerald horne who said that ensuring the rebels cooperate may prove very difficult. that's the weakness of this peace process recall that just a few days ago these so-called rebels little officially with the more extremist faction basically saying that the less extreme instructions to somehow be purged in expelled the extremist fraction of course is spearheaded by the old mr front close to al qaida keep in mind as well that some of the so-called chemical facilities in syria or under the jurisdiction of rebel forces if the rebel forces are not part of this process it's unclear to me how it could be resolved that is to say how can

chemical weapons be destroyed not the least talked and these chemical weapons be found if the rebels are not part of the process. so i had for you this hour our heart of darkness we look at what lies beneath a surge of bloodshed in africa as students shoppers and churchgoers become targets of militant attacks plus the power to electoral success in austria is paved with euro skeptic sentiment that's as preliminary results suggest right wing parties appear to have made a strong showing in the country's parliamentary vote that's later in the program. in bahrain fifty shia muslims have been sentenced to up to fifteen years in prison for organizing a clandestine movement the group was formed back in two thousand and eleven and was the major driving force behind the nationwide probe reform uprising dr nedda day of the bahrain rehabilitation an anti-violence organization spent two months in prison

there she says the whole trial is a well known top level tactic of demonization. actually it's a quite old propaganda and the whole process all through the demonization of the pro-democracy orders and to pro-democracy groups is a quite an old fashioned thing that's the death or it is the bahraini authorities they'd be using for a while and it's not working anymore i mean at this moment they failed absolutely failed to provide any evidence that these groups are involved in any way to terror attacks or any terrorist more of it take movements two years ago exactly at the same date same judge he a convicted doctor has almost fifty doctors for sentencing up to fifteen years it's the same thing that a beating after the break we'll look at how residents of the u.k.'s ascension

island are faced with losing their homes all because of the u.s. air force. sympathize with the syrian uprising but we do not train and we do not smuggle weapons or send them. we do not do any of these things. on your comment. alex it's a. pleasure to have you with us here on our kids today on rollers you should.

welcome back you're watching r.t. live from moscow i'm in de france thanks for joining me in the u.k. fifty thousand people stage one of the biggest protests manchester's ever seem to coincide with the first day of the annual conservative party conference protesters are furious with cuts to social spending and health services brought in by the coalition government which is led by the conservatives we talked to one of the protesters to ask what precisely got the marchers so fired up. this government is in fact in real trouble of course it's been very much to do with the national health service today that actually that it's facing twenty billion of of cuts by twenty fifteen it's all but it's also shown that crystallized to so many issues of where the government's own popular for all the way from mass surveillance to

threaten action in syria to legal aid the fact that so many people are willing to speak out and stand up for the n.h.s. and stand up for britain britain a really puts pressure on this government now we've seen how the austerity the austerity agenda is damaging the country and that it's also clear that a new network a new movement is really beginning to forge itself it's also i think what's going to really put pressure on the tories is the fact that people are talking together it's not like the left wing in one corner but if this is a much the a much bigger movement now time to rethink david cameron. head to our web site r.t. dot com for even more stories just a click away for you now the u.s. federal government could be on the verge of shutting down that's after congress voted to push back obama's controversial health care reforms by one year something the white house is unlikely to accept i know details on our website. plus find out

about the new unit in the british army that staffed by the it's crowd and is designed to defend the country from the threat of cyber warfare this and more at r.t. dot com. and russian court in murmansk has now denied bail to all of the greenpeace activists who were arrested after trying to scale a russian oil platform in the arctic although altogether thirty people will remain in custody for two months as the investigation into the protests continues now this comes as the polar region gears up for significant changes that are cheap enough explains. the pictures that stormed international media greenpeace activists trying to climb onto a floating platform in russia's north arrested by coast guards was. shot. all thirty activists from eighteen countries were detained and are now awaiting

whether they will be officially charged greenpeace claims their actions were peaceful but the authorities say they could have endangered not only the lives of the rig's workers but the environment itself social and she would know it's obvious they are not pirates but they tried to storm the platform and these people violated international law by coming dangerously close to the president's common scheme at an international arctic conference organized by russia or here in city huts the only city in the world located exactly on the arctic circle line where the presidents of russia finland iceland other officials along with around four hundred experts have gathered and the arctics environment is what this forum is all about as average temperatures warm up the arctic is opening up new opportunities for trade routes and energy projects moscow says only companies with experience working in the tough region and enough funds to do it properly and without harming nature must be allowed access and cleaning up the heritage of the cold war era is another

issue amanda and military bases equipment and piles of barrels with fuel i know a map of the arctic binary assessment program has been involved in that but russia has really been working on its own to try to claim we have a ways to go and they're not alone there are places around the planet or similar things that happen when people didn't recognize it as something they did had long term negative consequences for the environment the arctic nations seem to be on the same beach looking after the north wall is a responsibility they must carry together so that the mistakes of the past aren't repeated especially when their every move is under such intense scrutiny you've got this going off in the arctic. let's take a look at some other world news now first in one where some fifty students were massacred while sleeping in their dormitories when militants assaulted their college in a rural area of the country witnesses say the attackers were in room to room gunning down young men and those trying to flee the terror group boko haram is

believed to be behind the atrocity that comes just a week after the kenyan shopping maad tak when islam islam at least sixty eight the founder of the viewpoint africa website told us deep social problems have led to the surge of violence on the continent. all joined together but i'll shut babin somalia or the why the m.l.a. in in mali or in the would you across the west africa these jihadi cells are all of the blueprints on the organization of the west has already declared terrorism leads to islam is in islam is in leads to fundamentalism and ultimately muslims when you're dealing with an ideology when you're dealing with a mindsets and in the case all these groups they believe they can do no wrong because as far as they think they believe they're getting their group from god so it's not extent it becomes very difficult to dislodge them all the time you're

looking at the generational problem alternately the the use would be the ones who would be that be educated better be mindful of what can go wrong when they join these groups and ultimately when you start addressing the right from course it's creating jobs addressing social issues ultimately we may be able to reap these problems from our societies. and in other stories from around the globe an explosion in the pakistani city of peshawar has killed thirty three and left at least seventy wounded a car bomb this place near a police station in the historic market area the blast is the latest in a series of deadly attacks targeting christians and government officials in the city taken together they have killed at least one hundred twenty people and injured scores more the president is enjoying luxury conditions behind bars have left these protesters seeing red. the cordillera facility in santiago holds agents of the former military dictatorship for crimes against humanity the president has ordered

the president to be closed and the inmates move to another jail. that news apparently triggered the suicide of a former intelligence chief under the disgraced dictator augusto pinochet according to his lawyer the ex general was upset at being moved to a regular facility. a suicide attack have struck a mosque in baghdad killing at least forty people the blast caused the mosque roof to collapse on to the congregation which was mourning a man killed by militants on saturday dozens of people are injured and more may be still trapped beneath the rubble it comes after a series of bombings in iraq e kurdistan that claimed six lives. the centrist coalition government appears to have secured a narrow win in austria's parliamentary elections but preliminary results suggest right wing parties have done particularly well scooping up more than a quarter of the overall vote you know all of our reports from vienna. what it

shows is that the social democrats on the people's party who went into these elections as the coalition government well it looks likely that they'll come out of these elections as the coalition government they've picked up around fifty percent of the vote there over the coming days we should probably hear that they will continue their coalition what is most interesting about these elections is that over one quarter of austrians have voted for parties that want to do away with bailouts for euro zone countries and see in see real changes to the structure of the single currency now to talk a bit more about this and what it means i'm joined by barbara cole who's the director of the austrian economic sense a barber thanks very much for talking to me why have austrians voted in this way and why are they upset with the current eurozone system while they entrust the politicians in brussels any more they don't trust our ostrander decision makers what day do there they don't believe they find the right solutions i mean after all

it's just. a redistribution on a supranational level it's austrian tax euros that go to other countries and are just washed down the drain now austria is one of the four eurozone economies this century underpins bailouts what would this vote over a quarter as they say people voting for parties that want to change things what does this mean for the future of the single currency well i think it does set a couple of politicians thinking and overlook their past solutions that after all it has only prolong the problems this is definitely what the people see and it has not come up to any solutions as a matter of fact that that's grew bigger and bigger and higher so the next generations will suffer and this is what those twenty five percent obviously have in mind so austrians voting in increasing numbers the parties they want changes to the eurozone and also voting for right wing party something that we have seen spreading across europe as my report shows. the political. it is on the rise in

europe and it's drawing some surprising support a lot of people from the working class blue collar workers lower educated people are voting for the extreme right of the radical right because of the policies staying put forward like immigration and european integration corruption i guess the politicization of such so these are the topics that are now days important for those people voting for the radical right across europe there's a time that's turning right ukip is being talked about as the legitimate third party in britain while alternative for germany just missed out on a place in the bundestag norway's conservative government came to power with tough immigration promises and in sweden and finland there's also been gains here in australia euro skeptic and right wing parties are gaining support from people who feel that the main issues important to them ons being addressed they might care less and we still feel we need to slow down immigration i have nothing against

foreigners but enough is enough. yeah e.u. is saying where no money should go to like and all can't poor countries on it should stay in their own country and the e.u. is jordan's be like john dictate everything that actually goes it used to be that opar truce interest spruced and the e.u. second now it's only a few. want and having the freedom party of austria have made significant gains it's critics call it xenophobia its leader thanks to differ being . i don't have foreigners. even so the party adopted a different campaign tactic than it had done in previous elections their issue hidden in the message about religious values and a sense of talking about love your neighbors which is a very catholic way of talking about issues but of course the hidden message behind

was that this is against islam or against muslims also flying the anti euro flying is a stroke canadian billionaire frank stronger who come dems the single currency is the road to rack and ruin. we need to stop creating every housewife knows that if she spends more money than. most of europe's recent elections of the nail biters for politicians desperate to keep their jobs amid libyan economies all street is different it's doing relatively fine what's happening here is brussels assistance with bailouts and encroachments on sovereignty has given the right to come didn't seem to beat them with peace or all over the. as one of the last outposts of the british empire ascension island in the south atlantic is said to be suffering the effects of colonialism the u.k.

stands accused of a victim families that have lived there for over a century let's take a look now ascension island is a tiny spot on the world map right here it's home to barely a thousand people many of whom may now have to leave reportedly to make way for an american military base the islanders who are mainly british citizens will not be allowed to stay after retirement or if they're unemployed at eighteen the case bears similarities to the expulsion of inhabitants from diego garcia part of britain's indian ocean territory the island was forcefully depopulated in the one nine hundred seventy s. also to make way for a military base those living on ascension island now say that similar to diego garcia london is squeezing the life out of their home or a smith reports. it's a tiny island in the middle atlantic made of volcanic rock and covered in pitch and guano but to eight hundred people it's home but now the story of ascension island

has all the hallmarks of being another diego garcia the british owned indian ocean islands whose inhabitants were forced to leave to make way for a u.s. base despite having lived through generations. good memories. it's not for them. you know when you see them you got this because they are enjoying the. islanders accuse the british government of emptying ascension and operating families who have been there for more than a century ten years ago with all the difference britain with promising democratic institutions for the island a legal right to live and to own property it wanted a viable community that but today the population's already decreased by a quarter with communities replaced by contract workers were tired or unemployed

people over eighteen had to leave and the similarities with diego garcia and the dominant feature on the island is you guessed it an american base heavily used during president obama's recent trip to africa there are also satellites and submarine tracking stations and one of those now infamous listening posts run by g.s.t. h.q. the british government now conveniently insists ascension has no indigenous population and many residents believe they intend to evacuate the island completely and abandon it to the americans far from the dreams of a permanent home they had a decade ago where they'll be reduced to paul in the special relationship. they would lend to his family comes from the island he says it's outrageous that the fate of british citizens depends on u.s. military ambition. of indian origin in mind that i was born there there is

a very very strong sense of a sentient being. starved to death there is a precarious. political representation there is the absence of property rights. and it is a serious question to be asked about. why on british territory british citizens living there they took full british passport photos of why these peoples are being treated like this for the sake of a station with a base which is almost certain you might know more of the details of this in fact engaged in the activities that have been such a huge global story in terms of spying on pretty much everyone but that is happening on british not an american and a british population there is being mistreated up next we have artie's political debate program with peter lavelle and has got some cross talk. as the media.