on. barricades in the center of the ukrainian capital keep growing the government slams the opposition for its methods and accuses it of attempting a coup. meanwhile divisions in the country become more visible as people in the east make it clear they don't share the views being voiced in kiev central square. also this hour british m.p.'s are said to grill the guardians of the secret service allegations with paper damage to national security by exposing the government spying program. while much of europe is trying to count its way out of recession with crippling austerity iceland's going down a different past funding money for its people to speed recovery not.

guilty as charged a course in moscow convict people short bonnie's leading soloist over the city at times on the artistic director of the theater. international news and comment live from moscow you're watching all she international with me. and welcome to the program and to government protests in the ukrainian capital keeping the situation on edge with the main square of barricaded and official buildings blockaded the country's parliament is debating a no confidence vote in the government the prime minister in turn has accused the opposition of trying to stage a coup going to follow in the developments for us in cuba. well at this point we have had several hundred people actually staying overnight at the independence

square in the center of kiev and i've just seen quite a large first session coming from one end of the square that's behind me all the way to the opposite so we are being told that there are several hundred people that's what it looks like who are heading towards the country's parliament the rada in government saying that they in turn have heard rumors that there could be a possible temps to essentially take over as the protesters have been taking over the government buildings and in fact that is the goal of the opposition they want to take full control of all the government buildings and all the government offices in the country's capital what is important to keep in mind however is that until now the focus has been largely on the country's capital whereas in fact the country as of now seems to be rather divided various regions of course in ukraine kerry different allegiances and this is what this report is about the european union flags burning trash bins get it teenagers and the world revolution passed around

like a football this is kiev but what about other parts of ukraine where people have a different opinion about what's good for the country and what isn't. how many revolutions did we have in ukraine seven and more did that bring us. together old people and students and use them so unpleasant i don't even want to talk about it right now the opposition is trying to sell the drive for e.u. integration as the choice of all but recent polls show that there's an equal split between the pro european west of the country and the east and south which are historically much more pro russian people want to live like they do in europe we must work might be doing europe we should not be school and work for the sake of being on the street. in the e.u. we must meet certain criteria and that the moment we are simply not up to par to the right. standards in the way we produce things. so far do you claim your

leadership has shown no sign of giving in quite the opposite the president the parliament and the cabinet remain firmly in place so perhaps the forecasts of impending doom could be premature if you go to school r t. and as arena just mentioned the demands of the demonstrators in kiev are not exactly shared by people in the east of the country signs have taken to the streets that voice support for the authorities and their decision to suspend the trade deal with the e.u. recent polls show the country is sharply divided on the issue with more than seventy percent of those living in the west of ukraine favoring the deal with the european union while those same pro e.u. moods are shared by less than thirty percent in the east and to further discuss this iteration and ukraine and how it might develop i'm now joined live by joel laughlin's director of studies at the institute of democracy and cooperation in paris mr oakland welcome to r.t.

it's great to have you with us as always so the ukrainian parliament is debating a no confidence vote for the government right now so would you bet on the prime minister and his cabinet in this particular situation. i think i probably would i mean i think the rumors of a coup are to be taken with some seriousness but i would be surprised if the events of two thousand and four the orange revolution could be repeated you know as i think hagel said or was it marx history repeats itself as tragedy and then as fast i think it will be difficult for the pro western forces in ukraine to pull off the same trick twice particularly since clearly this decision about the trade agreement with europe is only a decision about a trade agreement the issue is not something constitutional like an election as it was nearly ten years ago. some seen a e.u.

politicians rushed to kiev as we express their support for the opposition and let's now have a listen together that what's been said in independence square that. used to you our board of europe and we should be more huge over the years the european union needs you and you need the european union and if you needed you would be able to go around. so that's your take on this deal saying such interference in the country's internal affairs justified that. absolutely not it's absolutely disgraceful for european politicians to travel this way as they did ten years ago when members of the european parliament and other people from the e.u. including of course particularly polish representatives played a very important role in disrupting the electoral process back at the time of the

orange revolution i think what it's very important for people to understand is that the european leaders the european elite genuinely considers itself to be more civilized and more politike. vance than anywhere else in the world they are in that respect i've often compared them to the early bolsheviks they really think that they're in the vanguard of history and they think that any country such as ukraine or even more so russia which is not interested in following their particular political and economic model is backward reactionary and dangerous and that's why they are inspired with an almost revolutionary zeal your reporter used the word revolution and said it was being bandied around again they really can but they are really convinced that they are in the vanguard of history and that's what gives them their dangerous drive. in case the government does step down from your point he will not be enough to quell the protests as well as the opposition or on the

contrary what that inspired them to demand more change is. well i as i say i'm not convinced that the government will fall although i'm a long way away from the events in ukraine i think unfortunately that as long as europe continues with its geopolitical project which is to constitute itself as the center of gravity in europe and to draw non european countries into its orbit to extend its sphere of influence as far as far as possible into eastern europe and deep of course into historic russia as long as europe continues that geopolitical program. this. these problems will continue these tensions will continue and of course they will particularly continue in ukraine ukraine is the biggest prize but it's also the most difficult prize other countries smaller countries like georgia and so on a fairly fairly easy to take over so as long as europe continues with its march to the into the east i think these tensions will continue on the other hand it's not

clear for how long europe will be able to continue to exercise this fascination as it undoubtedly does in certain parts of the ukraine because everybody knows that the european model itself is in deep crisis. everybody knows that in southern europe from where i'm speaking now the euro has inflicted terrible economic damage youth unemployment is over fifty percent in spain and so on so europe will i think cease to have to vittie increasingly so at least for people who look at things factually rather than with emotion as many people are doing right and that's their return to the e.u. politicians who were supporting the opposition on a independence square in kiev and one of the most vocal supporters of the process that we just heard from the polish opposition leader jaroslav could change ski and he is known as as as a staunch critic of the e.u. so one from your point of view he would support ukraine's integration deal with the

very block that he's so against. well i mean his his you say he was a staunch critic i mean he was a bit like the british conservative party who make euro skeptic noises as the kaczynski brothers did when they were in power but in fact never do anything against europe on the contrary they have always been fervent supporters of polish accession kaczynski brothers jaroslav kaczynski the former prime minister and they above all see this integration of ukraine into the european union as a political victory for poland it's very important to emphasize as i alluded to earlier the role of poles specifically in this process with ukraine poland has always regarded ukraine as its backyard it has i would say neo imperialist designs on ukraine it wants ukraine to come into its orbit into the european orbit mainly into its orbit and that's why polish leaders the former president question have ski

and others have taken such a role in this so there's no incompatibilities between kaczynski professed euro skepticism and his deep desire to effect this radical geopolitical change which would be represented by ukrainian accession to this disagreement jonathan director of studies that of democracy and corporation in paris mr lupton thank you very much indeed thank you. the current unrest in ukraine fall from spontaneous and is no longer inspired by the failure of the trade deal with the easy russia's president commented on the ongoing process in the neighboring country stressing the events look like they were masterminded for the next presidential election numbers really what's going on in kiev has little to do with ukraine's relations with the e.u. moreover it doesn't look like a revolution but a well planned action we can see well prepared and organized militant groups but

the opposition is either not always in control of what's going on or it's a political shroud for extremist christians but the government and the opposition agree violent riots were deliberately instigated but they differ on who's been behind them a prominent foreign affairs analyst dr trout subjective coverage has the authority has had nothing to gain from such tactics we need the question. who gains and it is obvious that the government has nothing to gain by escalating violence the government is actually hoping that it will gradually die down the only people who have a vested interest in provoking violence are the protesters themselves or to put it more precisely those who are behind the organized aspect of the protests because it would work wonders both in the western media and in the end of the

coach segment of the ukrainian population who have the marches of the so-called peaceful protests who are being suddenly be savaged by the police no that scenario simply does not sound convincing in my opinion the violence being instigated is perhaps by the fringe elements of the protesters but certainly not by the government because they have nothing to gain. and of course we'll be bringing you more updates from ukraine and expert opinion on this iteration there throughout the day plus you can always keep an eye on developments by logging on to r.t. dot com where you will also find the most striking videos and photos from the protests. the acid ballet drama the bolshoi has reached its conclusion a russian court has found

a leading ballet soloist and his two accomplices guilty of their time on the company's artistic director has more details. the bolshoi theater a leading soloist private has been found guilty and i must remind you the acid attack on the theatres artistic director research be fillin now the prosecutors earlier asked for a nine year sentence but such is the gravity of these charges that jangle may face up to twelve years in jail and now the actual chances are being delivered as we speak as well as to the two other fellow defendants were also found guilty and taking part in this attack of course this case has tarnished the reputation of russia's bolshoi theatre that last year reopened after a spectacular refurbishment but some of the shine has been taking up to the theater by the sky and so now i've been looking back at this opposition rushes valley history let's have a look. at the final act in

a case as dark as anything to grace the famous stage an acid attack that exposed to the world that russia stop theater in reality as a battle of filled where the struggle for glory when the curtains for the all songs and the theatres artistic director siggy fill in that almost made him blind shocked the world leaving the question who was the monster mind behind it so gazillion was returning home after an evening at the theatre world gala to this apartment building a man concealing his identity with a scoff called out phyllis name and right after that through some liquid in his face saying it was a greeting for him and their leader a court appearance for len described the pain as unbearable and terrifying he was left suffering in agony and the snow right outside this building it was late at night and it took him some time to get help and more than twenty operations before

he showed his face in public again from the start of official sun investigators believe the assault had come from inside the bali community to muncie. later in the arrest of leading soloist bible dmitrichenko often in his career the villain playing average thing from von rothbart and swan lake to yvonne the terrible he was accused of planning the attack and chord need to change to admit it he did want to rough up felon but sad he did not in town for acid to be thrown into his face i organized the state of crime but not on the scale that it turned out. and your advantage rumors and sooner ations even violence the dark underbelly of the bolshoi place and the spotlight. it will take a while to grease store of the lost or this famous and situation i didn't question the artsy moscow. it was all see international the news continues of course of go

north includes a. while david cameron visits beijing sweets in mandarin him from its close its trade links between the u.k. and china many of the british chinese working in these shops and restaurants say that the immigration clamp down in london this chinatown isn't making them feel very welcome. don't go away we're back after a very short break. well not talking about language at all but i will only react to situations i have read the reports but unlike the british no i will be distinctly to comment on your latter point to save lives to carry out a college on the job you know god i. think you know more recently.

when you made a direct question be prepared for a change when you should be ready for a. critical speech in a little down to freedom to. do we speak your language as i think about the war not advance. news programs and documentaries and spanish what matters to you breaking news a little too much of angle is the stories. you hear. that all teach spanish find out more visit actuality. you're watching all see international life or most go welcome bach in the u.k. the as so they go into newspaper is due to appear before the house of commons of the publishing edward snowden's revelations on global surveillance the country's

security says his claim public access to been talking ones has eroded national security but investigative journalist tony sling told us if the secret service agency itself that should be facing a grilling. what they're doing is they're informing the public criminal activity by our own intelligence services g c h q particularly because other newspapers and people have been doing it over the last few years this is absolute rubbish i'm afraid when in front of the intelligence and security committee the bosses of m i five m i six and q were giving their evidence we we were asking them for evidence that there's been any kind of threat to national security and you know what they said oh we could tell you in secret this is no real evidence they don't have any evidence they've been caught out acting criminally and we've got no proper oversight whatsoever of our intelligence services right now our intelligence services even though they completely failed us on iraq and in other ways have risen

in power their their budgets after the cold war doubling and it's absolutely ridiculous to see the. parliamentarian starting to interview the messenger shooting the messenger is what they're trying to do today and they're not going to succeed. and that's no walk through this story now the guardian mase its first public revelations based on snowden's materials at the beginning of the summer soon after that in july the police knocked on the door demanding all the league data be handed over and what would become a common occurrence followed the paper was warned of legal action against it than in august david miranda pointed to one of the guardian's columnists was arrested accused of trying to bring a fresh materials on the n.s.a. and g c h q and a symbolic move the newspaper destroyed the computer hard drives which contain some of the secret data and here we are now waiting for the editor of the guardian to go before and. and a quick reminder now to r.t.

dot com always has more stories for you and among them will tell you of the grave revelations about the preparations for the football world cup in qatar. that says the international community's sounds. alarm over the conditions for migrant workers say the lives of thousands are in danger if no changes are made. on the one pushing something online to read this small print and think twice before posting and actually review as it could now land you see fine. going soft on human rights in tibet and tweeting in the during that just some of david cameron's latest moves to win the good graces of the chinese the british prime minister is in beijing on the largest ever trade mission to the country whispering swear words into the ears of officials there. some in europe and

elsewhere see the world changing and want to shut china off behind the bamboo curtain of trade barriers britain wants to trade barriers and britain is the ideal for an opening china. home in the u.k. chinese residents say they don't feel as welcome london's chinatown a sparkling clean raided by the u.k. border agency point of business in the district. according to the local association here in london's chinatown immigration officials would visit the eateries here once or twice a week but it wasn't for the food or even that is just one of the restaurants raided by the u.k. border agency if you imagine where you are in a restaurant enjoying you know your meal with your friends your family some uniformed people. we don't know so we know what's going on and on the one hand the

staff will have to deal with a customer and they don't know what's happening in or near that they're being questioned by these guys who may not have a tent for them so the u.k. border agency insists that any immigration checks that carries out looking for illegal workers are always intelligence led but businesses up and down the street say that legal procedures weren't followed jury in the raids in fact some of them didn't result in any arrests whatsoever but the frequency and the reported heavy handedness of the immigration officials led to on precedented to action all of the businesses here shut down in protest against what they said was discrimination from the u.k. border agents same consensus the genuine frustration and the level of the threat of anger. and the level of. discontent. flecked it in the number of people. to close the business to support the

action since the protests to take place community leaders have met with the u.k. border agency to discuss the way in which the raids were harmed but while david cameron visits beijing tweets in mandarin and promotes closer trade links between the u.k. and china many of the british chinese working in these shops and restaurants many of whom of work to for generations say that the immigration climb down in london is chinatown isn't making them feel very welcome. artsy london. a slower than hoped recovery from recession is one of the functions making bricks some of course chinese money and while the u.k. and much of europe trying to bounce back with the help of crippling costs a small nordic country has proven their reason not the way iceland is writing off we have no mortgage debt sportspeople. join my colleague to discuss it. the

icelandic government they're going to inject one and a quarter billion u.s. dollars to help people that are really struggling with higher costs of living so what they're going to do is they're going to get this money it's going to be in more good pay downs another half in tax exemptions it's going to help one hundred thousand people which probably doesn't sound a great deal but that's actually a third of the population of iceland some people say that since two thousand and eight iceland has actually come rather a long way it has done very much so we rewind the clock it was pretty much a disaster the first domino to fall in the whole financial crash and we had international debts six times higher than the country's g.d.p. which is pretty startling stock market plunged ninety percent inflation surged eighteen percent we had unemployment rising nine fall that's just to give you an idea of what happened so the government they stepped up and this is what they did

so they decided to go against what the rest of europe was doing so they paid off consumer loans first of all that's a verse and they decided to do they forgave mortgages as well so again they helped out the people that were struggling they burned bondholders instead of using taxpayers' money again the opposite of a lot of what the european union decide is they aren't interested in me enough they put some of the bankers in prison. they did indeed so they did go against it and also want to remind you that they've paid their i.m.f. loans back ok they're still in germany session there's a long way to go but if we consider the situation they were in in two thousand and eight it's quite a comeback. kerry up next a look at the lives of military families who have lost their loved ones.

ukraine is in a tough spot right now trying to figure out whether to join the e.u. or the regime's custom union it would be nice if they would you know maybe allow the populace to vote for their future via referendum but sadly it looks like the politicians will be making the historic decision i can see why some people want to look west and some people want to look east but i don't understand why so-called ukrainian nationalists want so desperately to join the e.u. first off any nationalist groups in the e.u. are automatically demonised as right wing extremists and in the politically correct west patriotism is pretty much a dirty word generally nationalist like their culture and the people who are part of it but if you look at migration trends within the e.u. we see that the slavic part of it is flooding western europe looking for work i have many relatives from the slavic part of the e.u. and almost all of them have to work abroad and might sound nice to be able to work in europe but the reality is that ukrainians will probably be paid even less than

bulgarians rumanians to clean toilets in london ukrainian nationalists don't have to like russia or join the customs union or join any bloc of countries but advocating a future for themselves the e.u. seems absolutely backwards at least to me but that's just my opinion. army grieve the loss of every soldier. his mother father brothers and wife will forever grieve as was. grief that was compound about the failing of his army.

we have a duty to all families of our fallen soldiers given the truth the best we know it's best we can.