from jail cells in cambodia and swayed into solitary confinement in denmark a founder of the pirate bay website continues his battle against the authorities in a case with powerful corporate interests at play. western powers to signal a rethink in their support for syria's rebel movement apparently acknowledging that the fall of ostend could boost extremists such as those implicated in a recent massacre outside damascus. a new year approaching and a new start for thousands of russian prisoners who will be freed under a game changing honesty law that just passed parliament it's good news for the punk protest bad pussy riot as well as the greenpeace activists arrested in an arctic drilling protest. but ukraine's multi-billion dollar deals with russia drop cries

of treason from kiev the most radical opposition leader who accuses president yet of coal which of pawning national assets for a chance to fix the budget. for watching r t international live from moscow good to have you with us straight to our top story this hour neither a killer nor a terrorist but an online activists an alleged hacker and yet he's being held in conditions worse than those of some mass murderers one of the founders of pirate bay isn't tegel in a complex legal battle accused by denmark of stealing millions of personal id numbers peter all over reports. banged up abroad since he was arrested in august twenty twelve pirate bay found a goat for its walk home bug seen the inside of jail cells in cambodia sweden and

now solitary confinement in denmark it's just terrible as his mother to see that he is being treated like in this way like as if he were a terrorist hard criminal or violent criminal or some kind acquitted on computer hacking charges by the appeals court in sweden he now has to wait and see what he'll be charged with in denmark juta the intricacies of danish law there's no way forgot for it to know how long he'll have to stay in solitary if it was you know a decision or warrant that was made by a judge i was i was able to tell him you know for two weeks and then we we can go and see the jets but now because it's a decision made by the prison service i'm not able to tell him if there is i can't give him an a deadline whatever case is brought against got fred for now he spends twenty three hours a day locked in a cell by himself and the thing that upset him most didn't me as well was

a divorce until now to have his books in this cell even scandinavia as most notorious mass murderer anders breivik has access to reading material as he serves his sentence in norway for the slaying of seventy seven people those involved in online activism sometimes called hacktivism fear a witch hunt the treatment of graph. shows that the governments are scared of on the act or worse than they do which they try to get how to worse for everything they think which might be illegal even if they are revealing crimes support for godfrey it is coming in from all across the world the likes of julian assange the activist collective anonymous of throwing their weight behind the campaign to get better treatment for a man they claim is be. persecuted because of his online activism on twitter using the hash tag an account got for its online alias his supporters flooded the social

media site some accusing the danish authorities not knowing what they're doing in the case just see somebody does something online online means birds they agree can't control it but they don't really seem to get what they are actually accusing him of for his family his mother is allowed an hour long visit once a week for which she has to make a thirteen hundred kilometer round trip it's immoral i would say and i don't think the danish people understand what's going on in their prisons saw tom denies the accusations of illegal online activity and the longer he waits for prosecutors to put together their case the more he becomes the face of online activism peter all over r.t. germany well recalled being a founder of the swedish pirate party thinks the dangerous authorities are acting independently in this case we can observe that throughout this entire ordeal

starting with the raid against the pirate bay on may thirty first twenty six a number of rights violations some more egregious than others have been committed and it's very hard to escape the feeling that governments are seeking to make an example out of god for it's far too rogue known as on a carter just to a scare others that might challenge the status quo and be frankly please the united states which kind of disgusts me to be honest i would certainly agree that he is a victim that somebody has to make an example out of him because he embarrassed hollywood. well the pressure first started to mount against pirate bay back in two thousand and six when the file sharing website got on the wrong side of hollywood it was taken down for several days when swedish police raided its headquarters as

the government decided it was time to take action two years later the founders of pirate bay were tards and eventually sentenced to a year in prison for encouraging copyright violations so at home lost his appeal and was arrested in cambodia last year then extradited to sweden but finally ended up in denmark as a suspect in a separate case. trade deals that you can craned struck during recent talks in moscow may bring some rest bite to the country's economy but not to the anti-government protesters in kiev that's even though the issue that troubles them the most a possible customs union with russia wasn't even touched upon at the meeting my colleagues discuss the deals and their impact likely impact with artie's venture capital host katie pilbeam. the end of the day came down to a practical economic decision craned simply can't afford the e.u. deal at the moment and russia gave a fairly good terms it's talk about that then so we've got the bond purchases which

are fifteen billion in toto added to that is the gas discount as well so in combination that would equal twenty billion dollars it's just that the problem at the moment is that their form of wind that's a real problem because at the moment borrowing costs are really escalating and that's where the risk of defaulting on your debt comes in and it was thought that they accepted the e.u. deal or not this deal that russia has now put on the table they may have defaulted in less than six months which is quite telling you asked about the e.u. deal so this unique approach we know he famously called it a humiliating and said it was a sum of six hundred ten million euros that were also in order to receive that money they would also have to enforce harsh spending cars also gas increases as well so at the end of the day it was an economic decision basically i mean people

would be bearing the brunt of it all in case the e.u. . struck with which could mean if you think about it lead to more protests in the future and that was a concern as well but there are still going on. and people are not happy at all but i can tell you that investors are happy about that so what i can tell you the overriding fact is short they're going to be getting three billion in three days now the point is the e.u. deal would have had long term benefits no one's arguing that but what we are saying is the ukraine economy could have defaulted in getting their. well let's get some analysis on the situation surrounding ukraine from austrian m.e.p.a. andreas maltster he joins us now officials are saying they don't know yet whether ukraine's deals with russia are going to be compatible with you on a covert commitment to join the e.u. association agreement do you think that ukraine has cut off its route to europe i don't think so these are just games to put pressure on the crane the real

political will within the european union to work with. should be no problem we also have to take into account the fact that both ukraine and russia are really important for the european union european and american politicians traveling to ukraine have been calling on the government to let the people make their own choice do you think they're right when assuming that ukrainian all of ukraine is choosing europe. in my opinion the european union shouldn't interfere into the internal premier and political power struggle only the people and elected representatives should decide about the future of their country and not some of the wisest or lobbies from brussels or washington and we have a elected parliament in kiev we have an elected government and an elected president

that's enough why are the pro yanna colwich rallies getting as much attention in western media as you see it as the anti-government demonstrations i mean clearly the numbers are larger on my dance square but why are we getting so little coverage of those that support the government i don't. write them the ukrainian authorities are being criticized by westerners for what's called a crackdown on protesters and police brutality how brutal do you think their response is when we can parrot to say greece and the response we've seen there are protesters. i also condemn the police forces against peaceful protesters but sometimes demonstrations are not peaceful anymore and the good other get out of control the police i think has to react but the reactions of . definitely too harsh and not acceptable as i've said earlier the politicians and

western media's. double standards and assessments always depend on the political goals they have that are seen at n.p.r.'s mike thank you very much we are now set. thank you. despite the economic benefits the agreements with moscow have been branded as treason by one of the most outspoken protesters in kiev the head of the nationalist parties for border says president in a call which has pawned the country's assets to win concessions from russia parties like they are says take a closer look at who is leading the opposition movement in ukraine. an offer of support for ukraine z u s gratian it was not enough to persuade one of the country's opposition leaders to book drop shoulders with the german foreign minister during his surprise appearance at the protests in kiev mr westerly is openly gay and they have to book sparges for border has made its position on homosexuals quite clear attacking gay parades to move us to what we want to build the country based on harmony and social justice we're being dragged into homosexual

values by the western states and we will not allow that but homosexuals and people of different races are clearly not books biggest foes. any treaty with russia is not worth the paper it was signed oh. thirty books forwards do not make up the core of the protest movement but there are clearly it's loudest voices and it's actions as well as words and the salt of the city hall and scuffles around it ten days ago they took all the lennon statue in key of an event described as the fall of the tyrant by the guards and reckless vandalism by many others this is a crack in the pavement where the toppled lenin monument literally lost its head and if you walk around the pedestal of what used to be the morning into the former soviet leader we can see some graffiti over here first one here says which your next and the one at the bottom says glory to the insurgent army of the 1940's in ukraine which some in this country believe to be freedom fighters who fought for

independence while many others described as nazi collaborators on top of that and no militant field commanders believe were spotted a man who fought as a mercenary in creation and south of in all cases against the russians. until the end of my days i will kill russians jews that got me this british reporter brian flynn had a first hand glance at the militarized right wing forces in ukraine and over the you were twenty twelve football championship you went undercover into their training camp these are people very serious about what way do they train physically to back it up with violence and i watched while they followed live weapons and the presence of such people among the protesting crowd seems to cause no concern among european officials walking on the same square. which is rather extraordinary isn't it to see somebody that the united states has banned from entering the country on the same platform as senator mccain to see somebody who's been by and by that i say

francis mistake statements for denying the holocaust who supporters actually in the streets of kiev still do make anti semitic as well as anti russian. gestures and slogans it does signify that the west and politicians are quite happy to use nationalist forces when it suits them that lack of reaction is particularly bewildering given many european statements about ukraine's right wing factions in the past and the burning over ukrainian football ground for not the slogans in this stance so if you create does make it into the e.u. some day it will be interesting to see how people with such different values sit at the same negotiating table. let's see reporting from key of ukraine. washington the appetite for surveillance have gone too far according to the bosses of america's tech giants but our google and apple really rooting for a change are just desperate to appease angry customers we hear more in

a few minutes. also coming up the british prime minister has the u.k.'s afghanistan mission as a success even as violent attacks continue an opium farming boom across the country . no the way out of this assad has to go is looking people we've been here for two years you know jay said assad has to go it's not going to happen if it was it was going to happen it would have happened he has the upper hand he's not he's not losing this war of course he doesn't have control of the entire part of the entire song borders of syria and that's why i brought up geneva too that is one way to move this process forward because i agree with sunny we will have a perpetual stalemate here the man wants to show up in geneva who's he going to talk to i think the geneva conference will be stillborn if the united states and

its allies goes in with the precondition regime change of assad leaving power i think they need to back off of that that red line and look at a way to pursue new elections fair elections and obama can claim that he is the fact that the assad regime by quarantining and removing and destroying his chemical weapon so he can claim that political victory and then move toward stability in the country. welcome back to our to international live from moscow the syrian president is the lesser of two evils that seems to be the message from western powers to the rebels that the latest so-called friends of syria meeting the apparent u. turn was prompted by the rise of al qaida and other extremist groups there which

may gain the upper hand if bashar assad's government falls in the latest incident dozens of innocent people were reportedly killed and tortured when radicals raided the town of hadera outside damascus r.t. arabic brings us this report. terror still fills the hearts of those who witnessed the militants entering the town of drug they saw panic disoriented people running for their lives and they ran themselves they will never forget the despair in the eyes of those who were forced to stay behind we have no reliable way to communicate with the people trapped inside address but officials are saying the atrocities against the civilian population are continuing our people are being butchered and even burned alive and every bit of news coming out of the town is doing a new blow to those whose families are still being held by the militants everyone working for the local authorities was to be killed regardless of their religion organon an asian they were all taken to be killed they took everyone even those who supported neither the government nor the rebels they were all either tortured

killed or used as human shields the things being done in a drawer unthinkable they're slaughtering children and throwing them out of windows and no one's doing anything about it because the syrian authorities say they have evidence confirming that massacres have taken place and address the dad led taqiyya and many other areas which remain under the control of the armed opposition that the situation in syria has now deteriorated to the point that international norms of combat are no longer being observed it. is an industrial town with a lot of these residents working both in the private sector and for government agencies horrifying crying as have been committed in this town houses who are set on fire with people trapped inside and. the syrian army which is a position just outside the town that continues to carry out surgical strikes as part of their effort to liberate address which is now the only hope of the families waiting for news of their loved ones inside the town. r.t.

. as soon as reports of the massacre started to appear are to got in touch with some prominent human rights groups to get the details artist policy player has more on what they told us. the fact is that syria is so deep in crisis that the international community is essentially unable to do anything it cannot even verify various mixed and partial reports that are coming from the war zone and this is what we see happening coming people's reports that we are receiving from both address and aleppo what we are being told is that in aleppo the military launched an air strike on where both held positions according to local activists at least one hundred people have been killed including some twenty eight children now the chaos in the country has led to the rise of extremist militant groups among the rebels and it is now essentially the extremists who are leading the way among the anti assad ranks now many posts inside syria and the international community have

been sounding the alarm bells from the beginning that this is what will happen but only now are others particularly in the international community starting to see what is going on in the ground. a far reaching out in the sea bill that could pardon tens of thousands of people have been passed in russia's parliament not only with the measure give offenders a clean start but it could also put an end to some of the country's most controversial criminal cases or does your piece cannot has more is the twentieth anniversary of russia's constitution and this is a good way to celebrate this amnesty is plans to in fact up to twenty five thousand people including those already been convicted of crimes those charged early on or investigation which means members of the world bank which currently are serving time in jail but there are lawyers say that they could be freed before the end of this year so they could get to greet the new years with their families since one of the crimes that they were found guilty of was hooliganism and that. and the state

also the so-called arctic thirty the group of greenpeace activists who were arrested in the russian north and or charged with hooliganism were released from jail on bail but should see under this amnesty all charges dropped against them as well and also is expected to affect some of the protesters were arrested during a mass protest rally in moscow on the witness square which ended with clashes with stories however we do know that this draft is not affecting those found guilty of serious crimes because of that of course is very likely to be released from jail sooner than his sentence will and now to more of the lower house of parliament has passed that and the amnesty should come into force before the end of this week the scope of amnesty is sweeping as you mentioned only nonviolent crimes with relatively short sentences can be pardoned it aims to provide relief for the more vulnerable members of society pregnant women pensioners and the disabled among

others the bill could become law as early as tomorrow the point of it is to strengthen trust between the state and its people. mission accomplished that's how the british prime minister described the work of his country's troops during a trip to afghanistan that's a year before they. take withdrawal i should say out of the country but his comments have been ridiculed by critics who point to rampant terrorist violence drug cultivation and human rights abuses iraq war veteran michael prysner says the phrase hides a decade of futile conflict. mission accomplished was used by cameron because you know politicians don't really say hey you know that wildly unpopular war is that we sent you and your children to die and whose legs for over a decade well we messed up and it was all of which they're not going to say mission accomplished like cameron needs that we died for years in

a colonial exercise that was a total blood soaked disaster due to the arrogance of rich politician who thought they could dominate the land and resources of poor people in afghanistan using the blood of working class people from the united states and from the u.k. for chairman to assert that there has been so called progress against the insurgency there is an absolute fantasy and yet another indication that cameron's victory speech was premature a taliban attack on a nato base in eastern afghanistan has left three insurgents and one afghan policeman dead is the second such assault on the base which is the vital checkpoint on the border with pakistan. the bosses of the world's top tech firms have just signed on the white house urging president obama to rein in washington's global surveillance program google and yahoo and apple and many others have suffered severe reputational damage since it emerged that they were all in one way or

another complicit in n.s.a. spying but former cia officer ray mcgovern thinks this is just a p.r. stunt. i think the internet executives are crying crocodile tears they've made a lot of money out of encipher in their their establishment and then a permitting the united states government to get trapdoors behind it they're losing business that's the name of the game for them and so yes they'd like to have a sensible rules to make it easier for them to do business particularly overseas but it's long since time for them to speak out about violations of the fourth amendment. the n.s.a. aims to make all individual privacy a thing of the past at least that's what the journalists who first released edward snowden's data leaked thanks at r.t. dot com we've got the full details of his address to an inquiry on the matter in which he says politicians are refusing to budge from till they themselves are

affected. and oklahoma environmental activists face up to a decade behind bars for a protest after police mistake the glitter on their banner for a chemical weapon and accuse them of a terrorist hoax. also online hits on the international space station supply trips are put on hold until the astronauts go out and fix a recently fried coolant system that story and much more r. t. dot com. debate next here in our tea with cross talk they debate washington's willingness to negotiate with syrian rebels including some of the most radical factions of our u.k. viewers it's going underground. wonderful strong arming a lot of these policies concerning you. a

pleasure to have you with us here today. if you got nothing and you got no opportunity. to start to construct your own little currency. kuno learn to be a bit gives don't want to meet gangsters you don't want to be drug dealers that only then will we know the time that a kid came be we can see. you just means a hundred thousand i hope i live in the hood and what aiki oh so very very wrong thing to keep but

a fellow like me but i said what about the. i don't want to die i just really do not want to die young young. i didn't know that you know the price is the only industry specifically mentioned in the constitution and. that's because a free and open press is critical to our democracy check albus. role. in fact the single biggest threat facing our nation today is the corporate takeover of our government and across several we've been hydrangea why a handful of transnational corporations will profit by destroying what our founding fathers one school class i'm john martin and on this show we reveal the big picture of what's actually going on in the world we go beyond identifying the problem for trucks rational debate and

a real discussion that critical issues facing america have done for job ready to join the movement then walk a bit like. a newly released. his or. hello and welcome to cross talk where all things considered i'm peter lloyd well syria is in collapse western backed rebels have either been routed or on the run so do you support of jihadism now prevailed in rebel held territories civilian populations terrorized meanwhile assad remains in power with this military in tap what's next for syria. to cross out the war in syria i'm joined by sunny in london he is

a contributor to al-jazeera and the guardian and in new york we cross to jason he is a writer political commentator and contributor to counterpunch and dissonant voice sorry gentlemen crosstalk rose in effect that means you can jump in anytime you want sunny if i go to you first in london it looks like western backed forces there rebels are basically they've dissipated they're on the run and the united states is talk thinking about talking about dealing now with the national islamic front that's in syria right now i mean what do you think of that before. well i mean i think it's dangerous because we don't really know who the rebels are and i also think that it's not clear exactly where where the peace talks will go you know i mean firstly we have to figure out whether we want assad to stay or not and i don't think the united states has a clear idea of that and it's not clear whether assad is going to stop his war with

with the civil war in the country so you know the one hand we have massive war civil war going on inside the country and the other hand it's not clear whether who is backing who and what rebels are working with so i think the key thing now is to get assad to stop bombing his own people and have saw and stop the civil war once that is done then you can have a discussion about where the country goes next where they're ok sweetheart leaves but he waited and hating something you cannot do you can you flip it over also to use maybe saudi arabia and qatar start stop arming the rebels as well both well i think so yeah i mean maybe but you know firstly assad is far far more equipped than the rebels are and secondly yes you can argue that saudi arabia and qatar should stop interfering the same way the russia and iran are interfering in the country too i mean all of that see no going again i mean of the middle eastern polity yesterday i mean syria if you like it or not is still a solid.