really fourteen people for sixty. years. on the. president. this international. eight. hundred thousands of people in britain.

for most. international. says he will sign a motion to russia. the businessman who spent more than ten years behind bars for embezzlement has reportedly already filed a petition. reports. well the president was hosting a media conference which lasted over four hours but the biggest news came after it finished he was surrounded by journalists and someone asked the question about me and suddenly the president said that the former take all had asked him to be released and he says the man has already spent over ten years behind bars and he is ready to sign all the necessary papers to let him free. who the kosky recently

wrote a petition asking me to pardon him but he spent more than ten years in prison and this is a serious punishment he sighs humanitarian reasons his mother a serial in the i believe taking jew account of all the circumstances it's possible to take your respective decisions and i might and in the near future i will sign it to creat a pardon him artie's managed to reach. the mother by phone listen to what she had to say about it really with. the news came absolutely out of the blue last time i spoke with him was back in august and he didn't show any intention of filing a petition i totally support any decision of his he needs to be said for his children and even grandchildren grew up without him. because of course he used to be among the wealthiest people in the world and them all the most influential in russia until he was arrested back in two thousand and three charged and found guilty of fraud and then in a second case was found guilty of money laundering and in it in this latest

announcement from the president what we did with applause by human rights groups would reportedly came as a complete surprise to us and even his family members. what a range of opinion about whether putin did the right thing or not. people are debating whether or not they expected this especially on social networks for me personally i've been covering russia for the last eight years i was shocked first we should say that this is probably a p.r. attempt by the putin administration head of the olympics to gender some good press coverage some goodwill towards russia but also i think to deflect a little bit of tension and anger away from the e.u. and the united states over their recent losing the bidding war over the ukraine with russia i just want to be the devil's advocate and say even if this was a p.r. stunt ahead of the olympics what's wrong with that like the olympics in itself is

essentially why do countries want the olympics they want the investment they want to improve their country why does it have to be a bad thing you know i think it can be seen as a clever move and i think this can be seen as a magnanimous gesture it will at the very least reduce the talking point criticisms that can be directed against russia during the olympics it's a sign of weakness as the west will interpret it first you have to understand the reason for the propaganda campaign on the gay rights issue the holocaust. pussy riot issue and so forth these are attempts to isolate russia and her while at the same time it justifies the so-called new cold war with a missile defense in poland czech republic turkey etc i disagree i think that the release of mr hodder will be viewed positively in the west i mean the strains of anti putin and to russian propaganda. are you know the l b l

g b t rights issue is one this completely separate from mr holder. but what i say let me just. say these people become celebrity prisoners these are well known people in the west and this is a great gesture of surprise from putin but is it is it actually a genuine change in direction for the country or this p.r. exercise no i don't think this is any genuine change for the country if we're talking about a move away from law and justice roast russian citizens in both of these cases feel that their crime and their punishment was well deserved and i think that this could create a little bit of domestic backlash because the russian people will question why they haven't. served out their full sentence but i have to agree that i do not think that this will be received positively in the west i think that nothing in the russian the putin administration does can please. the west this point.

i just want to say that so far. unlike what john said in london it hasn't quelled the anti russian side to men in fact people after this announcement and you can debate it until the end of time whether it was expected or not a lot of the western journalists found the most interesting thing that putin talked for too long today even despite this enormous news whether or not you expected it or not and i think putin is in a very very difficult position because it's a lose lose position if he didn't do this he would be criticized if he did this criticize he said today he envied obama it's just for that reason well i think that the tide is swinging in london and elsewhere in favor of mr putin just as an example last night i had i had a taxi driver who was turkish here in london and he

had me talking russian. associate and he said oh you're russian i said no no i'm british but speak a little. better russian i lived there for a long time and he said oh you're right mr putin i said mr putin is doing good things for russia and he then said i agree and i would i particularly like the way he stands up to other international countries especially the united states and i have a great deal of respect for him in fact i wish he was a teacher he said i would do anything to send my son to study under him. when investors are expressing their opinion on the presidential pardon through the markets kiddie pool boomers told us what it is they're so happy about and what it could cost he might get up to once he is out. the my cigs index gained over one percent it means that the index is now on its longest winning streak since september got telecommunications financials oil and gas stocks all right using by

one point three percent on average and international investors have been calling for more transparency and this is another stage inclusions campaign to make russia more desirable place to comment invest at least house the idea of twenty thirty as been the year to fight corruption with tons of asian also featuring putin's target is now the proof is in the numbers our capital outflow a constant battle for the russian economy which has been stalling on with the rest of the globe of course by demonstrating that russia is becoming more transparent this is a way a chance of more money being being spent here most importantly tempted transfers to foreign accounts now let's talk about what is next for once the richest man in russia no one would presume that despite his company you can getting auctioned off due to tax fraud and or investment crimes he still some of his billions somewhere but where that is the question could he have a bank account in the states where a lot of his family are perhaps somewhere more exotic a tax favored

a paradise are we don't know all his billionaire days over was all his money invested in ucas is gone now after ten years in prison will he be eager to start investing in weeknight in his business career or will he want to retire leave russia and spend the rest of the days with his family there is no forget when he was at the helm russia was a different country and chances are he has no power or friends left. as you probably know i would just remind you how mikhail khodorkovsky ended up where he is now let's have a look at the background to all of this one in february of ninety seven he became chairman and c.e.o. of the oil company one of the world's largest state oil company producing a fifth of russia's oil temba two thousand and three he was the wealthiest russian and indeed one of the richest people in the world now it was at that time he was arrested on charges of fraud linked to the privatization of a form of the state and money in fertilizer company and he was found guilty in may two thousand and five and sentenced to nine years well later that year an appeal

reduced the sentence by a year when the second case against him began in december two thousand and six when charges of embezzling three hundred fifty million tonnes of oil he was found guilty in december two thousand and ten and sentenced to fourteen years but the court ruled the time already spent behind bars should be included well the idea of granting clemency to khodorkovsky came off to face more than four hours of questions from journalists after the break international were reporting the highlights ranging from edward snowden and global surveillance to the chaos that ukraine. i wonder if we can add democracy at least. in the seat of the kind of styles by george w. bush to the aptly stuff utopian ideologies on par with communism on par with naziism on par with militant trail agents you know the ideologies that can ultimately lead to an increase in violence i think the problem is the idea that by

military force. and create a state of anarchy and hope that democracy would spontaneously. technology innovation all the developments around russia we. covered. the surprising announcement about khodorkovsky came out of let me put in face to

tough q. and a session last thing when over four hours the subjects journalists pushed him on included developments in ukraine the newly adopted and the city for prisoners in russia as well as the strained ties between moscow and washington or the evil of his going to have told us about the president's responses. well the media card for itself was attended by over thirteen hundred journalists and of course they discussed a huge variety of topics and edward snowden was. the former n.s.a. contractor who leaked scores of controversial documents on u.s. surveillance programs across the world he received temporary asylum in russian his exact whereabouts are so unknown due to security reasons that machine your sister to know that we are now after snowden's leaks and america was shocked to learn her telephone had been wiretapped. she was absolutely fine so don't worry she knew what i russia's relations with the u.s. after leaks. was your disability and if you want to know how my feel about mr obama

after snowden's leaks i feel jealous i feel jealous because he can do these things and get off scot free still there is nothing to be happy about but on the other hand there's no reason to be frustrated however tough the criticism against the us may be all these measures have always been aimed at tackling terrorism but there must be some clear rules and certain agreements including those of ethics was another issue discussed the country's been going through rough times in the past few weeks with the protest taking place both for and against moving closer with the e.u. moscow is giving a fifty billion dollars. according to the president that's being done primarily to help the country cope with the severe economic problems it's also experiencing and what's going to put an added he doesn't think that integration with the e.u. is the core of the current wave of protests. those who are pushing forward the idea of signing an association agreement with the european union these people would

govern in ukraine not so long ago it's a new it was a foreign minister also headed the parliament to machinegun is a former prime minister you schenker was ukraine's president why didn't they sign these papers when they were in power no one was standing in their way. so you could have gone ahead and sign them and there'd be no problem today i have legitimate sounds that the current protests are about moving closer to the e.u. it's an internal political struggle signing or not signing this document is just a pretext. now another reason why news about that of course is a such a surprise is because the amnesty that they are currently are working on and that should affect up to twenty five thousand people that was discussed and for the first time during all these years no one actually asked a question about us even during the actual conference in itself but they did talk about. should benefit from the upcoming amnesty and the so-called arctic thirty

peace activists who were arrested in the russian water and are being charged with going isn't at least should expect seeing these charges all of these charges lifted against them and the president did comment on the organization itself. and their ship it entered our exclusive economic zone was not responding and they tried to scale the platform after attempt to stop this second boat started ramming all good guards is that a civil discussion about protecting the environment it's just p.r. or an attempt to blackmail racketeering or someone's order to disturb our work on developing resources how to ensure they serve as a lesson and unite us along with greenpeace into an effort to minimize environmental risks instead of just making a fast buck from. the president also spoke about recent diplomatic breakthroughs like the one with the syrian chemical weapons arms deal and the breakthrough or

would be iranian nuclear program and also spoke about the need to protect traditional values saying that can serve being conservative isn't about keeping society from moving forward but it's more about preventing it from rolling back. you know the position of the i want to get some international perspective on what vladimir putin had to say with brownback and he's director of the anti war on coalition. lot of issues covered there and it didn't strike you particularly well the event itself struck me i mean here is the you had a state in russia allowing thirteen hundred journalists to ask questions freely in contrast with what goes on in the united states where the president in spite of the fact that it proclaims itself to be the united states that is becomes itself to be the freest country and has a great free press the kind the president only has very scripted kinds of press conferences with and so i think the event itself is interesting and i think many people in the west particularly in the united states and it was certainly like to

have many more sessions where the political leaders are challenge with tough questions and what about foreign policy he did talk about the diplomatic successes that russia's had over the syrian and iranian issues but it seems that relations that an all time low with the west at the moment would you agree because critics are saying it's just that. well i mean you have to look at what does it mean to have an all time low kind of relationship with the west during the period of boris yeltsin right after the fall of the soviet union perhaps the the approval ratings of yeltsin were very high but what conditions were the russian people and what conditions was russia as a as a major power and it was seemed as as a weakened power something that was almost a plaything by western powers in the recent period the russian government has reasserted itself as a major player in the case of syria it stuck with its ally it demanded a political settlement that's what the syrian people wanted that's what the people in the region wanted all to me at least president obama grabbed hold of that as

a lifeline because he was so severely politically isolated and in the case of iran the russian government has recommended what the people of the world want which is a diplomatic settlement for a crisis which was largely created as a pretext by western powers who want to undo another independent government so maybe the governments in the west are bridling that putin's position but i would say generally the positions he's taken on these issues have favorable response in the western public opinion at least and he seemed to be going out of his way to will fold of branches to less than friendly nations why now. well i think the russian government is well aware that the united states is not content with the fact that there may be a multi-polar world that the u.s. thought maybe it was a fantasy i believe but they thought there would be a sort of a unit polar world where the u.s. would be the giant and sole superpower russia has reasserted its authority both diplomatically militarily economically and so the russian government is now trying

to be prudent in terms of the of stablish sheen or minimizing some of the hostility that's been generated perhaps mostly by western countries other by other regional players too but this was an occasion for diplomacy on the part of putin i think whether it's sincere or whether it's something that's just diplomatic that will she brought just briefly the n.s.a. scandal he could have been a lot of american surveillance couldn't he but he was quite soft on that one is that while i prime minister putin made the point that the russian government and all governments and gauge and state craft including espionage. i think that's true i think what's going on really is snowden has opened the door for the public opinion in the west which did not know about the spine does not know about the massive data collection to rise up against it i think that's what's going on because the russian government gave temporary asylum to snowden and

perhaps putin is taking a prudent position not wanting to go out of his way to appear to be a friend of snowden's or a supporter of the that enterprise of course he's on the hot seat because in the west especially in the united states by president obama and by congress the acts by russia giving temporary asylum to snowden are considered to be. extreme hostility towards the united states wrong good to talk to you thanks a lot brownback a door to the anti war on sick coalition right here i want you to national. children as young as eight years old are being held and tortured across a network of secret is known as prisons in syria according to shocking new reports the jails are operated by one of the fiercest rebel groups the islamic state in iraq and the levant its practices and laws are so harsh that amnesty international has equated it to a reign of terror smoking or behavior deemed and the islamic community to link the sentences of these detention centers and even worse selena nasser she's now understands national research have told us what people face in these jails there is

widespread torture torture of adults including and also children the most common form of torture is flawed gave flogging against detainees take place on a daily. on a daily every day basically it includes flogging against children we have witnesses former detainees who told us that they have seen the children as young as thirteen to fourteen being flogged scores of times their detainees are sentenced to death at a trial that does not exceed three minutes which is. outrageous really one former detainee child us that he once counted the number of lashes falling on a child he counted until ninety four and he stopped counting anymore washington's

commitment to the rebels in syria however means it's willing to talk to even the most hardline groups as it is going to check on reports. washington says it's willing to negotiate with the so-called islamic front inferior just days after the front kicked the western backed supreme military council out of their headquarters and seized their warehouses we can engage these on a front of course because they're not i think needed and you haven't yet the islamic front includes groups that are demanding a hard line shari'a state to be a strategic mistake if the us administration or europe or their allies would be engaging in a partnership and a partnership meaning they would be collaborating with organizations that are the hardest and have not committed to become moderates or recognize the fact that if they come to power or part of power they will recognize human rights that did not happen while washington is we valuating whom to support in the fight against assad

all qaeda linked groups have made significant gains in the north of syria where they've pushed out other rebel forces in the name of allah the gracious and merciful. when you're firing rockets it's allah who fires them with your hands these strikes are only a drop in the ocean the lines of the islamic state are fulfilling their oath from iraq to lebannon is islamist forces are better trained and better armed some of them got their training fighting against the u.s. in afghanistan in the one nine hundred eighty s. when the u.s. was arming the anti soviet mujahideen in those days some got their experience and their arms fighting against the u.s. in iraq much more recently washington says the islamic front that it is willing to negotiate with does not include designated terrorist groups like job at a loose wire and the so-called islamic state of iraq can live on but on the ground in syria there are so many different groups that the labels could be relevant. residents of the town of audra near damascus can't name the exact rebel group that

executed over eighty civilians there including children earlier this week. the u.s. has supported the syrian opposition on the premise that washington would be able to discern different shades of extremists there and figure out which ones are less extreme but even the report that there was no battle over the warehouses between the islamic front and the western backed supreme military council is one indicator of how blurred those lines are and how flawed is the assumption that one can distinguish with certainty between those groups in washington i'm going to our team . britain is being accused of putting ideology before common sense that's off the london turn down the e.u.'s offer to fund food banks despite having more than half a million miles for the going hungry what is your smith looks at why. just a stone's throw from the seat of government in westminster is something that's becoming a more and more common sight in the u.k.

this building's used as a food bank handing out emergency supplies to families so poor they can't afford to eat as the cost of living rises the number of people turning to food banks increases with its funding tighter all the time but nevertheless the government has turned down a potential twenty two million pounds in funding for food aid why because the money comes from the european union britain we've caught a government with a very anti european ideology appears to be more keen to. warn europe to get credit for something than to get money which can how fate hungry people are if you are starving you need some food and you cry to die and this government's refusal to cry in the carriage is literally taking food out to the merits of how great the european aid for the most deprived amounts to two and a half billion pounds but the position britain's taken means the country will

receive just two point nine million and instead of using that for food aid as intended it's expected the government will spend it on helping unemployed people find work all well and good to say critics but there are people who need survival basics now and this money is meant for them come up for you here or not international talking global politics and oksana worlds apart. the parliament of yemen has put forward a motion to ban drone attacks in the country the motion is now waiting approval by the president and it's probably impossible to enforce unless they could build a really big net or something isn't it strange that now after years of drone strikes in their country the parliament just wakes up to the fact their systems are

getting blown up from the sky to be fair yemen doesn't have a ton of cash and i could see how having the well equipped and funded u.s. military to take care of the al qaeda problem for them for free could be really entices i mean let's be scary to be a politician with lots of power hungry terrorists about this would be the first time in history that a stronger foreign power for a weaker states battles for them but the problem is that according to the huffington post a former u.s. state department official in yemen says that every year drone attacks create eight from forty to sixty new terrorists why they create terrorists because according to the human rights watch seventy percent of the people killed by drones in yemen are civilians you know if the yemeni government is really free from washington's grasp and really wants to deal with their al qaeda problem they'll have better luck doing it themselves with the good old rifles and bayonets pointed at the right targets but that's just my opinion.

on the money with the business of russia. hello and welcome to worlds apart if you just watch the news bulletins on i t you'd probably be surprised to hear that we may be leaving in one of the most peaceful areas in our species history and here this is exactly what one of the world's leading intellectuals believes professor steven pinker laid out his argument in his two thousand and eleven book the better angles of our nature and he joins me now on the walls apart professor pinker thank you very much for being on the show it's a great honor for me so thanks for having me now we're recording this program on

a monday just a few hours after the news broke about four harvard buildings being evacuated to due to a possible bomb threat and so far no explosives have been found but i wonder if you could update us on what is happening on campus. no much as far as i can tell. most of the activity is from journalists there's a news helicopter flying overhead there are television trucks everywhere i see reporters on several corners but nothing has actually happened in any harvard building according to the latest report that i got on my e-mail and i also know that some of the final exams have been scheduled for today i wonder if i don't know some student who may be falling behind on his studies do you think however students are capable of something like that off using a bomb scare as a way to get out of the final exam. i'm almost certain that that is not the who who

called in the hoax i might be wrong but my guess is that it's some nobody who wants to achieve a little bit of fame a little bit of influence who is probably watching the news right now happy that he has made so many people to. up their lives because of something that he did that would be my guess now given these bombs carried the main thesis self your book that we are living in one of the most peaceful iraq is in our species history is a bit counter-intuitive isn't it it's only counter-intuitive if you get your information from the news forgetting about the fact that news is about things that happened so yesterday and last friday and the friday before there was no bomb scare but that did not make the news so all of the. days and places that are free of violence never get reported in the news no matter where violence happens it's guaranteed to be on the news because the.