from behind bars to berlin a former russian tycoon mikhail put our post he is about to be reunited with his family in the drama capital. as his family members begin to arrive here it's a family reunion it's been ten years in the making for the holder called skis. for the solid defense that a prize eight and trillion dollars goes and accounted for in less than two decades as part of the effort to keep the pentagon running. and another charges slapped on troops toppled leader mohammed morsi over a twenty eleven prison escape as police grondahl and he supporters who were protesting against a law restricting demonstration. this

is on seem to national coming to life from moscow with me. and welcome to the progress. the parents of me here how to confiscate how reportedly arrived in berlin to be reunited with his with their son after he was released from prison friday as soon as the oil tycoon was let out of a russian penal colony following a presidential pardon he flew to germany that's now getting all the details from peter oliver he's outside the hotel where holder confiscate is believed to be staying right now that pieces so there's been a long wait but the hundred family league said to be together shortly doesn't it. well we're hearing. his mother and father have landed here lin they arrived on an

airliner unlike their son who we arrived here on a private jet on friday we're also understanding that. he has had a meeting with his son from his first marriage his son pavel who flew here from new york now that's according to a statement that was released by mikhail khodorkovsky spokesperson spokesperson other arriving here that said to be an emotional meeting will be the first time they've seen their son without it being in the environment of a prison visiting room and ten years his mother and father are quite sad they know berlin reasonably well his mother has received medical treatment here she's currently receiving medical treatment here for cancer it is a city center hospital in berlin so they have arrived we are expecting them to arrive at the hotel just behind me where we believe what it called ski is there's still no confirmation of the is there nobody seen him but that's down to the nature

of they said this hotel it prides itself on its its ability to to keep people away from prying eyes away from the public it does have an entrance around the back underground which is where we believe because what are called ski entered on friday we're expecting his parents to go through that entrance as well they're unlikely to see them coming through the front door just behind me and it seems like after a decade behind bars one of course gains one can be lap of luxury private chat before i start hotel in the heart of berlin said i was picking up the bill for this extravagant state taste of freedom. well he was once russia's richest man m. it's unknown how much he is worth these days but he certainly still has friends in very high places most notably huns gay again surely former foreign ministry here in germany and now he has his team's been instrumental in getting hold of course key

here to germany he organized the private jet that brought him from russia here to lynn he also apparently helped to negotiate a visa to be issued very quickly for from a cohort of course he had a. viz that allows the train to travel through most of the e.u. well within a matter of hours he received that at the at the airport here in berlin and also just again she has been making statements about what a called ski he said in an interview with german television on friday evening they start of course he was very grateful to the mercy of law to be a putin for having released him which echoed statements that were that were said in a press release from the khodorkovsky own people now the picture that we have of what a called ski that seems to show him in the hotel room shows a man relaxing after what after ten years for the first time in a little bit of of a luxury there but in terms of his arrival here and how he's being greeted by the german government a statement from the spokes person representing german chancellor angela merkel

said that mrs merkel welcomed me carlotta called ski here to germany and praised the sterling work that she said had been done by former foreign minister again sure in order to facilitate this and she also praised the work in cooperation done by the the german government and russian government in order to make this all possible and because a lot of calls he could come here to berlin so the very latest that we do have is we are expecting a press conference from the carlotta called ski at eleven pm local time tomorrow on sunday so we may not even see him for another twenty four hours over twenty four hours yet but we'll be bringing you all the latest here on r.t. from outside the hotel where we believe what is called ski is staying. on in my life from. many thanks indeed for that update. and we're also learning that holocaust had actually filed two letters seeking clemency one was an official application the other a longer and more personal that's what pretense parks pass and i say adding that

holocaust is welcome to return to russia if he chooses to and political commentator eric margolis believes in the long term plan space it will be hard to him to launch a political career what wonders he might be a little traces by his lip and not started rants against google career for a while what little thing after ten years in prison will he be mandela or will he turn how did he really start last thing we crown one of the girls he was. trapped in a brilliant man but he really is not a rose and he simply i don't think that russia is certainly not west. no none of the sort of you get over it it's harder there was little. love lost the russian oligarchs most people still there should have been a jew there my confiscated so he's learned he really could have got away with some

money and were boarded no longer jail since. they bonded to khodorkovsky stays this was guided by the principles of humanity while what has been much speculation in the western media that they were nice was an attempt to boost russia's image ahead of the winter olympics in sochi but legal experts and blogger alexander america race believes it was first and foremost because of hope of course case plea for clemency. i did it's got anything to do with nobody was going to stay away from salt two because of vista holder god being in prison i think the first point to make is that he is guilty and i i want to say that because the constant attempts to say that he was a political prisoner there's been six or seven decisions by the european court of human rights i've lost count family thereafter which is said unequivocally that mr holder of course he is guilty of massive tax evasion on a simply a normal scale now he has been punished he's been in prison for that for ten years

what what has changed the situation and has led to use release is that mr holder koskie did what he had previously consistently said he would not do and that is that he wrote a letter to mr putin asking for a pardon. the day were closely following the latest developments in this story so to stay with us here on r.t. international. eight and a half trillion dollars that's the figure hundred by the u.s. congress to the defense department since ninety nine to six and it's remained an accounted for ever since despite the organization having some of the most sophisticated military hardware in the world it still relies on antiquated and error prone accounting computer systems it's even lead to active duty personnel and war veterans being underpaid r.t. is there to check and investigate. the pentagon is almost certainly the biggest

source of waste in the u.s. government ovoid or seemed best to geisha and says since one thousand nine hundred ninety six the pentagon has spent eight point five trillion dollars in taxpayer money that has never been accounted for and nobody can say for sure how many billions of that amount of wasted on goods and services that were never delivered on over payments to contractors and many other things what does congress do about it nothing and national security expert steve miles serious here with me to help us crunch the these numbers even a half trillion dollars on accounting for a lot of money this is the kind of thing that you would think would bring capitol hill to a screeching halt they would be hearing this kind of almost daily you know various committees looking into it none of that just leads to massive waste and there can be all sorts of fraud that you don't know about just one example when the inspector general looked at iraq which was you know a lot of money but in the grand scheme just a portion of the money the u.s. spends what they found was about fifty billion dollars of the money the u.s.

spent there was wasted about six billion dollars was completely lost they had no idea where it was completely unaccounted for and put that in perspective that's about the amount of money that other countries would spend on their defense in a year total and that's just the least pocket change that we lost in the couch one thing i found very interesting in this report is that the pentagon apparently using this standard operating procedure to enter false numbers or so-called blogs to cover lost or missing information in their accounting in order to submit balanced budget to treasury so they could write he knew everything in this probably the most shocking part of this is that they get to the end of the day and they say oh there's money in this and what do we do we'll just put a number in there that says it's there and we'll sort it out later i mean again this is this is the type of operating practice that if you did it in your own business if you try to do it with your own taxes for the government they haul you off to jail what contributes to the massive waste is the fact that for two decades the pentagon has dug in on. it means nobody checked if the numbers in their

accounting made sense congress has just passed the budget that allocates around six hundred thirty billion dollars to the pentagon roughly the same amount as last year how much of that will be wasted taxpayers will never know in washington i'm going to check on our team. under which we'll see retired u.s. army candidate douglas macgregor on the pentagon's failure to keep track of its money things given the seriousness of a share the government doesn't seem anywhere near concerned enough. i have actually been in this position where i was the director joint operations that shape headquarters for reasons that i did understand my pay was suddenly reduced and it took a years old or at least straight to doubt it then subsequently i was paid money that i had actually earned but for reasons that no one could explain had not been paid to me and my point is that you're dealing with billions of people and a lot of instability a lot of movement and it's

a difficult system to to work effectively. this is an enormous problem and this is something that absolutely must be addressed and addressed in a forthright manner at the moment no one on capitol hill seems terribly concerned that a senior editor for the veterans today nice paper gordon duff believes bost expenditure goes i'm a fanciful defense projects that never come to my. no we have so many defense entities that have gained so much power in washington over the past ten years certainly the. i consider the phony war on terror as been an opportunity for the defense industry to buy congress the pentagon it works much like the federal reserve we have overt and covert policies we have so many black budget a budget projects including nuclear weapons development projects that when dark is

early as one nine hundred ninety one we have heard of none of the advances we know that were achieved during the strategic defense initiative in the eighty's and ninety's the have all gone dark but they're continuing to eat funds and we're watching much of the military budget used for sustaining a top heavy military and air force for every third person in our air force is a general. training every inch of the festive spirit out of the glum. gurudas. of the holiday season getting underway special days patrols going in this country's capital to take out does that in dallas asked i can't. this is a media lead us so we leave the people. of this in motion secure. your party visible

. which is that no one is asking with the guests that you deserve answers from it's all politicking only on our t.v. . the. economic downturn the find out. that landed in new york sank night and the rest of life join me a little bit every week. welcome

back to our team international it's good to have you with us a gypsy deposed president mohamed morsy is set to go on trial once again base time for a prison break and twenty eleven there is a misleader will be tried along with more than one hundred thirty other defendants in a continuing crime down against the muslim brotherhood and away from the courtrooms and on the streets it's people on all levels suffering from the political witch hunt true now reports. mohammad buckra waits at home for the return of his fifteen year old son credit jailed for taking a pro morsi ruler to school teaches notify the authorities when they saw the fourth think it symbol which commemorates the bloody august dispersal of sit ins in support of egypt's ousted president. the first time in my life that the child is

locked up in the military prison for having a ruler resume and the rest warrants out for me for inciting my son to take the ruler to closs but even if they look my son our problems we're ready to keep fighting islamist supporters of morsi like mohamed say they are in hiding fearful of show. in any allegiance to the ousted muslim brotherhood president. since they cleared the sit in some men started shaving their beards and the women to go off their new cabs anyone who is against the coup does not sleep in their own homes they spend night at friends or even in barmes they're not even arresting are to this but normal people the checkpoints because they look like islamists with a beard even the simplest expression of support for mohammed morsi like a piece of stationery puts people in danger both from the communities and the state hundreds of morsy supporters have been arrested and many face trial after july's overthrow by the military security forces say the crackdown is necessary to secure

the country but human rights organizations say it's part of a wider clampdown on for i. the military backed government is determined to enforce new legislation banning protests without police permits so now leading secular activists are on trial to be jailed under the law. again to let the crackdown on political activists is normal and natural because it's easy to accuse them of working for a foreign agency and charge them with treason attacking people even killing them is part of a political game played by the state. the government insists on restricting and controlling demos to keep the peace but egypt's dissidents are determined to keep protesting no matter the consequences true r.t. kafir shake. and this is a photo of khaled in his classroom a pious they've taken on a mobile phone and if you look closely you can notice him showing

a full saying good salute here and this is a sign which can land you in jail or egypt no matter what your age or gender and allen muhammad chairperson of the british egyptian for democracy group says the detention of their fifteen year old is far from an isolated case that so this fifteen year old child. and with many many children are now placed in prison just because they have things that simple symbol it's a symbol was false and is only a yellow background and he's actually placed in an adult facility alongside suggs and rapists and criminals in fact this is actually outrageous but we're seeing is the military regime. going absolutely in man because a child is reminding its of its atrocities and the clear violations of human rights are taking place and it is as you know at the moment there are many many children as well some of them we know about some we don't know anything about because once

they're in prison you don't get access to a lawyer or medical attention. and as always has plenty more stories for your encouraging another blood to gay rights this time in uganda where the parliament has ratified a bill that could land homosexuals in jail for a lifetime more details on this topic measure log on to our to not hold. and if we do private emails and eavesdropping on foreign calls it wasn't enough more leaks revelations show the n.s.a. paid millions to a leading some twelve security fund to leave a bottle open and its product so companies could be spied on with ease more details for you on the story just a click away. if the right comes to. the first street. and i would think that your take.

on our reporters would. be in the. despite the vigorous attend so whistleblowers to expose government wrongdoing it's often difficult for them to find media outlets willing to publicize the truth media ston is a recent road movie szell by a wiki leaks team of journalists who embarks on trip across central asia and highlights the difficulties they faced and will be showing the film here on r.c.m. later today but you can always watch it anytime at our website dot com. st augustine. strategic leadership. under cover team of journalists trying to release which leads documents about how the united states is trying. there. may be

a local media more pro-american they encounter for your ignorance and pressure. country blocks the way to information freedom. media stuff on our t.v. . it was a. very hard. to. get back would that hurt but there. was.

a bubble. welcome back time now for more world news in brief at least thirteen people have been killed in a fresh string of attacks across iraq a senior military commander and four troops were among the victims killed during

a raid on al qaeda hideout in western iraq a man opened fire on a police checkpoint leaving four dead bloodshed in the country this year has reached levels not seen since two thousand and eight. in the capital of the central african republic a fresh break of sectarian violence has left at least thirty seven people dead a red cross official claimed most of the victims were either shot or honks to death with machetes this comes after france which are already has more than six hundred troops on the ground appeals to its european allies to help violence between muslims and christians has left around a thousand people dead this month alone. yes . i woll and surrounded in the greek capital as hundreds of farmers took to the streets in protest at a new property tax they were confronted by riot police who they pelted with fruit before attacking them with sticks the clashes broke out ahead of a vote buy and peace around popular bill needed to qualify for more international

bailout cash. and dozens of launches have a target a police station in the german city of hamburg after a demonstration over the threatened addiction of the large squad. police cars and windows while a number of arrests were made refugees and their supporters are expected to gather on saturday in front of the road north squad to demand open spaces and for a few true right around four thousand police. it's maybe the height of the party's season but some people will always celebrate that little bit more than others in the scottish capital edinburgh patrols are taking to the streets so the festive mood doesn't spill out of control after us joined one. in the streets and pops of edinburgh and the festive spirit is alive and well as the roots and with the city's sponsored details filling up the holiday season

provides a much needed boost to the local economy. was . the scottish new year isn't it is hockey and the celebrations held in the city of renowned around the world being the hottest ticket in. the tradition is that you're going to take your ticket but last i wish he'd simply . cold to keep you warm and whiskey to to have a drink and i think new year's eve was invented by the scots but it's not cause for celebration ambulance and police stuff it's a busy period and it is a prayer this year number of steam city put in place to try and provide support for the people he hosted a little team every fifty sayings and t.

say khud these buses will be in operation to try to take the strain off the local services the scottish ambulance service says the buses will be there to treat ses he suffered a minor injury will have simply aver introduced. this is up for a busy holiday season and does that midnight countdown is party goes here it is imbra us to try and enjoy the spirit of the event just easy on the spirit was. their first. shot. and we're back with more stories for you from around the globe in about thirty minutes and the meantime breaking the set.

we've reported on this ratio before debt to g.d.p. growth going back to the one nine hundred fifty s. it was almost want to once america will issue some dead and they get some some kind of g.d.p. kick as a result of it but it requires more and more dead to cripple gave equivalent same g.d.p. dollar of growth what we now have is clearly a case of zombie banks and zombie corporations that would not survive if they were being transfused with more debt continuously which means that good businesses are being crowded out by zombies and it also means that you've got a lot of total losses. competitiveness this is the worst thing really that quantitative easing is doug's american. legalese

. looking right still up sir st louis and i would think the true. on our reporters with their. instrument. in the. on. the the.

merry christmas happy kwanzaa happy belated hanukkah and happy festivus everyone i'm having martin and this is breaking the cycle guys this is our last show of the year and given that news can be really depressing we thought to be quite appropriate to take a quick look back at some of the most uplifting and encouraging moments of two thousand and thirteen incredible technological advances were made from ultra efficient solar power to prenatal d.n.a. sequencing perhaps most incredible was the advent of three d. organ printing yes for the first time ever. three d. printing technology was used to build tiny bits of organs although we're still years away from fully grown organs that can be built from an individual's own cells this development means one day people will no longer have to wait on a transplant list now stain on the world of game changing technology last month nasa launched maven a space probe that's being sent to mars to study the martian atmosphere and

determine how the planet went from being rich in water to the barren red rock that we know it is today the discoveries that maven makes may revolutionize our understanding about space and the atmosphere of planets but another story that shook up the status quo here on earth zero why is courageous decision to legalize marijuana amazingly the country's president hosts a movie was able to see the complete abysmal failure of the world's war on drugs same quote einstein said there's nothing more absurd than trying to change results by always repeating the same formula that's why we're trying other methods whom he that world the new law could save why which spends eighty million dollars a year on drug trafficking millions of dollars but here in the us so we saw one of our own bigoted laws shot down when the supreme court overturned the federal defense of marriage act since then we've seen seven states legalize same.